Jessie Jordan (23 December 1887 – 1954) was a Scottish hairdresser found guilty of spying for the German Abwehr on the eve of World War II. After her German husband’s death in battle, she remarried and later became a spy in Scotland. Imprisoned and deported to Germany after the war, Jordan’s life was marked by […]
Few Dundonians are as well remembered for their contributions to battle than Admiral Adam Duncan, yet many of us may not even know who he is, despite there being a statue dedicated to him in the centre of town. The lands now known to us as Camperdown Park were gifted to him because of his […]
In her book “Frances Wright and the ‘great experiment’”, Margaret Lane notes that very few people today have heard of Frances (Fanny) Wright, despite being a famously notorious figure on both sides of the Atlantic. Her views during the first half of the 19th century shocked both her peers and, in fact, whole countries! Even […]
Piracy has been around almost as long as sailing itself. Our tale lands us near the end of the ‘Golden Age’ of piracy, with the rise and fall of a man from Dundee called William Kidd.
George Mealmaker was a legendery Dundee radical from the late 1700s, he founded the ‘Friends of Liberty’ – a slightly rowdy bunch who supported the ideals of freedom, liberty and equality for all.
George Wishart was born in 1513 and became one of the earliest Scottish religious reformers. Wishart is widely recognised as a martyr for his Protestant beliefs and was burned at the stake because of them in St Andrews on the orders of Cardinal David Beaton under accusations of heresy in 1546. George Wishart is best […]
William Bury presented an alarming story concerning the death of his wife to local police in Dundee on 10th February 1889, but was he the infamous Jack the Ripper?
Grissell Jaffray is undoubtedly the most famous witch of Dundee, having been the last witch to be executed in Dundee, but Dundee’s superstitious side was still alive and well in the 19th century, when Janet Kindy, or ‘Hurkle Jean’, was believed to be responsible for a number of afflictions that allegedly beset the town. Sickness […]
Bonnie Dundee, or John Graham of Claverhouse, 1st Viscount Dundee (c. 21 July 1648 – 27 July 1689), known as the 7th Laird of Claverhouse until raised to the viscountcy in 1688, was a Scottish soldier and nobleman, Tory and an Episcopalian. Claverhouse was responsible for policing southwest Scotland during and after the religious unrest […]
Now, you might be thinking, what has Mary Slessor got to do with Dark Dundee? Sure, she’s from Dundee, but as a missionary, she is hailed as somewhat of a heroine. Of course she is, and we’re not denying that…but what’s truly dark about Mary Slessor are the things she witnessed during her lifetime. Her father, […]