Pocket Book of Robert Paterson (1715 – 1801)

Paterson was a stonemason who leased a quarry at Gatelawbridge.  In 1745 he was imprisoned for being a Cameronian, a type of Covenanter.  After his release he wandered the countryside cutting and erecting stones for the graves of Covenanters.  He is remembered in a story by Sir Walter Scott called 'The Tale of Old Mortality' and is now known by this nickname.   Robert Paterson was born in Hawick. When he was 13 he was apprenticed as a stonemason, later building a substantial house at Gatelawbridge near Thornhill for himself and his family. In 1745 the house was looted by the retreating Jacobite forces and Paterson was taken prisoner as a Cameronian.  Paterson died in poverty at Caerlaverock in 1801.   Sir Walter Scott immortalised Robert Paterson in the novel 'The Tale of Old Mortality' describing him as he worked one tranquil summer evening,   "A blue bonnet of unusual dimensions covered the grey hairs of the pious workman. His dress was a large old fashioned coat of the coarse cloth called hoddin-grey, usually worn by the elder peasants, with waistcoat and breeches of the same; the whole suit, though still in decent repair, had obviously seen a train of long service. Strong clouted shoes, studded with hobnails, and 'gramoches' or 'leggings', made of thick black cloth, completed his equipment.  Beside him, fed among the graves, the companion of his journey, whose extreme whiteness, as well as its projecting bones and hollow eyes, indicated its antiquity."