ALLOA is the administrative centre of Clackmannanshire, Scotland’s smallest local authority area, which is set between the Forth and the Ochil Hills. Its main settlements are strung along the ‘Hillfoots’ – Menstrie, Alva, Alloa, Tillicoultry and Dollar. Between these characterful places and the Forth is good grain-growing land, under which were rich coal seams. Coal was mined to supply local industries, notably woollen manufacture, brewing, distilling and glass-making, and for export through Alloa. One of Scotland’s first horse-hauled railways was constructed to link coal mines to the port. The area was very prosperous from the 18th to the mid-20th century, when Alloa was second only to Edinburgh as Scotland’s principal centre of brewing.
All of this economic activity goes a long way to explaining the scale and magnificence of St Mungo’s Parish Church. It was built in 1816-19 to designs by James Gillespie Graham, then Scotland’s most fashionable church architect, and sits on the main road from Alloa to Stirling. The church was obviously intended to be seen from the river (a ‘sea mark’), as its striking steeple faces south. The steeple is modelled on that of the parish church of Louth, in Lincolnshire, which is set in a flat landscape, presumably to act as a landmark.
The present St Mungo’s replaced a church in Kirkgate, in a graveyard which is likely to have been formed when the first St Mungo’s church was built, presumably in the 12th or 13th century. Before the Reformation the parish belonged to the Abbey of Cambuskenneth, further up the river Forth. After the Reformation, in 1600, the parish of Alloa was united with that of the neighbouring parish of Tullibody, also with a church dedicated to St Mungo (built in 1149 by David I), and also historically the property of Cambuskenneth Abbey. What was probably the mediaeval parish church in Kirkgate was reconstructed in about 1681-83, with a handsome tower with an unusual slated spire. When the present St Mungo’s was completed in 1819 most of the old church was demolished, leaving the tower and spire. In the churchyard is a burial aisle of the earls of Mar, added after the Reformation when burial in churches was forbidden. This was remodelled in 1819 by James Gillespie Graham, as a mausoleum for the earls of Mar.