On 2nd August this year, one of Scotland’s most iconic churches, B-listed St Mungo’s Church in Cumbernauld, was deliberately set ablaze and resulted in severe damaged to the building and community
The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS) escalated the response to seven fire engines and specialist resources to tackle the blaze, which took till the following day to put out.
Police Scotland Lanarkshire reported that the fire occurred deliberately around 7:50ish, with no reports of any injuries, nor any suspects at the time of the fire
After the incident took place, they began with bringing out demolition teams to take down the remains of the church as it was viewed as unsafe and could not be saved, the process took months but discovered something mysterious later.
A demolition crew issued the task with clearing away the burnt-out remains of the Church who discovered the mysterious metal canister following a tip off.
The mysterious canister was seen and placed at the lower structure of the landmark building when the foundation stone was laid 61 years ago by Queen Elizabeth’s representative General Sir Richard O’Connor, served as Lord High Commissioner to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland.
Found by member of the congregation who discovered a copy of the order of service for the foundation stone laying service among some of her late mother’s papers at her home, also containing copies of the Cumbernauld News, appearing to a time capsule that they have discovered.
Morag Rusk, who is the Session Clerk of Cumbernauld Trinity Church talked about how the time capsule was found in a meeting
He said: “I had a copy of the ‘Order of Service from the ‘Laying of Foundation Stone’ service from Saturday, 7 November 1964 in my house, kept by my mum,” she said.
“But I did not realise there was a time capsule buried in the foundations.”
