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HISTORY
The Mandate Period ...
St Andrew’s Church & Guest House are part of the Church of Scotland, a Christian denomination in the Reformed, Presbyterian, Protestant tradition.
The reason it came about was as recognition for the price paid in human lives by a disproportionate number of men from the Scottish regiments, which played such a prominent role in the Palestine campaign.
Back in Scotland the feeling grew that there should be some fitting memorial and in January 1918, not long after the capture of Jerusalem, Ninian Hill, a ship owner and Kirk elder from Edinburgh, proposed that a Scottish Church should be built in Jerusalem to act as a war memorial.
This gained widespread support and the money was raised through a nationwide campaign; and on May 7th 1927, the now Field Marshall Lord Allenby laid the foundation stone (which can still be seen outside, at the corner of the steps) on a lofty site across the Hinnom Valley, from Mount Zion.
The Church, with its accompanying Hospice, was dedicated in 1930, with Ninian Hill being introduced as the first minister of the Church.From its inception the hospice has been a popular temporary home. During the early years, St Andrew’s was able to serve the sizeable Scottish population who lived and worked in Jerusalem during the year of the British Mandate.
An Israeli lady who arrived in Jerusalem in 1933 remembers the hospice as "‘the’ place to stay – very upmarket"
The Lady Warden at that time, Mrs Macrae, ruled the ‘hospice’ with a firm but kindly hand. Dress had to be formal in the dining room and was compatible with military life. Ties and long trousers were compulsory, regardless of temperature. In the vestry there is a splendidly evocative photograph of the 2nd Battalion, the Cameron Highlanders, on church parade, kilts, pipes and drums and pith helmets which give us some understanding as to the lifestyle presided over by the lady wardens of pre-Second World War days.
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