| Architect Details |
(?) I Bell, architect c.1604; John Smith, architect 1828-40; George Angus Mitchell and George Bennett Mitchell, architects 1926-7.
John Smith was born in 1781, the son of William Smith, architect and builder, Aberdeen. Of the father little is recorded except that he was known as 'Sink'em'; that he had his workshop in Longacre; that he designed and built Gilcomston Chapel of Ease and the houses at the bottom end of Marischal Street, all in Aberdeen. It is not known exactly when he died but it appears to have been between February and November 1812. The son is said to have been sent at an early age to the office of James Playfair (or perhaps he assisted him in some junior capacity at the building of Cairness, Aberdeenshire, but neither the Playfair diary nor the Gordon muniments provide any evidence of it). He cannot have worked long for Playfair who died in 1794, and it is not known which London office he was in thereafter. Around 1804 he returned to Aberdeen with an extensive collection of plans and was nearly lost as his ship entered Aberdeen Harbour in a storm. Circa 1805 Smith designed his first major work in Aberdeen, a large house on Union Street for Patrick Milne of Crimonmogate. Two years later Smith succeeded Thomas Fletcher as engineer to the King Street, Union Street and Union Terrace works and laid out St Nicholas Street to connect it with George Street. By 1860 he had produced the first accurate survey of Aberdeen which was published in the same year. Thereafter he built up the largest business both in architecture and building and cabinet-making in the north-east, with headquarters at his house at 142 King Street, Aberdeen. He was associated with Thomas Telford on the harbour improvements planned from 1824 and was formally appointed superintendent of work for the City of Aberdeen in that same year. In that capacity he attended to such matters as street lighting, cleansing and executions (which are said to have brought gloom to the Smith household for weeks). He was also agent for the Imperial Insurance Company. John died after a long and painful illness at Rosebank Hardgate, a pleasant 18th-century mansion with a large garden which he inherited from his father-in-law. He had married Margaret Grant, only child of Colonel George Grant of Auchterblair in Banffshire, a marriage which brought useful landed connections, their first home being at Longacre adjacent to the elder William Smith's house and builder's yard. Near contemporary accounts record that she was tall, good-looking and aristocratic in demeanour which a family portrait appears to confirm. Smith himself was 'a shy retiring man as well as an able and diligent official'. Most members of their family died early but his son William joined the practice after graduating MA at Marischal College and subsequently sought experience in London with Thomas Leverton Donaldson. He appears to have returned to Aberdeen by 1842 and was made a partner in 1845, succeeding his father as Aberdeen City Architect on his death. His eldest daughter Margaret Grant Smith (died 1857) married Alexander Gibb, the civil engineer, on 17 March 1831. Some biographical details will be found in Lettice Milne Rae's 'Story of the Gibbs.' John Smith's work was in his early years almost exclusively refined neo-Greek, but from 1820 onwards most of his churches and large houses were Tudor Gothic, the latter sometimes with Scottish features as at Balmoral from about 1830. These were closely modelled on William Burn's style with which he had become acquainted at Robert Gordon's, Fintray and Auchmacoy. Brief biographical notices with short lists of principal works compiled by John's son William appeared in the Aberdeen Journal' in July 1852, in 'The Builder' and in the 'Architectural Publication Society's Dictionary'. A great many informative references to his career in Aberdeen will be found in G M Frazer's biography of Archibald Simpson (1790-1847), which appeared as a serial in the 'Aberdeen Weekly Journal' of 1918. A collected copy of these articles is available at Aberdeen Public Library. A fragmentary list of plans and some of his accounts (1807-1832) are in the National Monuments Record of Scotland. George Bennett Mitchell was born on 27 November 1865 and educated in Aberdeen and Newburgh. He was articled to Pirie & Clyne in 1881 and joined the practice of Jenkins & Marr as assistant on completing his apprenticeship. He remained with them until 1887 when he was appointed architect in the surveyors' department of Davidson & Garden, advocates (i.e. solicitors), Aberdeen. While there he carried out a great deal of work on the Dunecht estate for A C Pirie, both at the house and in the village, and was allowed to undertake a few small private commissions in his own name. During these early years he made several visits to France and Italy. On leaving Davidson & Garden, Mitchell opened his own practice at 148 Union Street; the exact date for this is uncertain as Mitchell himself gives dates varying from 1898 to 1 January 1903 and 1 January 1904 in different documents. His business mainly consisted of country house work and villas and cottages for the estates with which he had become acquainted through his work with Davidson & Garden. In 1913 Mitchell's son George Angus Mitchell (born on his father's thirty-first birthday and educated at Aberdeen Grammar School) entered the practice as an apprentice, and was one of the first two students to enrol at Aberdeen School of Architecture when it opened in 1913. His training was interrupted in 1915 when he commenced war service as a subaltern in the Highland Divisional Engineers; he served in Palestine and France with the 52nd Lowland Divisional Engineers, reaching the rank of Honorary Colonel, and returned to his father's office on his demobilisation in 1919, completing his diploma course the following year. He practised in association with his father from 1921. The practice moved from 148 Union Street to 1 West Craibstone Street in 1922 and George Angus became a partner in 1929, the firm name becoming George Bennett Mitchell & Son. George Angus Mitchell was elected FRIBA in late 1930, his proposers being Clement George, James Brown Nicol and George Watt. This may have prompted his father to seek RIBA membership, as he applied for Licentiateship immediately and was admitted at the beginning of 1931, his proposers being George, Nicol and William Liddle Duncan; and in May of the same year he too became a Fellow, with the support of the RIBA Council as a whole. By this time George Bennett had been awarded an MBE; he was also a Justice of the Peace, and had acted as District Civil Commissioner at the time of the General Strike in 1926. George Bennett Mitchell's main interest outside the office was the Boy's Brigade, of which he became Commander and President of the Aberdeen Battalion in 1906. His concerns for social welfare were further manifested in his work as Red Cross Transport Officer in Aberdeen during the First World War. He was also a devoted churchman, being a lifelong member of the West Church of St Andrew, of which he was an elder for over forty years. From at least 1914 he had a country residence at Cean-na-coil, Aboyne, one of the several houses he designed there, as well as his Aberdeen house at 4 Deemount Terrace and later at 18 Rubislaw Terrace. George Angus Mitchell continued to be active in military circles after the First World War, taking command of the 139th Field Park Company (TA) with the rank of Captain in 1924 and taking over 236 Field Company as a Major in 1928. He was promoted to lieutenant-colonel on the outbreak of the Second World War and became CRE 9th Divisional Engineers, CRE North Highland Area and CRE Lothian and Border Area. The elder Mitchell was taken ill in October 1940 whilst working as Divisional Food Officer for the North-East of Scotland, a position he had taken on in 1938 when hostilities were imminent. He underwent an operation involving the amputation of a leg, and resigned from the Food Office shortly afterwards. He died at his home on 22 March 1941. He was survived by his son and his daughter Meta, who like him took a leading part in youth welfare work in the area. His wife had predeceased him some years earlier. George Angus Mitchell inherited the practice, returning to it on his release from war service in June 1945 and continuing it under the existing name of George Bennett Mitchell & Son. The younger Mitchell was President of the Aberdeen branch of the RE Old Comrades Association for some years before 1958; President of the Aberdeen Rotary Club from 1947 to 1948; and President of the Aberdeen Chapter of the Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland in 1939, 1947 and 1949. Like his father, he was a lifelong member of the West Church of St Andrew, becoming a deacon in 1921 and an elder in 1939. In the later 1940s John Lamb was taken into partnership, followed in the later 1950s by Gordon Taylor and by Robert Alexander in 1971 and Alan Hamilton in 1976. George Angus Mitchell retired to Newburgh in 1962 and died there at his home, Thornhill, on 6 December 1964. He was survived by his wife Alice Jones and two married daughters.
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Historic Environment Records (HER)