Creeping desecration of the Sabbath unleashed a bellowing outburst from The Courier’s leader writers in 1852.
They condemned a rise in profane behaviour and judged Dundee to have become the least decorous town in Scotland.
While they defended individual liberty, they also warned a once-cherished Scottish institution was becoming sullied by coarse conduct.
Their words were prophetic. Just over a decade later an outrage on the Forth coast tainted the Scottish Sabbath forever and brought shame on the nation.
In Dundee, Sabbath problems were caused by people with low standards of personal behaviour.
On Sunday mornings, drunks would stagger half-asleep in front of families on their way to church.
The Courier noted that idlers in their working clothes engaged in disgusting ribaldry at street corners. Gangs of youths would tear down trees and insult respectable people.
Working women considered it superfluous to dress in a becoming manner and would stroll the streets staring rudely at people, determined to pass the day in indolent idleness.
Standards did not improve across Scotland and in 1864 an incident at North Berwick was greeted with sorrow by Sabbath keepers.
A French schooner ran aground early one Sunday and while locals saved the crew, there followed a bestial display of self-indulgence. Locals pounced on the ship’s 2,000 casks of brandy. Little attempt was made to stash the casks locals cracked them open immediately, drinking deep, straight from the barrels.
When dawn broke there was a scene of devastation. Witnesses describe only the number of inebriates lying at high water mark but the condemnation of this corruption of the Sabbath perhaps hints that even more disgraceful licentiousness was taking place.
The Courier printed this observation of the incident: “If the London papers had told us of such doings in Margate, what a cackling we should have had at the profanity and godlessness of the Cockneys. But these drunken, thieving wreckers were the Sabbath-loving Scots people, our austere and religious peasantry.”
The paper added that it hoped the incident would provoke thought in those capable of thinking.