File:Plaque near the site of John Arrol's gravestone - geograph.org.uk - 1241793.jpg

English: Plaque near the site of John Arrol's gravestone This plaque is one of several that are located at the foot of a wall alongside a narrow and probably seldom-visited lane behind the church hall of Dumbarton's Riverside Parish Church. Several of the plaques indicate the positions of old worn gravestones that have been incorporated into the wall.

The text on this plaque is rather terse:

"JOHN AROLL (Schoolmaster Rhu) Died 2nd February 1760 Aged 52 John Aroll was murdered"

The story behind this brief text is recounted by Dr I M M MacPhail in "Dumbarton through the Centuries" (Dr MacPhail uses the spelling "Arrol", which, despite what is written on the plaque, appears to be the correct form of the name; I've therefore done the same in this description).

Arrol had gone to Dumbarton to collect the then very considerable debt of £30 from a man named Cunningham, who, after obtaining a receipt from Arrol, killed him, and took back the money. Cunningham concealed the body for a while, but later threw it into the River Leven under cover of darkness.

There was, at the time, a superstitious belief that if a murderer touched his victim's body, it would bleed (for more information, look up "ordeal by touch"). Cunningham was a chief suspect when Arrol's body was found, but, when asked to touch the corpse, he refused, claiming to believe that it would bleed because Cunningham had shaved on a Sunday. In response, the parish minister pointed out that he himself had occasionally shaved on a Sunday, and that he had touched the corpse without causing it to bleed. Nevertheless, Cunningham managed to evade justice for the rest of his life, confessing only on his deathbed.