There are two important paintings in the Tolbooth, The Tournament and The Riding of the Marches both painted by London artist Charles Cranmer RA (1780 – 1841) in the last year of his life. The recent repair and cleaning of these two magnificent canvases was completed in 2025 financed by the Forres Heritage Trust, the Pilgrim Trust, the Forres Ward fund and many local subscribers.

The Riding of the Marches

• This is more than a beautiful landscape of the Forres area. The panorama extends more than 50 miles including Forres, Nelson’s Tower, Findhorn and the river Findhorn threading its way between Kinloss and Binsness. The view extends to the Black isle and Sutherland
• The picture shows Forres Town Councillors ceremonially checking the town’s boundaries from Califer Hill
• This annual inspection of boundary stones to mark the town lands is led by Provost Laing of Forres and a great number of dignitaries
• Story goes that sometimes some of the stones were moved by the tenants to gain more land!
• Standing on Califer Hill the stone in the picture is known as the “douping stane” . This is the significance of the painting. Any recently appointed baillie to the Forres  Town Council would be subjected to an initiation ceremony whereby they were held by the wrists and ankles and swung toward the stone until their “doup” (i.e. their bottom) made contact with the stone.
• Provost Laing can be seen with his hat upraised welcoming the group
• In front of the “douping” stone you can see other members of the Town’s officers in complete uniform
• Three trumpeters in the Inverness-shire Militia uniform can be seen in front of the procession playing their instruments
• In the far-off distance, you can see two steam ships entering Findhorn Harbour which, at this time, was a thriving continental trading port
• A number in the crowd can be named as there was a reporter from the Forres Gazette there that day who wrote an article for the June 1841 edition of the local paper

For more information about the Riding of the Marches in contemporary coverage in the Forres Gazette and also in the Annals of Forres. please click on this link

The Tournament

• Representation of a medieval tournament as envisaged by Sir Thomas Dick Lauder in his popular 1827 historical romance novel, “The Wolf of Badenoch”.
• Hosted by the Earl of Moray in 1390 at St John’s Meads on the banks of the River Findhorn and near Darnaway Castle which is still the home of the present Earl of Moray
• Knights and Nobility of Scotland and England were invited except for  Lord Alexander Stewart, the “Wolf of Badenoch”, his four sons and a group of others
• Coloured tents of the Knights occupy the field in all directions
• “The Wolf and some of his party can be seen in armour, on horseback and carrying lances with pennons attached pointing towards the pageant with deer hounds and a dead deer
• Note the three frightened locals behind the tree with their deerhounds and a dead deer
• A consequence of not being invited to the tournament resulted in the Wolf of Badenoch taking his revenge out on Forres by burning it!

For more information about the Tournament in the Annals of Forres, please click on this link

For information about the Restoration of the two paintings between 2023 and 2025, please click on this link