SALTCOATS

" Scotland's Quaintest Burgh "

It's Lost Links and Landmarks Restored

Up "The Hedges": The House of Miss Stevenson of Dykes.   The Chapel Well.

Long, long ago there stood at the end of the Manse Lane of Saltcoats the houses occupied by Margaret Stevenston of Dykes and her cottars. At the southeast of her yard was the possession, in 1793, of Hugh Smyllie, wright, marked out by an old thorn which stood there until the railway broke through precipitating the rustic boundary into its yawning gullet. A private lane led into her grounds, giving communication to the other yards and the appearance of the site, as it dipped backwards to the rigs of Springvale, remained until half a century ago such as was most fittingly described by the townspeople as "up the hedges", for the hawthorn blossomed there year by year and sent its fragrant odour into the pathways. Beyond, to the northeast, lay the yards of Earl of Eglinton, beauty and attractiveness covered the flowering expanse.

The old house of Miss Stevenson, in Dykes, with its neat thatch into which the top windows disappeared, looking like a storey and a half, was remarkable amongst the picturesque surroundings. Her occupancy, given for her lifetime, was of shorter tenure than perhaps she expected, for at Christmas time of 1795 it had passed to the widow of Saltcoats shipbuilder, Peter Pattieson. Then many years had sped the house came to the widow of Captain Ritchie and quarter of a century ago it fell into the possession of Owen Rush. Owen Rush has left long since and another wright's operations have come into the once pretty garden of Miss Stevenson of Dykes. The house is down and it is long since dependency cots were ruins. Nothing is left but the tree, under the shadow of which the lady of gentle Dykes passed her declining days. To what uses may even such a survivor of one time rustic beauty become. There is still adhering to it the chain which held the beam and scales used by the worthy Owen in his Merchandise. The tree lay behind the house; now it stands out stark in that little wilderness along the border of which the railway engine whistles noisily.

Two little cots at the head of the Chapel Brae rested upon the rising ground towards the rear in such a way that children could touch the back of their thatched roofs. Between these and the slips of back garden and the churchyard dyke lay the grass-grown ruin to which a fond tradition gave the honour of being the last of the ancient Chapel of Saltcoats. One curious memory of the cots is that of the existence of queer vaults beneath their bare floors, attributed and rightly so, to the times of smuggling - the smuggling of salt, when the material could not be made without Royal imposition. Nearly every house in Saltcoats in those days had thus its hiding place. first of all for the private distillation to which the fine spring of the district gave especial flavour; and secondly, for that one great necessary of life-salt. Little wonder that in the Seventeen Forties the ladies near the Crofthead sang, with very particular adaptability to their own condition:

"And to oor kail we can't get saut,
For Geordie says we're in the fau't.
Then welcome Royal Charlie."

Before and after the Erskine Church came, the house of the Hills stood at the top of the Brae. Hill was a horse dealer and many of the best "bloods" of the Green Isle were galloped by Jamie Spence before admiring "coupers" and buyers. The wee shop of Archie Kelso, founded nearly a century ago, also stood by. Round the corner came the sheds of the Willocks, famous carriers of their day, before and after the advent of the railway, the successors of the Cunninghams, whose family had been carriers from the earliest days of last century. A row of wee "thacks" straddled down the descent, one being the dwelling of Rabbie Boll, a famous townsman.

At the brae foot was Dan Smith's old-fashioned inn, which, forty-five years ago, provided refreshment under homely conditions. A few yards from its door stood the Chapelwell pump, representing the last form in which the waters of the ancient well were dispensed to the townsfolk. The foot road leading to William Stewart's yard is now obliterated in the lodge of the church, so prettily perched on the brae and beside it there has risen the tall fourstorey "house of letters" which today exemplifies the remarkable development of Post Office life in Saltcoats. Only a few years ago Chapel well looked its ancient self. It was a thing of quaint gables and thatches. The clack of Willie Bolton's loom might have been heard in what is now the house of the worthy Tuscan. The junction of Kirkgate and the street formed a gusset thatch, behind which the glowing forge of Burns' Smithy has long sustained the antiquated interest of what will for all time be known as "Burns' Close". The elder Burns came to Saltcoats when the century was very young and acquired an unrivalled reputation as a horse shoer, but he was also a farrier; eighty years ago and later, his services were in constant demand. His son and grandson worthily preserve the ideal of continuous representation of the horseshoeing industry through to the third generation.

From the Town Cross to the Old Post Office:  Memories of the Floods.

The Crown Inn has been long an interesting feature of the Town Cross of Saltcoats and the house immediately beyond it (the one-time residence of Captain Crawford) dates from 1783. The Royal Hotel opposite stands on Mrs Oliphant's fine house and garden of other days. Hamilton's Buildings arose in 1875 on the site of the ancient Hay Weigh House. They derive their name from the late Alexander Hamilton, who was well known as a judge at the agricultural shows. A high wall enclosed the weighing space to which an iron barred gate gave admittance. Men met at the junction of the roads to discuss more than the price of oats. Many a time was this spot the centre of loud agitation and demonstration. No longer do the people burn witches here. They found, some years ago, a more congenial pastime in burning effigies. Archie McKillop's weaving shop, in 1823, stood next Hamilton's. In the sixties a space thereabouts was occupied as a "stedyard". It became a bakery.

Beyond the Crown Hotel the old forestairs have vanished; so has the quaint house of tailor Henry and of her "biggins", from the windows of which people had to be taken to save them from being overtaken by the flood. Somewhere between the new Trinity Church and McBride's flowed the historic water-runner, which, crossing the street, pored itself out in the bosom of the Braes. McBride's was a dairy farm and keen memories have pictured to us those not very far back days when the cows might have been seen moving across the thoroughfare about milking time. Gilbert Gordon, manufacturer's agent, had his place immediately below the Bank. Andrew McBride's, on which the Bank was built, was a twostorey thatch adjoining (formerly Sandy McKinnon's), but long previously known as Kirsty Nicoll's, a place with a but-and-a-ben and a weaver's shop at the back. In the days long gone by, says an old indweller, "the dairy was a place to enjoy a tumbler o' guid milk wi' a cinder in 't". "The one house with the straw top was very ancient. Up to the time of its demolition it forced itself into the middle of the street, its large window having been once the attraction of the children of Saltcoats. That window had in its day formed a casket of delectable dainties and more than children glanced at its contents as they passed by. The weavers came there to obtain their necessaries; the tailors, sometimes their cloth, the guid-wives of Saltcoats their eggs. It was said to have been at on time the prettiest house in Saltcoats.

The old building was taken down at the end of the sixties when the present elegant structure was erected to the plans of Mr Wallace, architect, the Bank entering into possession in July 1872. When the fortunes of the City of Glasgow Bank were at an end it became, as it now is, the headquarter of the Bank of Scotland. The City of Glasgow Bank had been previously carried on across the way in the building that is now Fullerton's. Until 1858 Fullerton's was the chief agency for the supply of newspapers, which came to the town three times a week, "The minister aye gettin' the first read".

Two old-fashioned houses stood near the water-runner to the north of the Bank buildings. The occupant of one of these used to relate how he jumped out of bed on morning to find himself up to the middle in water. The "burn" (the primeval drainage system) had swollen and the back drench of the sea had placed the streets in flood. Dockhead Street was like a street in Venice and he had to hail a passing boat to escape from his own house. The old houses referred to are now submerged in the Trinity Church. Trinity Church had its origin in the old Relief Church at Parkhead, where, after the stirring days of sectarian war, it pursued its even tenor under the name of the East U P Church. Its transition to Dockhead Street as the Trinity Church recalls the fact that the new home was built for its esteemed and popular minister, the Rev George Philp, who from the day of his reception in September 1864, when, standing at the gate of the church he was publicly acclaimed, merited the compliment to his services which this transference represented.

The quaint little house with the crowstep gable still clinging to the narrow part of the thoroughfare (Dunlop's Hairdressing Emporium) was the Post Office between 1862 and 1884, when John Grimwoood acted as Postmaster and Inspector of Poor. It recalls one most memorable occasion about twentyfour years ago when the waters flowed into Dockhead Street and overran the adjacent streets and the Dockhead was alive with floating craft; cradles, eggboxes and miscellaneous variety of materials appearing on the surface of the water. Dr Wallace, driving home that day from the country over Bradshaw, found his horse immersed almost up to the neck in water and had to take to the higher lands. The Post Office officials found themselves imprisoned in the flood and had to betake themselves - letters, bags and stamping paraphernalia - to an upper floor. From that upper window the mail bags had to be handed out to John Welsh, the postman, who was left to make his way through the alarming current as best he could and so maintain the tradition of "prompt delivery". The little building in which this took place was, in the Forties, the possession of Grace Rose. The Post Office under George Fullerton. now postmaster, Port Glasgow and his sister, Miss Fullerton, was transferred to near the Dockhead entrance. The Dockhead Street has a singular history. It was built over the primitive beach and has its foundation on the wrack, tangle and kelpshore thrown up from the sea and which at one time was claimed as a perquisite of the lordly lessors. During recent excavations ashes were found and these were said to be the remains of the salt fires of the primeval salters; but less enthusiastic antiquarians declare them to be the refuse of the more recent salt works drifted in from the Pans.

The Path through the Green Mailling, Howf, haunts and Famous Dignitaries and Dwelling of the Drakemyre.

Upon the little path through the Green Mailling, worn by the feet of many tenants of the Earl of Eglinton as they came to pay their meal rents at "My Lord's Girnal House", was appropriately bestowed the name of Girnal Street. Until the end of the eighteenth century it remained a narrow and crooked way, broled by sidecloses and ancient courts, with stepdown doorways and quaint old lozenged windows, several of which remain.

Before 1803 Maillie Aumrie's, with its bowwindow and old-fashioned door-bearing the unfailing sign of good luck, a nailed horseshoe, was the principal business house in the town. It was a haberdashery depot and was the centre for securing the only paper that came into Saltcoats. It became the business house of Christina Hodge, a thrifty and managing woman - famous for making balls and pardies - whose predecessor, Lawrie King, kept lodgers. What is now the establishment of Mr Peter Reilly was a twostorey thatch standing almost opposite the school gate.

In a house not far from it there lived and traded Mrs McDonald, who drove a curious old Irish cart and donkey through the streets bearing its load of "cheena and delf". Danny Sutherland, who lived in the same building, was famed for the possession of a boar, which he led through the streets, the worthy attire in his tailcoat and wearing a big Kilmarnock bonnet. The little "public" is one of the oldest institutions of the Girnal Street and above it, on the face of a gable, the date 1832 and certain initials indicate the antiquity of the Albert and Good Templars' Hall. Here the Burns Club had its birth in 1824, under the genial chairmanship of Thomas Miller and with a membership which included William Good, Sandy McBride and Daniel Kerr. The breezy coterie met in McKillop's then tenanted by Orr and none added more distinction to the proceedings than the late John McKillop, who was "the bard of Warrenhill". The "Giggledales" and "Rattlerhymers" of that time made the rafters merry with "song and sentiment". Tom Miller was conspicuous in his literary efforts. He could quote all the poets with singular ease his extensive library in Raise Street still showing his range of reading. He was a veritable walking encyclopedia. His sons could both sing and speak on occasions of festivity.

What was Malcolms Land in 1870 lay at the end of the Girnal Street and adjoined to it was what became the home of the famous Kate McTaggart. Until her death in 1876, Kate was a great figure in the town. In 1863 her house and yard were almost at the very corner. Separated from this by an old thorn hedge stood the onetime dwelling of a noteworthy villager, Fergus Kennedy. Close by was the yard of Widow Russell, which became the property of James Neil, from whom the little recess round the corner into the adjacent street received its title of "Neils' Loan". In 1863 that corner looked no more modern than it had done a hundred years before. In 1780 the then very lonely loan leading from the corner to the crofts beyond was known under the name of the "Puddock Loan".

Kate McTaggart was the dispenser of attractive things for the school children, when all the academy the town held lay almost in front of her door. Even before Kate's time another had done similar service to a former generation. This was Jean Poe, crotchety old madam who was the terror to the youths of the district and who used to leave her perch behind the counter to fly after them with a broomstick. Stealing round the corner into the adjoining street the boys would hide in the little loan, where four cots zig zagged in the formation of an inverted V. In later years it received the designation of "Jimmie Whitley's Loan" from a well-known chimney sweep, whose name was a common terror with which weary mothers and nurses tried to send wakerife children to sleep. He was sometimes the only sicknurse who could be got to tend to fever cases when others were afraid to venture. Jamie was knocked down by a crowd and, thinking his last hour had come, murmured "Saltcoats 'ill miss me". His lamentations over his dog "Venus" are vividly remembered. Here was started, by Jamie Logan, the first pawnshop in Saltcoats. For many a day a younger Logan fiddled through the streets with a boxlike homemade violin, having a single string.

A great change was made on the Loan when it came to be owned by Thomas Borland, a very notable figure of the district, who, as a contractor, had his carts on the road late and early. He brought the building line forward and the Loan, so full of memories of better days disappeared. He took leading part in the agitation over the name of this street, which was then called the Drakemyre. The correct name will be found in Ainslie's plan of 1789 as Chapel Street and in the earliest titles it is rightly so called, since it was the street which opened out in front of the Chapel. The proprietors solemnly met in the Town Hall, in March 1878, to decide what was the proper name of the street. It was then proved that in 1813 the street was still Chapel Street. It was urged that as Drakemyre was only a nickname and that as no such name appeared in the Eglinton rental books, it should be taken away and a new name adopted. Thomas Borland was then the oldest resident in the district. The name was changed to Vernon Street in compliment to the Earl of Eglinton's Commissioner and the old term of Drakemyre thrown over. A dip into older history might have led to a greater appreciation of the old and despised name, so reminiscent of innumerable "Goosedubs" throughout the country, which were a feature of the religious establishments of a far off time.

Reilly's which lies to the northeast of what was John Barclay's smiddy (approached through Baillie's close), dates from 1824. Fergus Kennedy's house, once the pride of the old Drakemyre, disappeared under the Co-operative Buildings and the water runner from the Raise yards that ran across into the Green yards became indistinguishable. Many a time the little runner, swollen by rains, would gurgle along in an alarming current. Latterly it was enclosed under a grating, through which children peered with curiosity or with dismay as their peeries or bools curled away from the "wee loan" to be swallowed up in its depths. Latterly the runner was used for cleansing the Drakemyre, a pure spring of water being drawn from a mysterious source at the end of the street, the boys watching the operation with astonishment and delight. One day, as the story runs, men working at this magic fountain (now evidently "lost to view but not to memory dear") started back in fright as they saw a terrible abyss, the last of an ancient pit, the site of which was almost opposite the little thatched school wherein the future Premier of an Australian Colony taught the "three R's" to budding Saltcoats. Here was opened the first Ragged School under Ephraim Barbour. The place is also reminiscent of the late Arthur Guthrie and Peter Gorme, founders of the Literary Society. They were, said a writer in the local press, "the leaders to whom all the elder members were content to sit mute and listen". Other lights were John Ewing, the first Doctor Wallace, Finlay Mitchell, gas manager, William Davie and "Verdant Paddy". The "Rabbie Burns" public house of today was Peter Hill's stables and Docherty's occupies the place of the little thatch of Joseph Milne, mason, who invariably conducted operations from the house tops in his black tile, the badge of the master tradesman. Close by lived old Robert Service, who gave out the flowering for the lady workers of Saltcoats and whose son James is now one of the merchant princes of Melbourne and Premier of Victoria. The veteran agent was a most enthusiastic teetotaler, It was he who, at a great public temperance conventicle, laid about the ministers with such zealous fury that the Rev Mr Elles, who was present, said "Sir, I am almost tempted to thrash you to within an inch of your life for your impudence". This reminds us that the Temperance movement in 1837 was initiated by James Smith and that the first Temperance demonstration of its kind in Scotland was held in Saltcoats. James served his time as a tailor with the father of Mr Bryden of Dockhead Street.

Other almost forgotten links with the life of old Drakemyre are the house near the railway end occupied in 1878 by Mr Steve originally built by Holmes, a Baptist and used for a time as a Baptist chapel; the stables and hayloft of Archie Robertson, the carrier, who, about 1851, was going back and forward to Irvine with a van; the Drakemyre pumpwell, opposite the old station of 1863; Donald McAlpine's coalree, which stood near the thatch school in 1862; the little shop where, in 1858, gutta-percha shoes were sold for the first time; the famous lodging of Peter McCulloch, sometimes going under the satirical designation of the "Drakemyre Hotel"; next it the house (dating, along with the lodging, from 1828) of the celebrated Elder Brodie, one of the stoups of the Auld Kirk, a great and worthy figure of the severe disciplinary methods of early church life, when nothing was more usual than a visitation from those ecclesiastical constables, looking "as grim as Hieland corbies", with the warning intimation, "Ten o'clock, an' a'body i' their ain hoose". Curfew did not strike more terror than the presence of an elder of the olden time in the Drakemyre "after lock-up 'hours". East of Brooders was the house of Meredith Keenan, carter. For many a day there stood opposite the "Banking Brae", a wee tottering hoose "looking like as if it had survived a thoosan' years". In the passage a little hole in the wa' did service as a bar and there many a surreptitious stirrup cup had been bottled by travellers before pursuing the long and lonely way northward. Immediately to the west of the loaning and so close as to form part of it, were the old-fashioned houses, threequarters of a century old, that became only a few years ago the handsome building of the Town Clerk's office.

The Y M C A has been in existence since long before 1859. The picturesque building which it occupies was at one time part of Mr Borland's property and was opened by the Association in 1890. Mention of Rob Miller's public house and grocery brings back the memory of Hughie "Benty" immortalised by John McKillop in his humorous versification, "The Folic" :-

"Next come the lads, a funny squad;
There was Pat Lancet, woman mad,
Tam Giggledale, a chield ne'er sad,
An' Hughie Benty
Douce Robin Weel-thegither-haud
An' Geordie Tenty".

Indeed the entire range of houses swept away when the railway station was brought to the Drakemyre enclosed most of the real character life of the town. Impossible is it to drag from the mists of local tradition the exact significance of name the "Lion's Den" and "Drakemyre" must remain inseparable. The corner house was Gilbert Gray's with little sideways and entrances to the station. Peter Hill, the horse dealer, who lived until 1849, had his habitation on the railway side. His tall figure, crowned with a tall tile, his swallowtail coat and knee-breeches, would have singled him out in any community. He smoked a long pipe and flourished a long four-in-hand whip. His jokes were clever and keenly relished. He was well known to officers in search of good mounts and it was said that the laughter created by Peter's repartee found an echo in far-off India. Near the commencement of what is now along stretch of dead wall supporting the railway loading bank was once a lane of seclusion and rural interest, since the villager used it as a way to the higher lands, to Malcolms weavers' shop and at a later time to a now obliterated kirk which stood on the other side of the railway, the lane was approached through a gate which was never opened except on Sabbath. It came to bear the name of the "Meikle Yell", from this large wooden gate at the entrance.

What indescribable felling of humor and what playful quips and jocularities, are aroused by the remembrance of the ancient two storey house, the "Turf Inn", which sat at the foot of what was known as the "Banking Brae" and the funniest thing concerning which is that it was never an inn at all. At its gable the road went up to the Gasworks, This road up the brae in older days was further westward. One day in winter the road was frozen like glass; boys were tobogganing down the hill on an upturned fourlegged stool, when a lady and gentleman appeared at the top and looked ruefully at the dangerous descent. The boys made offer of their primitive conveyance, but the gentleman returned a rude answer. Hardly had he done so than, by an unexpected slip, he was precipitated to the foot amidst roars of laughter. The lady was wiser. She gallantly accepted the odd transport and buckling her skirts about her, she placed herself on the stool and was launched safely at the foot amidst the hurrahs of the onlookers. Alongside the Turf Inn was Lennart's Smiddy, a feature which have true auld' warld'ness and character to the site. No old Saltcoatian will forget the house of Rabbie Boll, satirically dubbed the "Port o' Ferry" Inn and dealt with in forgotten rhyme:

"There stands a wee thatch hoose at yonder gate
Sing hey for its people, ever merry
The name of the landlord's There stands a wee thatch hoose at yonder gate
Sing hey for its people, ever merry
The name of the landlord's Rabbie Boll
And naebody passes the Port o' Ferry

In the Heart of Old "Saltland"

The School: The Earl’s Girnal and the Quaint House that became the Headquarters of a Quaint Burgh.

BETWEEN the bay and the northern stretch of pastoral upland forming the High and Laigh Raise Parks, was the Village Green - a long quadrangle upon which the land-ward part of the ancient village rested. 

It has been already shown that the King’s highway from the shore went by the rocks. There was no road through the village proper, except across the wild stretch of beach that has become Dockhead Street, or by a confined lane at its eastern extremity pursuing the long and tortuous line of a rude water course from the higher lands known as the Flush. The way or approach from the water to this lane was called "Up the Flush." As it was little more than a recess from the cross roads, it might almost have been termed a cul-de-sac. The march boundary between the lands of Cuninghame and the Earl of Eglinton formed a sinuous line of dyke across the central parks of the village, in which were involved the territory of one James How, a merchant, regarding which something very important in the history of the town emerged. Westward from the spot where James and his guidwife Grisel had their home lay the village smithy, in what one may term the very heart of old Saltland. In the centre of the Green Mailling, not far from the smithy, sat the ancient Girnal House of the Earls of Eglinton, and the stable for the horses employed in bringing the salt and carrying away to the Earl’s store-houses at Irvine, the meal brought as rent by the tenants. Prior to 1700 few dwellings had their place in the vicinity of the Girnal House. Up the irregular line of the burn which flowed into the Green there ran the long and straggled vennel, used by those who dwelt in the centre of the village to enable them to reach Kyleshill. This was the line of the Flush, the way, in short, to the Flush Rigs. At its foot lay James How’s house. On the banks of the now vanished stream, in the heart of the village, were several cothouses, in which dwelt one Alexander Kenier, and they were reached by an entrance so narrow that it would not permit two people to pass abreast. Further towards the centre of the green expanse was the house of Robert Morial, the coal grieve to the Earl of Eglinton. To the north-west of How’s house lay the croft of Alexander Ritchie.

Thus roughly may the surroundings of the site be pictured in 1714. Before another half-century passed, great were the changes that came into this little colony at the foot of the Flush rigs.

" In a green lane that from the village street Diverges, stands the schoolhouse, long and low The frame, and blackened with the hues of time."

From ancient records in the possession of Mr William Service, the Session Clerk, we learn that the old Parish School was in the Seventeenth Century controlled by the kirk authorities at Stanley, and now came the Parish Church to Saltcoats, and with it the rustic school. One can readily imagine the scholars under the shadow of the old church on the brae, weary of pot-hooks and Latin classics, playing hide-and-seek amongst the grave-stones, their only playground. Then came their removal, as their numbers grew larger, to the Green, Rob Morial, the coal grieve, giving up his house to make room for them, and the gardens on the Earl of Eglinton’s land for a capacious playground. The exact date when this transference took place cannot be definitely determined. In 1751 the School was at the Old Kirk. Within the next twenty years or so it was down at the Green. It had many masters, whose names are "written in gold" on a tablet in the old kirk wall. In 1803 William M‘Pherson had the school at a salary of 350 merks. He resigned in 1814, Edward Gibb, from whom the school Close obtained its name, died on 27th March, 1831. Under his regime the school had been enlarged (in 1822) and later (September, 1825) exchanged for part of that on which the Town House now stands. In January, 1832, the inhabitants, realising that the once open space of the village green had become unhealthy by the over-building upon it, petitioned for a new school, and plans were actually considered in the summer of 1833. The site proposed was Green End, now part of Ardrossan Road. Mr Park succeeded Edward Gibb in June, 1837. After a single year the school was found once more to be panting for outlet. In 1850 the heritors appointed Dr. Charles Marshall, of St. Martin’s, in Perthshire, and six years later a supplementary addition to the schoolhouse left it still more impoverished of playground, and by and by the teacher’s dwelling-house had to be taken in to accommodate scholars until it elbowed itself out of space. Then came the new legislature of 1872, and the best days of the school were over. Over its portals ‘there was carved a Latin legend, the translation of which--" Learning advances innate power, and suffers not the manners to be rude "-seems to have had more influence upon its pupils than the admonitory ! texts of a later day. It was a sound school, well disciplined, and well taught. A devastating fire placed in peril the Doctor’s very valuable classical library, the existence of which bore testimony to his liberal reading resource. He could write as well as teach, and nothing could have been more biting than his answer to the authorities in the school’s last days--" The categorical statement of requirements cannot be predicated of the dismal cooperage in which both departments of the school have been immured." The "dismal cooperage" lingered on until two years ago, when it disappeared to make way for the new County Police Buildings, which have been not unfittingly described as Saltcoats’ little Scotland Yard.

The venerable Girnal House stood second in the street to which it gave a name, long after its purpose had come to an end and the meal rents became commuted to money sterling. It was fitted with stalls for the reception of the meal, and for storing the salt to be given in exchange. The house still standing, with the broken outline of an old stairway facing the straggled vacuity into which so much of the municipal stonework has recently been imposed, represents the ancient and historic reception house of the rents of the Earls of Eglinton. It was alienated from the Earl’s possession only in 1841. An old stable stood at the rear. This, with its curious clay floor, and still more curious stalls, was the place wherein the Earl’s draw horses were housed. It was adjoined to the gable of the Girnal House, and had become ruinous in the Eighteenth Century. It is believed to have been covered by the printing house of Archibald Wallace, which rests upon ground given by the Earl of Eglinton to William Stevenson, cooper in Saltcoats, in 1764, and formed part of the possession of Dr. Robert Wallace, the successor of Dr. Alexander Hamilton, whose house was 4 Dockhead Street. The front part of Herdman’s rests upon part of the possession of a famous man of Saltcoats of his day, Patrick M’Alla, whose tenement went as far as the " Shopends." 

Immediately northward from the Girnal House was the dwelling of Miss Lusk, dating from 1824, and raised at a time when the surroundings were still unfreed from their early rural character, a surviving feature of which is the ancient pear tree of her garden, still standing in rustic loneliness on the spot where once so much homely comfort was enclosed, and which still grows its fruit in abundance. Upon " the north-west quenzy " of Hugh Paterson’s smithy, with its adjoining house and kiln, there came to be erected the bakehouse of John Brown, of " sailor biscuit" fame. George Jameson followed Brown in 1813, and the old smithy has long since become enveloped in the bakehouses and granaries of Herdman’s. Where the corner shop of Countess Street stands to-day there was an open close up which a cart could go to the bakehouse. Beyond that lay another most important landmark of old Saltcoats, the almost forgotten hostelry known as the "Black Bull," the nearest approach to the site of which, to-day, is a confectioner’s shop. It was a pretentious little hostelry, truly reminiscent of Saltcoats’ better days, and offering those quaint and restful charms which few of the inns of to-day can do. It was sometimes called the " Eden Inn," not on account of the attractions alluded to, which might have justified the designation, but because the Eden Lodge of Free Gardeners met there.

Within the square, behind the Dockhead thoroughfare, lay the "offices and class " belonging to the family of Auchenharvie, purchased by the Earl of Eglinton in 1795 to enable him to make straight the ancient paths and highways which that territory adjoined. But long before that year he had been maturing a scheme destined to be of the utmost importance to the welfare of the town. This was the making of a way northward to Knockcrievoch and Dalry. And thereby hangs an interesting tale. When James How, "up the Flush," built his house in 1714, he was taken bound to leave out nine feet of space for the roadway between him and his opposite neighbours. Little did James How dream that his possession and that road space were to become the centre of the town’s most important buildings, and the site in front of his door the most thronged of the coming town. Many years passed, and it became necessary about 1777 to continue the road northward by breaking through a part of How’s territory. The old shipmaster was dead, and the Earl, through his factor, had to bargain with the widow. A part of her ground was taken in exchange for a part further back, and the old stop-gap at the foot of the Flush broken through to continue the direct- line of the street from the Quay. Grisel, like most women, was not enamoured of her bargain, declaring that she had got "jimp measure." The territory of the Hows came to Robert Stevenson of Coalhill. To-day the house and ground that were Grisel How’s lie buried beneath the spacious expanse of the Town Hall, which also sweeps out of sight the scene of the town’s early collegiate life, for there also, are covered the one-time public School, the master’s school-house which lay to the west of the cooperage, his offices and garden. The ground to the left of the plot of the How’s with the house built in 1715 by John Paton, weaver, "up the Flush,‘, became the possession of Captain Thomson, and long after-wards, and for nearly sixty years, a part was occupied by Miss Fleck, a well-known " lady body " of her time, whose fine presence and black ringlets give back a pleasant impression of the elegant manners of those old days. Still more

The roadway in front of How’s patch then bore the fine old Scotch appellation of the " Brochan" (sometimes rendered " Broughton.") When it first began to assume the appearance of a thoroughfare it was called "the Way or Street." Then, with due respect to the Earl’s good intention to break through the fields, it was called " Eglinton " Street ; after it was opened, " New " or " Raise " Street, and finally, by the most remarkable of variations in nomenclature, " Countess " Street, under which name it remains. Early in last century the surroundings of the plot had become partially covered with ruins, for here had lived the oldest villagers, and many of the cots had served their day. The public spirit of the town was beginning to manifest itself, and now took the form of a subscription for a Town House and Steeple, the primary object being to secure a public clock. This movement developed into " the Town House Society," on 3rd October, 1823, at a public meeting, presided over by Edward Gibb, schoolmaster, at the Green, and a constitution was drawn up. The original subscription sheet, beginning in 1823 and ending in 1831, contained 202 names. When sufficient funds had been obtained, the Society acquired the ground at "number one Raise Street" for 999 years, from Martinmas 1823 ; and the Town House was built in 1826, from designs submitted by Peter King. The Eglinton Trustees gave the stones from Ardrossan Quarry free of servitude. The bell was hung for the first time in 1829. The Society did not pay the bellringer, but he was to " take his chance of the good-will of the inhabitants of the town for his trouble." When the foundation stone of the Town House and Steeple was laid on the 15th September, 1825, by Alexander Hamilton, of Grange, with Masonic honours, all the local lodges walked in procession from Stevenston, where they assembled. Upwards of 300 Masons walked. The Grand Master’s speech on that occasion was an oration that an aged townsman says " rang like Julius Caesar’s."

"The Revolution :" Municipal Metamorphosis :Transformation of "Saltland" into a Burgh.

After long and weary endeavour, the proposals for transforming the " town or village " of Saltcoats into a Burgh were formally adopted in 1885. This was called "the peaceful revolution," and it had taken thirty years to accomplish. It was in 1851 that the thought of creating the enviable status first occurred to the aspiring townspeople. There was a short and sharp conflict of two years, with a vigorous opposition which manifested disfavour in the form of a "Death’s Head and Cross Bones".demonstration. A question of enfranchisement suggesting disqualification of all who had rents below £10 led to the trite battle-cry of " No Votes, No Burgh." The Sheriff ordered a new Electoral list, and this, regarded as a victory by the opposition, was celebrated by a general illumination. In 1865, and again in 1884, the strife was renewed, and the proposals defeated by organised opposition. Times and manners changed within twelve months. At a meeting in the Town Hall on 22nd May, 1885, at which Sheriff-Substitute Hall, Kilmarnock, presided, Mr M‘Isaac of Parkend moved a simple adoption of the Burgh Statutes; William Bryden seconded; there was no opposition; and the old Baronial Burgh of Saltcoats attained its long-cherished desire. 

The following memorials of the Burgh fall to be recorded :-

On 29th June, 1855, James Campbell was appointed Clerk to the Commissioners, an office which he held until his death on 5th August, 1906. 

The first Medical Officer was Dr. J. R. Brown, on whose death in July, 1896, Dr. C. R. Macdonald succeeded. 

The office of Procurator Fiscal first fell on 17th August, 1855, to Thomas Kirkhope, who resigned in 1857. The appointment devolved upon James Gay, Writer, Ardrossan. On his death in November, 1894, Thomas Smith was appointed.

The first Sanitary Inspector was Boyd Miller, appointed on 25th July, 1855, and to the Surveyor’s office a few months later. He resigned both offices on 23rd April, 1891, when James Miller, Jr., succeeded him as Sanitary Inspector and Surveyor. Hugh Thomson had both offices from 25th April, 1892, to 13th January, 1896. Ultimately David Robertson was appointed to the offices on 20th December, 1897, following upon the resignation of James Miller, Jr., who had then been twice in office.

The first Treasurer of the Burgh was James M‘Isaac, of Parkend, who discharged the duties gratuitously. He was appointed on 14th September, 1855, and resigned in May, 1891. Andrew Armour, the first salaried Treasurer, died in October, 1897, when the duties fell to William Allan, Banker, who was Treasurer from 22nd November, 1897, and resigned on 22nd February, 1895. Archibald Ritchie followed him, and held office until his death in 1906. John Miller, present Chamberlain of the Burgh, was appointed on 18th September, 1906. 

Joseph Gillies, Irvine, holds office as Veterinary Inspector. 

In appointing as Town Clerk of the newly-formed Burgh the late James Campbell, a just tribute was paid to his long and active interest in the town, and his enthusiastic and loyal efforts for its welfare during practically a lifetime. He had taken part in every movement of public importance, and his wise and prudent counsels had gone far to leaven its administration and shape its destinies. He was the author of a " History of the Burgh Cess or Stent," published in 1890, and of a " Digest of the Burgh Police (Scotland) Act, 1892." He died suddenly while engaged in official duties, He was succeeded by his son, James Campbell, who had been appointed Town CIerk Depute on 26th August, 1902, and received his commission to the higher office on 27th August, 19o6. On 27th December, 1906, William Mathieson was appointed Depute Town Clerk, which office he still holds.

The following have been Provosts since the formation of the Burgh :

John G. Halkett, elected June, 1885-in office 1 year.

Jas. M‘Isaac, elected July, 1886-in office 9 years 4 months,

John Smith, Jr., elected Now., 1895-in office 4 years.

Alex. Guthrie, elected Nov., 1899-in office 4 years 8 months,

Robt. Blakely, elected Aug., 1904-in office 2 years 3 months.

David Donaldson, elected Novr., 1906-the present Chief Magistrate.

The following have been Magistrates :-

Dr. Kinnier. T. Miller, Joiner. James Fullerton. P. W. Hunter. James Campbell. Hezekiah Arnott. Thomas Glen. John Ross. Edward Miller. Alex. S. Millar. Robert Duncan. John Christie. Thomas Miller, Builder. Wm. MacGavin. John Smith, Jun. James Miller, Jr.

Thomas Miller, Builder, and A. S. Millar received appointments as Police-Judges.

The longest to hold office under the Burghal administration is Thomas Miller, Builder, who has been a Bailie for the long term of 11 years and a-half, Police-Judge for 3 years, and Councillor for 18 years. He was six times elected, and was Councillor from 1888 to 1906 continuously.

The following is the present constitution :- Provost Donaldson. Councillor Blakely. Bailie Christie. Councillor Thomson. Bailie James Miller, Jr. Councillor Amott. Judge A. S. Millar. Councillor Auld. Councillor James Fulton.

The Seal of the Burgh is one of curious and appropriate interest, and was only adopted after long and serious consideration of the local features it was intended to symbolise - the chief impression being of the old Salt Pans, so significant of its staple industry.

That part of the building which is now the Council Room John Banks, the saddler, of Quay Street, who was a man of fearless integrity and fine impressive figure, was a special constable. " Amongst the notorious houses of the town," his relative tells the writer, "and the characters that frequented them, the quarrels that took place bordered sometimes on murder." The appearance of the stalwart Banks quelled every such riot on the instant. On one occasion he took two giant combatants - Highlanders they were - and banged their heads together with as much imperturbability as if they were -fighting schoolboys. Constables’ duty was no sinecure when strange ships were in the harbour and foreign sailors ran amuck. 

The Public Hall adjoining the Steeple, which, with its fluted pilasters and projecting balcony, presents a fairly imposing appearance, was designed by Howie & Walton, of Glasgow, and opened on 20th October, 1892. It rests upon the border line of the parishes of Stevenston and Ardrossan, with part of its bulk in each, and beneath it is the fabric of the old parish school. On the pinnacle of the steeple spire, some 100 feet from the ground, the town proudly displays the symbol of its vanished trade - a sloop - which, taking the place of a weather-cock, yields its iron-rigged figure to every breeze, and turns daintily on its iron-supporting rod. A unique feature of the Town Hall is that the keeper is a lady---Miss Hamilton-whose capacity for management and genial courtesies make her popular amongst townspeople and visiting strangers. 

The Kirk of the Burghers. Peggy Vicar’s.

On turning into Countess Street in the olden time, the eye rested quickly upon the genteel house to the right, with its little genteel door and knocker, where lived the three Miss Wilsons. The house maintained its pleasant odour of gentility until removed to be turned into other uses than a stately residence. Their place has become a depot of Italian refreshments. It belonged to William Thomson, skipper. South of it was the house of Captain William Service. A stretch of ground on the right was included in the territory of James How, the skipper. This became broken into many parts. Skipper How’s own house, which had survived from 1714, was re-built nearly a hundred years later, and is now the possession of Leah Caplin. 

The most interesting memorials of that side concern the site a little further on, for it was the scene of the early devotions of the Burghers. The ground in 1791 belonged to John Lusk, shipmaster and inn-keeper. There the Burghers built a small kirk only 52 feet long and 36 broad, with a stair at the side. The little meeting house, with its unrailed stair, looked, in later days a very plain building indeed. The Reverend Mr Orr, of Fenwick, used to take pleasure in recalling the plight in which the congregation found themselves owing to an unfriendly proprietor who built a wall round the church, on which occasion minister and worshippers had to mount the wall to get to their service. The first ordination took place in a quarry, and sometimes a park was rented for a tent. It was 1798 when the late Rev. James Ellis was called, and under that remarkable man, the church rose from its earlier depression, His humour was as broad as his learning. He gave young preachers " dogs’ wages," as they had "to bark for their meat." Sometimes, in a fit of learned abstraction, he would seize old John Brown, the church officer, by the hair of the head ; and to a restless child, would say, " Tam Baillie, if ye dinna sit still I’ll name ye." Here the "Associate Burgher Congregation or Society in Saltcoats" remained until its name became shorter and its principles more modernised. The successors of that congregation now worship on the Chapel Brae. The railway came, and swamped in its operations the Burghers’ house which went to make way for a large business establishment. Outside of the one-time Burgher Church there lay the angle of the tattered delta round which the old " Goat Vennel " from the village ran towards Kyleshill. The square open space formed a little "loan," and, straggling eastwards between the lane and the street continued by the Earl of Eglinton, there lay the strange collection of houses, back-houses, and gardens which it is difficult to realise with proper definiteness to-day. At the very angle was the little refreshment shop of Sarah Ramsay. How often, through those crooked pends and alleys, ran old Bob Reid, the drummer, proclaiming the Sarah’s tripe. In the recessed space or loan stood a famous old well. In continuation, past Sarah’s, were several houses terminating in M‘Alister’s bakery establishment. In the triangular space itself lay the houses, yards, and gardens of the Wilsons, the successors in the carrying trade of Saltcoats in pre-railway times. Near the top of the lane, beyond the kirk, stood a two-storey house with a weaver’s shop below - the school of which Mrs Aitken was the preceptress. Onwards, the lane took the traveller to the gates of the railway. To restore the way which has become erased from modern Saltcoats, one has to indulge in much mental picturing. There were two crossings, one from the main thoroughfare at the foot of Raise Street, and another nearer Kyleshill, known as "Tam M’Whirter’s Gates.,,

The space within the angled territory of the Goat Vennel still bore the old name of " the Flush." To the west of Daniel M‘Alister’s, and latterly Jean M‘Alister’s, was the wall separating William Wilson’s ground. This and the surrounding territory had all at one time appertained to Thomas Bradshaw, as one of the historic nine yards, with right to a ninth part of the Bowbridge lands. 

On the far side of the church the ground that had belonged in 1773 to Samuel Mitchell, innkeeper in Saltcoats, represented the commencement of the historic territory known as " Orr’s Nine Yard." A quarter of a century later it passed to his daughter, who married John Lusk, the granter of the lands of the Burgher Church. There stood a two-storey slate house facing the Goat Lane, with a piece of square ground at the back and a large walled garden. Here had been the house, barn, and stable of Robert Lusk, merchant in Saltcoats, adjoining the ground belonging to Robert How, son of the famous Grisel. To the south lay Captain Brown’s house, and to the north that of Agnes Hutcheson, Robert How’s wife. In 1730 this whole ground came to Mary Jack. Mary conferred it on John Watt, shoemaker, in 1737. The possessions came to Thomas Vicar, in Bury, his heir, in 1830, then to Margaret Vicar; and this is why they obtained the name of " Peggy Vicar’s" The houses were so far sunk below the line of the road (each with its little green and dip well) that coming over the Kyles Bridge, the feet of the pedestrian were as high as the ridge tiles of Peggy Vicar’s roofs. 

Part of the property had been derived from Robert Stevenson in 1855 ; and when the railway came his trustees conveyed it to the Company, who, under an Act of 1821, formed a new road alongside, to the east of the Goat Lane. Here Harris had his refreshment house, and his building line on the east of the lane ; but as the space between his property and the new road would have caused the Company to build a retaining wall, the line was brought forward and everything levelled as it is now. Upon this cluster of the Vicars’, so thoroughly illustrative of the old village life, there were erected the handsome mansion and offices of the Royal Bank of Scotland, surrounded by beautiful trees, and with every mark of later elegance and gentility. The original Royal Bank Buildings lay at the foot of Raise Street, touching the railway, and as these fell under the railway operations, a new site had to be found. 

We have now emerged upon the old street up the hill from the Harbour, and formerly known as Kyle Street, before falling under the designation of Kyleshill. Between this and the eastern Bay there lies a palatial stretch of buildings ranging from Finlay’s Brae to the outermost point of the Bay. This is the stately Mission Coast Home, erected under a scheme of philanthropy unexcelled in the West, and conferring upon the convalescent throughout Scotland the benefit of a comfortable home under able and considerate management. The promoters purchased, in May, 1869, properties with gardens facing the sea. Before then there were only two two-storey cots forming ten apartments on elevated ground, and one a few feet higher. To the most elevated a verandah was added, with stairs leading downwards to beautiful walks and gardens. The Home was opened in May, 1866, when there existed only a room and kitchen containing five old women from the Calton district of Glasgow. By 1874 a new hall was opened, capable of accommodating 200 people, and additions have been gradually made since. Now, looked at from the East Promenade at night, with lights hushed down and a sense of twilight glory resting upon the building, one might be pardoned for imagining it to be like a little palace built in air. The Institution was the foundation of Messrs Smith and Bryden, whose enterprise has formed the theme of many pens.

Helen Morial’s Hedge. Jean Morial’s Lane.

The house and yard of Elizabeth Mitchell, which in later days belonged to Captain Hooks, lay alongside the house of Robert Watt, and at the beginning of the century belonged to William Blackwood, tide-waiter in Saltcoats. Robert Watt’s house now lies buried below the Royal Bank. In the shady hollow, beneath Kyleshill Bridge, lay a series of ancient cottages with, from the rising ground, an alternative descent by a long straggled series of steps or a deep slope. These formed a quaint feature by day, and at night the rush-light from the windows-unless closely barred and shuttered-presented a feature of older Saltcoats quite in keeping with the picturesque environment of the rocky height under which they sheltered. In front of the houses lay the ascending road to the Flush Riggs and the Moor. To the south was "the road to Kyleshill," which became a street. John How, weaver and cloth merchant, had his possession to the west. Northwards was a lane (which in the Sixties gained the distinction of the " Roading " ), involving an ancient part known as "Willie Auld’s Rigg." The western division of this singular cluster within the shadow of the Vennel was bordered on the west by a thorn hedge which had been put up by one of the Morials, and dedicated for ever afterwards to a daughter of that proud and interesting family. Until well into the Fifties it received amongst the villagers a no more pretentious name than that of "Helen Morial’s Hedge." On higher ground lay the plot which had been at one time Mathie Auld’s, and afterwards known to the world by the familiar title of " Roadman’s." Roadman’s little enclosure lay to the west of the road that led from the Kyle Street to the Goathouse, and it had a connection with the village life as early as 1719, when it was owned by John Cunningham. 

This homely territory, remarkably encircled by so many domestic and other interests, dated from before 1700. One authority on the Flush Green remembers the successor, in name at least, of John Deane, "of the state of New Jersey," who came after Sandy Dunlop. John Duncan, sailor, had his interest there in 1847, in which year Dan M‘Alister became owner of all. Then came the days of change. In 1864 the Ardrossan and Johnstone Railway drew its iron way across the little cots. Away went the home of the Vicars. The knights of the pickaxe and the shovel drove their way through the back greens and front patches that had been the early glory of the Flush Brow. The pioneers of progress broke down the intervening thorns and rose bushes and clinging "sweet-William," as they marked the rustic way across to the higher flights. Locomotives came panting through the once rural territory, pursuing their remorseless way into what had been the pride of the Morials, the immortal Hedge that was Helen’s, of which not a shadow now remains, but which a sympathetic posterity must acknowledge as a tender and interesting landmark of the life of the villagers of Saltcoats, and the simplicity and romantic realness of those who dwelt in its then undisturbed serenity. It crossed where the railway lies now, almost at the point which became afterwards known as "Tam M‘Whirter’s Gates." Robert Roadman’s house lay at the corner going from Kyleshill. 

There stood there until later days another of the many places of refreshment upon which Saltcoats seems to have prided itself. It was a "Treacle-Ale" shop. There came the young apprentices of the weaving trade to " hansel" their advancement to the status of journeyman ; and many a merry evening has been spent in that attractive corner. The Morials, who had shown such affectionate interest in the lanes and by-ways of the village, had bestowed upon the little pathway out of the town at the extremity of their possession, the name of "Jean Morial’s Lane." The name has disappeared from public memory and usage, but the place itself, unlike Helen’s Hedge, remains, for the pathway blossomed out, as the days went by, into a street, which is now " Nine Yard Street." Here we stand upon the borders of the "Town Head Mailling," at one time entirely occupied by Robert Auld, and continued by Michael Auld and his family. A century or more ago the lowing of Michael Auld’s " kye " were the only sounds that broke the silence of that beautiful neighbourhood. The odd-looking triangle formed by Nine Yard Street falls to be accounted for in this way. Before the bridge came, the gardens extended in their sweet spaciousness down to the very water edge. It was in 1840 that the possessor of ground at the corner sold property to the Kyleshill road trustees, who then threw their bridge across the gardens. When the Aulds leased the ground of Nine Yard Street a provision was made that three feet of ground should be left " through the yards." No road came that way, and the stage-coach trundled past the foot of the yards close to the sea. Out of this little ribbon of pathway evolved the public road now leading to Stevenston. Eastward lay a piece of ground called the " Beer yard." The great space near the sea, partially covered by the stately houses beyond the Mission Coast Home, was called "Thomas Reid’s Bigg yard." Widow Dunlop, the ancestress of the first captain of the first vessel of Saltcoats, lived near by on the brow of the hill. At the eastern corner of the Reid’s yard was Archie Wilson’s "public," the first halting place for a stranger; the waters came close up to the door. Sometimes a drouthy pilgrim would come out of the Inn to walk upon the creamy foam of the advancing waters. Sometimes a lodger awoke to find his table an island, and the bed he lay in a peninsula. Between the higher ground and Kyleshill, which in these days was not much more than a grass covered rock, there existed no obstruction, and if one had thrown a stone down that rocky decline it would have splashed into the sea without interruption. 

Before 1839 the top of Kyleshill formed a stretch of waste ground with such greenery as is still visible at that part. In that year it had become necessary to relieve the congestion at the Town’s School by forming a new school at Kyleshill. Old Kyleshill School was built in 1839, chiefly through the exertions of the Rev. Dr. Landsborough (who was then minister of Stevenston Church), and the late William Brown of Park-end. It was known as Kyleshill Subscription School. It was taken over by the School Board of Stevenston after the passing of the Scottish Education Act of 1872. George Tait, the present master, was appointed in November, 1876. When he took charge of the school, along with Ex-Bailie Duncan as a pupil teacher, the number of pupils was only 64; but within three years the average rose to 179, while the accommodation provided was for only 120. It was finally agreed to build a new school to accommodate 300. The old building was vacated in September, 1885. Since then the school has been enlarged twice. Many successful pupils have received their early education at Kyleshill; one of the most distinguished being John M‘Innes, Lecturer in Latin in Victoria College, Manchester. 

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