Ordnance gazetteer of Scotland > Volume 5

MAXWELTON
roods, is about two-thirds of a mile in length, and
nearly the same in breadth. Maxwelltown has a station
on the line to Castle-Douglas, the large Troqueer tweed
mills (1866-70), a dye work, 2 saw-mills, nursery-
grounds, etc. ; and it shares considerably in the trade
and commerce of Dumfries. The Established church of
Maxwelltown quoad sacra parish is a Gothic edifice, with
a spire and 800 sittings, built at a cost of £2000 in lieu
of a previous chapel of ease, which was burned on 28
Sept. 1842. A handsome Free church was built in
1866, and a public school in 1876, the latter costing
£2200, and accommodating 359 children. The town
originally bore the name of Bridgend, and was such a
disorderly village, that, according to the byword, ' You
might trace a rogue all over the kingdom, but were sure
to lose him at the Bridgend of Dumfries.' But in 1810
it was erected into a free burgh of barony, under the
name of Maxwelltown, in honour of Mr Maxwell of
Nithsdale, its superior, and was placed under the
government of a provost, 2 bailies, and 4 councillors ;
and it speedily underwent great improvement, as to at
once its police, its trade, the condition of its houses, and
the manners of its people. The general police act has
also been adopted with good effect ; and the manage-
ment of this is reposed in 12 commissioners, 3 of whom
are police magistrates. Sheriff circuit small debt courts
are held on the second Tuesday of January and June,
the third Tuesday of March, and the fourth Tuesday of
September, and justice of peace small debt courts on the
first Thursday of every month. Valuation (1884)
£15,142. Pop. (1831) 3230, (1861) 3599, (1871) 4198,
(1881) 4455, of whom 2425 were females, and 2070 were
in the quoad sacra parish. Houses (1881) 965 inhabited,
64 vacant, 5 building. — Ord. Sur., sh. 9, 1863. See
also Dumfries and Troqdeek.
Maxwelton, a village in East Kilbride parish, Lanark-
shire, h mile E by N of East Kilbride town.
Maxwelton, a mansion in Glen cairn parish, Dumfries-
shire, near the left bank of Cairn Water, 3J miles ESE of
Moniaive. The estate — 1810 acres, of £1531 annual
value — has long been held by the Laurie family, one of
whom was the ' Annie Laurie ' of song. — Ord. Sur., sh.
9, 1863.
Maybole, a town and a coast parish of Carrick, Ayr-
shire. The town, lying 3| miles inland, and 200 to
350 feet above sea-level, has a station on the Ayr and
Girvan section (1857-60) of the Glasgow and South-
Western railway, 9 miles S by W of Ayr, 49i SSW of
Glasgow, 87 SW of Edinburgh, and 67i NNE" of Port-
patrick. It stands on the slope and partly along the
skirts of a broad-based, flattened hill, with south-east-
ward exposure, the summit of the hill intervening
between it and the Firth of the Clyde ; but it com-
mands a pleasant and somewhat extensive view over
one-half of the points of the compass into the interior
of Carrick. An old rhyme, using one of several obsolete
variations of the town's ancient name, says —
* Minnibole '3 a dirty hole.
It sits aboon a mire.'
The notion conveyed by these words, of the town being
situated on miry ground, is now, and probably was
always, incorrect. A broad belt of deep green meadow,
nearly as flat as a bowling-green, stretches along the
base of the hill, and anciently seems to have been a
marsh ; but it could not have been a marsh of a miry
kind, or otherwise than green and meadowy ; nor does
it, even at present, form the site of more than a very
small and entirely modern part of the town. The
ancient site is everywhere declivitous, abounding with
copious springs of pure water ; and not improbably was
clothed in its natural state with heath. Two sets of
names, both very various in their orthography, but
represented by the forms Maiboil and Minnybole, were
anciently given to the town. They have greatly per-
plexed etymologists ; but, according to Col. Robertson, are
derived from the Gaelic magh-baile, ' town of the plain
or field.' The lower streets of the town, called Kirk-
lands, Newyards, and Ballony, are not within the limits
14
MAYEOLE
of the burgh of barony, and consist almost wholly of
artisans' houses and workshops, tidier and better than
similar buildings in many other towns. The main street
runs nearly due NE, and — with exception of a short
thoroughfare striking off westward at right anglesfrom its
middle — occupies the highest ground within the burgh.
A considerable space, sloping between it and the low-
lying suburbs, is disposed to a small extent in the
ancient burying-ground with the relics of the collegiate
church ; to a greater extent in four or five incompact
and irregularly arranged streets ; and to a yet greater
extent in fields and gardens which give all the intersect-
ing thoroughfares a straggling or detached appearance,
and impart to the whole town a rural, airy, and health-
ful aspect.
The only parts of the town which draw the attention
of strangers are Main Street and what is called Kirk
Wynd. These are narrow and of varying width, quite
destitute of every modern adornment, and guiltless of
all the ordinary graces of a fine town ; yet they possess
many features of antique stateliness, decayed and
venerable magnificence, which strongly image the aristo-
cratic parts of Edinburgh during the feudal age. As
capital of Carrick, the place anciently wielded more
influence over its province than the modern metropolis
does over Scotland, and contained the winter residences
of a large proportion of the Carrick barons. As seat,
too, of the courts of justice of Carrick bailiary — the place
where all cases of importance in a roistering and liti-
gating age were tried — it derived not a little outward
respectability from the numbers and wealth of the legal
practitioners who made it their home. In connection,
too, with its collegiate church and its near vicinity to
Crossraguel Abbey, it borrowed great consequence from
the presence of influential churchmen, who, in a dark
age, possessed more resources of power and opulence than
most of the nobility. No fewer than 28 baronial man-
sions, statelj', turreted, and strong, are said to have
stood within its limits. Out of several of these which
still remain, two figure in association with such inte-
resting history that they deserve to be specially noticed.
The chief is the ancient residence of the Ailsa or
Cassillis family, the principal branch of the Kennedys.
This, standing near the middle of the town, bears the
name of the Castle par excellence, and is a lofty, well-
buUt, imposing pile, one of the strongest and finest of
its class. It is said to have been the place of confine-
ment for life of the Countess of Cassillis, who eloped
with the Gipsy chieftain, Johnny Faa. (See Cassillis.)
The Earls of Cassillis, directly and through collateral
branches of their family, wielded such power over the
province that they were known as the ' Kings of Carrick ;'
and they used the castle of Maybole as the metropolitan
palace of their 'kingdom,' whose limits were thus defined
in an old-world rhyme : —
• 'Twixt Wigtown and tlie town o' Ayr,
Portpatrick and the Cruives o' Cree,
You sliall not get a lodging there
Except ye court a Kennedy.'
Gilbert, fourth Earl, who lived in the unsettled period
succeeding the commencement of the Reformation,
pushed his power into Galloway, and in 1575 acquired
the large possessions of the Abbey of Glenluoe, just
five years after his roasting of Allan Stewart, the com-
mendator of Ckossraguel. A feud, arising from or
aggravated by that crime, between the Earls of CassUlis
and the Lairds of Bargany, issued at last in very
tragical events. In Dec. 1601 the Earl of Cassillis rode
out from Maybole Castle at the head of 200 armed fol-
lowers to waylay the Laird of Bargany as he rode from
Ayr to his house on the Water of Girvan ; and on the
farm of West Enoch, near the town, he forced on the
Laird a wholly unequal conflict. The Laird, mortally
wounded, was carried from the scene of the onset to
Maybole, that there, should he show any sign of re-
covery, he might be despatched by the Earl as ' Judge
Ordinar ' of the country ; and thence he was removed to
Ayr, where he died in a few hours. Flagrant though
the deed was, it not only — througu bribery and state