Ordnance gazetteer of Scotland

AYR
tops and gable ends of the old parts of the town start
up irregularly on the further side, and are seen through
such vistas or in such arrangements as make the town
appear much larger than it really is ; and the entire
place sits so grandly on the front of the great amphi-
theatre, with the firth sweeping round it in a great
crescent blocked on the further side by the peaks of
Arran, as to look like a proud metropolis of an extensive
and highly picturesque region.
The town comprises Ayr proper on the left bank of the
river, and the continuous suburbs of Newton-on-Ayr
and Wallacetown on the right. Consisting of two nearly
equal parts, separated from each other by the river, it
must be treated here in some respects as only Ayr
proper, in others as including the two trans-fluviatile
suburbs. These, Newton and Wallacetown, have a
topography, local interests, and a history of their own,
and will be noticed in separate articles ; but they
stand compact with one another, and all mutually
contiguous to Ayr proper ; and they and it are one
town both for all business purposes and for parlia-
mentary representation ; so that all, in considerable
degree, require to be described together in the present
article.
Ayr proper, so late as the early part of the present
century, presented a motley aspect, and could boast
of little street improvement. It had just acquired the
very fine extension of "Wellington Square, but, with that
exception, it consisted mainly of mean buildings, with
fronts, gables, and corners projecting to the roadways
as chanqe or caprice had directed. Its only thorough-
fares were High Street, Carrick Vennel, Mill Vennel,
Old Bridge Street, New Bridge Street, Sandgate Street,
and Wellington Square ; and these were wretchedly
paved, very indifferently cleaned, ill-lighted, and desti-
tute of side pavements for foot-passengers. The prin-
cipal approach to it from the N, too, was then a squalid
winding way through Wallacetown ; and what is now
the principal approach through Newton was then the
water-way of a rnill-lade, blocked by an old huge build-
ing, partly mill and partly dwelling-house. But the
improvement which began in the erection of Wellington
Square went rapidly forward ; it accomplished more in
the twenty years up to 1835, than had been accomplished
during the previous hundred years ; it made a further
start at and after the opening of the railway to Glasgow
in 1840 ; and it has issued in giving the town a high
rank for at once orderliness, cleanliness, and beauty,
among the second-class towns of Scotland. Wellington
Square stands in the SW, and, as regards at once the
neatness of its houses, the spaciousness of its area, the
fineness of its situation, and the fine seaward view com-
manded by its windows, is scarcely excelled by any
modern extension in any other provincial town in the
kingdom. Handsome suburbs, with numerous villas,
have radiated from Wellington Square or arisen beyond
it; and these, with the square itself, constitute an or-
nate and urban West End. All the parts nearest the
river and toward the shore have, generally speaking,
a modern town-like aspect ; those in the centre and
towards the S continue, in considerable degree, to be
either antiquated, mean, or of village-like character.
High Street is still the principal street., winding through
both the modern regions and the old, and partaking
of the character of both.
A Roman road led from Dumfriesshire, through Gal-
loway, into Ayrshire ; passed by way of Dalmellington
and Ponessan to Ayr ; traversed the site of the town along
the line of what is now Mill Street ; and seems to have
terminated in either a military station or a harbour at
the mouth of the river. It could be traced in many
parts within the town, so late as about the beginning of
the present century ; is still traceable in the SW of Castle-
hill Gardens, within 1 J mile of the town ; and, till about
the beginning of the 18th century, formed the only line
of communication from Ayr to Galloway and Dumfries.
Some urns, culinary utensils, and other small objects,
believed to be Koman, have been found when digging
foundations in the town. — A castle was built near°the
Peal of Ayr.
AYR
mouth of the river, about 1192, by William the Lyon
and is mentioned by him as his ' new Castle of Ayr,' if
a charter erecting the town into a burgh about 1200.
Often destroyed and rebuilt in the course of successive
wars, it held a strong garrison in 1263, to watch the pro
gress of the Norwegian invasion under Haco, when it is
said to have been assaulted and captured by the Norse
men. In 1298 it was burned by Robert Bruce, to pre-
vent its becoming a stronghold of the English army, who
were marching westward to attack him ; but it was so
repaired before 1314' as then to be garrisoned by Edward
Bruce's army of 'full seven thousand men and mair,'
raised for his expedition into Ireland ; and it is said, but
on very questionable authority, to have existed down to
Cromwell's day. No trace of it appears to have been
visible for several centuries ; but its site is supposed to
have been a rising ground near the river, behind the
present academy. The burgh
seal is thought to have been
adopted from the castle, ex-
hibiting three battlemented
towers, together with em-
blems of St John the Baptist.
— A # temporary barrack,
known in history as the
Barns of Ayr, was erected
by the forces of Edward I.
of England on the SE side of
the town, probably because
they found the castle not
sufficiently commodious or
in improper condition for
their occupancy; and that barrack was in 1297 the
scene of the famous tragical exploit of Sir William
Wallace, separately noticed under Baens op Aye.— A
citadel, afterwards called the Fort, was erected by Olivei
Cromwell in 1652, on ground extending from the sea
to the site of the present Fort Street ; was built chiefly
with stones freighted from Ardrossan, and at so grent
a cost as to have made Cromwell exclaim that it seemed
to have been built of gold ; occupied an area of about
12 acres, on a hexagonal ground plan; had bastions
at the angles, with the main one close to the harbour,
and commanding the entire circuit of the fortifications,
the river's mouth, and the town itself; and enclosed
the cruciform church of St John the Baptist, founded
in the 12th century, and converted by Cromwell into
an armoury and guard-room. The citadel was con-
structed for the occupancy of a large body of troops,
both to command the town and harbour of Ayr, and to
overawe and defend the W and S of Scotland ; and it
continued to be garrisoned till the end of Cromwell's
time, but was dismantled after the Restoration. The
ground it occupied, together with such of its buildings
as remained, was given to the Earl of Eglinton, in com-
pensation for losses sustained during the Great Rebel-
lion, and, under the name of Montgomerystown, it was
created a burgh of regality, and became the seat of a con-
siderable trade. In 1853 it became the property of
Mr John Miller, who transformed the old castle into its
present state, and feued out the whole ground, which is
now occupied by elegant villas.
Part of a gateway of the town, called the Old Port,
still stood at the Townhead within the present century,
projecting on the pavement, in connection with the
present ' Tarn o' Shanter Tavern. ' — The original Tol-
tiooth, in which, according to Blind Harry, Sir William
Wallace was confined, stood in High Street, and was
supplanted by a house, long since removed, which, in
its front, had a carved head, claiming to be a bust of
Wallace. A building at the corner of Newmarket
Street and High Street contains in a niche a figure of
Wallace. The next tolbooth, known to record aa the
Old Jail, stood on the rising ground in the centre of
Sandgate, and, leaving barely room for carriages to pass,
was the first object that attracted a stranger's attention
on entering the town by the New Bridge. It was gained
from the street by a stair of nineteen steps, so that
prisoners taken into it were said to have gone up the
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