Ordnance gazetteer of Scotland > Volume 4

KIRKCALDY
at times in a notable, if rather inexplicable, manner, as
the following table shows : — -
Date.
No. of Vessels.
Tonnage.
1831, .
. i 95
10,610
1861, .
. | 76*
7,458
1868, .
35
3.6S9
1871, .
29
3,496
1875, .
27
3,309
18S0, .
. 1 21
2,290
1883, .
. | 18
1,565
Kirkcaldy has a fishing fleet of 18 boats, with 27
fisher men and boys. As a port, it extends from Fife
Ness on the E to Downey Point on the W, and
comprises the creeks of Crail, Cellardyke, Anstruther,
Pittenweem, Elie, Largo, Leven, Methil, Buckhaven,
Wemyss, Dysart, Kinghorn, Burntisland, Aberdour.
Kirkcaldy harbour, situated near the E end of the royal
burgh, was tidal until some years after 1843, when it
was considerably improved. Not less than £40,000
were spent in constructing an outer harbour of 1J acres,
an inner harbour of 3 acres, a dock of 2§ acres, and
extensive wharfage. In 1875 further improvements
were proposed. There is considerable likelihood that
before long a tramway will run through the High Street
of Kirkcaldy, and that a new Fife railway line will have
Kirkcaldy for one of its stations.
Earliest of the celebrated natives of Kirkcaldy was
Sir Michael Scott, who lived in the 13th century, and
on account of his researches in natural science — wide
for his day — was held a wizard by the ignorant. Henry
Balnaves (died 1579) held different political appoint-
ments, having been Lord of Session, Secretary of State,
Depute-Keeper of the Privy Seal. George Gillespie
(1613-48), his brother, Patrick (b. 1617), principal of the
University of Glasgow, and John Drysdale (1718-88) were
well known as learned divines, who took an active part
in the affairs of the Church. Robert Adam (1728-92)
was a famous architect of his day, having been the
designer of the University and Register House of Edin-
burgh and the Infirmary, Glasgow. He sat as member
of parliament for Kinross in 1768, and on his death
was buried in "Westminster Abbey. Adam Smith (1723-
90) was educated at Kirkcaldy Grammar School, Glas-
gow University, and Baliol College, Oxford. He was
appointed Professor of Logic in Glasgow University in
1751, and of Moral Philosophy in 1752, from the last of
which chairs he retired in 1764 in order to accompany
the young Duke of Buccleuch on a continental tour. In
1766 he settled down quietly in his birthplace to write
his great work, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of
the Wealth of Nations (1776). Among other of his works
may be mentioned as next important to The Wealth of
Nations, his Theory of the Moral Sentiments (1759).
Three men deserve mention as inhabitants of Kirk-
caldy at one time or another, one of them because of
his peculiar pulpit gifts, and the other two on account
of the high eminence they afterwards attained to. The
first of these was Mr Shirra, minister of the Burgher
Church of Kirkcaldy in 1750. His peculiar style of
preaching, his intense earnestness, and the broad vein
of humour that ran through his ministrations in the
pulpit and out of it, are proverbial. Thomas Carlyle
and Edward Irving may be mentioned together because
of the close connection between them that arose from
their residing in Kirkcaldy at the same time. When
Carlyle went to the 'lang toon' in 1816 as teacher of
mathematics, etc. in its burgh school, he was welcomed
by Irving in the most cordial fashion, and given ' will
and waygate ' over all the latter's possessions. Carlyle
in a certain way supplanted Irving, but that was not
able to abate even to the slightest degree the friendship
that existed between them. ' But for Irving,' wrote
Carlyle, ' I had never known what the communion of
man with man means.' And this communion was
drawn closer by their frequent intercourse with one
another in the woods of Raith or on the beach of Kirk-
caldy — 'a mile of the smoothest sand' — upon which
416
1 74 sailing vessels and 2 steamers.
KIRKCHRIST
they were wont to walk in the moonlight, or in Irving's
'Utterly library' amid French and Latin classics.
Doubtless it was mainly owing to Irving that Carlyle
was able to say in after years, ' I always rather liked
Kirkcaldy to this day. ' Carlyle spent three years there,
and Irving spent seven years. After the latter had
become a famous preacher, he revisited it in 1828 and
preached in the parish church, his audience being so
large that the gallery fell and killed 28 people.
The parish of Kirkcaldy is now of comparatively small
extent, but till 1650 it comprised the present parish of
Abbotshall. Bounded N by Kinglassie and Dysart, E
by Dysart and the Firth of Forth, and S and "W by
Abbotshall, it has an utmost length from N to S of 2f
miles, a varying breadth of 6J and 8J furlongs, and an
area of 1248J acres, of which 71J are foreshore. The
coast-line, 7| furlongs in extent, is level and sandy ; ad-
jacent to the beach is a belt of flat land ; and the sur-
face thence inland first makes a somewhat abrupt ascent,
and then continues to rise in easy gradient, till near Dun-
nikier House it attains an elevation of 316 feet above
sea-level. The rocks belonged to the Carboniferous
Limestone series, but include some intersecting trap-
dykes. Coal occurs in seams from 9 inches to 3J feet
thick, and at Dunnikier has been worked to a consider-
able depth. Iron ore, in globular masses, lies dispersed
through much of the coal-field ; and was formerly
worked for the Carron Company. The soil, in the low
tracts light, on the southern part of the higher grounds
a dry rich loam, on the grounds further N is clayey,
cold, and wet. About 180 acres are under wood ; and
all the rest of the land, except what is occupied by
houses and roads, is in tillage. Dunnikier House,
noticed separately, is the only mansion, and its pro-
prietor is much the largest in the parish, 3 others holding
each an annual value of £500 and upwards, 40 of between
£100 and £500, 75 of from £50 to £100, and 165 of from
I £20 to £50. The seat of a presbytery in the synod of
Fife, this parish is divided ecclesiastically into Kirkcaldy
proper and St James's quoad saera parish, the former a
living worth £413. Landward valuation (1SS3) £7273,
lis. 2d. Pop. of entire parish (1801) 3248, (1821) 4452,
(1841) 5275, (1861) 6100, (1871) 7003, (1881) 8528, of
whom 5739 were in the ecclesiastical parish of Kirkcaldy,
and 2789 in that of St James.— Ord. Sur., sh. 40, 1867.
The presbytery of Kirkcaldy comprehends the quoad
civilia parishes of Abbotshall, Auchterderran, Aucher-
tool, Burntisland, Dysart, Kennoway, Kinghorn, King-
lassie, Kirkcaldy, Leslie, Markinch, Scoonie, and
Wemyss, and the quoad racj-ct parishes of Invertiel, Kirk-
caldy-St James, Lochgelly, Methil, Milton of Balgonie,
Pathhead, Thornton, and West Wemyss, with the chapel-
riesof Linktown and Sinclairtown. Pop. (1S71) 56,868,
(1881) 64,775, of whom 11,582 were communicants of the
Church of Scotland in 1878.— The Free Church has a
presbytery of Kirkcaldy, with churches of Buckhaven,
Burntisland, Dysart, Kennoway, Kinghorn, Kinglassie,
Invertiel, Abbotshall, Gallatown, Pathhead, Dunnikier,
St Brycedale, Leslie, Leven, Lochgelly, Markinch, and
Wemyss, which 18 churches together had 4S14 com-
municants in 1883. — The United Presbyterian Church
has a presbytery of Kirkcaldy, with three churches
in Kirkcaldy, 2 in Leslie, and 13 in respectively An-
struther, Buckhaven, Burntisland, Colinsburgh, Crail,
Dysart, Innerleven, Kennoway, Kinghorn, Largo, Leven,
Markinch, and Pittenweem, which 18 churches together
had 4S65 members in 18S2.
Kirkchrist, an ancient parish in the S of Kirkcud-
brightshire, now forming the southern district of Twyn-
holm parish. It remained a separate parish till at least
1605, probably till 1654 ; but was certainly annexed to
Twynholm long before 1684. Its church and church-
yard were situated on the right bank of the river Dee,
opposite the town of Kirkcudbright ; and the church is
still represented by some ruins, while the churchyard
continues to be in use. A nunnery anciently stood
somewhere on the southern border, and is commemorated
in the names of two farms and a mill — High Nunton,
Low Nunton, and Nunmill. — Ord. Sur., sh. 5, 1S57.