Dalry | As described in F.H. Groome's Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland (1882-4)

Descriptive Gazetteer Entry for Dalry

Dalry, a town and a parish in Cunninghame district, Ayrshire. The town stands on a rising-ground between Rye and Caaf Waters, and at the right side of the river Garnock, 3 furlongs W by N of Dalry Junction on the main line of the Glasgow and South-Western railway, this being 15½ miles SW of Paisley, 22½ SW of Glasgow, 70¼ WSW of Edinburgh, 11¼ NW of Kilmarnock, 9 NE of Ardrossan, 6¾ N by W of Irvine, and 17½ N by W of Ayr. A tract of country around it was anciently under special royal jurisdiction, and bore the name of the King's District or Valley (Gael. dail-righ); and a field on which its first houses were built was called the King's Field (Gael. croftanrigh), a name that it still retains in the slightly modified form of Croftangry. The parish church, St Margaret's, dependent once upon Kilwinning Abbey, and originally occupying a different site, was rebuilt on that field about the year 1608, and gave origin to the town. The site is eligible enough for a seat of traffic and industry, and commands an extensive southward and north-eastward view; but, owing to great freshets in the Garnock, the Rye, and the Caaf, it sometimes has almost the aspect of an island. The town was long no more than a petty hamlet, in 1700 comprising but six dwelling-houses, and about the beginning of this century numbering barely 800 inhabitants; afterwards it rose somewhat speedily to the dimensions of a smallish town, with a population of about 2000 in 1835. Some nine years later it started into sudden importance as a seat of business for the great neighbouring iron-works of Blair and Glengarnock; and then assumed, along with its environs, an appearance so different from what it had borne before, that a visitor acquainted with it only in its former condition would hardly have known it for the same place. Now consisting of twelve streets, it contains great numbers of well-built modern houses and not a few excellent shops, and has a post office, with money order, savings' bank, insurance, and telegraph departments, branches of the British Linen Co., Clydesdale, and Union banks, 16 insurance agencies, 4 hotels, gas-works, town buildings, with library and reading-room, a Good Templars' hall, assembly rooms, 3 woollen factories, a worsted mill, an oil and stearine factory, etc- Thursday is market-day, and a fair is held on 31 July and 1 August. A gravitation water supply, capable of affording 130,000 gallons per diem, has been introduced at a cost of £9000; and in the centre of the town is a handsome granite fountain. The parish church was rebuilt in 1771, and again in 1871-73, the present being a cruciform Gothic edifice, with 1100 sittings, stained windows of Munich glass, and a tower and spire 124 feet high. Other places of worship are the West Established church, a Free church, a U.P. church (508 sittings), and St Palladins' Roman Catholic church (1851; 500 sittings). Besides a public school at Burnside and Kersland Barony school at Den, the 3 public schools of Blairmains, Townend, and West End (enlarged at a cost of £3000), and Dalry female industrial Church of Scotland school, with respective accommodation for 100,296, 625, and 192 children, had (1880) an average attendance of 44,293,476, and 166, and grants of £32,13s., £263, 8s., £449,6s., and £130,3s. Pop. (1851) 2706, (1861) 4232, (1871) 4133, (1881) 4021. The parish contains also the villages of Blair Works, Burnside, Den, Drakemyre, and Riddens, with part of Glengarnock. Very irregular in outline, it is bounded N by Kilbirnie, NE by Beith, SE by Kilwinning, S by Kilwinning and Ardrossan, W by West Kilbride, and NW by Largs. Its utmost length, from NNW to SSE, is 9 miles; its breadth, from ENE to WSW, varies between ½ mile and 6⁷/8 miles; and its area is 19,361 acres, of which 77 are water. The river Girnock, coming in from Kilbirnie, flows 6³/8 miles south-by-westward through the interior and along the Kilbirnie and Kilwinning borders; it is followed throughout this course by the Glasgow and South-Western railway, and receives on the right hand Rye and Caaf Waters, and Bombo Burn and Dusk Water on the left. The surface, sinking in the extreme S to 85 feet above sea-level, thence rises north-eastward to 239 feet at Muirhead, 334 at Bowertrapping, and 357 near East Middlebank-north-north-westward and northward to 302 near Linn House, 869 at Gill Hill, 1099 at Baidland Hill, 1216 at Cock Law, 1261 at Green Hill, 652 at Carwinning Hill, and 1378 at Rough Hill, whose summit, however, falls just within Largs. The rocks are partly eruptive, partly carboniferous. Limestone has long been largely worked; and coal is mined of excellent quality, partly in seams from 2½ to 5 feet thick. Ironstone, of very rich quality, began to be worked about 1845, when two farms which had been sold to the Glengarnock Iron Company for £18,000 were shortly afterwards resold to the Blair Iron Company for £35,000. Agates have been found in the bed of the Rye. The soil along the Girnock is deep alluvial loam, and to the E of it is chiefly thin, cold, retentive clay. In some parts to the W of the Girnock, it is an adhesive clay; along the base of the hills, has generally a light dry character, incumbent on either limestone or trap; and elsewhere is often reclaimed moss. Antiquities, other than those of Blair and Carwinning, are cairns and a moat near the town-the Courthill Mound, which, excavated in the winter of 1872, was found to contain large deposits of human bones and ashes. The Blairs have been lairds of Blair for wellnigh seven centuries; one of the line, Sir Bryce, was foully murdered at Ayr by the English in 1296. Another of Dalry's worthies was Sir Robert Cunningham, physician to Charles II.; and Captain Thomas Craufurd of Jordanhill (1530-1603), who gallantly took Dumbarton Castle in 1571, spent the close of his life at Kersland. The chief mansions are Blair, Giffen, Kirkland, Linn, Maulside, Ryefield, Swindridgemuir, Swinlees, and Waterside; and 8 proprietors hold each an annual value of £500 and upwards, 43 of between £100 and £500,32 of from £50 to £100, and 88 of from £20 to £50. Dalry is in the presbytery of Irvine and synod of Glasgow and Ayr; the living is worth £364. West and Kersland Barony churches are chapels of ease. Valuation (1860) £70,893; (1882) £44,227; plus £6798 for railways. Pop. (1801) 832, (1831) 1246, (1841) 4791, (1851) 8865, (1861) 11,156, (1871) 10,885, (1881) 10,215.—Ord. Sur., sh. 22,1865.

Linked entities:
Feature Description:	"a town and a parish" (ADL Feature Type: "cities")
Administrative units:	Dalry ScoP Ayrshire ScoCnty
Place names:	DAIL RIGH \| DALRY
Place:	Dalry

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