Who Fired the First Shot?
Eighty Letters to Canada
Those of you who enjoyed John Sproat’s talk on the Sproat Family https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TseCbodllY&t=9s will be pleased to hear that the book has now been published.
The promised book, ‘Eighty Letters to Canada’ is hot off the printing presses and is now available in the UK! This limited print run of books is being distributed by John Sproat of Glenlochar, Castle Douglas. His cousin and co-author Paul Sproat is having the identical book printed and distributed independently in Canada.
The letters tell an extensive, interesting and diverse story of the first half of the Nineteenth Century, and one that covers anything from the state of Galloway agriculture to tales of colonial emigration, from life on ocean-going clippers to gossip from Borgue, schisms in the Church to life in Canada and Australia, and much about the families living in the area. Did you know that Chilean ladies had smaller feet than Scottish ones, or that Andrew Main, an alumnus of Borgue Academy, lost an arm in his uncle’s joinery business in Chapelton Row, and emigrated to teach Latin and Greek in Poughkeepsie, NY State? Such a myriad of gems!
The cost is £17.00 per book
Roon the Kep- what does it mean? Margaret Wright and Alan James investigate.
In Gatehouse of Fleet the short walk from the church, along the road to Barwhill and then back to Gatehouse via the War memorial is known as going roon ‘The Cape’. The derivation has always been a mystery until Stuart Nicholl told Margaret Wright about the ‘kep’ or sluice gate. The old expression he says was going roon ‘the kep’.
After the last spell of heavy rain, the garden at Barwhill [near the walk’s turning point] flooded slightly and a large hole appeared. Stuart Nichol, a local builder and dyker, told Margaret that a collapsed kep had caused
the flooding. He explained that kep is an old term for a type of sluice gate that held back water in the lade system—overnight, for example—before releasing it in the morning to power the mill. She suspects there was once a holding pond near Barwhill.
The water is part of the lade system from Loch Whinyeon. It runs alongside the road from Barlay Mill and then underground through the garden of Barwhill.
The water from here could either be sent on down to the large mill pond at the foot of the Cut (by the war memorial) and then down to the Birtwhistle Mills or it could be diverted off down the Cape Road to the Gatehouse/Fleet Farm next to the church.
Alan’s research into the word kep:
Parton Kirk Appeal
Parton Kirk, the burial place of the world-famous physicist James Clerk Maxwell, is being sold by the Church of Scotland.
The community of Parton, has been offered the exclusive right to buy the Kirk with the idea of developing a James Clerk Maxwell Science and Community Centre to celebrate the life and work of this great mind, a scientist who laid the foundations of our modern society, yet remains relatively unknown outside the world of science and engineering
Clerk Maxwell is known as the ‘Father of Modern Science’, and his classical theory of electromagnetic radiation (the first theory to describe electricity, magnetism and light as different manifestations of the
same phenomenon) is the basis of all our modern communication.
This places him between Newton and Einstein in the chronology of scientific discovery that shapes our understanding of the physical world, and yet he still remains relatively unknown in his own country!
To help Parton secure the Kirk for their community, and to celebrate the life and achievements of this giant of science you can donate here. https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/savepartonkirk?fbclid=IwY2xjawUHgV9wZG9mAWV4dG4DYWVtAjExAHNydGMGYXBwX2lkEDIyMjAzOTE3ODgyMDA4OTIAAR5-LKxM8DzsLj-YC-Ka3Erog1TKqJZkyA-4IfFhFXzWlphiN0NX41aaS4ZMtw_aem_GF85iuKqzpUmpFTrZ0cbrA
Programme/Membership Form 2026 – 2027
The programme and membership form for 2026/2027 can be accessed here:
Talks are held in Kirkcudbright Parish Church Hall at 7.30pm on the second Wednesday of the month from October to March. They are also live streamed via Zoom.
Annual KHS membership of £15 gives free entry to all talks, in person or on Zoom. KHS members also have free Zoom access to the lectures of both the D&G Natural History and Antiquarian Society and the Ayrshire Archaeological and Natural History Society.
Visitors (in person or on Zoom) are welcome to attend for a fee of £5 per meeting (Zoom access payable by BACS).
