Local newspaper notices for the Stewartry itself are scarce for the hard winter of 1894–95. What survives is mainly the wider Scottish record of that long frost, together with this old postcard of Kirkcudbright’s Tollbooth standing in deep snow. The postcard gives a fair idea of how the town must have looked at the worst of it.
The frost began late in December 1894 and ran on, with only short breaks, into the second half of February. Here on the west coast the cold was less extreme than further inland, yet the snow that did fall would have settled and drifted under the north-easterly winds. Kirkcudbright, sitting on the estuary, is usually spared 
the worst of the inland storms, but that winter the snow came in on a sharp wind and stayed. The lower levels of the Tollbooth tower would have been half lost in the drifts, and the familiar High Street view narrowed by snow on the pavements and roads. The postcard of figures picking their way past the building is probably as close as we can get to the look of those days.
Further inland the difficulties would have been greater. Drifts along the quieter roads, such as the one between Dalbeattie and Auchencairn, could easily have risen above head height in places. The higher ground towards the Glenkens may have been cut off for days at a time. Farm tracks would have blocked, and the smaller settlements would have relied on neighbours to keep paths open. On the railway the Kirkcudbright branch and the line through Castle Douglas ran late or not at all when the cuttings filled. Coal deliveries and the movement of milk would have slowed until the lines could be cleared again.
January brought little relief. Fresh falls added to what already lay on the ground, and the frost was firm enough to pack the lighter drifts hard. Livestock on the more exposed farms must have suffered, though the same communities that faced the weather also organised help for older residents and turned out with shovels to cut paths where they were needed most.
By early February the weather finally eased. A slow thaw would have shown the damage to hedges, fences and the smaller wooden bridges along the back roads. Even so, the winter seems to have been remembered more for the long stretch of endurance than for outright disaster. The old postcard of the Tollbooth in deep snow remains one of the few reminders of how the Stewartry faced it.