In 1882-4, Frances Groome's Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland described the Isle of Whithorn like this:
Isle of Whithorn, a seaport village in Whithorn parish, SE Wigtownshire, at the head of a small bay, 2 miles NE of Burrow Head, and 3¼ SE of Whithorn town. The most southerly village in Scotland, it stands upon what was once a rocky islet, and conducts some commerce with Whitehaven and other English ports, having a well-sheltered harbour, with a pier erected about 1790, and with capacity and external advantages sufficient to invite extensive commerce. ...
It contains remains of a Scandinavian fort or camp and the roofless ruin of ` St Ninian's Kirk,' which has been falsely identified with the Candida Casa (397 a.d.), and so believed to represent the earliest place of Christian worship in Scotland, but which was probably merely a chapel attached to the priory of Whithorn. The village has a post office, with money order, savings' bank, and telegraph departments, an inn, some tasteful villas, a lifeboat, a public school, and a neat Free church. Pop. (1831) 697, (1861) 458, (1871) 459, (1881) 352.—Ord. Sur., sh. 2, 1856.
the Isle of Whithorn through time
the Isle of Whithorn is now part of Dumfries and Galloway district. Click here for graphs and data of how Dumfries and Galloway has changed over two centuries. For statistics about the Isle of Whithorn itself, go to Units and Statistics.
GB Historical GIS / University of Portsmouth, History of the Isle of Whithorn, in Dumfries and Galloway and Wigtownshire | Map and description, A Vision of Britain through Time.
URL: https://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/place/21651
Date accessed: 27th April 2024
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