Architecture Notes

Event ID 841362

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Architecture Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/841362

NMRS REFERENCE

Ref. Photo 1906

Originally the old Church of St John the Baptist, which stood on the Sands of Ayr from the 13th Century until Cromwell built his great Citadel in 1645 to command the Town and Harbour of Ayr - when the Church and its graveyard were enclosed by the Citadel.

The Church was put to military use and later demolished, but the Tower, which had been used as an Observation Post, was retained.

The Citadel walls were breached around 1857, and the area put up for sale in Edinburgh when it was bought by Mr John Miller who arrived before members of Ayr Town Council.

Known locally as "Baron Miller", he turned the Tower into a gentleman's Gothic Residence with additional towers, and a fine garden was laid out. He lived in the Fort Castle along with his two sisters, and a niece and her husband and family.

When the old man and his sisters died, his neice and her family sold the Tower to the Marquis of Bute who removed those parts added by Baron Miller and restored it to its original form as shown in the oldest known picture of the period.

The Marquis spent a lot of money in "restoring" the Tower, and exposed a beautiful rose window on the West, before presenting the Tower to the Town of Ayr in 1914.

The last witch to be burned in Scotland is said to have been buried in the grounds around the Tower, and the two escape passages are believed to reach the shore from the Tower.

L A Murdoch,

1980

Photographed on behalf of the Buildings of Scotland publications.

RCAHMS 2009