Arran, Gargadale

A township annotated 'Ruins', comprising five unroofed buildings and one enclosure is depicted on the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Buteshire {Island of Arran} 1868, sheet ccliv). Four unroofed buildings, one of which is L-shaped, are shown on the current edition of the OS 1:10000 map (1980).

Information from RCAHMS (AKK) 22 October 1998.

The location, classification and period of this site have been reviewed.

HES Survey and Recording 29 November 2018

The ruins of this deserted township are situated on the SE side of the valley of the Sliddery Water, immediately to the S of a steep-sided gulley. The site comprises a group of five buildings arranged around a yard, three enclosures, and a corn-drying kiln, all set within a contemporary landscape that includes extensive remains of ridged cultivation. Built around 1779 and cleared of its occupants in the late 1820s, the site is a rare survival of the type of small late-18th century farmstead that was once relatively common on Arran. The distance of the farmstead from the public road and the necessity of a river crossing appear to have protected the buildings from stone-robbing. By comparison, little remains of the nearest contemporary site at Corriehiam (NR92NE 7), some 470m to the NW.

The farmstead comprises five roofless buildings the walls of which are constructed of random rubble set in an earth mortar. Two of the buildings, which were all originally thatched, are gabled, whilst the remaining three were hip-roofed; none of them exhibit any clear evidence of cruck-slots and all, to some extent, have been altered for use by shepherds. On the date of visit full access to the bracken-infested buildings and heavily water-logged surrounding ground proved difficult; accordingly, this description draws on a report on the farmstead by ACFA dated 1996.

Building A1 (ACFA 13), which is the only one aligned across the slope from N to S, stands on the E side of the farmstead and was a dwelling in the latest phase of occupation. It measures about 8.7m from N to S by 4m within a wall 0.6m thick and up to 2.3m high at the S gable, which stands to its full height and retains some turf-capping. The W wall contains a single doorway and faint traces of a splayed window-opening at its southern end. A straight-joint in the E wall indicates that this building has been extended to the N by the addition of another room (A2). There is no suggestion of an opening between the two rooms, but A2 has been provided with a doorway to the W and a partition within. A twinning pen in the SE corner of A1 and some rebuilding of the side-walls indicate the re-use of the building by shepherds. An irregular enclosure (ACFA 14) measuring up to 16m from E to W by 14m overall is attached to the E side of the building, while immediately to the NW there is an unusual angled length of masonry (ACFA 12).

Two byre-dwellings (ACFA 10 and 11) are situated on the edge of the stream gully NW of building A. The easternmost, building B (ACFA 11), measures 17.9m from ENE to WSW by 3.5m within walls 0.7m thick and 1m in average height, and there is a narrow stony platform that runs along the foot of the S wall. There is a central doorway on the S, leading into an interior that has contained three compartments, though the partition walls between them, now reduced to footings, are secondary. One compartment occupies the entire W half of the building and contains a central drain. The E half of the interior has contained two roughly equally-sized compartments, one of them furnished with a possible fireplace. Two later animal pens have been built in the interior, a small one in the NW corner and another, larger one, which occupies the S half of the central compartment, its ends partly overlying the footings of the earlier partition walls. Building C (ACFA 10) lies immediately W of B and has been built to the same design. It measures 17m from E to W by 3.9m within walls 0.7m thick and 1m in average height, and there is a drain and doorway disposed in the same pattern. A blocked doorway in the N wall opposite that in the S wall is secondary.

Building D (ACFA 9) stands to the south of the yard and its NW part (D1) measures some 10m from NW to SE by 3.8m within a wall 0.7m thick and up to 2.1m high at the gable. The doorway is in the SW side-wall but the only other feature is a possible step in the floor level. Attached to the SE end of the building is a later outshot (D2) measuring 6.4m by 3.6 internally. Most of its SW wall, which contains a blocked doorway 0.9m wide, has collapsed.

An outhouse, building E (ACFA 2), stands to the W of the yard. It measures 6m from ENE to WSW by 4.5m over walls 0.7m thick and 1.5m high. Only one jamb of a doorway in the SSE wall is visible while a ‘trough’ identified in the previous survey is not convincing. A roughly rectangular enclosure immediately to the W measures about 35m from E to W by up to 23m internally and contains a deepened soil that has clearly been cultivated. The wall along its E side has been reconstructed and built over the remains of building E, apparently to aid the folding or gathering of sheep in front of buildings B and C. Just to the S of building E, there are the remains of what has been either a building or a peat stack stance (ACFA 7 and 8). A third enclosure (ACFA 5 and 6) lies just 10m SW of Building D. Roughly D-shaped on plan with its straight side on the SE, it measures about 23m from NE to SW by 20m overall. Its relationship to the head-dyke that runs off to the SSW is not clear, and it appears to partly overlie an earlier enclosure on the NW.

A corn-drying kiln (F; NR92NE 15) stands in the formerly cultivated ground 105m WSW of building E. It measures about 10m in diameter and up to 1.4m in height and contains a bowl 1.4m in diameter and 0.5m in depth, with a flue opening to the NE. A ‘mill stone’ identified in the previous survey (ACFA 15) is simply a fortuitously shaped slab which measures about 1m in length by 0.5m in breadth and 0.1m in thickness, but bears no evidence of wear, nor a central hole.

The cultivation remains associated with the farm extend for nearly 400m to an unnamed stream to the S (the march with old Glenrie) and are bordered to the NW by the Sliddery Water and to the SE by a contemporary head dyke. To the north of the farmstead they extend for about 460m to the old march burn with Glenscorrodale and are similarly enclosed. In places the remains of rig-and-furrow have been obscured by later phases of drainage aimed at improving the pasture in the 19th and 20th centuries. The farm was served by a track that approaches the steading from the NW, traverses the steep stream gully and, immediately W of the steading, takes the form of a hollow-way.

Historical note

An indication of agricultural practice and rural housing on Arran in the late 18th and early 19th century is given in general reviews such as Aiton (1816), Headrick (1807, 221, 309-315) and Paterson (1837) as well as the accounts of the parish by Hamilton (Stat. Acct., 1793, ix, 165-171) and Macmillan (New Stat. Acct. 1845, v, 59-62).

The farm of Gargadale was cleared of its occupants in the late 1820s and combined with Corriehiam (NR92NE 7), Glenrie (NR92SE 25), Margareoch (NR92SW 25) and part of Sliddery into ‘one of the largest farms in the island’ based at Burican (OS Name Book, Buteshire 2, 110), a farm that is now known as Glenree (NR 9460 2519). The date of the foundation of Gargadale is not known although the records of Kilmory Church indicate that a child from Gargadale was baptised in 1701 (notes from Arran Museum). During the mid- or late-18th century the farm was depicted on a small-scale map of Arran which indicated the presence of six buildings and disposition of arable similar to that visible today (NRS RHP 6170).

In 1772 Gargadale was described as ‘a ½ merkland presently possessed by 3 tenants viz. Henry Henderson, Niel McBride and Isbol Stuart relict of Fergus Nickle, who sow 9 bolls oats & 3 bolls potatoes who holds 5 horses, 23 milk cows, 20 yeel [?yearling] beasts and 29 sheep who pays yearly rent £5.9.37 and who paid of grassum on entry money at the commencement of the last 19 years lease £9 which lease expired at Whitsunday 1772 and which contains within the head dyke 42 acres arable and 260 acres pasture...’ (Burrell’s Journal, 9 October 1772; cf. 7 May 1770). By 20 October 1779, a single tenant Alexander McNicol was reimbursed for the construction of ‘5 houses, barns and byres built from the foundation upon the farm’ (Burrel’s Journal, 14th and 20th October 1779), at which time it was noted that there was ‘no houses upon the farm when he entered’. In 1807 Gargadale was surveyed at a larger scale by Robert Bauchop, who recorded all five of the buildings that are still standing and two of the enclosures, delimiting the extent of the farm at about 35 acres arable and 300 acres pasture (NRS: RHP 6632).

Visited by HES Survey and Recording (GFG, ATW, GLB) 17-18 October 2019.

HES undertook measured survey of Gargadale township on 17 - 18 October 2019 using a variety of sources that included a 1:500 pencil drawing, HES dGPS survey data and UAV photography (with GCPs), as well as airborne laser scan (ALS) data (from Scottish Public Sector LiDAR (Phase II) data*. In addition, colour orthophotographs taken in 2004 and 2010 (supplied by Getmapping), historic maps and documentary sources were consulted. The final 1:1000 plan has been archived as a Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) file and as a layered PDF, which includes a steepness of slope background and contours. The archive also includes the GNSS data (including ground control points) and vertical aerial photographs that were not further processed.