An’ siccan pranks by the haunted thorn
They hae the po’er to play,
That mortal man was never born
Could see , an’ live till day!
It is the days when the wind drops, you really notice the difference. Snow rarely falls on the fringes of the Machars peninsula, but a cold, cutting wind is an almost constant companion during winters in these lands. Contorting the bare skeletons of stunted trees, into horrific, twisted creatures.
The Legend O’ Kirkmaiden tells that on such a night, with a storm raging around the ancient Fell of Barhullion, a merry gathering took place at the nearby old House of Moure, the original home of the Maxwells of Monreith. As the evening wore on and the guests partook freely of the hospitalities, talk turned to the supernatural. Bravado flowed as freely as the drink by the warmth of the fire, as the guests told tales of bravery and indifference of all things dark and uncanny, until a young man declared he would ride to the church of Kirkmaiden and return with its bible, as proof he’d been there1.
Despite dire warnings from ‘Jock of the second sight’ to avoid the haunted hawthorn tree, the foolhardy young McCulloch, full of drink and valour, replied that he’d not only pass by the tree, but also cross the witches lair2 and rode off into the teeth of the tempestuous night.
As the night wore on and despite Kirkmaiden only being a short ride away, McCulloch did not return. Once daylight broke, a search party set out and found his body and that of his horse laying in a bleak spot, with both of their entrails entwined around the haunted hawthorn. He had reached the church and was returning to the House of Moure with the bible.
M’Culloch’s bluidy corpse they saw,
In’ the licht o’ that awfu’ morn,
Wrapp’d roun’ in the thorny branches a’ ,
An’ the heart frae the body torn!
What foul fiends’ wark the youth did dree
That nicht, there’s nane can say,
But weel kent is that hawthorn tree
Ca’d ” Man-wrap” to this day.
It is difficult to ascertain when the story is set. Kirkmaiden merged with the parish of Glasserton, sometime before Andrew Symson wrote his ‘A Large Description of Galloway’ in the 1680s, in which he describes the church as ruinous. The original House of Moure came into the possession of the Maxwell family circa 1450, via the marriage of Edward Maxwell to an heiress of the de Mundeville family. It was replaced by the tower house now known as Dowies in the late 16th/early 17th century, but the name transferred to the new building3. This in turn was abandoned in favour of Myrton Castle when William Maxwell bought it from the McCullochs in 1684. It seems almost certain the story would be set well before this date.
Man Wrap is a bleak area of rough, stony ground beneath the eastern side of the Fell of Barhullion, populated by a number of twisted hawthorn trees. The name survived long enough to be included on the first Ordinance Survey map of the area in the 1840s.
Today, little has changed and it is obvious few visitors tread here. On a gloomy winter afternoon, you stumble on the uneven, frozen ground in the half light. Gnarled branches grab at your coat and scratch your face. The wind grows colder as the sun sets and the place manifests an atmosphere of seething menace. Wind felled hawthorn trees lay scattered, not just blown over, but smashed into pieces, utterly destroyed. Visitors are not welcome here, once the darkness rises.
Sources
1. Maxwell Wood, J (1911) Witchcraft and Superstitious Record in the South-Western District of Scotland, J Maxwell & Son P. 256.
2. M’Lachlan Harper, M (1889) The Bards of Galloway, Thomas Fraser P. 16 A Legend O’ Kirkmaiden, David M’Kie.
3. Reid, R C. (1948b) ‘Dowies’, Trans Dumfriesshire Galloway Natur Hist Antiq Soc, 3rd, vol. 25, 1946-7. P. 36-8
Dark Galloway 