the auld kirkyard

Sarah and I paid a visit to our ancestors in the old Dunscore Kirkyard at Merkland. There has been no church here since 1649, when the building was said to be in a ruinous state. A new church was built up on the hill in Dunscore, and that in turn was rebuilt in the 1820s.

Many interesting old graves here, my own family rubbing shoulders with the likes of Robert Riddell, friend of Robbie Burns, who lived nearby.

The big memorial behind Sarah is to Sir Robert Grierson, persecutor of the Covenanters ("Cruel Lag") who died in 1733.