Cree Bridge

Today's the day ......................... for tales of a river

The defining geographical feature of the small Galloway town of Newton Stewart is the River Cree - the 'silvery, winding Cree' - with its tributaries, the Minnoch, the Trool, the Penkiln and the Palnure.
 
The Cree was the source of power for the textile mills built in Newton Stewart in the 18th Century when water power was a key element in industrial development.  Most of the time, the river is fordable (although not today!) and the old site of the main ford, downstream from here, is still detectable in the street layout of Newton Stewart. There were very few bridges until the 18th Century when tolls and local customs duties could be levied at such crossing points. The location of the first, wooden bridge and the boat ferry remain local landmarks just to the north of here.
 
Before there were proper roads, and before the railway came to Galloway in the 19th Century, bulky goods such as coal and fertilisers, gravel and grain, timber and stone, were transported by sea. The Cree has a winding, silty estuary, not good for navigation, but there was a harbour at the Carty Port, a couple of miles south of Newton Stewart, and others further down the estuary at Wigtown and Creetown from which coastal cargoes were traded. Regular services linked the Solway ports with Liverpool. Although both of these ports are now almost derelict, there are still active fishing ports further south around the Machars peninsula at Garlieston, the Isle of Whithorn and Port William ................