Skulferatu #36 - Crichton Castle, Crichton, Midlothian

 

Today I went for a wander out of Edinburgh and along to the ruins of Crichton Castle.  The ruins sit just outside the village of Crichton, on a terrace that overlooks the picturesque scenery of the valley of the Tyne. 

 

View of Crichton Castle

 

Crichton Castle from hill above

 

The stable block with the castle in background

 

The stable block

 

In the Fourteenth Century a keep was built on this spot by the Crichton family.  In the Fifteenth Century the castle building was extended around this by Sir William Crichton and then later by others who had either inherited or were granted the castle and its lands.  Sir Walter Scott wrote of the castle in his narrative poem Marmion and also wrote a history of the castle, informing his readers that – ‘it was built at different times, and with a very differing regard to splendour and accommodation.  The older part of the building is a narrow keep, or tower, such as formed the mansion of a lesser Scottish Baron; but so many additions have been made to it, that there is now a large courtyard, surrounded by buildings of different ages.  The eastern front of the court is raised above a portico, and decorated with entablatures, bearing anchors.  All the stones of this front are cut into diamond facets, the angular projections of which have an uncommonly rich appearance.  The inside of this part of the building appears to have contained a gallery of great length and uncommon elegance.  Access was given to it by a magnificent staircase, now quite destroyed…’  Unfortunately, I didn’t get to see the interior of the castle today, as it was closed due to Covid restrictions.  However, I did find a drawing of the courtyard.

 

View of the courtyard - taken from The Castellated and Domestic Architecture of Scotland

 

The first recorded owner, Sir William Crichton, was a man who was remarkable for his time, having risen to prominence through politics rather than through warfare.  He became the Lord Chancellor under King James I and later he also became the guardian of James II.    He was a man involved in various intrigues and his main claim to fame, or infamy, would appear to be that he took part in organising the ‘Black Dinner’.  This was when the Sixth Earl of Douglas and his younger brother were invited to dine with young King James II and as they ate were seized, dragged away and brutally murdered.  Their great uncle, James Douglas, who had also been involved in the plot against them, then inherited their wealth and titles making him one of the most powerful men in Scotland at that time.

 

In the early 1480s the Crichton family fell out of favour and their lands were forfeited with the castle being given to Sir John Ramsay.  He then fell out of favour and in 1488 the castle was given to Patrick Hepburn, who later became the Earl of Bothwell.  The castle stayed with Hepburn’s family for a few generations, but in 1568 they fell out of favour, and it was again forfeited.  It was then handed over to Francis Stewart, the ‘bastard’ grandson of James V.  He carried out extensive work on the castle including having the decorative diamond faced façade added in the courtyard and a rather grand stable building built next to the castle.  However, guess what, he was then accused of witchcraft and plotting against King James VI.  He fled to Naples and in 1592 his properties, including the castle, were forfeited.  The castle was then reinstated to Stewart’s son, and he sold it on to the Hepburn’s of Humbie. It then passed through various owners who all seem to have just left it to crumble and fall into ruin.  The castle is now in the care of Historic Environment Scotland.

 

I left the Skulferatu that accompanied me on today’s walk in a crack in the wall on the outside of the castle.

 

Front entrance door to the castle

 

Skulferatu #36

 

Skulferatu #36 in crack in wall of castle

Close up of Skulferatu #36 in crack in wall of castle

 

Map showing location of Skulferatu #36

 

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are –

 

Latitude 55.839688

Longitude -2.991259

 

I used the following sources for information on the castle –

 

The Castellated and Domestic Architecture of Scotland from the Twelfth to the Eighteenth Century

Volume One

By David MacGibbon and Thomas Ross

1887

 

The Ruined Castles of Midlothian

By John Dickson

1894

 

The Scots Magazine and Edinburgh Literary Miscellany

1^st August 1808

 

Wikipedia – Crichton Castle

Wikipedia - Crichton Castle

 

 

Skulferatu #17 - New Calton Burial Ground, Edinburgh

 

I think I’ve previously mentioned that I do love a good walk around a graveyard, especially a graveyard with a bit of character.  New Calton Burial Ground is just such a graveyard.  Built on the slope of a hill with tiered graves and a watchtower overlooking it all, this graveyard has some spectacular views over Edinburgh.  So, what better place to go on a grey, dull day to take in some of Edinburgh’s unique scenery while contemplating one’s own mortality? 

 

Graves at New Calton Burial Ground, overlooked by the Watchtower

 

A view of the Watchtower

 

Near the main entrance stands the Watchtower.  This was built so that in 1820, when the cemetery opened, guard could be kept against graverobbers, or resurrectionists as they were known.  Recently buried corpses were regularly stolen from their graves to feed the need for bodies at Edinburgh’s medical schools.  The only bodies legally available to them at that time were those of executed criminals, and there just weren’t enough of those to go round.  So, a trade in illegally acquired bodies developed.  Fearing that their relatives, or indeed their own bodies when they died, may end up on the dissection table, people went to extraordinary lengths to prevent this.  These included extra deep burial, iron cages built over the grave and guards watching over the graveyard. 

 

The Watchtower was later used as a house and was occupied as such until around 1955.  Despite it being tiny, at one time it was occupied by a family of ten.  The building is now derelict and in a state of disrepair.  It is on the Buildings at Risk Register.

 

A view over New Calton Burial Ground

 

View from New Calton Burial Ground over Edinburgh to Arthur’s Seat

 

There are several notable people buried in the graveyard, such as a couple of the Lighthouse Stevensons and William Dick, the founder of the Dick Vet College in Edinburgh.  Another of the worthies whose bones lie mouldering here is the poet William Knox.  Little known nowadays, he wrote one of Abraham Lincoln’s favourite poems – Mortality.  Knox, who was seemingly related to the Presbyterian killjoy preacher John Knox, was quite unlike his austere relative and led a rather intemperate life.  He was seemingly a very jovial and much liked bloke, with many friends.  However, he was a heavy drinker who like many alcoholics found it difficult to manage his money and his day to day life.  His drinking destroyed his health and he died of a ‘paralytic stroke’ at the age of 36 on 12 November 1825.    

 

Gravestone of William Knox

 

For your delectation here is Knox’s poem Mortality in full.  It’s a lovely piece of over the top morbidity – perfect for an old Goth like me.  Enjoy –

 

MORTALITY

 

O why should the spirit of mortal be proud!
Like a fast flitting meteor, a fast flying cloud,
A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave –
He passes from life to his rest in the grave.

The leaves of the oak and the willow shall fade,
Be scattered around and together be laid;
As the young and the old, and the low and the high,
Shall moulder to dust, and together shall lie.

The child that a mother attended and loved,
The mother that infant’s affection that proved,
The husband that mother and infant that blest,
Each – all are away to their dwelling of rest.

The maid on whose cheek, on whose brow, in whose eye,
Shone beauty and pleasure – her triumphs are by:
And the memory of those that beloved her and praised,
And alike from the minds of the living erased.

The hand of the king that the sceptre hath borne,
The brow of the priest that the mitre hath worn,
The eye of the sage, and the heart of the brave,
Are hidden and lost in the depths of the grave.

The peasant whose lot was to sow and to reap,
The herdsman who climbed with his goats to the steep,
The beggar that wandered in search of his bread,
Have faded away like the grass that we tread.

The saint that enjoyed the communion of Heaven,
The sinner that dared to remain unforgiven,
The wise and the foolish, the guilty and just,
Have quietly mingled their bones in the dust.

So the multitude goes – like the flower and the weed
That wither away to let others succeed;
So the multitude comes – even those we behold,
To repeat every tale that hath often been told.

For we are the same things that our fathers have been,
We see the same sights that our fathers have seen,
We drink the same stream, and we feel the same sun,
And we run the same course that our fathers have run.

The thoughts we are thinking our fathers would think,
From the death we are shrinking from they too would shrink,
To the life we are clinging to, they too would cling –
But it speeds from the earth like a bird on the wing.

They loved – but their story we cannot unfold;
They scorned – but the heart of the haughty is cold;
They grieved – but no wail from their slumbers may come;
They joyed – but the voice of their gladness is dumb.

They died – ay, they died! and we, things that are now,
Who walk on the turf that lies over their brow,
Who make in their dwellings a transient abode,
Meet the changes they met on their pilgrimage road.

Yea, hope and despondence, and pleasure and pain,
Are mingled together like sunshine and rain:
And the smile and the tear, and the song and the dirge,
Still follow each other like surge upon surge.

‘Tis the twink of an eye, ’tis the draught of a breath,
From the blossom of health to the paleness of death,
From the gilded saloon to the bier and the shroud –
O why should the spirit of mortal be proud!

 

I left the Skulferatu that accompanied me on today’s walk in a hollow in a tree near the top of the graveyard.

 

Skulferatu #17

 

Skulferatu #17 in tree hollow at New Calton Burial Ground

 

Google Map showing location of Skulferatu

 

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are:

 

Latitude 55.953664

Longitude -3.177293

 

Skulferatu #15, St Baldred's Cradle, Peffer Sands, East Lothian

 

The thing I love about working in East Lothian is that there are so many beautiful places nearby to go for a lunchtime walk.  My walk today was along Peffer Sands, which is a great big sandy beach with lots of sand dunes.  It is a quiet and isolated spot with amazing views over the Forth and down to the Bass Rock.   

 

View down Peffer Sands to the Bass Rock

 

I walked along the beach and up onto the rocky outcrop at the southern end of the beach.  This area is known as St Baldred’s Cradle. 

View from St Baldred’s Cradle

 

View over rocks at St Baldred’s Cradle

 

Here St Baldred is believed to have spent some years in a remote hermitage.  He obviously liked the view if he came here, as it’s still pretty remote and out of the way.  There is supposedly an ancient cairn here, but I’ve never actually seen it.  However, I do find this is often the case with ancient landmarks, unless they are pointed out to me, I just don’t see them.    

 

Today’s Skulferatu was left in a crack in one of the rocky outcrops overlooking the Bass Rock.

 

Skulferatu #15

 

Skulferatu #15 in rocks at St Baldred’s Cradle

Google Map showing location of Skulferatu

 

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are:

 

Lattitude 56.023742

Longitude -2.584464

 

Skulferatu #14 - Figgate Park, Edinburgh

It has been snowing.  The snow has turned to slush and ice.  So today I didn’t venture far, my walk taking me through Portobello and up to Figgate Park and around the pond there.

 

View over pond at Figgate Park to Arthur’s Seat

 

Figgate Park is nestled between Portobello and Duddingston.  The main East Coast railway line from Edinburgh to London runs past the park, and it is surrounded on the other sides by various housing estates. The park is about a kilometre long and at the east end there is a large pond.  This used to be a claypit, which supplied the potteries in Portobello.  It is now a habitat for lots of birds.  The park was formally opened in 1938.

 

The name of the park comes from the burn that runs through it and from the old name for the land it sits in, Figgate Muir.  Figgate Muir was an area of land on the east side of Edinburgh that now forms the main part of Portobello.  In Cassells Old and New Edinburgh, Vol.3 (1883) it is described as ‘…a once desolate expanse of muir-land…which latterly was covered with whins and furze, bordered by a broad sandy beach and extending from Magdalene Bridge on the south perhaps to where Seafield now lies, on the north-west.’ 

 

The park was busy today with everyone doing their daily Covid walk, or slip and slide in the slushy mess of last nights snow.  Disconsolate looking ducks sat on the ice of the pond while a group of swans swam in the small area that hadn’t frozen over.  Noisy seagulls circled around hoping to spot someone throwing something edible to the other birds.  Children screamed and demanded attention from their worn out parents, while an occasional train roared past. 

 

Boardwalk round pond at Figgate Park

 

View over pond to pylon and powerlines

Disconsolate ducks and selfish swans

 

I found some quiet places in the park to take a few photographs.  Then in another quiet spot, in between some reeds on the bank of the pond, I left my Skulferatu.  I placed it on some pockmarked, icy snow, so it should fall down between the reeds and into the pond when the snow melts.

 

Skulferatu #14

Skulferatu #14 on snow by pond

 

Google Map showing location of Skulferatu

 

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are:

Latitude 55.949871

Longitude -3.124324 

Skulferatu #13 - Victoria Swing Bridge, Leith Docks, Edinburgh

 

Today’s Skulkferatu ended up somewhere a little bit different, on a structure from the industrial past of Leith – the Victoria Swing Bridge.  This crosses the water of Leith just down from the popular area of The Shore, where there are many restaurants and eateries.

View down Water of Leith

Victoria Swing Bridge, Leith

The bridge was built between 1871 and 1874 and is constructed of wrought iron.  It is a swing bridge, meaning it could swing open to allow passing boats through.  It was hydraulically operated and the power for this was supplied from a small power station building that sits nearby.  Originally a railway track and a private road ran down the middle of the structure and there was a walkway on both sides.  The bridge no longer swings open and is nowadays solely for pedestrian use. 

Victoria Swing Bridge and old Whaling Harpoon

View down Victoria Swing Bridge

Unfortunately, the bridge is now in a state of disrepair and though there have been various campaigns to have it restored, nothing has yet been done.  It is currently on the Buildings at Risk register.

 

I left a Skulferatu balanced on a rivet in one the beams of the bridge.

Skulferatu #13

Skulferatu #13 on Victoria Swing Bridge, Leith

Google Map showing location of Skulferatu #13

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are:

Latitude 55.978708

Longitude -3.170241

Skulferatu #12 – Lochend Park, Edinburgh

I lived in the Abbeyhill area of Edinburgh years ago and remember the first time I stumbled across Lochend Park with it’s strange, little loch in the middle.  It was a hot, humid summers day and the loch looked almost like something from a bayou in the southern United States with the trees growing out from the water.

Lochend Loch or Restalrig Loch is really just a large puddle that sits in a natural hollow in the ground and its depth varies with the rainfall.  It used to serve as one of the main water supplies for Leith, but the water was of poor quality and often stagnant.  The locals therefore preferred to get their water from the local wells instead.

Lochend Loch with Arthur's Seat in background and Lochend House on left of photo

 

The loch was also used for the hunting of wildfowl and King James IV of Scotland hunted there occasionally.

A drawing of Lochend Loch from Cassells Old & New Edinburgh Vol. 3 (1883)

 

Sometime in the 1570s the loch was the site of the ghostly apparition of a fairy army.  Bessie Dunlop, a midwife, and folk healer from Ayrshire was on the way to Leith and had stopped and tethered her horse by Restalrig Loch.  As she was resting, she heard ‘a tremendous sound of a body of riders rushing past her with a noise as if heaven and earth would come together…the sound swept past her and seemed to rush into the lake with a hideous rumbling noise.  All this while she saw nothing…’  (Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft, by Walter Scott).  It would seem that a ghost she regularly spoke to informed her that this was the fairies on one of their earthly processions.  Alas for poor Bessie, she was later tried and found guilty of witchcraft and in 1576 was executed on Castle Hill in Edinburgh.

Above Lochend Loch sits Lochend House, which is also known as Restalrig Castle.  The house used to belong to the Logan family, however it was confiscated from them by the Scottish Parliament in 1609, due to Robert Logan having been involved in a plot to abduct King James VI of Scotland.  From 1704 it was owned by the 6^th Duke of Balmerino, Arthur Elphinstone.  He was beheaded on 18 August 1746 at Tower Hill in London for his part in the Jacobite rising if 1745.  In 1816 most of the house was pulled down and a new house was built on the site.  The property was recently renovated and is now privately owned.

Lochend House, as seen from Lochend Park

 

There is a Doocot in the park which stands north from the house and next to a small, brightly coloured playground.  It provided a nesting site for several hundred pairs of pigeons, which were used for eggs and meat.  The Doocot is still popular with the local pigeons.

 

In 1645 the plague hit and devastated Leith, killing off around half the population (and we think we’ve got it bad with the Covid!).  There is evidence of a chimney in the Doocot and it is thought it was used as an incinerator to burn the clothing and other items of those who fell victim to the plague.  In old maps of the area, it is referred to as the ‘plague kiln’.

Doocot in Lochend Park

Pigeon sheltering inside Doocot

 

I left a Skulferatu by the loch as a present for the fairies, just in case they come by again.  I hope they like it.

Skulferatu #12

Skulferatu #12 resting on some leaves by the bank of the loch

 

Google Map showing location of Skulferatu

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are:

Latitude 55.960842

Longitude -3.159896

Article and photographs are copyright of © Kevin Nosferatu, unless otherwise specified.

Skulferatu #11 - Hangman's Crag, Holyrood Park, Edinburgh

I was out for a walk around Holyrood Park, and while there wandered past a spot known as Hangman's Crag.  Leaving the main path, I crossed over a small fence and took a narrow path up to the top of this rocky outcrop. I have walked up here a few times before, but always in the summer when it has been dry.  Though it was steep, it was a relatively easy walk.  Not so in winter.  Everything was slippery and wet and a worked up into a mass of mud from all the thousands of people who have been walking up this path in these Covid ridden times.  Thankfully, on the most treacherous part of the path, there were lots of tree branches to hold onto.  If there hadn’t been, I’d have ended up flat on my arse in the mud.

Hangman's Crag, with Duddingston Kirk in the background

Hangman’s Crag sounds like the name came from the place being a site of execution, but actually it comes rather from the sad tale of one of Edinburgh's much hated and loathed executioners.

 

In the late Seventeenth Century in Edinburgh, one of the city's hangmen was a young man who had come from a wealthy and well-to-do family from Melrose in the Scottish Borders.  On his father's death, he had inherited the estate and a great deal of money.  However, the young man had extravagant tastes and wasted the whole fortune on living the high life.  When not drinking, entertaining and visiting one of the city’s many whorehouses he was gambling away vast amounts of money.  Soon he was broke.  There was no money left.  To survive he had to move to lowly lodgings and sell off his belongings, though he did keep one set of fine clothes.  The young man then had to do what no gentleman should ever have to do, he had to work for a living. So, he took the job as the city hangman.  This was a particularly odious and unpopular job at that time, as many of those sentenced to die were innocent men fallen foul of higher powers or those whose religion was not in keeping with the main orthodoxy.  Even in normal times the city hangman was seen as someone on the fringes of society, on the same level as common criminals and prostitutes.

 

The young man took up this office and performed his duties of execution, flogging and all the other rather unpleasant sentences ordered by the courts.  Now, a man has to be of a certain mentality to carry out these sorts of duties and not be affected or destroyed by the torment he is inflicting.   This young man found escape from the guilt of his actions and from the lowly office he now occupied in life, by donning the one set of fine clothes he had kept and mixing with the gentlefolk of Edinburgh.   He would dress up and mingle with the groups of Edinburgh society who played golf in the evenings at Bruntsfield Links, and for a few hours he could feel he was back in his place in society.  He could switch off from the haunting screams of those whose lives he was paid to end.  Those he was paid to maim or torture or humiliate.

 

One day while out at Bruntsfield Links, the young man was recognised by a group playing golf.  One of their friends had recently been sentenced to death for some minor offence, and they realised that the young man playing golf alongside them was none other than the man who had hanged him.  They shouted at him and pointed out to the others there who he was.  They insulted him, spat at him, threw stones at him and chased him away.  They told him never to come back, that he was a disgrace and lower than even the most common and base criminal who had dangled from his rope.    The young man ran off humiliated and ashamed.  He made his way to the quiet solitude of one of the crags overlooking Duddingston Loch.  There he contemplated his life and what he had become.  Falling into a state of great despair he threw himself off the crag to his death.  His body was then found there the next day.  After this the crag he had thrown himself from was always referred to as the Hangman’s Crag.

View up path to top of Hangman's Crag - with Crow Hill in the background

View from Hangman's Crag over Duddingston Loch

 

Near the top of the crag, I found a hollow in a group of rocks near the cliff edge and there I left the Skulferatu that had accompanied me on my walk.

Skulferatu #11

Skulferatu #11 in a hollow between rocks at the crags edge

Google map showing location of Skulferatu #11

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are:

Latitude 55.941027

Longitude -3.154901