KILMARONOCK DISTRICT / PARISH
This area lies to the north east of West Dunbartonshire bound to the north by Loch Lomond and some of its islands and to the east by Endrick Water. Central to it is the village of Gartocharn. The community is tightly knit and very active in many ways. The Millenium Hall is the centre of social life. See GARTOCHARN, KILMARONOCK AREA. and KILMARONOCK CHURCH, OLD MILITARY ROAD, KILMARONOCK
A look at the Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland of 1882-1885 gives us a good perspective of the area.
Kilmaronock, a parish of E Dumbartonshire, whose church stands 2 miles WNW of Drymen station on the Forth and Clyde Junction section of the North British, this being 3 miles NE of Caldarvan or Kilmaronock station and 6¾ ENE of Balloch. Including the islands of Inchmurrin, Creinch, Torrinch, and Aber, it is bounded W and NW by Loch Lomond, NE and E by Buchanan and Drymen in Stirlingshire, S by Dumbarton, and SW by Bonhill. ...... Loch Lomond is on the boundary from a point 5 furlongs N of Balloch pier all round to the mouth of Endrick Water; Endrick Water winds 8 miles west-north-westward along all the north-eastern border; and Gallangad or Catter Burn, entering from Dumbarton, flows 3¼ miles northward through the southern interior, then 2¾ miles north-eastward along the boundary with Drymen, till it falls into Endrick Water near Drymen station. From Loch Lomond the surface rises south-eastward to 284 feet near Baturich Castle, 576 at Mount Misery, 462 at conical Duncryne, and 800 at the Dumbarton boundary, the southern district, beyond the Forth and Clyde railway, being mainly a moorish upland tract, projected from Dumbarton Muir. The north eastern district, along Endrick Water, to a breadth of from 1 furlong to ¾ mile, is a low, level, alluvial tract of high fertility, richly embellished with culture and wood; and the rest of the land, with exception of Duncryne and the ridge of Mount Misery, is all champaign, diversified with heights of from 100 to 300 feet above sea level, and richly adorned with corn fields, woods, and parks. ...... The original church of Kilmaronock (Gael. church of my little Ronan') was dedicated to St Ronan, a bishop of Kingarth in Bute, who died in 737; but a neighbouring spring bears the name of St Maronock's Well,' a d Scott in the Lady of the Lake calls Ellen a 'votaress of Maronnan's cell.' In 1325 it was given by Robert I. to the monks of Cambuskenneth, and theirs it continued down to the Reformation. Kilmaronock is in the presbytery of Dumbarton and synod of Glasgow and Ayr; ......[Gazatteer].
Joseph Irving writing in 1879 describes Kilmaronock : The most evident derivation of this name is the church or burying place (Kil) of St. Marnock. Other derivations, however, are not wanting. one is "Kil-ma-Ronach", the church of the holy Ronach, or, more properl, St Ronan, and another. "Kil-Mirrannoch", the church of St Mirren, a female saint, to whom the Abbey Church of Paisley was dedicated, and from whom the island of Inchmirren may have probably derived its name. The generally accepted etymology, however, is the one first mentioned, which gives the honour to St Marnock. About his history little or nothing is known with certainty. An old well in the parish bears his name, and is reported to have wrought wonderful cures in bygone times, but its virtues, as Sir Walter Scott remarked, like the merits of its patron, have now fallen into oblivion......The earliest notice of Kilmaronock occurs in connection with the Fleming family, In 1329. Sir Malcolm Fleming, steward of the King's household, and sheriff of Dumbartonshire, when rendering his account of the "tenth penny" and the "contribution of the peace", refrained from stating the rents of Kilmaronock, "because they were in his hands for life, for the keeping of "Dumbarton Castle". About the middle of the fourteenth century, David II, confirmed and infeftment granted by Malcolm Fleming, Earl of Wigton, to John Dennistoun of the Isle of Inchcalliache and the lands of Kilmaronock. From the Dennistoun family the barony of Kilmaronock passed, in 1404, to the house of Cunninghame, by the marriage of Sir William Cunninghame of Kilmaurs with Margaret Dennistoun, who with her sister Elizabeth, married to Sir Robert Maxwell of Calderwood, shared between them the large estates of their father, Sir Robert Dennistoun of Dennistoun. Kilmaronock was held blench of the Crown for the payment of 4d, annually to the Lord Chamberlain........ From the Cunninghames it passed into the hands of William, the first Earl of Dundonald, and was erected into a barony in favour of Willliam Cochran, brother of John, the second Earl. He feued out the greater part to the tenants in possession for payment of feu-duties, partly in money and services, but chiefly in grain, little, if at all above the rents of their holdings. The arable parts of Aber bounded by Lochlomond and the water of Endricks were greatly subdivided. The feuars of these lands obtained rights of salmon fishing in Lochlomond, of the Aber Bog for meadow hay, and of the Ring and Limehill of Aber for common pasturage. These feuars formed a community, long known in the parish as "Aber lairds". Bordlan belongs to the Duke of Montrose, and also part of Wester Finnary. Duncryne, originally part of the possessions of the Abey of Paisley, and celebrated as a resort of the Lennox fairies, also belongs to the Duke of Montrose, and is now covered to its summit with timber and copse.....
This map by Timothy Pont is from (about 1560-1614). A = Duncryne Hill, the dumpling; B = Gartochar ie Gartocharn village: C = Kilmaronock Castle; D = Buchanan Castle; E = A farm across the Endrick Water also called Gartocharn. NLS © as ref below.
IRVING, JOSEPH. The Book of Dumbartonshire. W. and A.K. Johnston. Edinburgh and London. 1879.
NATIONAL LIBRARY OF SCOTLAND : MAPS : Mapmaker: Pont, Timothy, 1560?-1614?; Blaeu, Joan, 1596-1673. Title: Levinia Vicecomitatus, [or],The Province of Lennox called the Shyre of Dun-Britt... Date: 1654 https://maps.nls.uk/view/00000438#zoom=6&lat=3621&lon=4051&layers=BT
ORNANCE GAZETTEER OF SCOTLAND: A SURVEY OF SCOTTISH TOPOGRAPHY, STATISTICAL, BIOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL. Edited by Francis H. Groome and originally published in parts by Thomas C. Jack, Grange Publishing Works, Edinburgh between 1882 and 1885. https://www.scottish-places.info/parishes/parhistory689.html
