Details from the book "
Cardoness Castle & Carsluith Castle" by Doreen Grove
QUOTE
The first mention of the family who took the name Cardoness is in 1220 when Nicholas de Kerdenes and his wife Cicely were in dispute with the monastery at Dundrennan over Cicely’s dowry. The litigation went on for more than twenty years. Nicholas was descended from David fitz Teri, Lord of Over Denton in Cumberland, who was in possession of Anwoth church by 1170, Cardoness being in the parish of Anwoth.
David, son of Teri, was one of a number of Anglo-Norman lords tempted across the Solway Firth in the 12th century from their Cumberland estates by the Crown, in a determined effort to undermine the power of the independent Lords of Galloway. There was widespread unrest among the Gallovidians at their arrival, which occasionally broke out into open revolt. The new Lords wisely built strong castles and most of these survive.
The history of the family thereafter is vague. In 1277 Bertram of Cardoness witnessed a charter by Lady Dervorguilla, of Buittle Castle, and mother of John Balliol who became king in 1292.
The McCullochs acquired Cardoness in the 15th century, possibly by marriage. Local legend tells of the previous laird of Cardoness drowning in a frozen loch near the castle along with eight of his nine daughters, as they celebrated the birth of his new-born son and heir, who also perished. The sole surviving daughter married a McCulloch from Wigtownshire. Gilbert McCulloch is the first to appear on record, as a witness to a charter in 1466. It was either he or his son James who built the present castle.
The McCullochs were already a powerful Galloway family by the time they came into possession of Cardoness. They appear in the records as a particularly lively family, frequently in dispute with their neighbours, especially the Gordons, over land ownership. James McCulloch, who died in 1500, resorted to litigation at least five times, once with his nearest neighbour. Nor was he a man of scruples, even where his family were concerned. He married off his only daughter to Alexander MacLellan, a “natural idiot”, apparently so as to secure the curatorship of the young man’s land from his lawful curator, the Earl of Angus. The dispute lasted several years. Ninian, James’ son, despite being a sheriff depute, had no more scruples than his father did. He was prosecuted for breaking into a barn and stealing 1500 assorted beasts, and for taking rents illegally – all the property of his mother.
When Ninian died in 1509, quite possibly executed for his crimes, his heir, Thomas, was still a minor. This was the opportunity for the MacLellans to reclaim their rights and to prove a point. Patrick MacLellan, Alexander’s brother, seized Cardoness in 1509, which was presumably not well defended, with Thomas and his mother in the house. Sir Alexander ‘Sande’ McCulloch had the wardship of Thomas from 1509 until his death on the battlefield at Flodden in 1513. Sir Alexander was clearly a friend of James IV, having been appointed keeper of Linlithgow Palace in 1505 and custodian of the King’s falcons. His sporting interests also won him a wager of thirty-five shillings from the King in an archery competition. However, he also had the McCulloch talent for attracting trouble, and his two convictions against neighbours were only repealed after the King’s intervention.
Sir Alexander’s branch of the family was united with the Cardoness branch after the marriage of his daughter to Alexander, the brother of Thomas, in 1516. Young Alexander was a typical McCulloch, and was soon in trouble. He was probably the ‘Cutlar’ McCulloch who led a raid on the Isle of Man in retaliation for a raid on Galloway by the owner of the island, Lord Derby. The McCullochs found it a lucrative adventure, and returned several times. This gave rise to the phrase
“God keep the good corn, the sheep and the bullock,
From Satan, from sin, and from ‘Cutlar’ McCulloch.”
Cardoness was built as a fortified house, with the expected threat from neighbouring families, with whom the McCullochs were in frequent dispute. The castle was designed to withstand a lightly armed assault, but not a full siege from a national army. However, the conflict with England in the 1540s and the civil war that followed Mary Queen of Scots’ flight into exile in 1568, almost brought Cardoness onto the national stage. Like many of the lairds from Galloway, the McCullochs supported Mary Queen of Scots, at least until her defeat at Carberry Hill in 1567. By this date the strategic importance of Cardoness had been recognised, for the castle had been included in a military report assessing the feasibility of an English army occupying the Scottish West March.
The report, prepared by an English spy between 1563 and 1566, advised that the castle stood upon a high bank and rock on the edge of the water. It was said to be impregnable, with guns and artillery unable to reach up to it from the water’s edge or from the landward side, the only possible way of attack being by two hundred men carrying their weaponry on their backs and climbing the rock. The walls were said to be 9ft (2.7m) thick and once in English possession, a garrison of one hundred men being needed to retain possession. The invasion never came about and the McCullochs returned to what they did best – feuding with the neighbours.
The constant feuding in time left the McCulloch family finances in ruin, and it was the misdeeds of William McCulloch from 1592 onwards that eventually led to the mortgaging of the Cardoness estate. By 1628 it was irredeemably lost to John Gordon of Upper Ardwell, a family with whom they had frequently feuded.
The McCullochs seem not to have recognised this change in their circumstances, for by 1668 they were back at Cardoness (the Gordons preferring to remain in their house near Anwoth, called Bush o’ Bield). Neither Alexander nor his son Godfrey appeared to have accepted the Gordons’ rights to the estate, and committed violent crimes in their attempts to win the estate back. Alexander was heavily fined for assaulting Marion Peebles, Gordons’ widow, in 1668. He dragged her from her sickbed, out of the house, and onto a dung heap, where he left her to die. Godfrey shot and fatally wounded Gordon at his home, a crime for which he was sentenced to death. He escaped abroad for several years, but was spotted soon after his return, whilst attending a church service in St. Giles of Edinburgh. He was executed in the capital, one of the last to perish on ‘The Maiden’, the Scottish equivalent of the guillotine.
With Godfrey’s death, Cardoness was abandoned. The castle then passed through the hands of the Gordons, the Maxwells, the Stewarts, the Murray-Baillies of Cally, and then back to the Maxwells. It was Lady Maxwell who placed the castle in State care in 1927.
The natural promontory on which the castle stands was its best defence. Even today, despite all the changes done by Alexander Murray of Broughton, MP in the 1820s, to drain the Fleet estuary for agricultural improvements, one can still appreciate why the McCullochs chose this location for their castle.
The castle was built at a time when the new-fangled gunpowdered artillery was beginning to rival the conventional weaponry of stone-throwing machines, longbows and crossbows. Hence the tower is well provided with gunholes, of the inverted keyhole type, making Cardoness one of the earliest castles in Scotland to make provision for guns in its construction.
In almost every other respect the tower house at Cardoness is typical of other Scottish tower houses regarding its defence. The walls are 2.5m thick and openings are few and far between. The only entrance into the tower is through the arched doorway in the south wall, which has evidence of two barriers, an outer oak door and an inner iron yett. Inside the doorway is a hole in the ceiling, called a ‘murder-hole’ because it would have been used by the defending garrison to drop unpleasant objects onto intruders. It was also used as a means of moving objects between floors. A guardroom or porter’s lodge lies just to the left of the entrance.
In one important defensive respect the tower is unusual – there is no sign of battlements at the wallheads. It is most likely that battlements were provided for in the original construction, for in the late 15th century the main part of the defence would have been carried out from the wallhead. It appears that the remodelling of the upper storeys resulted in this defensive element being removed in the late 1560s. The original battlements would have provided excellent views over the Solway Firth and out towards the Isle of Man.
The castle was the residence of a wealthy nobleman, and therefore would have to be capable of serving a number of functions – private residence, estate office, law court and guesthouse. Only the tower house survives more or less complete. This was chiefly the laird’s private lodging, but housed also some storage space and a prison. The other accommodation needs - including an outer hall (for meeting of the tenantry and a large scale banqueting hall), kitchen, storage cellars, stables, bakehouse and brewhouse – were sited to the south of the tower, around a courtyard. The stone vaulted buildings became ruined and what remains was largely reconstructed in the 1930s.
The simplicity of the exterior of the tower belies the well-planned interior where every space was put to good use. The tower contained six storeys of accommodations. The family’s private lodgings were on the top three floors and storage provision on the lower two floors. Sandwiched between, was the hall or public room of the tower.
The ground floor was divided into two storage cellars by a cross wall, which no longer exists, although the two entrance doors survive. The west cellar, the larger of the two, has a slop sink under the gunhole in the north wall, and two unusual circular recesses in the west wall. These were probably used for pickling or salting tubs.
The corbel stones projecting from the side walls carried the timber joists of a loft or ‘entresol’, also used for storage. It is featureless save for a small window in the west wall, flanked by two small cupboards. It was entered through an arched door in the east wall. The spiral staircase in the south-east of the tower provides the only access to the upper chambers. Also at this level are two wall chambers. The one directly over the entrance contains the ‘murder-hole’, whilst the chamber in the east wall was a prison and pit. The upper cell has a latrine in the north wall and a narrow window. The lower cell is a dark, damp pit, accessed only via a trap door from the cell above.
The first floor contained just one large room, the hall and public room. It was used for more intimate entertaining and feasting, to complement the larger outer hall in the courtyard. It was well lit through two beautifully proportioned windows, furnished with stone benches. The quality of the masonry is best seen in the finely carved cupboards in the side walls and immense fireplace in the north wall with a saltbox in its right-hand jamb. Sadly, the massive stone lintel from the fireplace has now disappeared. Four wall chambers open off the hall, the one in the north wall having been the latrine closet.
The floors over the hall have lost their wooden floors and the details are more difficult to see. Together, they provided the private lodgings for the laird and his family, and the personal servants. The floor immediately above the hall was one large room. This was the great chamber or family withdrawing room. It was originally entered through the arched door in the east wall, blocked during a later remodelling. It was heated by the elaborate fireplace in the west wall, with a saltbox in its left-hand jamb. The wall chamber in the north-east corner was the latrine closet. At a later date, the room was divided into two smaller chambers, each being entered through a door way at the end of a passage formed in the south wall. A modest fireplace was inserted at the east end of the chamber. Moulded corbel stones and joist holes on the west wall indicate the floor levels of the chambers and attic above. These provided additional private rooms for the family.
The castle lies on the top of a hill just north of the A75 on the B796, is open to the public and maintained by the Historic Scotland.