Lugton is a small village or hamlet in East Ayrshire, Scotland with a population of 80 people. The A736 road runs through on its way from Glasgow, to the north, to Irvine in South Ayrshire. Uplawmoor is the first settlement on this 'Lochlibo Road' to the north and Burnhouse is to the south. The settlement lies on the Lugton Water which forms the boundary between East Ayrshire and East Renfrewshire as well as that of the parishes of Dunlop and Beith.
|Lugton comes from Ludgar or Lugdurr and Ton. A Toun or Ton was a farm and its outbuildings. The termination Durr is supposed by some to be of Celtic origin and may refer to 'black' or 'water'.|
The name 'Turnpike' originated from the original 'gate' used being just a simple wooden bar attached at one end to a hinge on the supporting post. The hinge allowed it to 'open' or 'turn' This bar looked like the 'pike' used as a weapon in the army at that time and therefore we get 'turnpike'. The term was also used by the military for barriers set up on roads specifically to prevent the passage of horses. In addition to providing better surfaces and more direct routes, the turnpikes settled the confusion of the different lengths given to miles, which varied from 4,854 to nearly 7000 feet. Long miles, short miles, Scotch or Scot's miles (5,928 feet), Irish miles (6,720 feet), etc. all existed. 5280 feet seems to have been an average! Another important point is that when these new toll roads were constructed the Turnpike Trusts went to a great deal of trouble to improve the route of the new road and these changes could be quite considerable as the old roads tended to go from farm to farm, hardly the shortest route. The tolls on roads were abolished in 1878 to be replaced by a road 'assessment', which was taken over by the County Council in 1889.
Most milestones are no longer in-situ and often the only remaining clue is an otherwise unexplained 'kink' in the line of a hedgerow. The milestones were buried during the Second World War so as not to provide assistance to invading troops, German spies, etc.. This seems to have happened all over Scotland, however Fife was more fortunate than Ayrshire, for the stones were taken into storage and put back in place after the war had finished.
A large number of small limestone quarries ware marked on the 1860 OS with several limekilns. Waterland corn mill on the Lugton Water is still marked on the 1895 map, with Tree Well nearby. Highgate wauk mill still survives as a dwelling (2007).
A creamery was opened in 1919, dispatching milk to Glasgow by train and making cheese which was matured at the manager's house; also known as "Jeely Jocks" when jams were made from turnips and other vegetables during the first world war. It closed in 1919. Lugton Garage was run by Angie and Angus Robertson.
A live railway emergency exercise at Lugton in Ayrshire in 2000 played a vital part in the ongoing process of protecting Scotland’s rail passengers. The exercise simulated a collision between two passenger trains carrying 270 passengers. The aim was to test the emergency services’ response and management co-ordination by replicating real accident conditions as closely as possible. Strathclyde police co-ordinated the exercise in conjunction with the rail industry in Scotland, the British Transport Police, Civil Police, Scottish Ambulance Service, Fire Brigade, local authorities and Government emergency planning co-ordinators.
The old castle of Caldwell sat on a knoll of the sloping hill-side to the south-west of Lochlibo. Only one tower remained as a prominent landmark after the times of the Covenanters and today's (2007) surviving tower is this same remnant. A new mansion house was built around 1712 by William Mure on the lands of Ramshead, however the present Robert Adam designed house was built by his son, William 'Baron Mure' about 200 yards lower down from the original. Caldwell House was the Mure family home until 1909.
In about 1770 half a dozen bronze bucklers (small shields) were dug out of a moss on Lugton ridge. They were found about 7 foot down and were arranged in a circle. One was preserved, measuring nearly 27 inches in diameter, with a semi-globular 'umbo' or 'boss' being just over 4 inches in diameter. It is highly ornamented, with twenty nine concentric rings with intervening ribs.
The Duniflat burn joins the Lugton Water from the East Ayrshire side close to the North Biggart bridge near where the Bells burn from Bells Bog on the East Renfrewshire side also has its confluence.
The village is celebrated in the songs of folk music group Nyah Fearties, whose members hail from Lugton.
Near the hamlet is Lugton quarry, which features in many geology textbooks for its marine fossils preserved in the Carboniferous rock.
James Richmond, aged 46, was killed when he was struck by a railway locomotive on 1 October 1870 on the line near the Lugton Viaduct.
The Lugton Ridges were part of the Barony of Giffen in the Parish of Beith. One of these ridges also had the name of Deepstone.
Halket or Hawkhead Loch, now drained, covered about ten acres and was drained in the 1840s. It is shown on the early maps of Ayrshire, such as Timothy Pont's map of 1604. Above it in 1820 was a dwelling with the unlikely name of 'Lions Den', possibly a corruption of 'Linn' as the farm of Linnhead is in the vicinity.