Auld Alloway Kirk Graveyard

A video guide to Auld Alloway Kirk Graveyard

Welcome to Alloway Auld Kirk, built in the 1500’s on the foundations of another building dating back to the thirteen century.   The belfry was built 4 years after the church was completed.  A 100 years later, the council decided to take the belfry down but resistance from residents made them change their mind.  

The Auld Kirk is surrounded by a graveyard  but whilst the church was in use you were not allowed to be buried here. By the 1740’s the church was also used as a school but by the mid 1700’s the Kirk was deserted and fell into disrepair. This empty ruin became ‘Alloway’s Auld Haunted Kirk’ in the mind of young Robert Burns and later became the central setting for his famous poem Tam o’ Shanter.  There are 219 ancient headstones in the kirkyard, the oldest dating from 1690. The most well known is of course  that of Robert’s father, William Burnes. One of our volunteer guides, Sandy McIntosh, has spent several years slowly gathering and researching the graves surrounding Auld Alloway Kirk. His graveyard guided tours are very popular.

Here is the first of a series of these interesting videos in which Sandy is interviewed by Hugh Farrell about his graveyard project. Our immense gratitude to Helen Beck (also a volunteer) and Robert Beck from BeckSport for producing this high quality video.

Here are some sample videos: