5.41 miles 2h 36m ascent 94m
Corncockle Plantation-Lockerbie
The Annandale Way splits as it emerges from the woodland of Corncockle, near Templand, one route to Lochmaben, the other to Lockerbie. They join again in Sorrysike Moor, a little north of Hoddom. Both of my Annandale Way walks (2010 and 2016) used the Lochmaben route. I think this was more about finding places to park at the right distance rather than an aesthetic choice.
The Lockerbie route is a manageable 10.3 miles but there is not easy parking where the routes meet, so I expected the actual walking distance to be more like 13 miles. Given our recent experience on the Comedy Way where the published 12.9 miles stretched into 15, I decided to cut this walk into two sections, this one a mere 5.5 miles.
We started in the woodlands of Corncockle Plantation, not quite the “yellow wood” of Frost’s poem being mostly conifer, but the broom had yellow flowers.
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
As we stepped from the woods we found an Annandale Way signpost pointing left for Lockerbie and right for Lochmaben. I remember being confused by this when we first walked the Way. Not so now.
We turned left along the wee road to Millhousebridge, the Moffat hills in the distance, with Saddle Yoke recognisable. I didn’t notice Spedlin’s Tower nestling in the middle ground until I was looking more closely at the photograph.
The River Annan looked quite diminutive at Millhousebridge. The present stone bridge was built in 1827 but the mill-house it is named for is long gone. A sandstone cottage in the village, a former school, has a small clock tower.
Looking south, the fields were filled with the bright yellow of oilseed rape.
Had thought we were in for a bit of road walking here but there was a narrow footpath along the riverbank until we had Gotterbie on the opposite bank. There were stands of pale yellow Comfrey, but neither I nor Audrey could recall its name at the time though she thought it began with “u”. I have a vague recollection of hearing that on a previous walk.
We crossed the Nethercleuch Burn at Fishbeck, me wondering if the waterway had once been “fish beck”. And guess what, the 1857 OS Map has the waterway named as Fishbeck Lake.
Applegarth Kirk is nestled in trees on a small hill. The name Applegarth is Norse, meaning something like ‘enclosed apple orchard’ though the name has outlived the orchard. There has been a church here since at least 1140 but the present building is a mere youngster dating back to 1763.
Somewhere along the walk, I forget where, we spotted the buildings of Lockerbie Creamery in the distance. And thought little more of it. Our attention was focussed on the hedgerows and the approaching buildings of Dryfeholm farm. These looked large and well kept. There was even an information board telling us how well maintained their machinery was!
The “Dryfe” attached to the farm, the nearby river and the surrounding dale is thought to be from a Norse personal name, Drifr, but who Drifr was we will probably never know.
At Dryfeholm we left the road for a footpath through the wonderful Gallaberry Woods which are shown in the photo at the top of the post and the one here. The woods include the Mansfield Arboretum. This was definitely my favourite part of the day’s walk.
The footpath brought us back to the road from Dryfeholm. We crossed Dryfe Water on a metal bridge but looking down at the river it looked so inviting that we retraced our steps and went down to have our lunch on the bank while the dogs cooled off in the water.
An idyllic scene but the opposite bank had been the site of a bloody battle four centuries earlier.
On December 6th, 1593, Lord Maxwell, Warden of the West Marches led 2000 men to raid the Johnstone stronghold of Lockerbie. A bitter feud had existed between the Maxwells and Johnstones for many years. Robert Maxwell, the Lord’s brother, had been killed in a Johnstone attack on Lochmaben. That raid was in retaliation for Robert burning the Johnstone castle at Lockwood. But things did not go well for the Maxwells. Lord Maxwell lost his own life as well as 700 men at Dryfe Sands just upstream of where we were sat.
There are two stories of how Maxwell met his end. One is that while the men fought, Lady Johnstone went out with her maidservant to see how the battle was going. She had locked the castle doors and taken the huge iron key with her. During their walk the ladies came across a regal looking man, badly wounded and propped up against a tree. He stretched out a hand and begged for her help. It was Lord Maxwell. Lady Johnstone didn’t hesitate. She smashed in his head with the castle key.
The second tale needs a few words of explanation. Lord Maxwell had offered a reward to any man who brought him the hand or head of Sir James Johnstone. When Sir James heard this he made a similar pledge. In the heat of battle the two clan chiefs met and Maxwell was beaten. Begging for his life, he stretched out a hand, offering to surrender but Sir James Johnstone cut off the arm then killed him. He is said to have kept the arm and head of Lord Maxwell as trophies.
The raids continued until the king sought to pacify the border regions after the Union of Crowns. The time of the Reivers was drawing to a close. The king ordered the clan chiefs to reconcile their differences and in 1608 a meeting was arranged “under trust”. The chiefs were each was allowed only one retainer, and these men withdrew while the chiefs spoke privately. They saw a heated argument and when Sir James Johnstone turned to walk away, Maxwell drew a hidden pistol and shot him in the back with two poisoned bullets. Maxwell fled to France but returned hoping the king would offer clemency. But King James could not condone a killing “under trust”. Maxwell was publicly beheaded in 1612.
Ah, halcyon days, those happier times before industrialisation and social media … when raiding bands could massacre at will, infant mortality approached 20% and epidemics of smallpox, plague and dysentery were regular events.
I didn’t know these stories at the time so my thoughts were on happier matters like the dogs paddling as I ate my sandwich.
After lunch there was a little more road walking. We had Aefur Brae on our left and on our right fields of wetland grasses and….the Lockerbie Creamery. That was strange. Hadn’t it been on our left earlier? The explanation was that we had been mistaken earlier. The buildings we had seen then were Steven’s Croft Power Station. I didn’t even know it existed. (It opened in 2008).
The road passing under the dismantled railway was a sign that our walk was drawing to a close. After the dilapidated buildings of Turnmuir Mill we turned up a side road and took a footpath up to the lay-by where we had parked. The OS map shows this as open ground but it is mature woodland.
We finished the walk with a visit to the Memorial Garden, which commemorates the Lockerbie disaster
