Whiting Bay ( gd, Eadar Dhà Rubha, "between two headlands") is a village located on the
Isle of Arran
The Isle of Arran (; sco, Isle o Arran; gd, Eilean Arainn) or simply Arran is an island off the west coast of Scotland. It is the largest island in the Firth of Clyde and the seventh-largest Scottish island, at . Historically part of Butesh ...
in the Firth of Clyde, Scotland south of
Lamlash and south of
Brodick
Brodick ( , gd, Tràigh a' Chaisteil ("Castle Beach") or ''Breadhaig'') is the main village on the Isle of Arran, in the Firth of Clyde, Scotland. It is halfway along the east coast of the island, in Brodick Bay below Goat Fell, the tallest mo ...
.
It is the island of Arran's third largest settlement behind Lamlash and Brodick. It is called after the bay near the southern end of Arran's east coast that the settlement sits on.
History
Originally Whiting Bay consisted of a group of small settlements situated on the coast or just inland from it. The names of these hamlets are still extant and are given to the separate "districts" which the small relatively small village of Whiting Bay is split up into. The most northerly is Kingscross, south of there is Auchencairn, then Kockenkelly, North Kiscadale, South Kiscadale and then the most southerly is Largymore. These settlements have an ancient origin, the hillside inland from Largymore there is a prehistoric burial site called the Giants Graves. At Kingscross Point, at the opposite end of the village, there is a dun or fortified farmstead dating back almost two thousand years. The
Vikings
Vikings ; non, víkingr is the modern name given to seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway and Sweden),
who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded and se ...
settled at Kingscross and had a burial site there, and has led to suggestions that the Bay and the Village were named after them as "Viking Bay" and that this was later corrupted to Whiting Bay. Kingscross is also noted as the site where
Robert the Bruce
Robert I (11 July 1274 – 7 June 1329), popularly known as Robert the Bruce (Scottish Gaelic: ''Raibeart an Bruis''), was King of Scots from 1306 to his death in 1329. One of the most renowned warriors of his generation, Robert eventual ...
embarked for Ayrshire in February 1307, on his way to regaining control of his kingdom from the English.
[ When these were excavated the archaeologist responsible discovered two settings of stones which were apart, and positioned approximately above the centre of the mound. Within the mound they found a pile of articles which consisted of human bones which had been affected by heat, fragments of whalebone which were decorated with a design of concentric circles, ]charcoal
Charcoal is a lightweight black carbon residue produced by strongly heating wood (or other animal and plant materials) in minimal oxygen to remove all water and volatile constituents. In the traditional version of this pyrolysis process, cal ...
, lumps of iron, among which were Viking boat rivets, bronze pieces, two pieces of vitrified stone and a bronze coin, identified as a styca
The styca (; . ''stycas'') was a small coin minted in pre-Viking Northumbria, originally in base silver and subsequently in a copper alloy. Production began in the 790s and continued until the 850s, though the coin remained in circulation until the ...
of Wigmund, the Archbishop of York between 831 and 854 C.E.Saltcoats
Saltcoats ( gd, Baile an t-Salainn) is a town on the west coast of North Ayrshire, Scotland. The name is derived from the town's earliest industry when salt was harvested from the sea water of the Firth of Clyde, carried out in small cottages al ...
in Ayrshire and Arran in 1790 this led to the merging of the five settlements into the village of Whiting Bay. The steamers from Glasgow and elsewhere in the Clyde Estuary began to call in at Whiting Bay in the 1830s. When the inland crofting
Crofting is a form of land tenure and small-scale food production particular to the Scottish Highlands, the islands of Scotland, and formerly on the Isle of Man.
Within the 19th century townships, individual crofts were established on the bette ...
areas of Arran underwent clearances from the 1830s this led to an increased demand for accommodation on the coast. Of all of the villages on Arran, Whiting Bay appears to have been attractive to a more well-heeled clientele. These more genteel arrivals had a succession of fine villas built along the inland side of the road running along the bay. A golf course was constructed in 1895, along with tennis courts, a bowling club and a putting green. A new pier was finished in 1901 and this enabled steamers to disembark passengers directly into Whiting Bay rather than ferrying them to shore in "flit boats", and this reinforced the village's increase in size. The Whiting Bay village hall was added in 1926.[ There was a youth hostel in Whiting Bay but this closed in the early 21st century and sold off.]
Present
In the late 1950s the steamer services to Arran from the mainland stopped calling in at Whiting Bay and the service changed to a car ferry calling only at Brodick from 1957. This led to the fortunes of Whiting Bay waning and the venerable steamer pier shut in the early 1960s. The village still has a modest pier situated on the shore close to the line of tiny shops in the centre of the village with their rears to the water. Many of the grander villas have been converted into tourist amenities such as hotels, guesthouses and restaurants and the village has a large proportion of such accommodation on the island.[ The Whiting Bay Golf Club continues to operate,][ The village also has a primary school,]
References
External links
Glenashdale Falls
Arran Heritage Museum
{{Arran
Villages in the Isle of Arran