Kirkmaiden Church

Kirkmaiden Church

Kirkmaiden Church, overlooks Luce Bay and is situated adjacent to the golf club. The ancient and pretty church is the resting place to many a Maxwell and McCullough. Also buried in Kirkmaiden Churchyard is Francois Thurot, naval officer of the French Navy, who was one of many Frenchmen whose bodies were washed ashore after a battle fought at sea off the Isle of Man in 1760 between Britain and France. Francois Thurot introduced the secret society, the Order of Coldin, into Sweden, which is the only country still to have this order, and members of the Swedish society erected a plaque to Francois Thurot on the wall of Kirkmaiden Church in 1960. 

There are quite a few legends associated with KIrkmaiden Church and it's patron St Meden... 

Including

Legend has it that when this parish was united with Glasserton, the pulpit and bell were removed from Kirkmaiden church and were to be transported by sea across Luce Bay to a church of the same name near the Mull of Galloway. A strange storm blew up and the boat foundered, sinking the pulpit and bell. The story goes that on the approaching death of any descendant of the McCullochs of Myrton, the wraith-bell rang from the depths of Luce Bay.

and

The “chincough” well, located on the beach below, is supposed , thanks to her saintly powers, to have a magical healing influence on illnesses and especially whooping cough ( formerly called “chincough” ). Peter's Paps is a dropping cave below the church again associated with whooping cough cure. See also White Loch.

and the legend of St Meden

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Folklore of Scottish Lochs and Springs, by 
James M. Mackinlay

Much uncertainty attaches to Medan or Medana, the tutelar saint of the spot. One legend makes her a contemporary of Ninian. According to another, she lived about one hundred years later. Dr. Skene thinks she is probably the same as Monenna, otherwise [94]Edana, who is said to have founded churches in Galloway, and at Edinburgh, Stirling and Longforgan. Kirkmaiden parish, at one time called Kirkmaiden in Ryndis, is believed to be named after her, like the other parish known as Kirkmaiden in Farnes, now united to the parish of Glasserton. An incident in her history has a bearing on the present subject. According to the Aberdeen Breviary, she fled from her home in Ireland to escape from the importunities of a certain noble knight who sought to marry her. Accompanied by two handmaidens, she crossed to Galloway and took up her abode in the Rhinns. The knight followed her. When Medana saw him she placed herself along with her maidens on a rock in the sea. By a miracle, this rock became a boat, and she was conveyed over the water to Farnes. Again the knight appeared. This time Medana sought refuge among the branches of a tree, and, from this coign of vantage, asked her lover what it was that made him pursue her so persistently. “Your face and eyes,” replied the knight. Thereupon Medana plucked out her eyes and threw them down at the feet of her lover, who was so filled with grief and penitence that he immediately departed. On the spot where her eyes fell a spring of water gushed forth, and in it Medana washed her face, doubtless thereby restoring her sight. There is much to favour the view taken by Dr. Trotter: that “possibly the well was the original institution; the cave a shelter or dwelling for the genius who discovered the [95]miraculous virtues of the water, and his successors; and the chapel a later edition for the benefit of the clergy, who supplanted the old religion by grafting Christianity upon it, St. Medana being a still later institution.”

and more

A saint of opthalmologists and more on the wells? Read on... 

And of the Rev Mr Marshall ordained in 1697, this zealous preacher along with a woman from Wigtown could uncover witches and warlocks as they came into the church - these unfortunate people faced the kirk-sessions. Tradition asserts that the Kirkmaiden witches brought retribution on the reverend as one day a hare ran across his path and never again was he able to speak from the pulpet in Kirkmaiden again. 

Elsewhere I read that the Rev used a chalice and if it shook in the hands of a member of the congregation then they were similarly sent off to the sessions.

See Witchcraft and . . superstitious record in the south-western district of Scotland : witchcraft, fairy lore, wraiths, death customs, ghost lore ...
by Wood, John Maxwell