The Carse

This is the companion painting to the one you saw last week - Troqueer Mills

And we are still in my homelands - but we have headed down towards the Solway Firth. This is Carsethorn. Carsethorn is first mentioned as a port, in 1562, when a ship was loading for Rochelle and Bordeaux. Later, the 'Carse', as it is fondly referred to, acted as an outport for Dumfries, with the larger ships anchoring in Carse Bay before unloading their cargo.

During the late 1700s and early 1800s there was a very high level of emigration to the American and Australian Colonies and newspaper advertisements show emigrant ships sailing regularly from Carsethorn. In 1775 the ''Lovely Nelly'', Captained by William Sheridan, took 82 emigrants to Lot 59 on Prince Edward Island. The reason for the families going was given as being 'to get more bread' - in Scotland they were almost destitute.

A rather grimmer export trade emerged with the transportation of convicts to Australia. They were marched down from Dumfries and housed in the barracks (later a warehouse) at the river's edge. The whitewashed building remains to the south of the bus-stop in Carsethorn.

There was also smuggling.