How can you have a story without a beginning? Until now the story of Robert Burns, our national bard, has been told with the opening of “born in Alloway on the 25th of January 1759………”. All the Burns’ trails promoted nationally ignore completely the life of Burns’ parents prior to their move to Alloway shortly before he was born, although many do include their deaths by way of directions to their gravestones! Also omitted is the town of Maybole, possibly the most important place in the story because, if it were not for the market there, Burns’ parents might never have met and there would have been no story at all! Maybole Historical Society would like to see Maybole being given its proper prominence in the story alongside Alloway, Tarbolton, Irvine, Mauchline, Dumfries and other locations connected with the bard and will be working to correct all the omissions and promote Maybole as

“THE START OF BURNS’ COUNTRY RIGHT IN THE VERY HEART OF IT!”.

It is fairly safe to say that, had it not been for Maybole and the Fair in the High Street where William Burnes met and fell for Agnes Broun, our national Bard might never have existed. William and Agnes married in Maybole on 15th December 1757 and just over a year later, on 25th January 1759, Robert was born in nearby Alloway. Maybole has many other connections with Burns in his later life and one of the subscribers to his Kilmarnock Edition of poems was Baillie Niven of Maybole. Returning to collect the money from his childhood friend, Robert Burns spent a convivial night in the Kings Arms, sadly no longer extant.

The Burns Trail rightfully begins here - at the cemetery gate where stood a church. The Bard's parents were wed there on December 15, 1757. Maybole singers Davie Anderson and Frances Dryburgh, who both featured in Burns an' a' That, are pictured at the scene.

AN INITIATIVE PROMOTED BY MAYBOLE HISTORICAL SOCIETY

c/o The Castle, Maybole, KA19 7BX     www.maybole.org/history

More about Robert Burns and his connection to Maybole