FERGUS-ST, a parish, in the county of Banff, 5
miles (N. N. VV.) from Peterhead; containing 1391 inhabitants.
This parish, which is locally situated in
Aberdeenshire, was formerly called Langley. It took
its present name, in honour of its patron saint, in the
year 16 16, when the church was removed from its ancient
site, the downs called the Links of St. Fergus,
where it had been erected as a vicarage by the abbot of
Aberbrothock. The lands formed part of the great
earldom of Buchan till its forfeiture by the Cumyns in
1 308; they afterwards came into the possession of the
ancient family of Cheyne, who built the castle of Inverugie,
and who, being heritable sheriffs of Banff, wished
this property to be placed under their own jurisdiction,
for which purpose they obtained an act of the legislature.
The Carmelite friary in Aberdeen was founded
and endowed by one of this family, Reginald le Cheyne,
who secured to it, by deed, £2 annually out of the lauds
of Blackwater, in this parish. His son, Sir Reginald
Cheyne, was lord chamberlain of Scotland in 1267; and
another son, named Henry, was bishop of Aberdeen in
1281. Sir Reginald was succeeded in his property by a
son of the same name, who was made prisoner at the
battle of Halidon Hill in 1333, and who died about 1350,
leaving two daughters, Mary and Mariot, by the marriage
of the latter of whom with John de Keith, of
Raven's-Craig, the parish of St. Fergus passed into the
family of Keith. John de Keith was second son of Sir
Edw-ard Keith, marischal of Scotland; and the issue of
his marriage with Mariot Cheyne continued to be a separate
branch of the Keiths until, in 1.53S, the families became
united by the marriage of William, fourth earlmarischal,
with the heiress of Sir William Keith of
Inverugie. The property escheated to the crown in 171.5,
by the attainder of the then earl, and was sold by the
crown to the York Buildings' Company. It was purchased,
however, from the trustees of the company by
George, son of the attainted earl, in I76I; and in 1*64
the family disposed of it to James Ferguson, Esq., one
of the senators of the College of Justice, with whose
descendants it has since remained.
The PARISH is five and a half miles in extreme length,
and its greatest breadth is three and a half miles. It
contains 7S78 acres, and is bounded on the south by the
river Ugie, and on the east by the German Ocean. The
shore is marked only by one point of any note, called
Scotstown Craig; the beach being generally low and
sandy. At a small distance from the coast there are a
number of hills, covered with a thick bed of drifted sand
overgrown with grass, and which divide the shore from
the interior land, and form a natural and efficient rampart
against the drifting of the sands into the country
by the violence of the east wind. These hills, varying
in breadth, form the fine pasture land known as the
Links of St. Fergus, and afford, perhaps, the finest
grazing for sheep and young cattle of any downs in
Scotland. In the lower part of the parish, to the extent
of a mile from the shore, the ground is flat and uniform;
but afterwards it rises towards the western extremity in
a succession of graceful undulations, exhibiting the pleasing
aspect of a well-cultivated surface. The only high
land approximating to the character of an eminence is
the Castle hill, in the vicinity of Inverugie Castle. The
climate, on account of the exposure to the sea, is cold,
and the impervious character of the subsoil renders it
damp; yet it is not found to be unhealthy. There are
some good springs in the lower lands which yield a constant
supply of water; but in the upper part a drought
sometimes occurs, especially in the hot summer months.
Near the shore the soil is a sandy loam mixed with
moss, requiring but little labour for cultivation; it produces
turnips, potatoes, and heavy crops of grain, which,
however, is not so fine in quality as that grown on the
stronger lands. The middle portion of the parish is a
tenacious clay, yielding excellent grain. In the western
district the soil is not so good, being chiefly clay and moss,
and having not very long ago been a moor. The larger
part of the land is arable, scarcely more than a sixth of
the parish consisting of pasture, moss, and plantations.
The Aberdeenshire and Buchan cattle, which, with their
several crosses, formerly prevailed here, have within these
few years yielded to a great extent to the Teeswater.
The unfitness of the soil generally for the growth of
turnips rather discourages the breeding of cattle; but
the easy communication lately opened up by steamer
with the London market has stimulated the attempts to
overcome this natural obstacle, and the number of o.xen,
cows, and sheep is now very considerable. Many improvements
have taken place by the formation of main
drains and ditches, the planting of hedges, and the construction
of various kinds offences; the farm-buildings,
also, are much better than formerly, and the houses on
the best farms are generally slated, and the offices tiled.
The annual value of real property in the parish is £6172.
The rocks comprise granite, trap, gneiss, greywacke, and
quartz, which are to be seen in all kinds of combinations:
limestone is also found, frequently mixed with gneiss and
granite. There are some tracts of peat-moss, in which
remains of oak, hazel, and birch are embedded; the
antlers of full-grown stags have been found, and large
quantities of marine testacea.
In the parish are three mills, at one of which, called
Stone mill, there were produced in a recent year 1508
sacks of meal, of two and a half hundred-weight each,
sent to the London market, 314 forwarded to Shetland,
and 200 for home consumption; 613 sacks of flour, and
100 sacks of barley, also, were prepared for domestic
use. There is a salmon-fishery on the Ugie, but it has
been much injured by a sand-bank thrown up by the
sea at the mouth of the river, and which prevents the
fish from entering, unless the bank happens to be driven
back by the force of a land flood. Considerable numbers
of black-trout, and the pearl muscle, are found in the
river; but the pearls are of no great value, being dingy
and opaque. The neighbouring seas, also, abound' with
fine fish, consisting of turbot, sole, ling, dog-fish, whiting,
herring, plaice, flounder, cod, and halibut, the most
valuable of which, however, are seldom taken, as the
fishermen have no nets suitable for the purpose. There
is a small village, independently of the kirktown; but
the larger part of the population is scattered throughout
the rural districts. The turnpike-road from Fraserburgh
to Peterhead intersects the parish from north to south;
and over the Ugie is a bridge for it, built in the latter
part of the seventeenth century, and connecting St. Fergus
with the parish of Peterhead.
Ecclesiastically the parish is within the bounds of the
presbytery of Deer, synod of Aberdeen; patron, the
Crown: the stipend of the minister is £217, with a
manse, and a glebe valued at £18 per annum. St. Fergus
church, erected in 1763, is a convenient structure, tastefully
decorated in the interior, and having three galleries;
it contains 610 sittings. There is a small meeting-house
belonging to the Baptists; and a parochial school is
supported, in which Latin, mathematics, and the usual
branches of education are taught, the master receiving
a salary of £34 per annum, with about £20 fees. A
good parish library was founded in 1829, and a savings'
bank in 1824. The chief relic of antiquity is the ruin of
Inverugie Castle, formerly the residence of the earlsroarischal
of Scotland, and the birthplace of Field-
Marshal Keith, who fell at the battle of Hochkirchen in
1758: one of the towers, of great antiquity, is called
Cheyne's, but the greater part of the fabric is said to have
been erected by the earl who founded Mariscbal College,
Aberdeen. The churchyard, on the coast, is a very
ancient cemetery, and of such singular interest, partly on
account of the loneliness of its situation, that the late
Dr. Beattie often expressed a wish to have his remains
deposited here.