"Auchterderran parish is bounded by Ballingry, Beath, Abbotshall, Auchtertool, Dysart, Kinglassie and Kinross-shire. It is about 5 miles long by 3 miles wide. About three quarters of the land is under cultivation and everything connected with agriculture has made great progress during the last 10 or 12 years. Coal and ironstone are extensively worked. At Lochgelly Station there are 4 furnaces for smelting the ore, although recently the industry has been dull. The principal village is Lochgelly, small portions of it also being in the parishes of Beath and Ballingry. There are also villages at Cardenden and Clunie. The parish church is in the hamlet of Auchterderran; there is a chapel of ease in Lochgelly where there are also a Free Church and a UP Church. In the same village are a number of Roman Catholics who meet fortnightly in Littlejohn's Hall. A small number of Mormons also worship in the same place." edited from Westwood's Directory for the counties of Fife & Kinross published 1862.

Auchterderran Parish

A parish in W Fife to the south-west of Kinglassie and north of Auchtertool. Traversed by the River Ore, its landscape was dramatically altered by over a century of coal mining which developed from the early 19th century and resulted in the former hamlets of Auchterderran, Cardenden, Bowhill and Dundonald all merging into one great mining township.

If you would like to visit this area as part of a highly personalized small group tour of my native Scotland please e-mail me at;

sandystevenson@thefreesite.com

Return To Fife