Page "Wigtown" Paragraph 37

The parish church of Wigtown was dedicated to an obscure 6th-century British saint,.

On display within the modern parish church is a Celtic interlaced cross shaft of the Whithorn School dating back to approximately 1000 AD.

Precisely how old the church is remains a mystery, and although at one time it belonged to the priory of Whithorn, Wigtown parish church was afterwards set up as a free rectory with the king as patron.

A church was erected on the site of the medieval parish church in 1730, and almost within a century that church was ruinous, for a third parish church was built close by in 1850.

Portions of the 1730 church survive, although fragments of this may, in fact, be older than that date, for there is a window, on the south side aisle ornamented with trefoiled heads and stone mullions with shields carved on them.

Some residents of Wigtown maintain that the ruins date back to the 13th century.

A Catholic Church church was built in the town in 1879.