The Beginnings
The original name of the parish was ‘Golyn’, and the ruins of the previous 12th-century church can still be seen in the neighbouring village of Gullane.
In 1600, Sir Thomas Erskine (who later became the Earl of Kellie), a close friend of King James VI, received the title Baron of Dirleton for saving the life of the King. On 23 October 1612, he obtained the permission of the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh to build a new church at Dirleton. The reason given was that the old Kirk:
“is sa incommodiouslie situat beside the sea sand that the same, with the kirk yard thereof, is continewallie overblawin with sand, that nather the Kirk servis commodiouslie for the convening of the parochiners, nor yet the kirk yard for their Burial”
[for a translation of the entire Act of Parliament please see here]
Work started soon afterwards and that original building forms the basis of the Dirleton Kirk of today. The Kirk is long and narrow with a square tower at the western end.
The Archerfield Aisle
In 1631 James Maxwell, a man of enterprise and a staunch loyalist, purchased the estate of Dirleton. In 1646 he was created Earl of Dirleton for services to the King. He died at Holyrood just before Cromwell invaded Scotland in 1650, when Dirleton Castle (which had been used as a base for Royalist troops) was captured and dismantled; it is in ruins to this day.
The Archerfield Aisle, which dominates the southern front of the present-day church, was begun soon after the Earl’s death by his widow Elizabeth Debousy and was probably built over his grave. The Archerfield Aisle is arguably the first example of neo-classical architecture in Scotland.
It was not completed in 1660 when James Maxwell’s grandson James, Earl of Salisbury, sold the estate to Sir John Nisbet. A year after Sir John Nisbet (who was Scotland’s Lord Advocate) purchased the estate of Dirleton, he was raised to the Bench with the title Lord Dirleton. The Archerfield Aisle was finally completed in 1664.
18th and 19th Century Benefactors
Sir John Nisbet bequeathed his Bible for use in the Kirk, and his estate to his cousin William Nisbet of Craigentinny, who was Member of Parliament for the County of Haddington in the last Scottish and first British Parliament at the time of the Act of Union in 1707.
Jean Bennet, the second wife of William Nisbet, presented the Church with Communion Silver on the occasion of her marriage on the 24th of April, 1711; it is still in use today.
Mary Hamilton Nisbet (born 1778) married the Earl of Elgin who, as Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire, brought the famous ‘Elgin Marbles’ from Athens to London. As Countess of Elgin, she had an interesting life but returned to Archerfield in her later years and died there in 1855. She did much to improve the church and village of Dirleton.
In 1825 the Kirk tower was extended up to four storeys, a vestry was added for the Minister on the northern wall and an imposing manse was built in 1828. There is a projecting circular turret stair to the north of the tower with a conical roof; the stair reaches the second floor of the tower with access thereafter being by ladder. Historically, the top story of the tower contained a lectern doocot. In 1836 the tower was crowned with Gothic pinnacles. Mary Hamilton Nisbet also paid for the building of the wall that now surrounds Dirleton Castle and for the establishment of the Castle Inn in the village.
Towards the end of the 19th Century, the Dirleton Kirk Session decided to build what is now the Gullane Parish Church for the benefit of “the large number of summer visitors annually residing in the village” of Gullane, which was then still part of the parish. That church was designed by Glasgow architect John Honeyman and was completed in 1888.
20th Century Internal Modernisation
The organ was built by Ingram and Co in 1900 and was installed in the Kirk shortly thereafter.
An extensive restoration was undertaken in the 1930s. Originally the Kirk had an entrance to the east which was removed during this process and replaced with a three-light window (see the section on internal features of Dirleton Kirk at ‘I am the vine’). During this restoration work the church was modernised and reorganised giving the layout seen today (the pulpit was previously in the middle of the north side of the Kirk with the pews facing it and the organ on the south wall).
The Kirk, including the gateway and graveyard walls, has had category A listed building status (as a place of special architectural or historical interest which are outstanding examples of a particular period, style or building type) since 1971 (LB1526). Dirleton is a Conservation Village which also includes a ruined 13th century listed castle managed by Historic Environment Scotland.
The Kirk Session records date from 1655 and there have only been twenty Ministers in the parish since the Kirk was built (for a list of the Ministers please see here).
