Fairfull Smith of Auchindrane – John Fairfull Smith, W. S. – of Old Auchindrane

My great-great grandfather, John Fairfull Smith, W. S., was secretary to the Glasgow, Paisley,

Kilmarnock, and Ayr Railway, and subsequently the Glasgow and South Western Railway.

 

 

His first wife, Caroline, died in 1849, and he remarried in 1850. John acquired land in Ayrshire,

and some of the family history, and details of the property, can be found in James Paterson,

History of the Counties of Ayr and Wigton, Volume II – Carrick, Edinburgh, 1864, pages 406-409.

Extracts can be read below. It is interesting to note that Paterson spells the name as

“Auchindrane”. Others use “Auchendrane”.

 

The house and grounds were sold to James Cowan in 1864. John died in 1868, and in that year

Auchendrane was acquired by Peter Coats of Paisley.

 

Old Auchendrane, as the property is also known, was photographed by Glasgow’s Messrs Annan

for Alexander Hastie Millar, The Castles and Mansions of Ayrshire: Historical and Descriptive

Accounts of The Castles and Mansions of Ayrshire, 1885.

 

 

 

 

 

In the text, Millar makes no mention of John Fairfull Smith, or James Cowan, and credits

Coats with the construction of the mansion. However, another source states that, in 1881,

Peter Coats built an extension and remodelled the 1856 mansion house.

 

 

 

 

Extracts from James Paterson, History of the Counties of Ayr and Wigton, Volume II – Carrick,

Edinburgh 1864:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

George Fairfull-Smith, May 2025.