10/10/2025
🕳🔦 𝗔𝗯𝗮𝗻𝗱𝗼𝗻𝗲𝗱 𝗰𝗮𝘃𝗲𝘀 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲 ‘𝗦𝗮𝗴𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝗕𝗲𝗶𝘁𝗵’
Just a short walk east of Gateside Plant Centre, embedded in an abandoned limestone quarry, lies a vast warren of hidden caves.
The landscape here at Langside was formed as part of the ocean floor in the Carboniferous geological era, 326-335 million years ago, when North Ayrshire sat under miles upon miles of tropical water. Over a seriously long period of time the accumulation and compaction of calcium carbonate deposits, primarily from the skeletons and shells of marine organisms like corals, molluscs, and plankton, produced hard, layered sedimentary limestone rock.
Historically, then, North Ayrshire has naturally been a hotbed of limestone production for agricultural and building purposes. And one of the most famous local families associated with quarrying it was the Craigs of Beith and Gateside – themselves descendants of the Craigs of Paisley, stretching back many centuries.
Robert Craig, who was born at Dundonald in 1762, began the Beith line when he moved to the area sometime prior to marrying Ann King (or Kennedy) in 1783. Together they had seven children: Margaret (b.1784), Robert (b.1788), William (b.1789), Margaret II (b.1792), Margaret III (b.1794), David (b.1797) and James (b.1799).
From at least the 1820s, and likely before that time, Robert senior was a lime merchant at Broadstone, south of Gateside. The Broadstone quarries, on three sides of the road junction, were first worked in the late 18th century, mainly for agricultural use, and from the mid-19th century, lime was transported by mineral railway for use in the Glengarnock iron and steel works. The quarries were worked out and abandoned before 1895, leaving behind a series of gullies, kilns, and a small circular cave (which we’ve covered previously).
Reek Street in Gateside is a reminder of the distinct aroma the burning lime once wafted across the village! Indeed, the 1837 Pigot’s Directory lists Robert as a lime burner, and we know he later lived at High Broadstone beside the lime quarries.
Sometime prior to 1841, Robert established a new limeworks and quarry at Langside Farm, located just east of Gateside on the B777 Beith-Lugton road, on land purchased or leased from the Trearne Estate. According to a family history written in the 1970s, the business headquarters “were at the farm of Langside and a drift immediately opposite the farm was opened and limestone was blasted out - this drift was at least 8 feet high, 600 yards long, and 6 or more feet wide.”
Robert’s son William, born at Beith, grew up in the lime trade alongside his father and brothers. For the 1841 census, he was the head of his own family at Easter Langside, listed as an agricultural labourer. Also listed are his wife Janet; son John, aged 20, limemaster; son Robert, limeburner, aged 15; daughter Janet, sower, aged 15; and son David, currier, aged 15. The Margarets had all sadly died in childhood.
Although a date is not mentioned, the family history states that William “carried on the work” of his father, presumably following Robert’s death, and he further expanded operations at Langside – extending the network of caves we see today.
In the 1851 census, William’s occupation is noted as “limeburner, employing three men”, while Janet and sons John and Robert, and daughter Janet, are all entered into the record as limeburners. There was at least one old limekiln in Langside Quarry, which may have predated Robert’s involvement, but most of the burning was done at Broadstone. A rectangular building served the entrance to the Langside site which worked the ‘Broadstone Limestone’, an obsolete term for Hurlet Limestone. Nearby Trearne Quarry worked the Dockra Limestone (now termed Blackhall).
Come 1858, Robert junior was on jury duty at Stevenston for the trial of four Catholics accused of inciting a riot there.
Fast-forward to 1861, the census finds William and family still biding at Langside. William was now a “farmer [of] 40 acres and limeburner”. John had been promoted to an agent for the family firm and Robert laboured in the quarry. Young Janet was a housekeeper for her widowed father. Interestingly, also living with them were Robert Lane, servant and carter, aged 22; Hugh Miller, servant and carter, aged 78; and Robert Sneddon, servant and “waggoner and railway” man, aged 78. The house at Langside had three rooms with windows.
An 1865 newspaper clipping tells of “men who lifted stones” at Langside hand-feeding a robin which used to poach crumbs from the men while they sat down for lunch. It returned months later, leading the workers to think birds could form memories.
William Craig died in 1876 and was buried on 27th March in plot 89 at Head Street Church, Beith (now a Scout hall), along with four children, his daughter-in-law, and grandson Alex.
Langside Limeworks was continued on by his sons Robert and John.
Robert, in particular, was a student of nature and history who received proper instruction at Gateside School. He attended evening classes over a few winters and became well respected for his knowledge of fossils and geology in the Garnock Valley; knowledge quite literally hewn from the rock he worked for decades.
Joining the Geological Society of Glasgow in 1867, he contributed a number of papers, dozens of which were printed in the society’s Transactions. He had a very valuable collection of fossils garnered from sites around Ayrshire, including ancient shark teeth from Broadstone and marine coral from Trearne and Langside - some specimens of which are in the Hunterian Museum in Glasgow. One of his specialist topics was mammoth remains recovered from fields near Dreghorn and Kilmaurs.
Among the Victorian-era finds at Langside were Clisiophyllum and Clisiophyllum coniseptum (solitary, horn-shaped rugose coral) and Dibunophyllum (sea-floor dwelling coral).
Additionally, he wrote an extensive narrative titled ‘The Covenanters’ – an 88-page-long poem printed in 1894. Robert also acted as a tour guide which together, along with his geological acumen, earned him the sobriquet ‘The Sage of Beith’.
In the 1870s and 1880s he wrote letters against the wheat tax; others to out our national bard Robert Burns as an alleged Tory; and he drafted many a spiel to speak out against Radical politics. Some of these letters are in the safekeeping of Liverpool University. We know, too, that Robert was a past master of Beith St John’s Lodge.
His brother John died a single but wealthy man, in 1887, aged 72. Robert held out until his own death in 1901, aged 80, at his nephew’s home in Glengarnock. In-between these years, and definitely before 1895, quarrying ceased at Langside. Robert latterly lived at King’s Cottage in Beith. Both men are buried at Head Street Cemetery.
As part of his will, Robert’s fossils and books went to another nephew, Robert Craig, of Crummock Knowe Cottage, Beith. However, other sources state the collections passed to James Neilson, who presented duplicates to Glasgow Museum in 1908. Neilson apparently sold the rest to the Royal Scottish Museum in 1909, where it is referred to as the Neilson Collection.
The empty caves and quarry were planted with trees and transformed as Langside Plantation, with the farm returning to agricultural use. On an 1895 map we can see the worked-out quarry with an entrance directly across from the farm. The Kirkwood family moved in to replace the Craigs before 1897.
A geological map from 1922 reveals a rich vein of ‘Langside Section limestone and sandstone, marine band’, and further maps show the reduction of the quarry site in the years 1958 and 1967 when it was likely used as an informal tip. On a recent walk we discovered medicine bottles from the 1940s, old china, and everything from half an abandoned car to a series of lawnmowers and fridge-freezers!
By the late 2000s the site had been completely consumed by nature. There are at least six separate cave entrances, some bigger than others, and the main exits each have a coloured guide rope to prevent folk from getting lost. (That said, please do not explore these caves without taking precautions, not least noting the WhatThreeWords location, notifying someone of your whereabouts, and donning some proper headgear and footwear!)
