Bass Rock
Bass Rock (56°4′31″N 2°38′21″W / 56.07528°N 2.63917°W) is an island in the outer part of the Firth of Forth in the east of Scotland, approximately one mile off North Berwick. Its correct name is the Island of The Bass [citation needed].
The island is a volcanic plug and stands over 100 m high in the Firth of Forth Islands Special Protection Area which covers some, but not all of the islands in the inner and outer Firth. Bass Rock is a Site of Special Scientific Interest in its own right, due to its Gannet colony. It is sometimes called "the Ailsa Craig of the East".
It plays host to at least 40,000 pairs of Gannets and is the largest single rock gannetry in the world so that, when viewed from the mainland, large regions of the surface appear white due to the sheer number of birds (and their droppings). In fact the scientific name for the Northern Gannet, Sula bassana or Morus bassanus, derives its name from the rock. They were traditionally known locally as 'Solan Goose'.
History
The Lauder Family
Historically the home of the Lauder of The Bass family (from whom Sir Harry Lauder is descended), who are the earliest recorded proprietors, the island is said to have been a gift from King Máel Coluim III of Scotland. Their crest is, appropriately, a Gannet standing upon a rock.
The family had from an early date a castle on the island. In 1497 King James IV visited the Bass and stayed in the castle with Sir Robert Lauder of The Bass (d.before Feb 1508). The boatmen who conveyed the King from Dunbar were paid 14 shillings. The family lost The Bass during the English Civil War, and the castle subsequently (in 1671) became a notorious gaol for many decades where many religious and political prisoners were sent. John Blackadder, the best known of the Covenanting martyrs, died on the Bass in 1686. He is buried at North Berwick, where a United Free Church was named after him.
Buildings & Stuctures
Not far above the landing-place the slope is crossed by a curtain wall, which naturally follows the lie of the ground, having sundry projections and round bastions where a rocky projection offers a suitable foundation. The parapets are battlemented, with the usual walk along the top of the walls. Another curtain wall at right-angles runs down to the sea close to the landing-place, ending in a ruined round tower, whose vaulted base has poorly splayed and apparently rather unskilfully constructed embrasures. The entrance passes through this outwork wall close to where it joins the other.
The main defences are entered a little farther on in the same line, through a projecting two-story building which has some fireplaces with very simple and late mouldings. The buildings are of the local basalt, and the masonry is rough rubble; there are, as is so frequently the case, no very clear indications for dating the different parts, which were in all probability erected at different times.
A little beyond the entrance there is a tower that formed a simple bastion and to which has been added a gabled chamber in the 17th century, which, though of restricted dimensions, must have been comfortable enough, with blue Dutch tiles round its moulded fireplace, now very much decayed.
During the 16th and 17th centuries there was sufficient grass present for 100 sheep to graze. Strangely, the freshwater well was right at the top of the island, where today the foghorn is situated.
Half-way up the island stands the ruin of St.Baldred's Chapel, which is sited upon a cell or cave in which this Scottish Saint spent some time. Although the Lauders held most of the Bass Rock, this part of it had remained in the ownership of The Church until 1316 when it was granted to the family. The chapel appears to have been rebuilt by the Lauder family several times. A Papal Bull dated 6th May 1493, refers to the Parish Church of the Bass, or the Chapel of St.Baldred, being "noviter erecta" at that time. On the 5th January 1542 we find John Lauder, son of Sir Robert Lauder of The Bass, Knt., as "the Cardinal's Secretary" representing Cardinal David Beaton at a reconsecration of the restored and ancient St.Baldred's chapel on The Bass. In 1576 it is recorded that the Church on the Bass, and that at Auldhame (on the mainland), required no readers, doubtless something to do with the Reformation.
It is also home to a 20 metre lighthouse, built in 1902 by David Stevenson, who demolished the 13th century keep, or governor's house, and some other buildings within the castle for the stone. It has been unmanned since 1988.
Publications
- "The Bass Rock" by M'Crie, Miller, Anderson, Fleming, and Balfour, Edinburgh, 1847.
- "Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries", - 'The Bass' by John J. Reid, 1885.
- "North Berwick, Gullane, Aberlady and East Linton District, by R.P.Phillimore, North Berwick, 1913.
- "The Berwick and Lothian Coasts" by Ian C. Hannah, London & Leipzig, 1913.
- "The Bass Rock in History" in "Transactions of the East Lothian Antiquarian & Field Naturalists' Society", 5th vol., 1948.
- "The Lauders of The Bass" by G.M.S.Lauder-Frost,F.S.A.,(Scot), in "East Lothian Life", Autumn 1996, issue 22, ISSN 1361-7818.