Breconside Tower

Breconside Tower is a tall 16th century tower house forming the core of a modern farmhouse, and cannot be seen from any public road or footpath. The farm buildings sit at the headwaters of the Breckonside Burn, a minor tributary of the River Annan, with high ground surrounding it on three sides – but excellent views to the south, where any threat was most likely to materialise..

The lands of Breconside were part of the lands of Logane, traditionally held by the Carruthers family from the Bruce Lords of Annandale, then the Crown, and later the Douglases, although the first mention of the land is not until 1411, when the Earl of Douglas regranted the lands to Simon de Carruthers. In 1452 they were regranted to John Carruthers of Mouswald by King James II – breaking the Douglas connection as that family fell inevitably towards civil war and outlawry. The new grant made the lands of “Loganetenement” part of a new barony of Carruthers. The lands of Loganetenement was made up of the farms of Craigbeck, Breconside, Logan Woodhead, Logan Woodfoot and Crofthead. The estate was also called the Procornal, and about a mile to the north of Breconside are the ruins of Cornal Tower. The property of Breconside was tenanted (Edward Maxwell was a tenant at Breconside in 1527 before he purchased the Hills estate), but the lords were still the Carruthers family. In 1544, Simon Carruthers of Mouswald obtained a re-erection of the barony of Carruthers, which included the “£20 lands of old extent of Mouswald…with tower, fortalice, mill…the £20 (old extent) of Logan-tenement with mill” which clearly shows there was no tower within the lands of Logane. In June 1548, Simon Carruthers was charged with treason for surrendering to the English – along with most of the Scottish West March. However, Simon was killed in July the same year, fighting thieves in the Debatable Lands. The government of Queen Mary granted the ward and marriage of his two daughters, Janet and Marion, to Sir James Douglas of Drumlanrig. Drumlanrig then entered a lawsuit with Simon’s brother John, who had been named his heir in the new entail of 1544, but was able to buy Carruthers out for £2000 Scots. Drumlanrig showed little desire to marry the girls off, and still held them in ward in 1558, when they were considered of age. In 1560, Janet Carruthers was married to one Thomas Rorison of Bardannoch, and kindly signed over her half of the Carruthers estate to Drumlanrig, for his services to her, including acknowldgement of her debt of £1000 for Drumlanrig buying her uncle off. The younger daughter proved to have more backbone, and refused the husband offered her by Drumlanrig. Eventually she tried to settle her half of the barony on her uncle Charles Murray of Cockpool in 1565, but was prevented from doing so by Drumlanrig’s lawyers. In a sad end, a document of 1570 records that the Crown had gained the estate through ” the said Marioun Carrutheris wilfull slaying of hirself in leiping ovir the wall of the Castell touer and fortalice of Cullyngane, [Comlongon Castle) upoun the twenty-five day of September last bipast, and thairthrow wilfullie breaking hir awin craig and banis quhairof sche deit” although it has to be said that for Marion to have killed herself at the home of her preferred uncle – who had tried so hard to help her secure and maintain her inheritance seems odd, and there were contemporary suspicions of foul play.

However, from 1550 Breconside was being held directly from Drumlanrig by a branch of the Johnstons, and in 1576 James Johnston, younger of Breconside, was served heir to his father James. In 1588, with the whole of Logane now held by Drumlanrig, the whole of these lands were absorbed by crown charter into the barony of Drumlanrig.  There is no suggestion that there was a tower or strong house here at the time, and in fact there is no such building shown on the 1590 “Platte” showing all the strongholds of the area – but it had been erected and named “the Brekensyde” by 1592. This tower was a rectangular building, with a winding stair in the south-west corner off a small ground floor lobby (now blocked and turned into a window). The vaulted basement was later subdivided, and the hall was above, but repeated alterations make further assessment of the layout impossible, and the tower became enveloped by later accretions, including a full-height semi-octagonal tower in the centre of the east wall adjacent to the original entrance – and obscured by changes such as the insertion of a new entrance doorway in the north gable. The second James Johnston died in about 1620, and his son, a third James, was outlawed in 1621 and 1622, and died in 1666. A fourth James is on record in 1683 and 1684 – a supporter of the Covenanters, who later elected to swear the Abjuration Oath instead of the fatal alternative – who was followed by his son John.

In 1693, John Johnston transferred the property to his nephew, Andrew Chalmers, and two years later passed to Chalmers’ sister Margaret, married to one William Carruthers. In 1746, their son, Captain John Carruthers, commenced extensive works, which proceeded at a slow enough pace to annoy the neighbours. The estate was encumbered by debt prior to this, and it is to be considered that the additional works were perhaps too much for the estate to comfortably sustain. In 1758 it was assessed for taxation purposes at fourteen windows – avoiding the higher window tax rate effective for fifteen and above. It is clear that several windows had been blocked up to achieve this little tax dodge. When the Captain had actually inherited the estate in 1756, the estate debts meant that he had to assign its income to a creditor. In 1805 it was purchased by the physician Dr John Rogerson, who had made his fortune serving as the personal physician of Catherine the Great. His daughter Elizabeth succeeded him in 1823, and married the future 9th Lord Rollo in 1834. Elizabeth’s son became 10th Lord Rollo in 1852, and carried out considerable works at Breconside, although he was an absentee landlord, and the property was a prosperous farm of over 1100 acres – tenanted by a family named Carruthers. The estate was sold several times after this, and eventually the house was permitted to fall into decline, was abandoned by 1980, and was for some time under threat of demolition. However, it seems that in more recent years, the building has been brought back into repair, although the projecting half-octagonal tower on the south side which can be seen on the Canmore image had to be demolished as part of this process. Today Breconside Tower is to all appearances just a very tall farmhouse, and remains in use as a private home for the working farm.

HES Canmore database entry