Knockentiber
Knockentiber (Scottish Gaelic: Cnoc an Tobair, hill of the well) is a village in East Ayrshire, Parish of Kilmaurs, Scotland.
Armstrong's map of 1775, shows both Busbie as a ruin with woodland policies and Knockentiber as a separate settlement nearby.
[4] The 1860 OS shows that a pre-reformation chapel dedicated to the Virgin Mary was situated close to the site of Busbie Castle.
A small hamlet of thatched cottages was also clustered near the castle, making this a distinct settlement at that time.
Busbie is more or less an alternative name for the area until the Royal Mail reorganised its postal districts in the 1930s when many hamlets and other localities ceased to exist in the eyes of that body.
A pit had been sunk near the mansion house and to the surprise of all the experts, good quality ironstone was found.
Malcolm was the son of the murdered King Duncan and on this occasion he was forced to escape to his castle at Corsehill in Stewarton.
He was nearly captured by MacBeth's soldiers, however a peasant named Friskin hid him by covering him with straw, hence the "Over Fork over" motto of the Cunninghames and Stewarton.
Whilst sinking a well at the edge of the mound in the 19th century the workmen found large quantities of chaff and charred wood.
[12] James Paterson,[13] the historian, relates that Greenhill Farm was then owned by Bailie Finnie, an unpopular man, due to his officious handling of the radical disturbances of the time.
In 1829, one William Brown, known as 'Diehard' due to his army experiences, led a hungry mob to Greenhill which was known to hold considerable hoarded supplies of meal and grain.
The farm domestics were taken by surprise, no difficulty was encountered in obtaining the food supplies and no wanton damage perpetrated.
On the return journey to Kilmarnock the mob met with Bailie Finnie and the local constables, resulting in a 'battle' in which stones were for the most part the weapons of choice.
Hugh Montgomerie, Ist Earl of Eglinton, had a charter on 3 February 1499 from James V of the £40 lands of old extent of Roberton in Cunninghame.
Thorntoun house and estate, including Carmel Bank, previously a Cuninghame property lies towards Springside.
It was home to various families, such as the Montgomeries, Ross's, Mures, Cuninghame's, Peebles, Wreys and Sturrocks, before becoming a school, opened by Barnardo's in September 1971 for children with emotional difficulties aged 11 to 16 years.
The 1860, 1898 - 1904 and, 1923 and 1912 OS maps all show that the extent to which Knockentiber was surrounded by collieries, coal pits and freight only railway or 'tram' lines.
These were served by standard gauge mineral railway lines, criss-crossing the countryside; they all now lifted, with only a few embankments left to indicate their original course.
Tiles were made at the rail served Plann Brickworks and Balgray Bauxite Company had a small mine at Fardalehill.
The old railway from Kilmarnock to Irvine, branching off at Busbie Junction (Crosshouse station), has become a tarmaced cyclepath, maintained by Sustrans.
In addition to providing better surfaces and more direct routes, the turnpikes settled the confusion of the different lengths given to miles,[19] which varied from 4,854 to nearly 7,000 feet (2,100 m).
[20] This seems to have happened all over Scotland, however Fife was more fortunate than Ayrshire, for the stones were taken into storage and put back in place after the war had finished.
The present Busbie farm is marked on the older maps, e.g. 1860, as a mill, with a clear millrace or lade and a sluice.
Strawhorn[5]: 470 states in 1951 that a fair number of inhabitants are of Cornish extraction, having been brought up here to break a coal workers strike in the 1880s.
