St Andrew's Kirk Ports

The roofless 17th-century church on Kirk Ports in the centre of town is the second of three churches that have been dedicated to St Andrew in North Berwick. The first, on a promontory by the harbour, was the site of the infamous 1590 North Berwick witch trials. This second church replaced it in 1664 and stood until a new church was built in 1882; it has been a ruin since.

The walled churchyard is open during daylight hours and contains some unusual 18th-century memorial slabs. It is a quiet corner two minutes from the High Street.

things to do sight
A story
In 1590, a group of more than 100 alleged witches were tried for meeting in St Andrew's Auld Kirk to raise a storm against King James VI's ship as he returned from Denmark. The North Berwick witch trials were one of the largest in Scottish history; the king himself attended part of the trials and became obsessed with witchcraft as a result, eventually writing the treatise Daemonologie.