Kirkbride, Isle of Man

Historical Description

Kirkbride, a parish, with a village, in the N of the Isle of Man, 4½ miles N by W of Kamsey. It has a post office under Eamsey. Break o' Day Hill, on the coast, has an altitude of 298 feet; Ballakish Hill, Ig mile inland, 323 feet; and Point of Ayre, at the N extremity, 106 feet. A wooded hollow lies round the church, at the NE skirt of Ballakish Hill, and a low flat tract extends thence to the Point of Ayre. The heights command fine views of the Scottish coast, the Lake mountains, and the mountains of North Wales. Large boulders, many of them several tons in weight, lie on the coast and seem to have been used as a quarry for the building of churches and other edifices. A stone circle, called Cronk-ny-Vowlan, with an internal tumulus, is on an eminence on Shellag. A lighthouse, 106 feet high, on the Point of Ayre, shows a revolving light each two minutes. A smaller lighthouse on the verge of the coast was erected in 1890, a fog signal being attached. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Sodor and Man; net value, £226 with residence. Patron, the Crown. The church is Decorated English, much altered, and has over the chancel door a rude sculpture of Adam and Eve in Paradise. Moore, the reviser of the Manx Bible, was rector.