Stage 12 of the JOGT: Whaligoe to Wick

Distance 10.6 miles/17 km

For further details see jogt.org.uk/stages/

This stage passes through Ulbster, an area connected with saint Martin. Martin of Tours (4th Century) is linked with Ninian, who is said to have had a devotion to the saint. Modern scholars dismiss the theory that Ninian met Martin while travelling to Rome. There may have been another Martin as the sites at Ulbster and Farr both had carved stones but of different styles. A Martin is associated with Donan on Eigg but is not listed as one of the martyrs. The site of St Martin’s chapel in an old graveyard to the S of Mains of Ulbster is occupied by a mausoleum, dated 1700. The site at Farr is Tobar Martain near Grumbeg burial place. The Ulbster stone is now in Caithness Horizons in Thurso. For details, go to canmore.org.uk/site/8431/ulbster-the-ulbster-stone.

Wick is associated with Saint Fergus. Fergus is associated with the north-east and with Drostan (6th C), Medan and Colm. He is also associated with Donnan (d. 617) and his name is on the Tallagh list. This is a Pictish name and dedications cover almost exactly the same area as the great Pictish stones. He seems to have spent time in Ireland, then Strathearn, then Caithness, then Buchan. He is the patron of Wick. Other dedications occur at Halkirk and Moy (Inverness-shire), also in Wigtownshire and Dundee (but there was another Fergus, or Fergustus, a Pictish bishop who attended a council in Rome in 721). The knoll at Halkirk on which St Fergus church stands was known as Tore Harlogan, indicating an earlier dedication to Talorc/ Tarloc/Tarlogan, another follower of Donan). These two names are also linked in Banffshire. His image, kept in Wick, was destroyed in 1613 by a local minister, who was then drowned by the enraged locals. A replacement effigy was placed in what was the Sinclair aisle of the old church of St Fergus and is now in the current St Fergus church. The shape at his feet is the heraldic lion couchant.  A baptismal font purportedly from the old St Fergus church is also in the St Fergus Church, Wick.

For more information, go to  https://www.wickheritagecentre and www.wickstferguschurch.org.uk/page16.html