Kinghorn

During the Scottish Reformation, French troops commanded by Henri Cleutin and Captain Sarlabous sailed from Leith and fought with the Lords of the Congregation at Pettycur Bay on 7 January 1560. Kinghorn Castle remained an important possession of the Scottish Crown, and this was recognised by the creation of the Earldom of Kinghorne in 1606. A burn, fed from the freshwater Kinghorn Loch above the town, once provided the town with its water and subsequently provided the source of power to drive the machinery of flax mills. The old town was dramatically transformed in 1846 by the construction of the railway viaduct across the valley of the burn and the opening of Kinghorn Station by the Edinburgh and Northern Railway which had its terminus at Burntisland for ferries across the Forth to Granton. Much of the former horse ferry traffic from Pettycur Bay was lost to Burntisland.