Deskford Church

St John's church was first mentioned in documents from 1541, which record its reconstruction, and which describe is as a chapel, probably built for the Ogilvy family. It is first described as a church in 1545, and the sacrament house was added in 1551. The buildings were designated a scheduled monument in 1934;

The remains of the church survive as a long, narrow and 'particularly fine' by Richard Fawcett, is seen as the most significant surviving feature of the church. Roughly 2.5 metres high and 1 metre wide, it features fine vine-scrolling and carvings, as well as a number of inscriptions in Latin which reference the Ogilvy family (who went on to become the Earls of Seafield), and the Gordons. The burial grounds contain a number of 17th and 18th Century memorials, including that of Walter Ogilvy, a former minister of the parish, who died in 1658. The grounds are enclosed by a coped rubble wall, and accessed from the north via a pair of simple cast iron spear-head gates, flanked by squared ashlar…