In Tam o' Shanter, Tam's drinking companion — his 'ancient, trusty, drouthy crony' — is Souter Johnnie, a souter being a shoemaker. Burns did not invent him. He was John Davidson, the village cobbler of Kirkoswald, whom Burns met during the summer of 1775 when he was sent here to study surveying at the parish school.
Davidson built this thatched cottage on Main Road in 1785 and lived and worked in it until his death in 1806. It stayed in his family until 1920, was restored, and eventually passed to the National Trust for Scotland.
It is free
This is the thing most visitors do not know: the National Trust for Scotland removed the entrance charge in 2016, and it has been free to go in ever since. Donations are welcome. The entrance is round the back rather than off the street.
Inside
The cottage is small and it does not take long, but it is well done. There is a recreation of village life at the end of the 1700s, including the souter's workshop with his tools and his fire — the actual working room of the man in the poem. Alongside it the Trust runs changing exhibitions of work by local artists and makers, most of which is for sale.
In a thatched outbuilding in the garden stand the life-sized stone figures of Tam, Souter Johnnie, the innkeeper and his wife, carved in the 1820s by the self-taught Ayrshire sculptor James Thom. Thom's work turns up all over this coast — his Wallace stands on the tower in Ayr High Street, and more of his Burns figures are at the Monument in Alloway.
Across the road
The old kirkyard opposite holds the graves of both men: John Davidson, and Douglas Graham of Shanter, the farmer Burns used for Tam himself. They lie a few yards apart. For anyone who knows the poem, standing between the two graves is a slightly uncanny five minutes, and it costs nothing.
Practical notes
Opening is seasonal and not daily — broadly late March to the end of October — so check the National Trust for Scotland listing before making a special trip. There are cobblestones outside and the garden slopes steeply, though the cottage itself is wheelchair accessible. A small car park sits at the south end of the village about 150 metres away, with free lay-bys on the main road.
Fifteen minutes from Girvan on the A77, or the same on the Stagecoach 60 bus. It combines naturally with Culzean two miles west, Crossraguel Abbey two miles east, and lunch at Souter's Inn. See Kirkoswald.
