Anwoth, near Kirkcudbright, is where Samuel Rutherford, one of the most loved Covenanter preachers and writers, was minister from 1627.

“Before Rutherford's arrival, his parishioners later wrote, ‘our souls were under that miserable extreme famine of the word, that we had only the poor help of a sermone every second Sabbath, by reason of a most inconvenient union with other two other kirks’. Rutherford transformed this situation. ‘He used ordinarily to rise be three a clock in the morning’, wrote John Livingstone, and ‘was the instrument of much good among a poor ignorant people, many of which he brought to the knowledge and practise of religion”
(Oxford Dictionary of National Biography)

In 1636, Rutherford was banished to Aberdeen for his strong Presbyterian beliefs. Here he felt much pain in being unable to preach (‘My dumb Sabbaths stick in my throat’) but continued his ministry through his famous letters.

Following the signing of the National Covenant Rutherford returned to Anwoth, but was then appointed professor of theology at St Andrews in 1639. In 1643 he was appointed as one of the Scottish commissioners to the Westminster Assembly

‘Anwoth Old Kirk’ as its known was still in use until 1825, but today it is a ruin. There is a monument to Rutherford on nearby Boreland Hill.

Links:
Google Earth: Anwoth and Rutherford Memorial