Kirkwall has very few manufactures.
Kirkwall received its first charter from James III.
Kirkwall belongs to the Wick district group of parliamentary burghs, the others being Cromarty, Dingwall, Dornoch and Tain.
He had, however, been chosen for Kirkwall, and could fight his cause in the House.
Many indications of ice action are found in these islands; striated surfaces are to be seen on the cliffs in Eday and Westray, in Kirkwall Bay and on Stennie Hill in Eday; boulder clay, with marine shells, and with many boulders of rocks foreign to the islands (chalk, oolitic limestone, flint, &c.), which must have been brought up from the region of Moray Firth, rests upon the old strata in many places.