Note on the probable origin of the Scottish surname of Gemmill or Gemmell

in 1617. The preceptors from time to time feued out the greater part of
the lands with the double object of providing for their dependents and at
the same time securing asufficient rental. Accordingly in 1614 the rights
held were principally those of superiority. 1
A remarkable circumstance attaching to Temple lands in the olden time was
their recognition as sanctuaries or "houses of refuge." In the record of
the trial of Cuninghame of Aiket and Raebourne of that Ilk for the
slaughter of John Mure of Cauldwell, it appeared that Raebourne was within
the privilege of the regality of the Lord Sanct Johnne (that is the Temple-
lands) and he declined to be taken therefrom. 2
Not many years since, an old woman who had got into some difficulty with the
Magistrates of Kinghorn, when pursued by the town officers, rushed into
a Temple tenement in that town, and, putting her head over the window,
dared them to do their worst, upon the belief that tkis'sanctuary could no
be violated. 3
Fullarton, another annotator of Ponis wor7i-,, states that
" Templehouse is a small property in the parish of Dunlop.
" It appears to have belonged to the predecessors of the
" present proprietor, John Gemmill, of Templehouse, at least
" since about the middle of the 16th Century ; and they
" probably were originally vassals of the great fraternity of
" the Knights Templars, whose domains were ultimately
" erected into the lordship of Torphichen." 4
The superiority of Templehouse was sold by the second
Lord Torphichen, as it appears that Robert Montgomerie of
Hes?ilhead made charters in 1619, and from him it passed
successively to Wallace of Cairnhill, Dr. Robert Patrick, of
Hessilhead and Trearne. William Patrick of Roughwood,
W. S., and it is now attached to the estate of Woodside,
Beith. The late Mr. R. W. Cochrane Patrick of Woodside,
in a letter dated 9th March, 1896, to Mr. J. A. Gemmill,
Ottawa, says : "The superiority of the Templelands in Dunlop
" parish is annexed to the entailed estate of Woodside. The
" proprietor of that estate is therefore the Superior, not in
" virtue of anything personal, but solely as proprietor under
1. Bobie's Pout's Cuninghame, 1874, p. 200.
2. Pitcairn's Ancient Criminal Trials of Scotland, and Eobertson's Historic Ayrshire, p. 18.
3. Abstract of the Torphichen Charters, p. 3.
i. Fullarton's Pont's Cuninghame Topographised, Maitland Club, 1858, p. 172.