186 The Church and Churchyard of Chirnside. 



to present the king yearly a sword for Chirnside, " reddendo per 

 annum ensem, in festo Nativitatis Sti. Johannis," but we find, 

 that on the 20th June, 1451, the King's lands of Chirnside and 

 Dunglass, which appear to have been for some time vested in 

 the Crown, were granted to Sir Alexander Home, the first Lord 

 High Chamberlain of Scotland. In 1489-90, Alexander, second 

 Lord Home, had his lands of Chirnside and Manderston united 

 to the barony of Home by charter bearing date 4th January of 

 that year. A decree of the same Parliament which brought 

 Lord Home to the scaffold in October 1516, confiscated his 

 estates. Chirnside, with some of his other lands and titles, was 

 however, restored to his son George, in August 1522, and con- 

 firmed to him by three successive Parliaments. In March 1646, 

 these lands were granted to John Home, uncle of James, Earl of 

 Home. About the period of the Kevolution, those lands now 

 called Whitehall were acquired by purchase from the Homes by 

 a gentleman of the name of Hall, ancestor of the present Sir 

 John Hall, Bart., of Dunglas. The last laird of Whitehall, as 

 individual proprietor, was William Hall, Esq., who died at 

 London, April 3, 1800. He was fond of chemical investigations, 

 and possessed a fine apparatus for carrying out his experiments. 

 After remaining in possession of the Hall family for nearly a 

 century and a half, the estate of Wliitehall was purchased, a few 

 years since, by Mitchell Innes, Esq., of Ayton, the present pro- 

 prietor and patron of the Church of Chirnside. The lower part 

 of the estate, stretching to the Whiteadder, is beautifully adorned 

 with lofty groves of oak, beech, ash, elm, &c, the most of which 

 were planted by the Halls, shortly after it came into their 

 possession. 



We know little of the state of the Church of Chirnside in the 

 times of old. In the ancient taxation, taken in 1176, "ecclesia 

 de Chirnesyd" was rated at 50 marks. In Bagimonfs roll, the 

 tenth of the rectory of Chirnside is taken at £4*. Symon, " par- 

 sona de Chirnesyde," subscribed a charter of Patrick, Earl of 

 Dunbar, between the years 1248 and 1289, " de restitutione 

 wardse maritagii heredam de Nesbyth." The successor of 

 Symon seems to have been William de Blida, or Ely the; he 

 appears on the list of Berwickshire clergy who were necessitated 

 to swear fealty to Edward I. at Berwick, in August 1296. In 

 1342, during the reign of David II., Patrick, Earl of Dunbar, 

 annexed the advowson and property of the church of Chirnside 

 to his newly-founded collegiate church at Dunbar, which was 

 the first establishment of that kind known in Scotland, and thus 

 constituted it a collegiate prebend. This annexation was con- 

 firmed by Landells, Bishop of St. Andrews ; and more recently, 

 by Henry, Bishop of the same diocese, on the 23rd October, 



