Cargill, a post office village and a parish of Strathmore, E Perthshire. The village stands on the left bank of the Tay, ¾ mile WSW of Cargill station on the Caledonian, this being 11½ miles NNE of Perth and 4¼ WSW of Cupar-Angus, the post-town. The parish, containing also the villages of Burrelton, Woodside, and Wolfhill, is bounded NE by Cupar-Angus, E by Kettins in Forfarshire and by a detached portion of Scone, SE by Abernyte and Collace, S by St Martins, W by Auchtergaven and Kinclaven, and NW by Caputh. Its greatest length, from ENE to WSW, is 63/8 miles; its breadth, from NW to SE, varies between 3½ furlongs and 5 miles; and its area is 9626½ acres, of which 131¼ are water. The Tay winds 4½ miles along all the western boundary; and the Isla, for 2¼ miles, down to the Tay, traces the north-western. The land surface is finely diversified with ascents and declivities, and with wood and water. The western border, to the mean breadth of about a mile, rises gradually from the Tay; the central tracts are a low plateau, with some unevenness of contour; and the eastern border includes a strip of the Sidlaw Hills. In the extreme SW the surface sinks to 100 feet above sea-level, thence rising to 409 feet near Wolfhill, 414 in Gallowhill, 390 at Redstone, 598 near Legertlaw, and 1235 in Kings Seat on the Abernyte border. Sandstone, of excellent building quality, has been extensively quarried, and limestone might be profitably worked; whilst a reddish rock marl is plentiful. The soil, near the Tay, is strongly argillaceous; on the central plateau is partly loamy, partly moorish; and towards the foot of the Sidlaws is a light dry gravel. An extensive acreage is under wood, and very little is waste or pastoral. The scenery along the Tay includes the picturesque Linn of Campsie, and ranges from the softly romantic to the magnificent. Tumuli and remains of Caledonian megalithic structures occur in various places; and vestiges of a Roman camp, with fossœ perfectly discernible, and with fragments of an aqueduct leading from it to a neighbouring rivulet, are near the confluence of the Tay and Isla. A Roman road, too, 20 feet broad, and formed of rough round stones, passes north-eastward by Burrelton; and a high rock overlooking the Linn of Campsie is crowned by traces of an ancient monastery, said to have been subordinate to Cupar, whose abbey, being supplied with fuel from Campsie Wood, gave the name of Abbey Road to the track by which it was conveyed. Stobhall House, a prominent feature, belongs to Lady Willoughby de Eresby, who is much the largest proprietor, 2 other landowners holding each an annual value of £500 and upwards, 2 of between £100 and £500, and 1 of from £50 to £100. Believed to have originally formed part of Cupar-Angus parish, but figuring on record as a separate parish so early as 1514, Cargill bore for a time the name of West Parish; it is in the presbytery of Dunkeld and synod of Perth and Stirling, the living being worth £375. The church, at the village, is a plain neat edifice, built in 1831. There is one Free church of Cargill, another of Burrelton; and two public schools, Burrellton and Newbigging, with respective accommodation for 150 and 125 children, had (1880) an average attendance of 102 and 71, and grants of £95,14s. and £50,10s. 6d. Valuation (1881) £12,997,6s. 5d. Pop. (1801) 1585, (1831) 1628, (1861) 1647, (1871) 1411, (1881) 1348.—Ord. Sur., sh. 48,1868.
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errors may remain. Please remember this description dates from
the 1880s; names may have changed, administrative divisions will certainly be
different and there are known to be occasional errors of fact in the original
text, which we have not corrected because we wish to maintain its integrity.
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