Chapelhill Farm

NT24SW 34 2452 4278.

(NT 2452 4218) Chapel (NR) (site of)

OS 6" map (1906)

Although at first sight it presents no obvious features of antiquity, the farmhouse at Chapelhill, proves upon closer examination to be a much-altered example of a small tower-house of the 16th century. The structure measures 31' 10" by 22' 2" over walls about 4' in thickness; it rises to a height of two storeys, but may originally have been higher. All the door and window openings now visible appear to have been inserted or renewed. Attached to the SW side of the house there is a single-storeyed kitchen. Above the door there is a stone bearing the incised date 1696, but both the doorway and the inscribed stone appear to be in secondary use.

The name Chapelhill evidently became attached to the property in medieval times because it formed part of the endowment of the chapel of Peebles Castle. This chapel, with its associated lands of Chapelhill, was granted by David I to the abbey of Kelso, which retained it until the middle of the 16th century when it passed to the Pringles. It was no doubt at about this time that the tower was built, and the existing building may be that in which part of the "ornamentis westmentis and jewellis" of the Cross Kirk were stored, while awaiting disposal, in 1564. The Pringles sold Chapelhill in 1657 and thereafter the property changed hands more than once before passing to the Williamsons, who held it in the second and third quarters of the 18th century.

RCAHMS 1967, visited 1959

This tower-house has been harled and is now of no architectural merit. There is no sign of the 1696 datestone.

Visited by OS (JLD) 16 May 1962 and (BS) 27 September 1974