| Place-name: | Linn Burn |
| Scots linn ‘waterfall, cataract, cascade of water Scots burn ‘stream’ | |
| Place-name: | Upper Linn |
| Scots upper ‘upper’ + Place-Name: Linn | |
| Place-name: | Netherlinn |
| Scots nether ‘nether’ + Place-Name: Linn | |
| Blaeu Coila (1654): | Garrif burn. |
| OS Name Books (1855-57): | Linn Burn, Netherlinn, Upper Linn |
| Location: | Ordnance Survey (1892-1960) |
| Early References |
| Linn Burn: Garrif b. (Blaeu 1654) |
| Netherlinn: Linn (OPR 1821), Lynn (OPR 1823), Linn (Census 1841/61), The Linn (Census 1871/81), Low Linn (Census 1891), Lynn (Census 1901), The Linn (Valuation Rolls 1915-1940) |
| Upper Linn: Lynnhead (1825), High Lynn (OPR 1833, 1835), High Linn (OPR 1835), High Linn (Census 1841/91) , Upper Lynn (Census 1901), High Linn ( Valuation Rolls 1885/1895), High Lynn (Valuation Rolls 1905/1940). |
Garrif Burn
In 1790 Sir James Stirling, Lord Provost of Edinburgh acquired lands in the parish of New Cumnock including those of Garrieve and Garclaugh. He named his new estate Mansfield in honour of his wife Alison Mansfield .
The farms of Nether Gariff and Over Garif were later renamed as Mansfield Mains and Mansfield Hall and the upper reaches of Garrif Burn was called Mansfield Burn while a small waterfall on this stretch of the burn was called Mansfield Linn, from Scots linn ‘ waterfall, cataract, cascade of water’ [1,2].
Linn Burn
Scots linn ‘waterfall’ + Scots burn ‘stream’
The Ordnance Survey Name Books (1855-57) entry for Linn Burn reads –
A burn formed by the junction of Mansfield burn with Hall burn and flowing southwards into the river Nith
Presumaby the Linn Burn takes its name from Mansfield Linn albeit the linn is not on that stretch of the burn. Indeed in the renaming of the Garrif Burn it would may have seemed more appropriate to name the upper reaches of the burn as Linn Burn and the lower reaches as Mansfield Burn.
Furthermore the stretch of Linn Burn from the meeting place of the Hall Burn and Mansfield Burn past the ‘auld barn‘ to Mansfield Bridge is known as ‘The Ladies Burn’, possibly after ladies that lived at Mansfield House [3].
From the bridge the burn heads south-west through heavily wooded banks and then follows channel cut cut to take it under the railway line to join the River Nith.
Netherlinn and Upper Linn
The place-name elements Scots nether ‘lower’ [4] and Scots over ‘upper’ [5] are commonly used to distinguish between two places bearing the same name, with nether and over applying to the lower lying and upper lying properties respectively.
Netherlinn
Scots nether ‘lower lying’ + Place-Name: Linn
The Ordnance Survey Name Books (1855-57) entry for Netherlinn reads –
A farm house, the property of Sir James Menteith, occupied by Mr. Brown, Factor of Mansfield
The ruins of Netherlinn stand in the Linn field on the opposite side of Mansfield Road from the ruins of Mansfield House.
Despite the ‘Authorities for Spelling’ – Mr. Brown, factor, Nether Linn; Mr. Gibson, Mansfield Cottages and the Property Map agreeing on the form Nether Linn, it was replaced with the form Netherlinn. However, neither Nether Linn or Netherlinn appear in the early records.
Early forms of the name were Linn and Lynn as found in the Old Parish Records of births/ baptisms of the children of David Wood and Jean Gibson –
- Peter baptised March 11th 1821, born the 5th in Linn.
- Twins William Thomson Honeyman and Catherine Thomson baptised 17th January 1823, born on the 12th in Lynn.
The twins were named after Catherine Thomson and her husband William Honeyman. Catherine had inherited the lands of Mansfield and Castlemains following the death, in 1806, her uncle Andrew Thomson. Part of the ownership included her husband William Honeyman taking on the family name Thomson [6]. The Mansfield lands were later acquired by the Stuart-Menteith family [7].
In the Census Records (1841-1901) the names Linn (1841-1861), The Linn (1871-1881), Low Linn (1891) and Lynn (1901) while The Linn appears in the Valuation Rolls (1915-194)
The tenants at the time of the 1891 and 1901 Census were Anthony Milligan, coachman; his wife Jane Gemmell and their family. Anthony would spend much of his day at the Mansfield stables where his son Hugh also worked as a groom. Lady Jane Stuart Menteth was one of the leading land-owners in the parish and one of Anthony’s duties would include taking Lady Jane by coach along the Mansfield road to church and back. The family headstone in the Auld Kirkyards bears the name Linn, Mansfield.
Upper Linn
Scots upper ‘high lying’ + Place-Name: Linn
The Ordnance Survey Name Books (1855-57) entry for Upper Linn reads –
A farm house on Mansefield* estate – it derives its name from a linn in its vicinity.
*Mansfield
The ruins of Upper Linn sit on the east bank of the Mansfield Burn some 200 metres upstream from the Mansfield Linn.
By 1825, David Wood and his wife Jean Gibson had moved upstream from Linn, Lynn to Lynhead and it was here a third child, Margaret, was born on 28th April 1825 and baptised on 15th May.
The Old Parish Records reveal that Robert Wilson and Agnes Willock had two daughters, Agnes (b. 1833) and Jean (b. 1835) born at High Lynn.
The following year George Brown and Margaret Millar welcome the birth of their loving son Thomas on the 14th February at High Linn. They were living with George’s parents at the time – Thomas Brown, 78, bower / dairyman and Margaret. George later found work on the Mansfield estate as a Tile Maker and then as a miner at Mansfield Colliery on Grieve Hill. Sadly, he was tragically killed by a fall of coal on 22nd December,1946.
The name High Linn stayed consistent through the Census Records (1841-1891) before the change to Upper Lynn (1901). High Linn was the preferred form in the Valuation Rolls (1885/1895) and then High Lynn (1905/1940).
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
| References |
| [1] New Cumnock Place-Names |Mansfield |
| [2] Dictionary of the Scots Language. 2004. Scottish Language Dictionaries Ltd.|Linn |
| [3] Responses | New Cumnock Heritage Facebook |
| [4] Dictionary of the Scots Language. 2004. Scottish Language Dictionaries Ltd.| nether, lower |
| [5] Dictionary of the Scots Language. 2004. Scottish Language Dictionaries Ltd. | over, upper |
| [6] New Cumnock History | Heritors (Landowners) 1833 Honyman |
| [7] New Cumnock History | Heritors (Landowners) 1833 Stuart-Menteth |
| Maps |
| Reproduced with the Permission of the National Library of Scotland |
| https://maps.nls.uk/ |
| Map 1: Joan Blaeu, Coila Provincia, [or], The province of Kyle / auct. Timoth. Pont. (1654) |Garrif B. |
| Map 2 : Ordnance Survey Maps – Six-inch 2nd and later editions, Scotland, 1892-1960 (1895) | Linn Burn |
| Map 3 : Ordnance Survey Maps – Six-inch 2nd and later editions, Scotland, 1892-1960 (1895) | Linn Burn |
| Map 4: Ordnance Survey Maps – 25 inch 2nd and later editions, Scotland, 1892-1949 (1895) | Upper Linn |
| Map 5: Ordnance Survey Maps – 25 inch 1st edition, Scotland, 1855-1882 (1856) | Nether Linn |
| Ordnance Survey Name Books |
| By Permission of Scotland’s Places |
| scotlandsplaces.gov.uk |
| Ayrshire OS Name Books (1855-57) Vol. 49| Netherlinn |
| Ayrshire OS Name Books (1855-57) Vol. 49| Upper Linn |
| Ayrshire OS Name Books (1855-57) Vol. 49| Linn Burn |
| Scotland’s People |
| https://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk |
| Old Parish Records, Births, Marriages, Deaths, Census Records, Valuations Rolls, Wills & Testaments |