The surname Cargill/Cargile is derived from the ancient lands of Cargill, lying in the present Parish of Cargill in Perthshire, Scotland. The Parish of Cargill is "ten miles inland from the east coast of Scotland, near where the Isla River flows into the River Tay." The parish name has undergone many changes, as language itself has altered. The Celtic derivations of the name Cargill have been given, but the most authoritative is the one meaning "white fort." The ancient lands of Cargill lay in the immediate vicinity of an old Roman camp. The Barony of Cargill afterward included several other lands besides the lands of Cargill, and the Parish of Cargill included the two baronies of Cargill and Stobhall.

The Cargill place is first mentioned in a charter granted in 1164 by Malcolm IV to the Abbot and convent of Scone, confirming lands and privileges granted them by Alexander I and David I. Some time between 1189 and 1196, William, the Lion, granted a charter to Richard de Montfichet of the "land of Kergille as fully as I held it in my hand and by those right bounds that used to belong to it on the day I gave it to him to be held of the kind and his successors with full rights of barony." (This is found in a copy of the Drummond charter in the Register House, Edinburgh.) During this same period, Richard, the Lion, granted some lands in Kergill to the monks of Cupar. And in 1220, William de Montfichet, son of Richard, granted a charter to the monks of Cupar "in my town of Kergillo." Between 1199 and 1225, Bernard de Kergylle (chaplain of Kergill) witnessed several charters of the Bishop of Dunkeld, the Kirk of Cargill being a mensal church of the bishopric of Dunkeld. The first person of the surname Cargill was Peter de Kergill, ca 1246. Others in this family lineage held title to the lands, including Walter de Kergyl, 1260; Bernard de Kergylle, 1283; Walter de Kergille, 1296; Iwyn de Carghille, 1296.

In 1328 Robert I The Bruce granted Auchterarder in Perthsire to the Montifex family. This was later given in dowery to the Drummonds.

1. Mary de MONTIFEX b: ABT 1330 in Stobhall, Cargill, Perthshire, Scotland

1. Title: Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists, 7th Edition, by Frederick Lewis Weis, additions by Walter Lee Shippard Jr., 1999
   Page: 252-33