Gavin Hamilton (1751-1805) was a Mauchline lawyer and a landlord to the Burns family at Mossgiel farm. He was also a dear friend and patron to Robert Burns. Burns found a like-mind in Hamilton – they were both freemasons and held similar views with regard to the church and religion. Both were opposed to the strict Calvinist, and sometimes hypocritical, values of the so called ‘Auld Lichts’ of the church, and themselves held more modern and rational religious beliefs. Like Burns, Hamilton clashed on a number of occasions with the ‘Auld Licht’ minister of Mauchline Parish Church ‘Daddy Auld’. Hamilton was publicly scolded in August 1787 for allowing someone to dig potatoes in his garden on a Sunday! Hamilton encouraged Burns to make the leap from hand-written copies of his work circulated among friends to “guid black prent” and a national audience. Burns dedicated his first book of poems ‘The Kilmarnock Edition’ to Hamilton, calling him, “the poor man’s friend in need, the gentleman in word and deed’.
