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CAMPBELL, MARTIN & BOSWELL
Manuscript - Solicitors' Letter Book - 170 Draft Documents Pertaining to Dalquharran Castle and Kennedy Estate, Foreign Investments in Australia and a Fascinating Link to Poet Robert Burns
Edinburgh, 1893. Letter Book Archive of draft documents made by the law firm Campbell, Martin & Boswell, for private estates and business agreements, neatly preserved in a custom binding, featuring little known details relating to the Dalquharran Castle and Kennedy estate, Scottish investments and links to Australia, and a fascinating connection to the renowned poet Robert Burns by way of a lease made with his descendent for a mansion estate which he, too, had personally visited. 8vo. Approximately 170 documents, most in manuscript and some in typescript, 1166 pages combined, with a scant few integral blanks, plus unpaginated manuscript index listed alphabetically by document type. Very large volume measuring 23 x 35 x 9 cm (WxHxD) and weighing 10 pounds. Quarter calf over brown cloth boards labelled in gilt to spine, original marbled endpapers. Bookbinder's label to front pastedown (Caldwell Brothers of Edinburgh). Very good condition, an excellent depository volume of legal and historical interest. The firm Campbell, Martin & Boswell, consisted of three solicitors, each with the title and privileges of "Writers to the Signet", John Douglas Boswell, W.S.; Patrick William Campbell, W.S.; and Francis John Martin, W.S., the latter of whom became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1892. Their office was at 1 North Charlotte Street in Edinburgh, which was the same address as the Royal Bank of Scotland, and situated very near to Charlotte Square. Scots law and legal proceedings of the late nineteenth century, much of which differ today, are well illustrated in this archive of original working documents executed by accomplished patrician lawyers representing some discriminating and aristocratic clients. Many of the documents deal with property conveyance and estate matters, and represent traditions no longer observed, including the obsolete " Trust Disposition and Settlement" procedure for claiming an inheritance. Other documents include assignations, land conveyances, bond and disposition in security, deeds of assumption and discharges, estate inventories, a search for deeds with the Register of Sasines, leases, loan proposals for purchasing commercial space in Edinburgh, records of monetary investments in Highland Railway (HR), Jamaican plantations, property to let in Scotland, Australian banks, and so forth. So exclusive and intertwined were the upper class and wealthy, perhaps not large in number, but surely powerful in society, some interesting genealogical and business connections can be made from examining these papers. Many clients are also relations to the solicitors who often acted as trustees. In one case, we find a multi-generational connection between the Campbell and Burns families, beginning with the Jamaica sugar plantation owner Patrick Douglas and Scotland's celebrated national poet Robert Burns (1759-1796). In addition, these documents shed light on the leasing history of the Dalquharran Castle in South Ayrshire, which included hunting rights for at least one resident, as well as the Kennedy family's monetary investments in Australia. Interesting to note, one of the lawyers from this firm, Mr. Campbell, is related through marriage to the castle's then most recent owner, Mr. Francis Thomas Romilly Kennedy (died in 1892). Some items of special interest: • A twenty page lease agreement was issued to a Glasgow coalmaster named Robert Burns (1844-1896), who was the great-great-grandson and namesake of the famous poet and lyricist Robert Burns (1759-1796) - who had visited the very same Mansion House of Garrallan in his day, being a friend of its proprietor at the time, Dr. Patrick Douglas. A fascinating and detailed document, the lessors were concerned with mining royalties, minerals specifically deemed as belonging to the Marquis of Bute, and minerals raised at the mansion house. [Garrallan was owned by the Campbell family until 1676. The Douglas family followed but it became extinct in the male line. Dr. Patrick Douglas, who died 1819, also owned property in Jamaica and in 1786 he offered Robert Burns a position as a bookkeeper in Port Antonio, but the poet declined. Burns was a visitor at Garrallan. Jane Douglas married Hamilton Boswell and this family retained it until 1914 when it was sold to the Stevenson family of Changue, who still own the property.] • Another fascinating document is headed "Notes on Titles of Charlotte Square," now a World Heritage Site situated in Edinburgh. In this we find reference to feudal tenancy and particulars of construction. Excerpts from the document: "Charter by the Magistrates & Town Council of Edinburgh in favour of Alexander Stevens dated 1st June 1803... no buildings are to be erected... on the foresaid back ground... that the area of the square within the line of the street ways was to become a common property for the accommodation pleasure health or other convenience of the several feuars round said square... For the lot of ground in Charlotte Square X the sum of £6. 18/4 3/12 and further paying the sum of £14. 18/4 3/12 upon the entry of each heir and singular successor or disponee to said Lot Houses or Tenements built thereon... For the foresaid piece of ground on Young Street the sum... Disposition of Sir George Hope to Margaret Kyle of Binghill dated 2nd April 1818. Disposition & assignation of the said Rev'd Dr. James Kyle in favour of Alexander Russell dated 8th January 1868. Disposition Settlement by the said George Bruce [Factor and Law Agent, W.S.] dated 10th July 1891 & recorded in the Books of Council Session 27th July 1892." • At least 8-10 documents pertain to Francis Thomas Romilly Kennedy (1842-1892) and the Dalquharran Castle which he inherited in 1879 and immediately expanded. The castle, which was built for his grandfather and featured a round bastion tower with a drawing room, piano nobile, and a library above, and an exquisite top-lit spiral central staircase, was extended from 1880-81 by Francis Thomas Romilly Kennedy, to accommodate his wife and bedrooms for their nine children. The work was completed at great expense, leaving the Kennedy family almost bankrupt. The family is known to have left Dalquharran for alternative lodgings, and by 1890 they had leased the castle and its lands as a hunting and fishing estate, as seen in this volume. Examples of the papers found herein include: An Agreement of Lease of the Dalquharran Castle as a furnished residence, "excepting the Strong Room retained by the proprietor", to James Paterson of Milton Lockhart, and includes surrounding lands with permission for shooting small game in accordance with the Ground Game Act of 1880. On 24 July 1893, the Scottish Union & National Insurance Company confirming notice of an "assignation" which transfers the estate of Francis Thomas Romilly Kennedy, to his second son "John Campbell Kennedy of the Royal Navy." A two page document which itemizes and places monetary value on the "Additional Inventory of the Personal Estate... of the late Mr. Kennedy", including the surrender value of a life insurance of sorts, from which are deducted debts and funeral expenses. A list of debentures, borrowed from institutions in Australia, Canada, and Oregon, also documents relating to his investments with the British and Australasian Trust and Loan Company. Matters concerning his executrix and widow Eliza Barbara Colina (née Campbell) Kennedy. • An agreement permitting a John Ernest Orr to manufacture and sell a certain steam trap which was patented in 1892 by a millwright named John Mackie. As members of the elite society of Scottish solicitors, the Writers to the Signet, and thus holding special signing authorities and privileges, the firm of three attracted some notable clients, some of which were long-standing clients from generations past. A cursory gander through the volume finds these examples: • William Jardine Herries Maxwell (1852-1933), a Liberal Unionist politician in Scotland. Maxwell was elected at the 1892 general election as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Dumfriesshire in 1895, but lost it very narrowly when his Liberal Party opponent had a majority of only 13 votes. He regained his seat in 1900, but stood down at the 1906 general election. • William Caven Lockhart-Mure of Livingston in the Stewartry of Kirkcudbright, Lieutenant in the 4th Bombay Cavalry (Poona Horse), Indian Army, who later rose to the rank of Major, and died in died in 1913. [With a lease herein the lieutenant agreed to a term of five years, letting and maintaining the Livingstone House, gamekeeper's house, garden and orchard in Kirkcudbright. It was owned by Colonel John Stewart (died 1726), a Scottish professional soldier who served in the Scottish Army and, after the Union with England, in the British Army, who also held a seat in the House of Commons of Great Britain from 1708 to 1715, and who had inherited the property from his father. • James Oswald (1779-1853), an influential merchant and Member of Parliament (MP) for Glasgow from 1832 to 1837 , who inherited the estate of his cousin Richard Alexander Oswald (1771-1841), a Scottish Liberal Party politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1832 to 1835. [Again a family connection, his son, also named Richard, married Lady Mary Kennedy.] • Alexander Oswald (1811-1868), a Conservative Party politician and Member of Parliament (MP) for Ayrshire from 1843 to 1852, as well as his father Richard Alexander Oswald, a Glasgow merchant. • Robert Haldane Scott, a Scottish attorney in Jamaica who filed returns for slaves by plantation owners in Trelawny, and his daughter Eliza Scott who married Reverend Edward Holland of New South Wales and died intestate June 1890. [A detailed document assigns a woman named Margaret Jane Wakeford, resident of Falmouth, Jamaica, as Power of Attorney for the estate of the late Eliza Scott.] • William Hume, technical chemist and innovative instrument maker, who was very active in the 1880s and 1890s designing and manufacturing magic lanterns, glass lantern slides, oxy-hydrogen lime-light apparatuses, a cantilever enlarging apparatus, a half-plate camera, rapid rectilinear lenses, and other photographic equipment, from his shop at 1 Lothian Street in Edinburgh. [A loan proposal herein indicates that he also purchased the property of 31 Lothian Street.] • Annabella Alexandrina Campbell Boswell (1826-1914), gentlewoman, born at Yarrows, Bathurst Plains, New South Wales, having a maternal lineage linked to the Campbells. She was a prolific diarist, horsewoman, skilled watercolourist and pianist. In 1849 Annabella met Patrick Charles Douglas Boswell, a free settler from Ayrshire, Scotland, accountant for the Bank of New South Wales (later becoming manager), who was related to James Boswell the biographer, and presumably also Mr. Boswell of this firm. Together Annabella and Patrick returned to Scotland in 1865, where Patrick had inherited the family estate in Ayrshire. • The only actual "will" recorded here is that of Bengal Army Major General Robert Farquhar Webster's widow, Janetta Annan Webster (née Dewar), which bequeaths the estate to her son, and permits the trustee to invest funds and heritable securities into in stocks of Great Britain, any British Colony or Dependency, until such time as he reaches the age of maturity. [Her husband was educated at the Edinburgh Academy before joining the British Army in India in 1843. He retired in 1878 as a Major General in the Bengal Staff Corps.] • Major Archibald Hume of Auchendolly and Spitalside, born 27 Dec 1843, and recognized by the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland for having presented the museum with a bronze enamelled harness ornament of British Celtic origin. • William Fullarton of Fullarton (1754-1808), a Scottish soldier in the Bengal Staff Corps who participated in the Second Anglo-Mysore War, a statesman, agriculturalist, author, and son of a wealthy Ayrshire gentleman for whom he was named - William Fullarton of Fullarton. • Reverend Samuel Smith, attached to the church and parish of Borgue in the Stewartry of Kirkcudbright. • Lieutenant General Sir Thomas Maitland (176-1824), a British soldier who served in St. Domingue, and colonial Governor of British Ceylon. Historical Scottish minutiae through and through, with over 170 documents to explore, the opportunity of finding little-known information or unravelling early questions of lineage and heritable rights is indeed great! Dalquharran Castle: In the spring of 1819 Thomas Francis Kennedy (1788-1879) of Dalquharran Castle and Dunure, Ayr, (Whig aristocrat and commissioner of woods, forests, land revenues, works and buildings), succeeded his estranged father to the encumbered Ayrshire estates. The principal properties were the Dalquharran Castle near Dailly, and the coastal estate of Dunure, situated between Dalquharran and Ayr. He died at Dalquharran in 1879 and was succeeded by his only child, Francis Thomas Romilly Kennedy (1842-1892). At great expense Francis Thomas Romilly Kennedy made expansions to the mansion, leaving the Kennedy family almost bankrupt. Recent studies suggest that external construction work was finally finished in the summer of 1890, relating this to a note made by Kennedy on documents bearing this date, and existing records regarding the exterior paving and roofing work being completed. The family is known to have left Dalquharran for alternative lodgings, and by 1890 they had leased the castle and its lands as a hunting and fishing estate. The castle had several tenants over the next 45 years, whilst staying in the hands of the Kennedy family. Eventually, the castle and the estate were put up for auction. It was bought by a Timber Merchant from Troon, who set about stripping the timber from the estate and who leased the castle to the Scottish Youth Hostel Association. Dalquharran remained a youth hostel until the Second World War, when the Langside School for the Deaf, evacuated from Glasgow, moved in. During the war, the Castle and lands were sold to one John Stewart, a produce merchant from Girvan, who later moved into Dalquharran with his family, and farmed the estate. The Stewart family co-habited the house with friends, but still the house proved too large and expensive to maintain, and was abandoned. The castle was inhabited as recently as 1967, but was unroofed to allow the then owners to avoid payment of high tax rates. It is now a ruin, with only the masonry shell remaining intact. The Society of Writers to Her Majesty’s Signet is a private society of Scottish solicitors, dating back to 1594 and part of the College of Justice. Writers to the Signet originally had special privileges in relation to the drawing up of documents which required to be signeted, but these have since disappeared and the Society is now an independent, non-regulatory association of solicitors. The Society maintains the Category A listed Signet Library, part of the Parliament House complex in Edinburgh, and members of the Society are entitled to the postnominal letters, WS. Wills/Testaments and Inheritance (Scotland): Heritable property, also known as immoveable or 'heritage' property and real estate, included land and buildings. Up to 1868 real estate was automatically inherited by the eldest son (the law of primogeniture) or daughter if there was no son unless there had been a specific disposition or bequest. The law of primogeniture applied to heritage until 1964. This meant that an eldest son might not appear named in the will. Likewise, a wife, who would automatically get the widow's part, may not be mentioned. The right to inherit was established by Retours of Services of Heirs or by a Trust Disposition and Settlement ('deed of settlement'). The actual register of the transfer or other change in ownership was recorded in Sasines. Manuscript
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