I74 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Charlotte Square.
Bank, near Edinburgh; Arnsheen, in Ayrshire ;
Redcastle, Inverness-shire ; Denbrae, Fifeshire; and
Gogar Bank in Midlothian. He died on the 27th
of May, 1836, Lady Fettes having pre-deceased him
on the 7th of the same month.
By his trust disposition and settlement, dated
5th July 1830, and several codicils thereto, the last
being dated the 9th of March, 1836, he disponed his
whole estates to and in favour of Lady Fettes, his
sister Mrs. Bruce, Mr. Corrie, Manager of the
British Linen Company, A. Wood, Esq. (afterwards
Lord Wood), and A. Rutherford, Esq. (afterwards
Lord Rutherford), as trustees ; the purposes of the
trust, which made ample provision for Lady Fettes
in case of her survival, being :-(I) The payment of
legacies to various poor relations ; ( 2 ) Bequests to
charitable institutions ; and (3) The application of
the residue to ?? form an endowment for the maintenance,
education, and outfit of young people
whose parents have either died without leaving
syfficient funds for that purpose, or who from innocent
misfortune during their own lives are unable
to give suitable education to their children.?
The trust funds, which at the time of the
amiable Sir William?s death amounted to about
&166,000, were accumulated for a number of years,
and reached such an amount as enabled the
trustees to carry out his benevolent intentions in a
becoming manner ; and, accordingly, in 1864 contracts
were entered into for the erection of the superb
college which now very properly bears his name.
Lord Cockburn, that type of the true old Scottish
gentleman, ?? whose dignified yet homely manner
and solemn beautygave his aspect a peculiar grace,?
and who is so well known for his pleasant and gossiping
volume of ?? Memorials,? and for the deep interest
he took in all pertaining to Edinburgh, occupied
No. 14 ; and the next house was the residence
of Lord Pitmilly. James Wolfe Murray, afterwards
Lord Cringletie, held No. 17 in 1811; and the
Right Hon. David Boyle, Lord Justice Clerk, and
afterwards Lord Justice General, occupied the same
house in 1830.
Lieutenant-General Alexander Dirom, of Mount
Annan, and formerly of the 44th regiment, when
Quartermaster-General in Scotland, rented No. I 8
in I 8 I I. He was an officer of great experience, and
had seen much service in the old wars of India, and,
when major, published an interesting narrative of
the campiign against Tippoo Sultan. Latterly his
house was occupied by the late James Crawfurd,
Lord Ardmillan, who was called to the bar in 1829,
and was raised to the bench in Jacuary, 1855.
At the same time No. 31 was the abode of the
Right Hon. Wlliam Adam, &ord Chief Commissioner
of the Jury Court, the kinsman of the
architect of the Square, and a man of great
eminence in his time. He was the son of Adam
Blair of Blair Adam, and was born in July, 1751.
Educated at Edinburgh, he became a member of
the bar, but did not practise then ; and in 1774 and
1794 he sat for several places in Parliament. In
the latter year he began to devote himself to his
profession, and in 1802 was appointed Counsel for
the East India Company, and four years afterwards
Chancellor for the Duchy of Cornwall. After being
M.P. for Kinross, in 18 I I he resumed his professional
duties, and was deemed so sound a lawyer that he
was frequently consulted by the Prince of .Wales
and the Duke of York.
In the course of a parliamentary dispute with
Mr. Fox, about the first American war, they fought
a duel, which happily ended without bloodshed,
after which the latter remarked jocularly that had
his antagonist not loaded his pistols with Government
powder he would have been shot. In 1814
he submitted to Government a plan for trying civil
causes by jury in Scotland, and in the following
year was made a Privy Councillor and Baron of the
Scottish Exchequer. In I 8 I 6 an Act of Parliament
was obtained instituting a separate Jury Court in
Scotland, and he was appointed Lord Chief Commissioner,
with two of the judges as colleagues,
and to this court he applied all his energies, overcoming
by his patience, zeal, and urbanity, the many
obstacles opposed to the success of such an institution.
In 1830, when sufficiently organised, the
Jury Court was, by another Act, transferred to the
Court of Session, and when taking his seat on the
bench of the latter for the first time, complimentary
addresses were presented to him from the Faculty
of Advocates, the Society of Writers to the Signet,
and that of the solicitors before the Supreme
Courts, thanking him for the important benefits .
which the introduction of trial by jury in civil cases
had conferred on Scotland. In 1833 he +red
from the bench, and died at his house in Charlotte
Square, on the 17thFebruary, 1839, in his 87th year.
? In 1777 he had married Eleanora, daughter of
Charles tenth Lord Elphinstone. She died in
1808, but had a family of several sons-viz., John,
long at the head of the Council in India, who died
some years before his father; Admiral Sir Charles,
M.P., one of the Lords of the Admiralty ; William
George, an eminent King?s Counsel, afterwards
Accountant-General in the Court of Chancery;
and Lieutenant-General Sir Frederick, who held a
command at the battle of Waterloo, and was afterwards
successively Lord High Commissioner to the
Ionian Isles and Governor of Madras.
Charlotte Square.] THE ALBERT MEMORIAL. I75
His neighbour and brother senator Lord Dundrennan
occupied No. 35 ; and in 1811 William
Robertson, Lord Robertson, a senator of 1805,
occupied No. 42. He was the eldest son of Dr.
Robertson the historian, and in 1779 was chosen
Procurator of the Church of Scotland, after ,a close
contest, in which he was opposed by the Hon.
Henry Erskine. His personal appearance is
described in ? Peter?s Letters to his Kinsfolk.?
He retired from the bench in 1826, in consequence
of deafness, and died in November, 1835.
On the western side of the Square, and terminating
with fine effect the long vista of George
Street from the east, is St. George?s Church, the
foundation of which was laid on the 14th of May,
1811. It was built from a design furnished by
Robert Reid, king?s architect The celebrated
Adam likewise furnished a plan for this church,
which was relinquished in consequence of the
expense it would have involved. The whole building,
with the exception of the dome, which is a
noble one, and seen to advantage from any point,
is heavy in appearance, meagre in detail, and
hideous in conception, and its ultimate expense
greatly exceeded the estimates and the sum for
which the more elegant design of Adam could have
been carried out. It cost A33,ooo, is calculated
to accommodate only 1,600 persons, and was opened
for public worship in 1814. It was intended in
its upper part to be a large miniature or reduced
copy of St. Paul?s in London, and is in a kind of
Grzco-Italian style, with a lofty but meagre Ionic
portico and surmounting an Attic Corinthian colonnade
; it rests on a square ground plan measuring
IIZ feet each way, and culminates in the dome,
surmounted by a lantern, cupola, and cross, the
last at the height of 160 feet from the ground.
The original design included two minarets, which
have not as yet been added.
It is chiefly celebrated as the scene of the ministrations
of Andrew Thomson, D.D., an eminent
divine who was fixed upon as its pastor in 1814.
He died suddenly on the 9th of February, 1831,
greatly beloved and lamented by the citizens in
general and his congregation in particular, and now
he lies in a piece of ground connected with the
churchyard of St. Cuthbert.
In Charlotte Place, behind the church, are the
atelier of Sir John Steel the eminent sculptor, and
a music-room called St. Cecilia?s Hall, with an
orchestra space for 250 performers and seats for
500 hearers.
In the centre of the Square is the memorial to
the Prince Consort, which was inaugurated with
much state by the Queen in person, attended by
the magistrates and archer guard, &c., in August,
1876. It cost A16,500, and is mainly from
the studio of Steel It is a quasi-pyramidal structure,
about thirty-two feet high, with a colossal
equestrian statue of the Prince as its central and
upper figure ; it is erected on an oblong Peterhead
granite pedestal, fully seventeen feet high, and
exhibiting emblematic bas-reliefs in the panels,
with four groups of statues on square blocks, projecting
from the corners of the basement; the
prince is shown in the uniform of a field marshal.
Of all the many statues that have been erected
to his memory, this in Charlotte Square is perhaps
one of the best and most pleasing.
With this chapter we close the history of what
may be regarded as thejt-st New Town, which was
designed in 1767, laid out, as we have seen, in a
parallelogram the sides of which measure 3,900
feet by 1,090.
The year 1755 was the period when Edinburgh
seemed really to wake from the sleep and torpor
that followed the Union, and a few imprdvements
began in the Old Town. After that period, says
Kincaid, writing in 1794, ? it is moderate to say
that not less than ~3,000,000 sterling has been
expended in building and public improvements.?
Thirty-five years ago,? says the Edinburgh
Adverther for 1823, ? there were scarcely a dozen
sliops in the New Town; now, in Princes Street,
with the exception of hotels and the Albyn Club
Room, they reach to Hanover Street.?
In the present day the whole .area we have described
is mainly occupied by shops, with the exception
of Charlotte Square and a small portion of
Queen Street.
