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Sir William Johnstone Pulteney
and
The Scottish Origins of Western New York
by
Jeffrey M. Johnstone, FSA Scot
What Whig but wails at good Sir James;
Dear to his country by the names
Friend, patron, benefactor?
Not Pulteney's wealth can Pulteney save!
And Hopetoun falls, the generous, brave!
And Stuart bold as Hector!
-- Robert Burns
Second Epistle to Robert Graham of Fintray, 1791
INTRODUCTION
MANY PLACE NAMES IN WESTERN NEW YORK STATE—for example, Bath, Pulteney,
Henrietta, Pultneyville, Caledonia, and Williamson—are vestiges
of a little-known period of British land speculation in the United States,
shortly after the end of the Revolutionary War and before the War of 1812.
The episode is all the more curious because, at the time, British soldiers
were stationed not only across Lake Ontario in Canada, but they also continued
to hold forts at Oswego and Niagara, and the Americans were very wary
of the British. Many of the major actors in this unusual drama were Scots,
mostly from Dumfriesshire.
After the Revolutionary War, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts claimed
the vast Indian territory south of Lake Ontario that is now western New
York State. New York disputed the claim, and in 1786 Massachusetts and
New York finally entered into the Treaty of Hartford, which settled conflicting
land claims in relation to a north-south line running near the present
city of Geneva on Seneca Lake, and extending north to Lake Ontario and
south to the Pennsylvania border. New York State received land to the
east of this "Preemption Line" and Massachusetts received the land to
the west of it.1 In 1788 Massachusetts sold the right
to develop virtually the whole of what is now western New York State to
two New England entrepreneurs named Oliver Phelps and Nathaniel Gorham.
Phelps and Gorham proceeded to enter into the Treaty of Buffalo Creek
with the Seneca Indians who resided there, and thus obtained clear title
to develop the land for settlers from New England.
Within a few years, Phelps and Gorham ran into financial trouble, and
they were forced to sell out. In 1790 Robert Morris—signer of the
Declaration of Independence, financier of the American Revolution, and
then the wealthiest man in the United States, although he later languished
in debtors' prison—acquired title to the "Phelps and Gorham Purchase"
bounded by the Preemption Line on the east and extending to a westerly
bend of the Genesee River on the west. At this time, there were fewer
than nine hundred settlers west of the Preemption Line in the Genesee
country. Morris hoped to sell the land for a quick profit. In 1792 Morris's
agent, William Temple Franklin, grandson of Benjamin Franklin, sold approximately
1.2 million acres to a partnership of British investors known as Pulteney
Associates.2 The Pulteney Purchase, or Genesee Tract,
comprised all of the present counties of Steuben, Ontario, and Yates,
the eastern portion of Allegheny, much of Livingston, most of Monroe and
Wayne, and part of Schuyler.
The major British investor was Sir William Johnstone Pulteney, an elderly
Scottish lawyer and Member of Parliament, who held a nine-twelfths interest
in Pulteney Associates. The other partners were William Hornby, former
Governor of Bombay, who held a two-twelfths interest, and Patrick Colquhoun,
a Scottish merchant, statesman and philanthropist, who acquired a one-twelfths
interest in exchange for putting the deal together. The activities of
these men would have a profound influence on Anglo-American rapprochement
and some of their heirs continued to own land in western New York until
the 1920s.
SIR WILLIAM JOHNSTONE PULTENEY
Parentage
Sir William Johnstone Pulteney is little remembered today, and consequently
it is difficult to piece together a coherent biography. The multi-volume
Dictionary of National Biography does not even have an entry
for him,3 although it has one for his younger brother,
Commodore George Johnstone.4 Nevertheless, in his
own day Sir William Johnstone Pulteney was one of the most influential
men in the British Empire. He was born in October 1729, as William Johnstone,
at Westerhall, his family's ancestral home in Westerkirk Parish, Dumfriesshire,
Scotland. He was the third son of Sir James Johnstone, third Baronet of
Westerhall, and Barbara Murray of Elibank, and he may have been named
in memory of William Johnstone, first Marquis of Annandale, Chief of his
clan. Miss Catherine Laura Johnstone, author of History of the Johnstones,
has published a letter of congratulations on the birth of a son dated
April 21, 1720, from the first Marquis of Annandale (died January 14,
1721), to Sir William Johnstone Pulteney's father:
Whitehall 21 of April, 1720
Cusin,
I congratulate you heartily upon the birth of your son. I wish my lady
a safe recovery and all healthe to the childe. I thank you for the compliment
of his name and assure you as I have ever been a true friend to the family
so I shall ever continue to do you and yours all the particulars that
lie in my power for nobody shall ever wish your prosperity, and the good
of your family more than I shall do. My wife gives your lady her humble
service and I hope next summer they shall be known to one and other. My
service to Lord Elibank and all the good family. I hope your father will
do all in reason and justice that can be expected of him.
I am cusin your true friend and servant,
Annandale5
Either the date of William Johnstone Pulteney's birth is earlier than
commonly reported, or, more likely, his parents had an earlier son named
William who did not survive.
The Johnstones of Westerhall
The Johnstones of Westerhall are probably an early offshoot of the Johnstones6
of Annandale in Dumfriesshire, Scotland—the main branch of the family.
The first member of the Westerhall family was Matthew Johnstone, who received
a grant of land in Lanarkshire around 1455. The Westerhall family claims7
that Matthew was a son of the Chief of the Johnstones of Annandale, and
that he received land called Westraw in Pettinain Parish, Lanarkshire,
which the King had given to the Johnstones for service in the Battle of
Arkinholm in 1455. That battle, near the present town of Langholm, Dumfriesshire,
was the final episode in the Black Douglas revolt. The Black Douglas family
was the most powerful family in southern Scotland and had become a serious
rival to the Stewart Kings of Scotland. King James II took measures to
weaken the Black Douglas threat with fire and sword, and the Royal forces
at Arkinholm were led by a rival branch of the Douglas clan, known as
the Red Douglases. Among the many smaller clans that helped the Red Douglases
to put down the Black Douglases at Arkinholm were the Johnstones, who
soon became one of the most powerful Riding Clans8
of the Anglo-Scottish border. The destruction of the Black Douglases was
a major turning point for the Scottish monarchy. History records the King
rewarded the Johnstones with land for their role at Arkinholm, but it
has never been proven conclusively that Matthew Johnstone, founder of
the Westraw (later Westerhall) branch, was a son of the Chief of the Johnstones
of Annandale.
Around the beginning of the seventeenth century, the Johnstones of Westraw
sold their land in Lanarkshire, and purchased an estate in the parish
of Westerkirk, Dumfriesshire, not far from the site of the Battle of Arkinholm.
They named their new estate Westerhall and henceforth have been known
as Johnstones of Westerhall. The family prospered and intermarried with
the Johnstones of Annandale. In 1700 Sir John Johnstone of Westerhall
was created a baronet of Nova Scotia. Many representatives of the family
served as Members of Parliament, for Dumfries and other seats.
Westerhall
Dumfriesshire, Scotland
Ancestral home of the Johnstone Baronets of Westerhall
Early Life and Marriage
Sir William Johnstone Pulteney, a scion of the Westerhall family, began
his life as "a penniless younger son,"9 and in his
youth he developed habits of extreme thrift which he maintained for the
rest of his life. He was educated in the law, became a member of the Scottish
Bar in 1751, and went on to become an eminent advocate. On November 10,
1760, he married Frances Pulteney, cousin and heiress of the first Earl
of Bath. In 1767, when his wife came into her enormous inheritance, he
agreed to add her name to his own.10
Associations with the Scottish Enlightenment
In 1762, while he was still known as William Johnstone, Pulteney was
appointed secretary of the Poker Club in Edinburgh, where men of learning
and wit mingled with members of the nobility. He was a patron of both
science and the arts and was personally acquainted with many of the giants
of the Scottish Enlightenment. He was a friend of the philosopher and
historian David Hume (1711-1776) and was an intimate friend of the political
philosopher and economist Adam Smith (1723-1790) from 1748 until Smith's
death. In 1752 Adam Smith wrote to James Oswald11
of Pulteney that he possessed:
qualities which from real and unaffected modesty he does not
at first discover; a refinement, depth of observation, and an accuracy
of judgement, joined to a natural delicacy of sentiment. . . . He had
when I first knew him a good deal of vivacity and humour, but he has studied
them away. You will find him . . . a young gentleman of solid, substantial
(not flashy) abilities and worth.12
In 1772 Smith thanked Pulteney for recommending him to the East India
Board of Directors, stating:
You have acted in your old way of doing your friends a good
office behind their backs, pretty much as other people do them a bad one.13
Pulteney was also a friend and patron of the architect Robert Adam (1728-92),
whom he eventually employed to design the world-famous Pulteney Bridge
on the Avon, linking the city of Bath with his wife's undeveloped lands
called Bathwick. The bridge is in the Palladian style and, unusually,
is lined with shops. Pulteney served as a pallbearer at Adam's funeral.
Sir William Johnstone Pulteney carried out public spirited projects in
his ancestral district and in Edinburgh. He personally bore the cost of
eight miles of the coach road that ran from Langholm to Annan, planned
the coach road in the Ewes valley, and in 1763 obtained an act of Parliament
to carry out the plan. He also funded the Agricultural Professorship at
Edinburgh University.
Beginning of Parliamentary Career
Even before his wife succeeded to her fortune, Pulteney had expressed
his desire to enter Parliament. In the 1760s he left Edinburgh for London
and Bath. He unsuccessfully contested the parliamentary seat for Shrewsbury
in 1768, but soon was returned for the city of Perth and also for Cromartyshire,
and he chose to represent the Scottish county rather than the city. In
Parliament, he voted independently—with the administration on the
expulsion of Wilkes in 1768, but with the opposition on the Middlesex
election of 1769. He continued this pattern for the rest of his life.
Pulteney also spoke frequently in Parliament on a wide variety of matters,
especially financial ones, and published a number of pamphlets. In 1774
he again contested the seat for Shrewsbury, and although he was defeated,
he was returned on petition the following March.
Interest in America
Sir William Johnstone Pulteney maintained an interest in affairs in India,
as did his brothers. He also had a strong interest in America's financial
possibilities. While his younger brother, Commodore George Johnstone,
was serving as Governor of West Florida, Pulteney invested both in the
West Indies and in mainland North America. After the outbreak of the Revolutionary
War, Pulteney published a pamphlet entitled Thoughts on the Present
State of Affairs with America, and the Means of Conciliation, which
sympathized with the resistance of the American colonies to taxation without
representation, while urging a continuing union of Great Britain and its
American Colonies. In March of 1777, he expressed his interest in possible
one-on-one negotiations with Benjamin Franklin, and in December of that
year he wrote to Lord George Germain:
Dr. Franklin knows that I have always respected him when it
was the fashion to entertain other opinions. He knows that I have always
wished the most perfect freedom of America with respect to taxation and
charters; but he knows too that I wished the indissoluble union of Great
Britain and America.14
In March 1778, as "Mr. Williams," he acted as a British emissary and
met personally with Benjamin Franklin in Paris to discuss U.S.-British
conciliation. Pulteney later wrote to a friend that he foresaw that an
independent America "would soon rival Europe in arts as well as grandeur,
and their power in particular would rear itself on the decay of ours."15
Shortly after the conclusion of the Revolutionary War, he began to invest
in bank securities in the United States. On June 1, 1782, his wife, Frances,
died, leaving him her fortune.
Patronage of Thomas Telford
In 1783, Pulteney began working with a young stone mason from his home
parish of Westerkirk, Dumfriesshire, to make some renovations to his family's
ancestral mansion of Westerhall. The young stone mason had walked to London
from Edinburgh in search of more interesting work and had become acquainted
with Pulteney there. He was Thomas Telford (1757-1834), who became the
famous civil engineer. Sir William Johnstone Pulteney was Telford's friend
and patron, and he played a key role in furthering Telford's career. Around
1787, he commissioned Telford to design and supervise the remodeling of
Pulteney's occasional residence of Shrewsbury Castle. In 1787, Pulteney
was instrumental in helping Telford obtain the post of Surveyor of Public
Works for the County of Shropshire (also known as Salop). At this time
Telford was such a protégé of Pulteney, that he was referred to as the
"young Pulteney." Around 1796, when he was Governor of the British Fisheries
Society, Pulteney was responsible for obtaining Telford's services to
build the world's largest herring-fishing port at Wick in Caithness.16
Telford built the harbor and a new settlement for herring fishermen. The
fishing village was named Pulteneytown in Sir William Johnstone Pulteney's
memory and is currently the location of the Old Pulteney whisky distillery.
Public Life
A member of seven successive British parliaments, Pulteney served for
Cromartyshire from 1768 to 1774, and for Shrewsbury from March 1775 to
May 1805. He was also an astute man of business who used his power and
enormous fortune liberally and wisely in both public life and the management
of his vast estates. He never abused his power, and in Parliament he had
a reputation for scrupulous honesty and integrity. According to Sir John
Sinclair, a Member of Parliament and architect of The Statistical
Account of Scotland:
He never gave a vote in Parliament without a thorough conviction that
it was right; and men of that description deservedly acquire a great
influence in a popular assembly. [He was] a quiet man of plain, unadorned
language and strong personality whose opinion was always received in
the House with respectful attention.17
Pulteney's demeanor was "austere, serious and socially concerned."18
In 1788, he exchanged correspondence with James Johnstone of Galabank
concerning the possibility and wisdom of abolishing slavery, without injury
to trade or navigation.19 In April 1800, he introduced
a bill in Parliament to abolish bull baiting—the first attempt to
secure legislation to protect animals from cruelty.20
Telford particularly admired and emulated Pulteney's complete lack of
ostentation. According to Telford, Pulteney was a man who did not court
popularity, and who was "distant, cautious and reserved to mankind in
general, but I believe to the few in whom he can confide there is no man
more open."21 Sir Nathaniel Wraxall, a Member of
Parliament, wrote a description of Pulteney that crystalizes the essence
of the man:
The elder, Mr. Pulteney, under a very forbidding exterior, and a still
more neglected, or almost threadbare dress, which he usually wore, concealed
a strong sense, a masculine understanding, and very independent as well
as upright principles of action. Nor did he want a species of eloquence,
though it could boast of no elegance of ornament.22
The Annandale Peerage Case
More than once, Sir William Johnstone Pulteney refused a peerage. In
1792, George, third Marquis of Annandale, Chief of the Name and Arms of
Johnstone, died unmarried and without an heir. By this time, the Westerhall
Johnstones had become the most influential branch of the family. Pulteney's
older brother, Sir James Johnstone, fourth Baronet of Westerhall, immediately
petitioned for the Annandale peerage titles. After James's death the following
year, Pulteney succeeded as the fifth Baronet of Westerhall in September,
1794, and acted in character by promptly dropping the proceedings to gain
the Annandale titles. When it became known that Sir William Johnstone
Pulteney did not intend to pursue the dormant Annandale peerage, James
Hope Johnstone, third Earl of Hopetoun and a descendant of the daughter
of the first Marquis of Annandale, petitioned for them. The Earl of Hopetoun
had long served as conservator of the vast Annandale Estates in Dumfriesshire
owned by his great uncle the third Marquis of Annandale. Hopetoun's petition
was unsuccessful. In June 1805, shortly after Pulteney's death, his nephew
Sir John Lowther Johnstone renewed the Westerhall petition to the House
of Lords claiming the dormant titles of the Johnstones of Annandale, but
he was likewise unsuccessful, as were other claimants.23
Death and Burial
In 1804 Sir William Johnstone Pulteney, fifth Baronet, Member of Parliament,
married, as his second wife, Margaret, widow of Andrew Stewart of Torrance
and Castlemilk, daughter of Sir William Stirling. The marriage did not
last long. Pulteney died intestate at Bath House, Piccadilly, on May 30,
1805, and his family held a grand funeral and interment at Westminster
Abbey.24 In America, James Wadsworth of Geneseo
wrote to Robert Troup, Pulteney's second American agent, in September
1805:
I have just heard of the death of Sir William Pulteney. My mind
is strongly impressed with the disasters that may befall this section
of the State, from the event. Sir William was a man of business; he was
capable of deciding for himself, what was and what was not proper. What
may be the character of his successor we know not.25
Pulteney's Westerhall baronetcy descended to his nephew Sir John Lowther
Johnstone, who became the sixth Baronet of Westerhall. Pulteney's only
daughter, Henrietta Laura, Countess of Bath, inherited his lands. Upon
her death in July 1808 without leaving any descendants, the Pulteney lands
also passed to Sir John Lowther Johnstone.
Character
Despite being one of the wealthiest men in the British Empire,26
in his private life Sir William Johnstone Pulteney's frugality had remained
extraordinary, although he showed generosity to his old friends. According
to Sir John Sinclair:
having been accustomed to live on £200 a year, he thought it
a great extravagance to spend £2,000 per annum, when he might have spent
£20,000.27
Pulteney's obituary in the Gentlemen's Magazine states:
In private life he was remarked chiefly for his frugal habits,
perhaps the more striking as he was supposed to be the richest commoner
in the Kingdom. His landed property amounted to nearly £2,000,000, and
he was the greatest American stockholder ever known (1805). He had the
greatest borough interest of any gentleman in the country, and of course
his friendship was courted by all parties. In the latter part of his life
he was remarkable for his abstemious manner of living, his food being
composed of the most simple nourishment, chiefly bread and milk. ...Sir
William's character has been much mistaken by the world. He was penurious
only as to himself. All his servants enjoyed comforts unusual in most
other families....28
Sir Henry Raeburn painted a portrait of Sir William Johnstone Pulteney.
Another full-length painting of him by Thomas Gainsborough is owned by
the Yale Center for British Art.
Agency in America
Sir William Johnstone Pulteney never saw his enormous territories in
what is now western New York State. As aliens, the Pulteney Associates—Pulteney,
Hornby, and Colquhoun—were not at that time legally permitted to
own land in the United States. They needed a representative who would
become an American citizen and hold title to the land for their benefit.
To serve as their land agent, they chose a member of the gentry from Pulteney's
ancestral district, Captain Charles Williamson. Williamson was born on
July 12, 1757, to Alexander Williamson,29 secretary
to James Hope Johnstone,30 third Earl of Hopetoun, and his wife Christina
Robertson, who lived on the estate of Balgray in Applegarth and Sibbaldbie
Parish, Dumfriesshire.
Charles Williamson
Although Charles Williamson had served as an officer in the 25th Regiment
of Foot in the British Army, he did not serve in the Revolutionary War.
He had resigned his commission and was traveling to America with letters
of introduction to Lord Cornwallis, when an American ship captured him.
For the duration of the war, he lived in the home of Ebenezer Newell,
near Boston. During this time, Williamson married an American, Abigail
Newell. After the war, Williamson returned to Scotland, where he resided
for the next ten years. Sir William Johnstone Pulteney and his associates
selected Williamson to become their agent, in part because of his extensive
knowledge of the United States.
In July 1791, a thirty-four-year-old Charles Williamson sailed with his
family for America from Annan, Dumfriesshire, to assume his new role as
land agent for Pulteney Associates. To assist him in America, Williamson
immediately employed two other Scots, John Johnstone, who may have been
a relative, and Charles Cameron.31
Williamson was an enterprising, tireless, and visionary land promoter.
His first planned community, called Williamsburgh after Sir William Johnstone
Pulteney, was intended as a German colony but was unsuccessful due to
causes beyond Williamson's control. He later planned Bath, named for Pulteney's
daughter, Henrietta Laura, Countess of Bath, for whom the town of Henrietta
in Monroe County is also named. Williamson's most successful settlement
was Geneva, where Pulteney Park remains the center of the city's South
Main Street Historic District. He also developed the port of Sodus Bay
and extended trade south to Pennsylvania. He established a village called
Hopetoun, named for the Earl of Hopetoun, on the outlet of Keuka Lake,
between the present villages of Penn Yan and Dresden.32
Captain Williamson sent messengers throughout New York, New England,
Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia and British Canada.
The messengers plastered the walls with posters touting the Pulteney lands
and inviting everyone to great fairs and horse races. Williamson built
the first good roads, taverns and hotels, mills, theaters and racetracks.
He supported schools and churches, arranged for regular mail delivery,
established the first livestock markets and fairs, established the first
newspaper, and contributed to charity.
Founding of Caledonia
Williamson attempted without success to induce a group of Scottish highlanders,
led by Donald Stewart, to settle on the Pulteney lands. However, he recognized
that his native countrymen possessed the qualities of industry, thrift
and ambition essential to successful pioneers. In 1798, he heard that
a group of emigrants from Perthshire in Scotland had landed in New York
City and had stopped at Johnstown, near Albany, to consider where to settle.
Williamson traveled to Johnstown to meet the Scots, and he encouraged
them to settle at Big Springs, which he later named Caledonia. He made
the Scots an offer with very generous terms: He agreed to donate land
for a church and a school, to accept payment in wheat, to provision the
settlers until the first harvest, and to provide money for transportation.
In March 1799, the first twenty Scottish pioneers arrived at Caledonia
by sleigh over the winter snow. Others followed over the next few years.
In 1803, the community built the first schoolhouse in New York State west
of the Genesee, and in 1805 it formed the first permanent church in New
York State west of the Genesee.
Direct Ownership of American Land
Although Williamson was a very energetic and enterprising agent, his
reports and financial dealings were not up to Sir William Johnstone Pulteney's
exacting standards. As time went on, Pulteney became increasingly interested
in owning his American properties directly. In a letter to Robert Troup,
dated September 28, 1799, he wrote:
I am desirous of obtaining an act of naturalization of the State
of New York, which I should consider as conferring upon me an honor of
which I should feel proud.33
However, this expediency proved unnecessary because on April 2, 1798,
the New York State Legislature had already passed "An Act to Enable Aliens
to Purchase and Hold Real Estate Within the State of New York."
By 1800, Sir William Johnstone Pulteney had become very impatient with
the lack of profits on his American investment and with Williamson's heavy
expenditures. The American political scene was also changing, and the
Federalists who favored good relations with Great Britain would soon to
be out of office. In March 1800, Charles Williamson conveyed the lands
which he had held in trust to Sir William Johnstone Pulteney under authority
of the 1798 act enabling aliens to hold title to real property. In 1801
Williamson resigned his land agency.34 Finally,
in 1805, after protracted negotiations,35 he reached
a settlement with Sir William Johnstone Pulteney, which left him with
Springfield and White Hart Farms, 13,085.5 acres of land in Steuben County
(worth a total of $93,298), and practically no cash, for fourteen years
of work. Charles Williamson returned to Britain, later entered government
service, and died at sea of yellow fever on August 28, 1808, while returning
to England from Havana, Cuba.
SUBSEQUENT SCOTTISH INFLUENCES
ON WESTERN NEW YORK STATE
The course of events that Sir William Johnstone Pulteney had set in motion
stamped a lasting Scottish imprint on western New York State. When Rochesterville
(later Rochester) was established in 1812, the Scots colony at Caledonia
brought needed grain to, and furnished trade with, the new community.
Charles Williamson's assistant, John Johnstone, persuaded another Scot,
John Greig, to seek his fortune in America. Greig was a native of Moffat,
Dumfriesshire, where his father was factor to the third Earl of Hopetoun.
Greig became a prominent lawyer in Canandaigua, President of the Canandaigua
Bank, and a member of Congress. He succeeded as the agent for the Hornby
and Colquhoun Estates on the death of his friend John Johnstone in 1806.
John Greig also laid out and promoted the Greig Tract, a pioneer Rochester
subdivision on the west bank of the Genesee. The Greig Tract was along
Caledonia Street, the southern extension of Plymouth Avenue. It centered
on Caledonia Square (now Plymouth Circle), which was framed by Edinburgh
and Glasgow Streets. From then on, Scottish families took an active role
in the development of Rochester and became leaders in many fields.36
© Jeffrey M. Johnstone, 2000, 2001, 2002, photograph supplied by author.
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Notes
1. While belonging to Massachusetts,
the land west of the Preemption Line was to be governed by New York.
2. Pulteney Associates also purchased
the mill constructed by Ebenezer “Indian” Allan on the Genesee
Falls in what would become Rochester.
3. The New Dictionary of National
Biography plans a biography.
4. Sir Leslie Stephen and Sir Sidney
Lee, eds., The Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University
Press, 1964), X, p. 963.
5. See, e.g., C. L. Johnstone,
History of the Johnstones, 1191 -1909 (Edinburgh: W.&A.K.
Johnston, 1909), p. 176.
6. The current representative of
the Johnstones of Westerhall resides in Leicestershire.
7. The Westerhall family made this
claim in its petitions for the Annandale titles.
8. The clans from around the Scottish
border were accomplished horsemen and are sometimes called “Riding
Clans.”
9. See e.g., Sir Lewis
Namier and John Brooke, “Pulteney, William (1729-1805), of Westerhall,
Dumbries,” in The History of Parliament: The House of Commons
1754-1790 (London: History of Parliament Trust, 1964), III, p. 341.
10. In Britain it is not unusual
for a husband to assume the surname of his wife, if she is an heiress.
Sometimes Pulteney’s name is written as Sir William Johnstone-Pulteney,
See, e.g., Sir Leslie Stephen and Sir Sidney Lee, eds., Ibid., p. 965.
A neighbor from Westerkirk Parish named his baby son after Sir William.
The boy grew up to be Admiral Sir Pulteney Malcolm (1768-1838), one of
the “Four Knights of Eskdale”—one of four famous brothers
who were knighted.
11. A Scottish politician.
12. See, e.g., Sir Lewis
Namier and John Brooke, Ibid., p. 341.
13. Ibid.
14. See, e.g., Sir Lewis
Namier and John Brooke, Ibid., p. 342.
15. Ibid.
16. The British Fisheries Society
established fishing stations at Ullapool, Tobermory, Lochbay (Skye), and
Pulteneytown near Wick. J.D. Mackie, A History of Scotland (New
York: Viking Penguin, Inc., 1985), p. 295.
17. See, e.g., L. T. C.
Rolt, Thomas Telford (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1958),
p. 17.
18. See, e.g., Alastair
Penfield, ed., Thomas Telford: Engineer (London: Thomas Telford,
Ltd., 1980), p. 2.
19. See, e.g., C.L. Johnstone,
Ibid., P. 188.
20. See, e.g., Terry Sessford,
“Fox and Hounds,” The Independent (London), Jul.
15, 1999, Comment, p. 2.
21. See, e.g., L. T. C. Rolt, Ibid.,
p. 17.
22. Sir N.W. Wraxall, Bart. Historical
Memoires of My Own Time (Philadelphia: Lea and Blanchard, 1845),
p. 472.
23. It was not until 1985 that House
of Lords restored the titles and peerage of the Johnstones of Annandale
to Patrick Wentworth Hope Johnstone, a descendant, through females of
the first Marquis of Annandale.
24. He was buried in the south cloister
on June 11, 1805.
25. Orsamus Turner, History
of the Pioneer Settlement of Phelps and Gorham's Purchase and Morris'
Reserve (Rochester: William Alling, 1851), p,. 279.
26. The Times (London)
list dated March 26, 2000, lists him as the tenth wealthiest person in
Britain for the nineteenth century.
27. See, e.g., Sir Lewis
Namier and John Brooke, Ibid., p. 343.
28. See, e.g., C. L. Johnstone,
Ibid. P. 188.
29. Descended from the Williamsons
of Castlerobert, Sanquar, who claim descent from the medieval MacWilliam
claimants to the Scottish throne and from the daughter of Sir William
Wallace.
30. The Earl of Hopetoun had managed
the Annandale Estates after 1742 when his uncle George, third Marquis,
was declared incapable of managing his own affairs, and the Earl eventually
succeeded to the Annandale Estates, but not the titles, on the death of
the third Marquis in 1792.
31. He also hired Donald Stewart,
James Towar, Dugald Cameron and Hector Mackenzie to act as assistants.
32. One of his personal favorite
spots seems to have been Bluff Point on Keuka Lake, where he established
White Hart Farm and built one of his three mansions, fencing off the entire
Bluff Point as his personal hunting preserve.
33. Ontario County Historical Society
(Canandaigua, New York), Pulteney-Johnstone Papers, MS-J-4
34. New York lawyer Robert Troup
succeeded Williamson as agent.
35. In a letter to Robert Troup
dated March 4, 1803, Pulteney said of Williamson: "If he had been able
to leave me the product of the Mines of Mexico and Peru, it would not
compensate to me for the misery he has occasioned me, for many years,
and the risks I have run of utter perdition." Ibid.
36. See, e.g., John White Johnston,
"A Historical Outline of the Scottish People of Rochester and Vicinity,"
Rochester Historical Society, V (Rochester, New York: Rochester
Historical Society, 1926).
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