Archibald Edmonstone

Archibald Edmonstone, Scottish merchant, the son of Archibald Edmonstone (1754-1821), brother of Robert Edmonstone (d. 1834) and partner in Arch. Edmonstone & Co., of Demerara. Also brother of Eliza and Margaret Hester Edmonstone (both q.v.). 

1. Born c. 1786 to Archibald Edmonstone of Spittal and his wife Elizabeth née Aitken. Living at Melville Place, Stirling in the census of 1851, age 64, unmarried, born Glasgow, with his sisters M.M. Edmonstone age 62 and Eliza Edmonstone age 45. 

2. Archibald Lapslie (q.v.), 'representative' of Arch. Edmonstone & Co., was probably Edmonstone's cousin. Ann Edmonstone, daughter of Charles Edmonstone (1757-1827) married the naturalist Charles Waterton, and was also probably Archibald Edmonstone's cousin. 

3. 'Archibald Edmonstone of Spittal, born 1786, was a West India proprietor in Demerera. In 1830, after some legal proceedings, Spittal was acquired by him from the factor and trustees of his late father, and sasine duly followed. Like other holders, however, of West India estates, his property there was much depreciated by the anticipated effect of the Emancipation Act. He was unable, therefore, to hold Spittal, and on the 9th July 1833, he sold it to his chief, Sir Archibald Edmonstone of Dunreath, Baronet.'

4. In 1817 in Demerara, Archibald Edmonstone registered 24 enslaved people (24M 3F) as joint proprietor in the name of Charles Edmonstone & Co.; 14 (12M 2F) people in his own name as proprietor; and 65 (41M 24F) as attorney of Charles Edmonstone. In 1832 he registered 122 enslaved people in his own name (77 male and 45 female): the bulk of the males were woodcutters and many of the females were described as 'woodcutting'.

5. David Alston gives a date of death for Archibald Edmonstone of 1837 at Stirling, but Archibald Edmonstone of Stirling, formerly of Demerara, whose death 28/01/1856 of was recorded at Glasgow, appears to have been the man born c. 1786/7: a memorial in Holy Rude Church Stirling identifies the Archibald Edmonstone who died at Glasgow 28/01/1856 aged 69 as the son of Archibald Edmonstone d. 1821.

T71/886 British Guiana claim nos. 1176 and 1294. 

For a genealogy of this branch of the Edmonstone family see John Guthrie Smith, The Parish of Strathbane and its Inhabitants from Early Times (Glasgow, James MacLehose & Sons, 1886) pp. 99-100. 

1. 1851 census online. See separate entries for Eliza and Margaret Hester Edmonstone for details of parentage. 

2. Brian Edgington, Charles Waterton: a biography (Cambridge, The Lutterworth Press, 1996) p. 70 shows Charles Waterton in 1820-21 visiting in British Guiana with Charles Edmonstone's '25 year-old nephew' Archibald Edmonstone. Note also that in the unpublished MS of John Castelfranc Cheveley, which records a stay in Demerara in the early 1820s, Cheveley meets Robert Edmonstone and says that his brother 'Archy' had inherited the business from his uncle old Mr Archibald, an upriver timber merchant (this may conceivably refer to the older Archibald Lapslie): John Cheveley, Journal of John Cheveley [SOAS Library], CWM/LMS/West Indies & British Guiana/Journals/Box 1; Typescript copies of extracts from the journal of John C. Cheveley, clerk with John and William Pattinson Bros, Commission Merchants, Georgetown, British Guiana, 1821-25. 

3. John Guthrie Smith, The Parish of Strathbane and its Inhabitants from Early Times (Glasgow, James MacLehose & Sons, 1886) p. 100.

4. T71/397 E1; T71/430 pp. 680-683.

5. Morning Chronicle (London) 2 February 1856, transcribed by Lisa Booth, http://sites.rootsweb.com/~nyggbs/Transcriptions/LisaB/DeathsTrans2015.pdf [accessed 11/10/2018]; https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/180111120# [accessed 11/10/2018].