There’s Something About Mary: Johnston v Paisley (1769)

“Miss Graham, I cannot go out but I am dunn’d with poor Mally’s light carriage with the servants and others in the neighbourhood, which you cannot but know. If she behave so now, What will she do afterwards? which has given me more uneasiness than all I heard from Moffat. It is not my children, but every body will talk. I wish I may be preserved from danger at this time of life, and not be made a speech to the whole country. I hope there is no harm done, is all from, your most obedient servant. James Paisley.”

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Hisses, Uproar, and Confusion: Mr James Fennell’s Riotous Nights at the Theatre Royal, 1788

An angry group of Edinburgh theatre patrons targeted an actor, Mr James Fennell, for systematic abuse as he attempted to perform his role in ‘Venice Preserv’d, or a Plot Discover’d’ at the Theatre Royal on 9 July 1788. The unruly group had entered into a most unwarrantable and illegal combination and conspiracy, to interrupt the…

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Lord and Lady Alva’s Georgian House: The Special Inventories

Special inventories were taken for linen, coins and jewels, pamphlets, and pictures and prints found at Drumsheugh House after Jean Stirling’s death in 1797. These were designed to resolve inheritance queries raised by her step-daughter-in-law Isabella Erskine. Linen The linen inventory is particularly interesting since it includes the marks the family used to identify their…

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Lord and Lady Alva’s Georgian House: The Family

David Allan painted Lord Alva and his family in 1780 and the resulting conversation piece, ‘James Erskine, Lord Alva (1722-1796) and His Family‘ is now held by the National Gallery of Scotland. Lord Alva is the small gentleman in black.  Jean Stirling, Lady Alva is seated next to him and his three surviving children from…

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