Up for auction a RARE! "1st Earl of Eldon" John Scott Hand Written Letter.
ES-5129E
John
Scott, 1st Earl of Eldon, PC, QC, FRS, FSA (4
June 1751 – 13 January 1838) was a British barrister and politician. He served
as Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain between
1801 and 1806 and again between 1807 and 1827. Eldon was born in Newcastle upon Tyne. His
grandfather, William Scott of Sandgate, a street adjacent to the Newcastle
quayside, was clerk to a fitter, a sort of water-carrier and broker of coals.
His father, whose name also was William, began life as an apprentice to a
fitter, in which service he obtained the freedom of Newcastle, becoming a
member of the guild of Hostmen (coal-fitters);[1] later in life he became a principal in the
business, and attained a respectable position as a merchant in Newcastle,
accumulating property worth nearly £20,000. Eldon was educated at Newcastle upon Tyne Royal
Grammar School. He was not remarkable at school for application to
his studies, though his wonderful memory enabled him to make good progress in
them; he frequently played truant and was whipped for it, robbed orchards, and
indulged in other questionable schoolboy pranks; nor did he always come out of
his scrapes with honour and a character for truthfulness. When he had finished
his education at the grammar school, his father thought of apprenticing him to
his own business, to which an elder brother Henry had already devoted himself;
and it was only through the influence of his elder brother William
(afterwards Lord Stowell),
who had already obtained a fellowship at University College, Oxford,
that it was ultimately resolved that he should continue with his studies.
Accordingly, in 1766, John Scott entered University College with the view of
taking holy orders and obtaining a college living. In the year following he
obtained a fellowship, graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in 1770, and in 1771 won the prize for
the English essay, the only university prize open in his time for general
competition.
His wife was the eldest daughter of Aubone Surtees, a Newcastle banker.
The Surtees family objected to the match, and attempted to prevent it; but a
strong attachment had sprung up between them. On 18 November 1772, Scott, with
the aid of a ladder and an old friend, carried off the lady from her father's
house in the Sandhill, across the border to Blackshields, in Scotland, where they were married. The father of the
bridegroom objected not to his son's choice, but to the time he chose to marry;
it was a blight on his son's prospects, depriving him of his fellowship and his
chance of church preferment. But while the bride's family refused to associate
with the couple, Mr Scott, like a prudent man and an affectionate father, set
himself to make the best of a bad matter, and received them kindly, settling on
his son £2000. John returned with his wife to Oxford, and continued to hold his
fellowship for what is called the year of grace given after marriage, and added
to his income by acting as a private tutor. After a time, Mr Surtees was
reconciled with his daughter, and made a liberal settlement of £3000.
John Scott's year of grace closed without any college living falling
vacant; and with his fellowship he gave up the church and turned to the study
of law. He became a student at the Middle Temple in January 1773. In 1776, he was called to
the bar, intending at first to establish himself as an advocate in his native
town, a scheme which his early success led him to abandon, and he soon settled
to the practice of his profession in London, and on the northern circuit. In
the autumn of 1776, his father died, leaving him a legacy of £1000 over and
above the £2000 previously settled on him.