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history |
With the exception of GD1/576 10-14 and 20, most of these papers appear to have belonged to Mr David Fearne, writer in Edinburgh. Fearne was the son of Andrew Fearne of Nigg and Pitcalyean. He was servant of Sir James Dalrymple of Stair, Lord President, and seems to have had a large business in Edinburgh. At the time of the Revolution by his own account he seems to have been employed in negotiations in London, and again at the time of the Union. During one of his absences in London, in 1700, his house and papers were destroyed in the great fire in the Kirkheugh. In 1690 he entered advocate. Possibly because of his long absences and also because of his intimacy with Stair, his work lessened and he became an applicant for admission to Trinity Hospital. He was admitted in 1730, or near that date. His first wife was Anna Hamilton (m. 1683), related to the Hamiltons of Little Preston, whose estate Fearn managed GD1/576/7. She died in 1690 and on 23 October 1690 he married an Englishwoman, Anne Boxall of Reading. He had two sisters, of whom Elizabeth (Bessie or Bettie) married Mr Wm Stewart, minister at Inverness. He was a prisoner for debt for some time after 1706 when Secretary Harley sent him back to Edinburgh. |