Sir John Hay Athole Macdonald, Lord Kingsburgh, KCB, PC, PRSSA, FRS,

FRSE Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland's national academy of science and letters, judged to be "eminently distinguished in their subject". This soc ...

(27 December 1836 – 9 May 1919) was a

Scottish Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...

Conservative Party politician and later a judge.

Life

Macdonald was born on 28 December 1836 at 29 Great King Street in Edinburgh's New Town, the son of Grace Hay and Matthew Norman MacDonald (later MacDonald-Hume) of Ninewells, an affluent Edinburgh lawyer. He was privately educated at Edinburgh Academy. He studied law at the University of Edinburgh and the

University of Basle The University of Basel (Latin: ''Universitas Basiliensis'', German: ''Universität Basel'') is a university in Basel, Switzerland. Founded on 4 April 1460, it is Switzerland's oldest university and among the world's oldest surviving universiti ...

in Switzerland. He was called to the

Scottish bar The Faculty of Advocates is an independent body of lawyers who have been admitted to practise as advocates before the courts of Scotland, especially the Court of Session and the High Court of Justiciary. The Faculty of Advocates is a constitu ...

in 1859. On 30 July 1875 he was appointed by Queen Victoria to be Sheriff of the Shires of Ross, Cromarty, and Sutherland. He was appointed Solicitor General for Scotland from 1876 to 1880. He was appointed as Sheriff of Perthshire in 1880, and served as

Dean of the Faculty of Advocates The Dean of the Faculty of Advocates, also known as the Dean of Faculty, is the head of the Faculty of Advocates, the independent body for advocates in Scotland. The Dean is elected by the whole membership. List of deans of Faculty * 1582 to ??? ...

from 1882 to 1885. The University of Edinburgh gave him an honorary doctorate (LLD) in 1884. In 1886 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. His proposers were John MacLaren, Lord MacLaren, Sir William Turner, Peter Guthrie Tait and Alexander Buchan. Elected as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Edinburgh and St Andrews Universities at the 1885 general election, he served as

Lord Advocate , body = , insignia = Crest of the Kingdom of Scotland.svg , insigniasize = 110px , image = File:Official Portrait of Dorothy Bain QC.png , incumbent = Dorothy Bain KC , incumbentsince = 22 June 2021 , appointer = Monarch on the advice ...

from 1885 to 1886 and from 1886 to 1888. He became a

Queen's Counsel In the United Kingdom and in some Commonwealth countries, a King's Counsel ( post-nominal initials KC) during the reign of a king, or Queen's Counsel (post-nominal initials QC) during the reign of a queen, is a lawyer (usually a barrister ...

in 1880, and was appointed a

Privy Counsellor The Privy Council (PC), officially His Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, is a formal body of advisers to the sovereign of the United Kingdom. Its membership mainly comprises senior politicians who are current or former members of ei ...

in 1885. He was created a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath (KCB) by Queen Victoria in 1900. He was commissioned as a

Lieutenant-Colonel Lieutenant colonel ( , ) is a rank of commissioned officers in the armies, most marine forces and some air forces of the world, above a major and below a colonel. Several police forces in the United States use the rank of lieutenant colonel ...

in the 1st Queen's Edinburgh Rifle Volunteer Brigade in 1864, and was its Lt-Col Commandant from 1882 to 1892. He was one of the leading advocates of drill reform in the Volunteer movement, author of ''On the Best Detail Formation for the New Infantry Tactics'' (1873) and ''Commonsense on Parade or Drill without Strings'' (1886). In 1885 he organised a spectacular night assembly of the brigade, which resulted in 500 new recruits. He was later appointed as the brigade's Honorary Colonel, remaining in that role with the 5th (Queen's Edinburgh Rifles) Battalion, Royal Scots, when the Territorial Force was formed in 1908. He gave up his Parliamentary seat and was appointed Lord Justice Clerk in 1888, taking the title Lord Kingsburgh, and presided over the Second Division of the

Court of Session The Court of Session is the supreme civil court of Scotland and constitutes part of the College of Justice; the supreme criminal court of Scotland is the High Court of Justiciary. The Court of Session sits in Parliament House in Edinburgh ...

until 1915. He was promoted from Ensign to Lieutenant in the

Royal Company of Archers The Royal Company of Archers, The King's Bodyguard for Scotland is a ceremonial unit that serves as the Sovereign's bodyguard in Scotland—a role it has performed since 1822 during the reign of King George IV when the company provided a per ...

on 18 June 1915. In 1875 he became one of the founding members of the ruling council of the

Cockburn Association The Cockburn Association (Edinburgh's Civic Trust) is one of the world's oldest architectural conservation and urban planning monitoring organisations, founded in 1875. The Scottish judge Henry Cockburn (1779–1854) was a prominent campaigner t ...

, Edinburgh's influential conservationist organisation, becoming the body's vice-president in 1887 and then its president in 1914, relinquishing the latter office in 1918. In the

1916 Birthday Honours The 1916 Birthday Honours were appointments by King George V to various orders and honours to reward and highlight good works by citizens of the British Empire. The appointments were made to celebrate the official birthday of The King, and were ...

King

George V George V (George Frederick Ernest Albert; 3 June 1865 – 20 January 1936) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 until his death in 1936. Born during the reign of his grandmother Quee ...

created him a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath (GCB). He was an enthusiastic car owner and was a founding member of the Automobile Club and was the first president of the Scottish Automobile Club. He also registered Edinburgh's first ever

number plate A vehicle registration plate, also known as a number plate (British English), license plate (American English), or licence plate (Canadian English), is a metal or plastic plate attached to a motor vehicle or trailer for official identificatio ...

. He died at home, 15 Abercromby Place, a short distance from his birthplace, on 9 May 1919. He is buried in St Cuthbert's Churchyard at the west end of

Princes Street Princes Street ( gd, Sràid nam Prionnsan) is one of the major thoroughfares in central Edinburgh, Scotland and the main shopping street in the capital. It is the southernmost street of Edinburgh's New Town, stretching around 1.2 km (three ...

Family

In 1864 he married Adelaide Jeanette Doran. She died in 1870.

Publications

*''Practical Treatise on the Criminal Law of Scotland'' (1887)

References and notes

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Macdonald, John 1836 births 1919 deaths Fellows of the Royal Society Knights Commander of the Order of the Bath Lord Advocates Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for Edinburgh and St Andrews Universities Kingsburgh

Solicitors General for Scotland A solicitor is a legal practitioner who traditionally deals with most of the legal matters in some jurisdictions. A person must have legally-defined qualifications, which vary from one jurisdiction to another, to be described as a solicitor and ...

Scottish Tory MPs (pre-1912) UK MPs 1885–1886 UK MPs 1886–1892 Royal Scots officers Members of the Royal Company of Archers Deans of the Faculty of Advocates