Sir James Johnstone, 4th Baronet (23 January 1726 – 3 September 1794)) was a Scottish officer in the

British Army The British Army is the principal Army, land warfare force of the United Kingdom. the British Army comprises 73,847 regular full-time personnel, 4,127 Brigade of Gurkhas, Gurkhas, 25,742 Army Reserve (United Kingdom), volunteer reserve perso ...

and then a politician. He sat in the

House of Commons of Great Britain The House of Commons of Great Britain was the lower house of the Parliament of Great Britain between 1707 and 1801. In 1707, as a result of the Acts of Union 1707, Acts of Union of that year, it replaced the House of Commons of England and the Pa ...

for all but one of the years 1784 to 1794.

Family

Sir James was the son of Sir James Johnstone, 3rd Baronet and his wife Barbara, daughter of Alexander Murray, 4th Lord Elibank. In about 1759 he married Louisa Maria Elizabeth Colclough, the widow of Rev. John Meyrick, vicar of Edwinstowe,

East Retford East is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sunrise, Sun rises on the Earth. Etymology As in other languages, the word is formed from the fact ...

, Nottinghamshire. They had no children.

Military career

He joined the marines in 1748 as a Second Lieutenant, and rose to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel in 1772.

Political career

Johnstone first tried to enter Parliament at the 1774 general election, when he began canvassing Dumfries Burghs, where the interest of the 3rd Duke of Queensberry was dominant. However, he made little progress and withdrew in favour of Alexander Fergusson of Craigdarroch, who was also unsuccessful. Queensberry's candidate William Douglas took the seat. Johnstone tried again at the 1784 general election. The 4th Duke of Queensberry lived in England and was unpopular in the area, and Johnstone won the seat in a 4-way contest, with the support of two of the five burghs. He took an independent line in Parliament, voting unpredictably. He supported Parliamentary reform and abolition of the slave trade, opposed the penal laws, and protested the tax burden on the poor. He supported the impeachment of

Warren Hastings Warren Hastings (6 December 1732 – 22 August 1818) was a British colonial administrator, who served as the first governor of the Presidency of Fort William (Bengal), the head of the Supreme Council of Bengal, and so the first governor-gener ...

and of Elijah Impey, proclaiming in Impey's case that: "We have beheaded a King, we have hanged a peer, we have shot an admiral, we are now trying a governor-general, and I can see no reason why we should not put on his trial a judge and a chief justice". His independence was less appreciated in Scotland, where he denounced the Scottish legal system, and twice opposed reform of Scottish seats despite petitions in favour of reform from the Dumfries Burghs. At the 1790 general election, he faced a strong challenge from Queensberry's interest, who spent over £8,000, while Johnstone spent over £12,000 (equivalent to £ in ). Corruption was rampant, and despite out-spending his opponent, Johnstone won only 2 of the five burghs. However Johnstone's younger brother

William William is a masculine given name of Germanic languages, Germanic origin. It became popular in England after the Norman Conquest, Norman conquest in 1066,All Things William"Meaning & Origin of the Name"/ref> and remained so throughout the Middle ...

had inherited a large fortune from his wife's family. He became one of the richest commoners in the empire and changed his name to William Pulteney. In 1790 he bought control of the four-seat borough of Weymouth and Melcombe Regis, adding to his interest in other boroughs. To provide a seat for James, William asked

Thomas Tyrwhitt Jones Sir Thomas Tyrwhitt Jones, 1st Baronet FRS (1 September 1765 – 26 November 1811) of Stanley Hall, Shropshire, was a British politician. Early life Tyrwhitt was born on 1 September 1765. He was the eldest son of Captain John Tyrwhitt, RN, o ...

to vacate his seat at Weymouth, and at a by-election in 1791 James was returned in his place. He held the seat until his death, when William Pulteney succeeded to the baronetcy.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Johnstone, James 1726 births 1794 deaths Nobility from Dumfries and Galloway Johnstone baronets Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for Scottish constituencies British MPs 1784–1790 British MPs 1790–1796 Royal Marines officers 18th-century Royal Marines personnel