User:Hegvald/Erskine

Thomas Erskine (about 1746 -- 6 February 1828), from 1793 Sir Thomas Erskine, Baronet, and from 1799 the 9th Earl of Kellie, was a Scottish merchant, landowner and politician who for many years was living in the Swedish port city of Gothenburg, before returning to Scotland in 1799, having inherited the earlship of Kellie from a distant relative.

Gothenburg
Erskine was born in Scotland to an aristocratic family that had become comparatively impoverished because of confiscations due to their support for the Stuart pretenders. He was probably born at Cambo House in Fife, one of the forfeited properties. At a young age he was sent to Gothenburg to learn trade. He was employed 1759 in the office of George Carnegie, a Jacobite exile who had established himself as a merchant there. After a few years he transferred to the firm of the iron-exporting English brothers John and Benjamin Hall, and became a partner in the firm in 1767. In the 30 years he remained a partner in the business, he managed to collect a large fortune. In addition to retaining his partnership in the firm of the Hall brothers, Erskine pursued business under his own name, later partnering with David Mitchell from Montrose, who took over Thomas Erskine & Co. as sole owner after Erskine's departure for Scotland.

In 1775 Erskine was appointed British consul in Gothenburg, Marstrand and the other port cities on the West Coast of Sweden. As such he wrote regular reports to the British government, including reports on the Swedish contraband trade with France during the revolutionary wars. The position also enhanced his social position in Gothenburg. He was one of the twenty (mostly British-born) founding members of the Bachelors' Club, an English-type gentleman's club established in 1769, mainly in order to circumvent a ban on the playing of billiards at public establishments.

Return to Scotland
Erskine bought back Cambo House in 1790. After inheriting the baronetcy from his brother David Erskine, who had died in 1793, he spent the winter of 1793-94 in Scotland, but returned to Gothenburg, where he remained as consul until 1799. His definite departure for Scotland was troubled by a conflict with the Gothenburg City Council, who demanded that he should pay a sixth of his fortune before leaving Sweden.

Marriage and family
In 1771 Thomas Erskine wed Anne Gordon, a daughter of Captain Adam Gordon of Ardoch. The marriage was childless, but Erskine had a premarital daughter, Harriet (born in 1763), who married Johan Henrik Engelhart, professor of medicine at Lund. Four of Harriet's children were raised in their grandfather's house in Scotland. While the earldom was inherited by his brother Methven, a new Erskine baronetcy was granted to the 9th Earl's grandson David Engelhart, who changed his name to Erskine. His sister Harriet Engelhart married a first cousin, another David Erskine, a nephew of the 9th Earl of Kellie and the natural son of Sir David Erskine.