On this day in 1728

The work of interior designer and furniture designer Robert Adam is still admired to this day. His works include Edinburgh’s Royal Exchange, Pulteney Bridge in Bath, the Theatre Royal on London’s Drury Lane, the Old College of the University of Edinburgh, and Osterley Park in London.

Robert Adam was born in Kirkcaldy and educated at the University of Edinburgh. He was an apprentice to his father, architect William Adam, and upon his father’s death he took over the family business, which made him responsible for many contracts for the maintenance of state buildings and the building of Fort George at Inverness.

Architectural success

Robert and his brother James, who was employed in the same business, later moved to England where they had great success as architects and interior designers, in part because they designed every element, both inside and out, to work as part of a greater whole.

In April 1768, Robert was elected the MP for Kinross-shire. He died on 3 March 1792 of a stomach ulcer that had burst two days earlier. He was in London at the time and is buried in Westminster Abbey.

Robert Adam’s death

His death was announced in Jackson’s Oxford Journal on 10 March 1792, with the Journal noting that “the many elegant buildings, publick [sic] and private, erected in various parts of the kingdom by Mr Adam, will remain lasting ornaments of his taste and genius. Mr Adam, after his return from Italy, was appointed Architect to his Majesty in the year 1762; which office being incompatible with a seat in Parliament, he resigned in 1768, on his being elected to represent the county of Kinross.”

The Caledonian Mercury of 15 March 1792 gave an account of his funeral, which was “attended only by a select number of his friends, who esteemed him while living and wished to bestow the mark of their regard.”

 

...and on this day in 1883

“A disaster unparalleled in the history of shipbuilding,” was how the London Evening Standard of 4 July 1883 described the sinking of the SS Daphne.

As the paper explained, “A small steamer named the Daphne, 500 tons, built for the Glasgow and Londonderry Steam-packet Company, was being launched from the shipbuilding yard of Messrs Stephen and Sons, Linthouse, near Glasgow. At half-past eleven o’clock the vessel moved off when the dogshores were cleared away; but when she took the water she showed a tendency to heel over… as she fell over upon her side a great many of the men who were on the upper deck could be seen clinging to each other, and grasping at the rails, chains, or any of the deck fittings that could afford a hold. There were but a few cries for help, the disaster occurring so suddenly. In a few minutes she had gone clean out of sight in the middle of the river, and nothing could be seen but the men struggling in the water.”

Hundreds dead

“There is no official record of all who were in the Daphne when she went down the slips, and it would be unsafe to take the account furnished by the dead yielded up by the river as being complete,” wrote the Glasgow Herald of 4 July. “But the absence of the breadwinners from homes in Govan and Linthouse will tell their own tale, and before many hours are over a fairly accurate list of those who have been lost will probably be compiled.”

That list eventually extended to 124 people, with just 70 of those onboard saved. It took several weeks for the last of the bodies to be recovered. The number of people onboard for the launch contributed to the capsizing, according to the subsequent report on the disaster.

Boat turned over

The following day’s edition of the Western Daily Mercury reported that the boat had turned right over as it entered the water, “sinking deck downwards, and burying, as it were, in one gigantic coffin, the unsuspecting occupants of her decks… of the six bodies first recovered two were found by dragging the river, and the other four were found attached to various parts of the vessel, such as the mains, etc. The first body was taken out about half-past one this afternoon and it proved to be that of a man of middle age. From the expression of the features the poor fellow must have struggled hard for his life.”

“It is expected that most of the bodies of those who were working between decks when the disaster occurred will be brought to the surface very shortly, but there will be more difficulty in reaching the bodies of the poor fellows who were working in the engine room and cabins, and they will probably have to remain where they are until the vessel is raised and pumped,” said the Sheffield Independent, the day after the disaster.

Official report

The official report into the disaster, compiled by Sir Edward J Reed and presented to the Houses of Parliament, laid blame for the disaster on the amount of weight aboard the steamship at launch.
Several of the victims were buried at Glasgow’s Craigton Cemetery, where a memorial was erected two years later.

 

...and on this day in 2023

Politicians in Orkney proposed breaking away from the UK to reunite with Norway, or at least finding some way to give Orkney more autonomy.

Orkney, Shetland and the Hebrides had been part of the kingdom of Norway for centuries until they passed to Scotland in 1472. Scotland and Norway had earlier signed the Treaty of Perth, which gave over the equally disputed Hebrides to Scotland, but had reinforced Norway’s claim over Orkney.

Political pressures

The move to break away from the United Kingdom a little over seven years after a slim majority of voters committed the country at large to leave the United Kingdom. Scotland thus lost its EU membership simultaneously, despite a majority of Scottish voters having cast a vote to remain. A previous proposal to give Orkney more autonomy, in 2017, had been complicated by the outcome of the vote, which had required politicians to take a wait-and-see approach rather than pushing things through.

Orkney Council leader James Stockan explained the proposal to the BBC, stating that Orkney had “contributed for the last 40 years through north sea oil, and the dividend we get back isn’t sufficient to keep us going”.