Number 17 - Information on residents

1808 – 1809 Alexander and Elizabeth (neé Jackson) Binny Alexander Binny had been an Agent working for the East India Company; a position that he no doubt landed thanks to his brother, Charles, who had become Secretary to the Nabob of Arcot. The Nabob was an ally of the British East India Company, but also harboured great ambitions of power in the South Indian arena. However, he borrowed heavily, and as many East India Company officials, in India or in the United Kingdom, were his creditors, by the 1780s the debts of the Nawab were having a direct impact on British politics. In 1795 Arcot died from gangrene poisoning, and was succeeded by his son, Umdat-ul-Umara. It was at this time that Alexander was appointed as the vakeel (representative) of Nabob Umdat-ul-Umara in Calcutta. However, a few years later Umdat was accused of supporting Indian rebellion and was deemed an enemy of the British, and it seems likely that Alexander had to leave India. He married Elizabeth in 1758 and they had eight children. At least two of the sons were employed in India.

1844 – 1868 Jane Stewart of Crossmount

Jane (neè Campbell) was the widow of Captain John Stewart of Crossmount in Perthshire who had died in 1835. He had served with the 82nd Foot. In The Autobiography Of Lt.-Gen. Sir Harry Smith he is mentioned when the two men were in Spain in 1808 fighting in the Battle of Corona. ‘The Hon. Captain James Stewart and I got some excellent greyhounds. We were always out coursing or shooting, and were never sick a day; our more sedentary comrades many of them distressingly so. The seven right-hand men of Leslie's Company died in the winter of this year. Our outposts were perfectly quiet, although sentries, French and English, were at each end of the bridge over the Rio Mayor, and vedettes along each bank. There was most excellent coursing on the plains of Vallé, and James Stewart and I were frequently out. Here I gave him my celebrated Spanish greyhound, Moro, the best the world ever produced, with a pedigree like that of an Arab horse, bred at Zamora by the Conde de Monteron; but the noble dog's story is too long to tell here. In one year Stewart gave me him back again to run a match against the Duke of Wellington's dog. But the siege of Ciudad Rodrigo prevented our sports of that description. Colonel Beckwith going to Lisbon, and I being his A.D.C., it was voted a capital opportunity for me to go to have the ball cut out from under the tendon Achillis, in the very joint. I was very lame, and the pain often excruciating, so off I cut. After some hours in the trenches, when we returned I invariably ate and went out coursing, and many is the gallant course I had, and many the swift hare I and my dog Moro brought home from the right bank of the Guadiana. One day James Stewart, I, and Charlie Eeles set off; having three hours off duty, to look for a hare or two at a celebrated spot where the hares ran very strong because there was a rabbit warren which saved them. Moro, of course, was of the party. We soon found an unusually strong hare, and, although the greyhounds fetched round a dozen times, she still worked her way for the warren. I was riding a great stupid Irish horse bought from General Vandeleur, called Paddy, and as it was important for the soup to kill this hare, however unsportsmanlike on quiet occasions it would be deemed, I rode to head her from the warren. My stupid beast of a horse put his foot into a hole and rolled over me. Stewart and Eeles picked me up, but I was insensible. Although I have generally managed on such occasions to get away from the horse, the animal had rolled over me, and when I came to myself I was sitting on Eeles' knee, my arms tied up with a whip-thong, and James Stewart, with a blunt-looking penknife, trying to bleed me, an operation I quickly prohibited by starting on to my legs. Moro killed his hare, though, without my help.’

In 1811, at the Battle of Barossa, Stewart was reported as injured but ‘the anxiety of his family was relieved by a letter from him a few days ago his wound which is in the arm is quite slight.’ He was still in Spain in 1812 when his father died and he inherited the Crossmount estate. A letter written by Sophia Stewart in 1812 recounts: ‘I accompanied my Brother to Derculich, on his way to poor Crossmount's funeral, and only returned last night .Your predictions of his near approach to that "bourne from whence no traveller returns" were but too soon realized, altho from what I can learn the event was very unlooked for by his nearest friends. I agree with you that his loss is indeed an irreparable one. Yet much depends on James's future conduct in softening their grief. If his dispositions are good he certainly has much in his power by exercising them in kind and affectionate behaviour towards his Mother and Sisters. Their future comfort depends I understand in a considerable degree upon James's kindness in consequence of Crossmount's sudden Death.

In 1813 Stewart returned briefly to sort out the financial affairs arising from his father’s will. After retiring from the army he married Jane and they lived at Crossmount until his death.

Later, his two sisters brought an action against Stewart, claiming that he had not properly administered the will of their father and that as a result the sisters and their mother had not received the money they were due. By the time the case came to a conclusion both Mrs Stewart and James were dead and it was Jane who was the defendant. In the end, the court decided the sisters’ claim was invalid with one judge stating: ‘I must say that captain Stewart has, from first to last, been very ill requited for the kindness he showed to his mother and sisters.’

It is probable that Jane died around 1867 as she was by then in her late 70s and the house went on the market for £1,700.

1868 Robert Ellis & 1868 – 1881 Robert Ellis (son) and William Ellis

Robert Ellis was a solicitor (WS) and moved here from Royal Terrace. He was a widower, his wife Margaret (neé Mitchell) having died 15 years before. He had previously lived at Numbers 13 and 39. He ran a family law practice with two of his sons, Adam, an advocate, and William, a solicitor. The eldest son, Robert, was a civil engineer.

Robert Ellis senior died the year they moved back into Albany Street. Adam left having successfully applied to enter the Colonial Service and being appointed as the Substitute Procurator and Advocate-General of Mauritius. Five years later he became Judge of the Supreme Court. In 1879 he was selected for the office of Chief Justice, and transferred to Jamaica in a similar capacity in 1883, where he served until his death in 1894. He was knighted in 1882. Adam Ellis was described as ‘a distinguished colonial official as well as an able lawyer.’ He was twice married. Firstly to Sarah Harvey who died and then Alice Chesney, whom he married in Switzerland.

William, now a partner in Ellis and Blythe, and Robert, lived on in the house, with their two unmarried sisters, Ellen and Margaret. It appears that both brothers probably died around 1880.

1899 – 1912 Robert Renton

Renton was unmarried, and his mother and sister lived with him here. Previously he had lived in Fife where he had practiced as a solicitor in Cupar, before becoming Procurator Fiscal of for Fife. He acted as Chair of the Association of Procurator Fiscals in Scotland and was directly involved in preparing all legislation submitted by the Crown Office to Parliament, including the important Summary Jurisdiction Act of 1908. He is best known for the book he wrote with Henry Brown in 1890, Criminal Procedure, according to the Law of Scotland, which remains, through updated editions, the accepted ‘handbook’ of criminal procedure in Scotland. Although to the popular press of the day he was best known as the procurator in a number of high profile cases.

One involved the alleged theft of a valuable pearl necklace from Mrs Cameron, wife of Lieutenant Cecil Cameron, winner of the Victoria Cross. Lieutenant and Mrs Cameron claimed that on their way back to their residence in Heriot Row, while he had gone into a chemist’s shop to make a purchase and Mrs Cameron waited outside, she suddenly had been grabbed from behind, and a hand forced down the back of her neck and her valuable pearls snatched from her neck. Mrs Cameron recounted that she had half collapsed in a fainting fit at the shock while the thief ran off; before struggling into the shop to raise the alarm. She explained that she had not cried out in the street for her throat had been compressed by the ripping off of the pearls. It later transpired that the pearls recently had been insured for £5,000 by Lloyd’s. There was the lack of witnesses, although the theft was supposed to have happened in a busy street. It also was discovered that Lt. Cameron’s finances were in a bad state and that just days prior to the alleged robbery he had enquired about how he might invest £6000. So the couple were charged with fraud and Renton took charge of the prosecution. The trial of a heroic army officer and his stylish wife engrossed the public. The newspaper reports gave full coverage to her style: ‘Mrs Cameron wore a cream coloured costume with black cuffs and collar. She had the same hat as the previous day, a black straw with a white feather. Her button-hole was of pink carnations and lily of the valley.’ The broker, who had provided the insurance, read out the letter he had received from Mrs Cameron. ‘I rather want them to be insured under the name I used to be known by in the singing world – Miss Ruby O’Brien. I always was lucky then.’ However, her luck ran out and she and her husband were found guilty and sentenced to three years hard labour. Throughout the case Cameron had refused to give evidence in his defence and remained silent. Later, when in prison, Ruby confessed that she alone was the guilty party and Cameron had only been protecting her. So, following his later release from prison, a petition for a pardon was signed by, among others, five dukes, twenty privy councillors, and 126 generals, and he received a full pardon and was restored to his rank of Lieutenant. During the First World War, he again served with gallantry, including running spies in German Occupied France. But in 1924 Cameron committed suicide. What became of Ruby is now known.