Details

Name

Robert Donald

Brief Biography

1724–1803, Scottish

Occupation

Merchant; lord provost

Description

Robert Donald was a ‘Virginia Merchant’ – one of the Glasgow ‘Tobacco Lords’ – and a Lord Provost of the City. He was born in 1724, the fourth son of Thomas Donald of Lyleston (also a tobacco merchant) and Janet Cumming of Baremann.
He formed a partnership with his older brother James. James Donald, who was also a tobacco merchant, acquired the lands of Geilston in Cardross in 1757. He was subsequently styled ‘James Donald of Geilston’. Robert married Catherine Donald, daughter of Robert Donald of Greenock, who was his first cousin.
When James Donald died in 1760 his estate passed to his eldest son, Thomas, who maintained the partnership with his uncle Robert, and they traded as Robert Donald and Co. They had their own fleet of ships, which they operated in conjunction with their cousins in Greenock. They maintained a network of company stores in the back country of Virginia and dealt with the small tobacco growers.
Both Robert and James appear to have spent time in Virginia, and the family had a plantation called ‘Pages’ at the township of Hanover County which was visited by George Washington in 1752. Robert left America to return to Scotland in 1758.
Robert became a Burgess of Glasgow (by right of his wife) in 1759. He was elected a Baillie in 1765 and 1773. In 1767 he feued the 24-acre Mountblow estate from George Buchanan of Auchentoshan, near Clydebank. He built Mountblow House on this estate.
He was elected Lord Provost of Glasgow on 1 October 1776 and retained that position until 30 September 1777. In 1778 he took an active part in raising a regiment to serve against the Americans in the War of Independence. However, he later lost most of his fortune when Thomas Donald & Son became bankrupt in 1787. Presumably Thomas was now senior partner, hence the name change. Robert remained at Mountblow and, until 1798, was employed by the city to supervise the deepening of the River Clyde at a salary of £50 per annum, which later increased to £60.
On 6 June 1793, Robert wrote a letter from Mountblow to George Washington asking him to look favourably on the bearer, who was his nephew.
Catherine Donald died in 1798 and five years later, on 22 February 1803 Robert Donald died at Mountblow. He is buried in the Ramshorn Churchyard in Glasgow. Having no children of his own, he seems to have left the bulk of his estate to his nephew Alexander Donald.
The Mountblow estate was acquired by Henry Bowie and then by William Dunn of Duntocher (1770–1849). It was inherited by Dunn's nephew, the advocate Alexander Dunn Pattison. It was sold to Glasgow Corporation in 1877 but remained a home, let by James Rodger Thomson of the Clydebank Shipyard until 1893 when it was leased to the Seamen's Orphans' Institute. It became Mountblow Children's Home in 1922. The house probably suffered damage in the Clydebank Blitz of 1941 although it was not hit directly by bombs. The remains were demolished to make way for housing after the war.
The painting of Robert Donald was completed in London in 1762 when Robert was 42. The artist is unknown. The painting did not remain in the family and may have been sold either when Robert’s business collapsed or when he died. In 1868, the portrait was on loan at an exhibition of portraits held in the New Galleries of Art in Sauchiehall Street. It was lent by Thomas Carlisle Esq. It was loaned to the ‘Old Glasgow Exhibition’ held under the auspices of the Glasgow Institute for Fine Arts in 1894, when the lender was a Miss Carlisle.