NAESMYTH, Maj Richard William, 16th of Posso 1938-2023

[Richard R]

From the Telegraph of 13 Nov 2023: NAESMYTH OF POSSO Major Richard William, RA (Retd), of Devizes, Wiltshire, passed away aged 84 on 7th November 2023. Much loved husband, father, and grandfather to Xenia (wife), Charlotte (dau), Alexander (son), Robin, Maxwell, Eleanor and Thomas. A Service in memory of him will be held at 2 p.m. on Thursday 23rd November at St Mary the Virgin, Bishop's Cannings. Donations, if desired, to the church or Royal British Legion. Enquiries to Charles S. Winchcombe & Son Ltd….

He was s of Rev George Creswell NAESMYTH 15^th of Posso 1895-1983 (whom he succ. as) head of that Scots gentry family and Christabel Sarah 1902-92 d of Thomas Reginald SLATTER 1868-1930 (farmer) of Northleach, Glos. by his 17 April 1901 (Kempsford, Glos) to Edith Mary HEWER 1871-1949. He m 1980 Xenia Angela Mary d of Very Rev Rudolph HENDERSON-HOWAT 1896-1957 and Agatha Mary Dorothea COOKE 1905-90, and had a son and a dau. His son succeeds him.

ALEXANDER CRESSWELL BENEDICT Naesmyth, 17^th of Posso, b 3 April 1983. He was due to m 20 Oct 2017 Sarah G. d of Thomas MACNEIL of Kingston, Nova Scotia, and had issue

1. MAXWELL XAVIER Naesmyth Yr b 31 March 2018 (Sydney, Telgraph 5 April)

2. Thomas William 25 Nov 2021 (Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, Telegraph 1 Dec)

1. Eleanor Vivian b 17 Jan 2020 (Sydney, Telegraph 23 Jan) 

 

[dpth...@gmail.com]

His paternal grandfather, Charles Webb, later Naesmyth, was himself a maternal grandson of Jemima Naesmyth, daughter of Sir James Naesmyth of Dawick, 3rd Bt., which title became extinct on the death  of Jemima's great-nephew in 1928.

[sarac...@googlemail.com]

I remember being in brief correspondence in the late 1980s with the late Maj. Richard  William Naesmyth of Posso where he lamented on not being able to claim the family baronetcy.

It should be noted that the Naesmyth of Dawick and Posso baronetcy(31st July 1706) was among the last batch of Scottish baronetcies created before the passing of the 1707 Act of Union and had the customary Scottish succession clause of  'heirs male whatsoever'

It is therefore feasible to class the baronetcy as dormant rather than extinct,with the death of the young and unmarried lineal 8th Baronet on 26th Jan.1928 ;as while the late Maj. Richard's father and  grandfather  were recognised as successive 'heirs of line'  of Naesmyth of Posso by the Lord Lyon on 7th July 1958; there is genealogical room for a collateral or lineal Naesmyth to still claim it,although the pedigree given in BLG,19th Edition-THe Kingdom of Scotland might means any successful claimant potentially has to definitely provide and prove a pre-Marian period kinship. 

[S. S.]

Unrelated to this thread, but the next baronetcy after Naesmyth of Dawick and Posso is that of Dunbar of Hempriggs, whose date of creation is given as 10 Dec 1706 in Complete Baronetage, iv, 444. However, under note B it is stated the date of creation is 10 Dec 1706, the same noted in Sir William Fraser's Sutherland Book (1892), i, 515 and in John Philip Wood's Peerage of Scotland (1813) under the title of "Duffus". The date is given as 21 Dec 1706 in Milne's, Chamberlayne's and Mierge's list (various compilers ). 

There is another baronetcy following it, Craigie of Gairsay, though this creation is contentious, being given in Beatson's list as 1707 and ostensibly the last creation, but does not appear in other prominent lists as noted in ibid, under note B by G.E.C. G.E.C. notes that the date of the baronetcy may have been a knighthood and refers the reader to Notes and Queries, 5th series, v, 28. I looked through Shaw's Knights of England, but could not find a mention of "Sir William Craigie", the person alleged to have been granted the baronetcy. In fact, Index of Baronetage Creations by C. J. Parry gives the Craigie baronetcy the distinction of being the last. The same fact is noted by the late Leigh Rayment on his  website. 

I investigated this beginning with the Notes and Queries entry. Funnily enough, G.E.C. is the person asking the query! He states that the baronetcy is mentioned in Beatson’s Political Index (1808), 3rd edn, iii, 1806, but no account can be found in mighty Playfair’s Baronetage of Scotland (1811), nor is it mentioned in Burke’s Extinct Baronetage (1844). Lodge’s Peerage and Baronetage mentions “Sir William Craigie of Gairsay, Orkney (S.), created 1707” in publications between 1832-1842, but nothing else appears. Dod’s Peerage (1841) has a similar entry to the foregoing.

G.E.C. then mentions Rendall parish in John Brand’s A Brief Description of Orkney (1701), wherein it is stated: “[here] belongs Gairsay, a little pleasant isle, wherein lives Sir [sic] William Craig [sic] of Gairsay”. G.E.C. adds that William was “probably then a knight, and possibly afterwards first baronet”. G.E.C. then quotes Fullarton’s Gazetteer of Scotland (1848) under “Gairsa” with the following: “Close by the south shore stand the remains of an old house, which seems formerly to have possessed some degree of elegance and strength, and was the residence of Sir William Craigie and others of that name and family”. G.E.C. closes his query by adding that the Rendall parish registers are lost, with the exception of two other mentioned Sir William Craigie, one of whom was “certainly before the baronetcy was creation, and the other probably long after it was extinct”. I don’t think G.E.C. ever received a reply to his query, as he wrote the Complete Baronetage only a few years later and would have included any further information. Most probably, this was not a baronetcy creation after all.

If we ignore Craigie, the next baronetage creations are Hill of Waughton (NS: 4 Feb 1707); Gray of Denne Hill (5 March 1707); Dick later Dick-Cunyngham of Prestonfield (22 March 1707); Maxwell of Pollock (27 March 1707), being a novodamus of the 12 Apr 1682 creation and thus counts as a new creation, and the final baronetcy of Nova Scotia being Stewart ofTillicoultry (24 April 1707). The Union took place on 1 May 1707 and all further baronets were of Great Britain. I am thus not sure why Parry and others listed Craigie as the last baronetcy.

The peerage and baronetcy are always filled with such complex minutiae :)

S.S.