Born in the Stockwell area of Glasgow on 5 December 1792, Brown followed his father into business as an oil and colour merchant. The company thrived for a while, with new works being opened and good foreign connections being made, until Brown made poor choices when investing a bequest and was forced out of business.
He had married Jane Wilsone in 1817 and remained prominent with his support for philanthropic, charitable and religious causes.
His later life was solitary, his wife and their two sons predeceasing him, as had most of his old friends. He health remained despite this, and he was aged 91 when he died at 33 Berkeley Terrace, Glasgow on 26 September 1884.
IN the newspapers of September the 26th, 1884, the following notice appeared:- "Died, on the 25th instant, in the 92nd year of his age, William Brown, Esq."
To older Glasgow folks this notice told that one had at last passed away who was a conspicuous citizen when they were boys - to the few who knew William Brown it meant the loss of one whom to know was to love and honour.
William Brown was the second son of James Brown and Jane Euing his wife.
James Brown, one of the Browns of Broadstone near Beith, had come here from Beith to push his fortunes, and eventually became an oil and colour merchant.(1) He may possibly have been led this way by his fondness for painting. He was himself a good draughtsman with a speciality for landscape, and we owe to his pencil two most interesting local views, an etching of the Old Bridge of Glasgow with the only known view of the Water Port, and a pen-and-ink of the Trongate in 1774, the oldest known view of that famous street. Several of his descendants have inherited his turn for art.
His wife, Jane Euing, was daughter of William Euing, Deacon-Convener in 1773, and Isobel Reid his wife. This worthy couple had another daughter Isabella Euing, who married Archibald Smith of Jordanhill and was great-grandmother of James Parker Smith now of Jordanhill, and a son William Euing, who was father of the late much-respected William Euing, insurance broker.
Isobel Reid, the Deacon-Convener's wife, sprang from one of the four old Glasgow families of Reids who among them produced our old friend Senex. She was the aunt of Senex, and shared with him the Reid turn for outliving one's friends. This doubtful blessing she transmitted to several of her descendants. Among them have been numerous octogenarians and one undoubted centenarian, her daughter Isabella Smith of Jordanhill, who died in her 101st year; and in William Brown, her last surviving grandson passed away in his 92nd.
William Brown was born on 5th December, 1792, in his father's house in the Stockwell of Glasgow. The house was in the upper flat of Dreghorn's land still standing at the south corner of Ropework Entry (now amplified into East Howard Street). The Stockwell was then the residence of substantial burghers and opulent merchants, and James Brown's house was exceptionally well situated. The east windows saw the braes of Castlemilk, for Park Place, the tall land at the foot of the Stockwell, had not yet blocked their view; the west windows saw the Kilpatrick Hills, for all was open at the back, the ground behind the Clydeside mansions of Bailie Craig and Bob Dragon, the great yard of the Town's Hospital, the Dowcot Green, and the walk of the Glasgow Roperie stretching away to unbuilt Jamaica Street.
James Brown died in 1808, leaving three sons, Robert (2), William, and Francis. Robert and Francis became West India merchants. William took up his father's business. He was a good chemist, and understood the business. He largely extended it, opened works of his own, and formed good foreign connections, and things throve with him. They throve just too well: and he had the further ill-luck (like the Cobbler in "Pickwick") of having money left him. His redundant capital tempted him into various ventures outside of his own business: he did not know the new ground: he was ingenious and active but sanguine: and the new ventures ended badly.(3) Latterly he was out of all business.
But business never took up all his thoughts. Like his brother, Robert Brown of Fairlie, and his cousin, James Smith of Jordanhill, he was a keen yachter, and in the yachts that he built he improved on the old fashioned "cod-head and mackerel tail" lines. He did better for us than that. He was an active and useful citizen: he was a diligent Sunday School teacher, district visitor, deacon, elder: he was always ready to help our philanthropic or charitable or religious efforts.
For some years he had to give up these good works that he did: it was too late a week: and one by one he had seen his old fellow-workers drop by his side. He had long been the sole survivor of the old pre-Reform, self-electing Town Council, the oldest past Dean of Guild, the last of those who called Chalmers to the Tron, and of those who invited Peel to the famous banquet, and since the death, on 25th June, 1883, of William Stiell the currier in the Gallowgate, he had been the last of that famous kirk-session of St. John's whom Chalmers fired with his own enthusiasm, enlisted, drilled, and led in his great fight with pauperism, vice, and sin.
William Brown married in 1817, Jane Wilsone, daughter of Dr. Charles Wilsone, one of our leading surgeons. Her father, like his, had lived in the Stockwell, ("2nd flat, west-side, near the head," Directory, 1789,) and husband and wife may have played there together as children.(4) Mrs. Brown died many years ago, and two sons who were of the marriage both died before their father.(5)
Latterly he led a solitary life: his wife dead, his sons dead, all his old friends gone. But he was privileged to retain his eyesight, his mental faculties, and a fair measure of health: he had in a love of books the best human resource for lonely age: and he had a bright and cheerful spirit to the last. Few saw him, few knew he was still among us, but no one could see him without being struck by his happy, kindly bearing, and his punctilious, old-fashioned courtesy. No one could know him without feeling the better for it, and without almost envying the so sunny evening of the long, grey day. Amid weakness and loneliness he never complained unless sometimes that the call home was so long of coming - fatal taint of the Reid blood!
(1) Before this he was in the Thistle Bank. The Manager sent him on Bank business to Graham of Gartmore. His glowing description, on his return, of the scenery of the district sent James McNayr of the Courier there. And a pamphlet that McNayr thereon wrote describing Loch Ard and Loch Katrine is said to have sent Sir Walter there, with what results we know.
(2) Robert Brown married Anne Rainy (sister of Dr. Harry Rainy, and aunt of Principal Rainy), and left one son, the Rev. George Brown, the esteemed Free Church minister of Pau. He had a passion for music. He and his cousin William Euing were leaders of the "Skylarks," a musical club of young men in offices, who got their name from having to meet for practice beneath the "purpling East." He was also a keen yachter. He was one of the old colony of Fairlie residenters who made a sort of little Clapham sect among themselves. He died at Fairlie in 1873, aged 84.
(3) He was an original partner in the Cunard Company, but this was a brilliant exception.
(4) Mr. Brown long lived in a tenement that stood at the S.W. corner of Buchanan Street and Exchange Place, where Muirhead, the jeweller, afterwards had his shop. From this he moved to a house, now taken down, in Moore Place, No. 9. In 1833 he bought Kilmardinny, which had been made into a fine country place by his uncle Archibald Smith's partner, John Leitch. He sold Kilmardinny in 1844 to 'Gibraltar' White, and thereafter resided in Glasgow.
(5) James, the elder son, married (i) Agnes, daughter of Andrew Ranken, and (ii) Mary, daughter of R. A. Oswald of Moore Park. Charles Wilsone, the younger son, married (i) Ellen, daughter of Walter Buchanan of Shandon, M.P.; (ii) Annie, daughter of Michael Rowand of Linthouse; and (iii) Patience, widow of Henry Swinfen of Swinfen. His only child by Ellen Buchanan was the wife of C. D. Donald, junior. William Brown was laid by special permission beside his wife, in the Ramshorn Crypt. The Crypt is of course closed under the Intra-mural Act, and this may be the last burial in it.
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