The sixth City Chamberlain of Glasgow, Strang was appointed on 29 May 1834, in succession to John Spreull. Sprang was born and educated in Glasgow and succeeded his father in the wine trade. An inheritance led to the business petering out, as Strang toured the continent, learning French, Italian and German and studying in the galleries.
On his return he translated and published the work of French and German authors and wrote art criticisms and reviews. In 1832 he edited The Day, a short-lived daily paper, and in 1833 he published Necropolis Glasguensis, a book on the conversion of Fir Park into the Glasgow Necropolis.
Once installed as chamberlain, he became well regarded and was awarded an honorary degree from the city's university. He also found time to write Glasgow and its Clubs, published in 1853. He died on 8 December 1863 and was buried in the Necropolis.
THE office of Chamberlain of Glasgow is a comparatively modern one, and the circumstances which called it into existence, and its history, seem to require some explanation before anything is said of the distinguished citizen whose name stands at the head of this notice.
The minutes of the Town Council of Glasgow record that on the 29th April, 1755, Provost George Murdoch represented to the Council "that the town's affairs and revenues have in some degree suffered through want of a proper accountant and inspector of their revenues, which have never hitherto been put in a proper method of management." After the matter had been discussed it was agreed "that a proper person be named and authorized to be the Town's Accountant and Chamberlain, who should have powers to review and rectify all accounts, affairs, and business relating to the whole dues and revenues which may be yearly payable to the town, as well as all debts and burdens with which the same may be yearly affected, and particularly to reduce all such accounts and the affairs of the town into a proper method of management, and to rank and methodize the town's writs and subjects in proper order of time, so that their whole affairs may be the more easily comprehended." A committee at the same time was appointed, consisting of the Magistrates, the Dean of Guild, the Convener, and ex-Provosts Brown and Cochrane, "to consider who shall be the proper person to be named for the said office, and of what ought to be paid by the town to him from time to time or yearly for his trouble and pains in managing the said affairs."
On the 20th May following the committee reported to the Council that "Arthur Robertson, merchant in Glasgow, was a very proper and qualified person" for the office, and he was forthwith appointed "Town's Accountant and Chamberlain, and collector of the impost or duty of 2d. Scots upon each pint of ale or beer brewed, inbrought, tapped, vended or sold within the city of Glasgow, and liberties thereof, and within the village of Gorbals and privileges thereof, at a salary of £60 sterling during the life of Zacharias Murdoch, last collector of the town's duty of 2d. on the pint, and from and after his death of £40 additional thereto, making in all £100 sterling yearly thereafter during his continuance in office."
A further minute of the Council provided that the Chamberlain was to receive all the town's monies, and that all the payments on the town's account were to be issued and paid by the Treasurer. Thus the first Chamberlain of Glasgow was appointed, his duties defined, and his salary fixed.
Glasgow at this time had a capital Provost in George Murdoch - a member of a family long honourably connected with the city, and which is still worthily represented in it. The committee appointed by the Council to regulate the new office of Chamberlain was a very good one. The Provost himself was thoroughly up in the town's finances, having gone into the subject very fully when he spent six months in London in 1749, trying to get compensation for the losses Glasgow had sustained in the Rebellion of 1745. Provost Cochrane was the man who carried Glasgow with credit through the trying times of the '45 when the good town was well nigh ruined by the demands made by the Highlanders, and when Provost for the second time was with George Murdoch in London in 1749.
Provost Brown - the ancestor of Mr. Dennistoun Brown of Balloch - was also well acquainted with the town's affairs, having been Dean of Guild in 1746, and Mr. Murdoch's predecessor in the office of Provost. The bailies, too, were men of standing, and so was the Dean of Guild and the Convener of the Trades' House. We may be satisfied, therefore, that the whole matter was properly gone into. The arrangements then made are practically those still in force; the City Treasurer being responsible for the general management and intromissions of the town's finances; the chief, in fact, or head of the department of which the Chamberlain is the principal executive officer.
From the time of King David I., who flourished during the second quarter of the twelfth century, a code of laws and regulations existed in the burghs of Scotland, and among the officials the Thesaurare or Treasurer held an important position. Glasgow, though a mere bishop's burgh up to 1636, early possessed, like the others, a Treasurer - and the earliest known balance sheet of the city, dated nearly two hundred years before the first Chamberlain was appointed, shows that then no such official was required, the revenue and expenditure being properly stated and correctly vouched.
The account is headed "The Thesaurare Compt of Robert Flemyng, Thesaurer of the Burght and Citie of Glasgow, of his intromissione with the commone guddis, annuellis, males, and vtheris dewiteis quhatsumeuir, of Witsondaye and Mertymes, in the yeir of God jmvclx threttene yeirs."
The charge consists of "the fermes of the toune myln," "the males of the mylnland," "the causualiteis of the mercatt callit the ladill," "the commone annuellis of the toun," "the dewiteis of Sanct Rokis Chaplanrie," "the small casualitie and gift of the brig," "the fructis of Sir Robert Watsoune's Chaplanreis," "certane annuellis of the New Kirk," "the auld proprietie of the brig," "ane perdoun of auld," "Sanct Johneis licht ane lib. walx," and "burges fynes."
"Summa of the haill charge is five hundretht thre scoir nyne pund sax schilling jd." (=£47 8s. 10d. sterling).
The discharge consists of very miscellaneous payments, such as sums "givin to the maister of work," "to Bessie Douglas for the prouest, baillies, and counsales dennaris on Witsontyisdaye," "to Eufame Campbell for ane galloun of wyne presentit to my Lord of Argile," "to James Andersoun, fermarare of the towne myln, doun of his ferm be ressoun of the greit droutht," "to Malcum Hammiltoun for keeping of the Gers Mercatt," "to Malcum Hammiltoun for scurgeing of ane woman throw the towne," "to my Lord of Glasgw quhen he wes admittit Bischop for ane galloun of wyne," "to my Lord Prouest for his fie," "to the baillies for thair fies," "to the thesaurer for his fie," "to George Elphhinstoun to ryd to Edinburgh to the General Assembly of the Kirk," etc.
"And sua the said Robert, thesaurar and comptar, hes maid compt compleit payment and is dischargit of his office and intromissioun, and gottin ane exoneratioun thairupon subscriuit be the prouest, baillies, and counsall."
Glasgow progressed but slowly during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and the Treasurer of the City was quite able without help to manage the town's revenue and expenditure, and it was only after the Union, in the beginning of the eighteenth century, and after the rise of the tobacco trade - the first great industry of Glasgow - that the financial affairs of the city were of sufficient magnitude to overtax the time and talents of the City Treasurer, an officer paid with the slenderest of fees and often not specially qualified to manage complicated accounts.
By 1755 matters had come to a crisis, and hence the necessity for a Chamberlain or accountant, who, however, though intromitting with the funds of the city, was not to relieve the Treasurer from his ancient and special responsibility, recognized by statutes, of supervising the estates of the Corporation.
Mr. Robertson, the first Chamberlain, continued in office till 5th January, 1780, when he resigned in consequence of old age. His successor was Andrew Buchanan, senior, who was relieved from office 24th June, 1784, Walter Logan, merchant in Glasgow, being chosen to succeed him. On the 24th April, 1798, Mr. Logan's death was reported to the Council, and on the 8th of the following month James Spreull received the appointment. Mr. Spreull was second son of Bailie John Shortridge, and had changed his name to Spreull in 1784, when he succeeded his relative Margaret Spreull in possession of her entailed estate of "Spreull's Land" in the Trongate of Glasgow. He was Chamberlain of Glasgow till 1824, and on his death his son John Spreull was appointed to the office. On the 30th February, 1834, Mr. Spreull resigned, and on the 29th May following John Strang was appointed City Chamberlain of Glasgow.
Glasgow up to this time had certainly been fortunate in getting men of standing to accept an office which at the best is only a secondary one; but John Strang took such an entirely different line during his tenure of it, and raised the office to so much higher a level than it had ever hitherto attained, that we are entitled to treat him as an ideal Chamberlain, and as such to give him a place in these records of worthy Glasgow citizens.
There is little to tell of Dr. Strang's family history or early life. He was born in Glasgow in 1795, and was educated in his native city. After he grew up and till he became Chamberlain he spent his life chiefly in literary and artistic pursuits. It is true he had been bred to commerce, and had succeeded his father John Strang of Dowanhill in an excellent wine business, but he had made no effort to keep it together, and happily in possession of a moderate fortune left him by his father he had early gone to France and Italy, to study the language and literature of those countries and of Germany, and the works of art in the great continental galleries.
Returning home he made letters and art his business, translating and publishing many of the prose and poetical works of French and German authors, writing art criticisms and reviews, and thus getting acquainted with literary men at home and abroad. In 1832 he was editor of "The Day," a small short-lived daily paper published in Glasgow, chiefly devoted to literary subjects and much enriched by his own writings - and at this time, and indeed all through life, he was much interested in any proposed improvements in the city. He was the means to a large extent of the conversion of the old Fir Park into the Glasgow Necropolis, which was opened in 1833. He had never any scheme more at heart than the formation of a proper cemetery for Glasgow, and during several years he had been taking every opportunity of attaining his wishes, by writing letters to the newspapers, by personal influence with leading citizens, and by the publication of his "Necropolis Glasguensis," a small volume devoted to the subject. The ability he displayed in this and other city matters, and the knowledge of affairs he evidently possessed, induced the Town Council on the resignation of Mr. John Spreull in 1834 to appoint him City Chamberlain on his applying for the office.
There is no doubt that Dr. Strang's desire to become a city official was prompted by a wish to turn his talents to some really useful and practical end - and in this he was very successful. He not only did the ordinary duties of his office thoroughly well, but he did a great deal more, for loving and taking a pride in his native place, he spent much time and labour in exhibiting its wonderful progress in the admirable "Vital Statistics" and other reports and tables he annually produced - a kind of work never before attempted.
Dr. Strang, while a useful citizen of Glasgow, was eminently an ornamental one also. Nothing connected with literature, art, or science could take place without his presence and aid; and when distinguished strangers, particularly foreigners, visited the city he was the public man always told off to entertain them. Indeed so much was all this the case that it used to be very generally supposed - even by citizens of Glasgow - that the Chamberlain of the city was a very high official, not, perhaps, exactly a sinecurist, but necessarily a man of elegant tastes, general information, and great scholarship, whose principal duty it was to entertain noble and eminent visitors to the city, speak in unknown tongues to foreigners, attend to the literary and artistic affairs of the city, and perhaps prepare speeches for provosts and other great men for delivery on solemn or festive occasions.
A prophet is seldom honoured in his own country, but this could not be said of John Strang. Each succeeding provost acknowledged gratefully the worth of his official and extra-official labours. The University of Glasgow, in recognition of his scholarship, conferred on him the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws. The citizens of Glasgow knowing the value of their Chamberlain showed it by the warm welcome they always gave him when he appeared on public occasions, and a wide circle of intimate friends, of varying tastes, pursuits, and habits, proved that in him was found combined the scholar, the artist and the man of business, the intelligent and charming companion, and the straightforward and unassuming gentleman.
Dr. Strang's official duties necessarily occupied much of his time after he became Chamberlain, but he found leisure, nevertheless, besides some lesser publications, to write his most interesting work, "Glasgow and its Clubs," a book unique in its subject, and one which throws a great deal of light on the manners and customs of Glasgow, especially during the latter half of last century. This was published in 1853. His last work, and it appeared a few days only before his death, was an interesting little volume, "Travelling Notes of an Invalid in Search of Health."
Dr. Strang married in 1842 Elizabeth, daughter of Dr. William Anderson, a well-known physician of Glasgow, and died childless on the 8th December, 1863. He was buried in the Necropolis he loved so well, and at the first meeting of the Town Council thereafter they duly and most justly placed on record in their minutes "their sense of the loss they have sustained, and of the fidelity, diligence, and urbanity with which, throughout his whole official career, Dr. Strang discharged the onerous duties which devolved on him."
It is perhaps not out of place, in bringing to a close this imperfect sketch of Dr. Strang and the City Chamberlains, to add that Glasgow was again fortunate in securing a capable official in William West Watson. He too did his duties well, and in addition continued the valuable vital and other statistics of the city which Dr. Strang had begun; and though he had not the brilliant versatility of his distinguished predecessor, it was universally felt by his fellow-citizens when he died in the spring of 1882 that an honourable, amiable gentleman had passed away, and that the city had lost a faithful servant.
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