Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Campbell, Frederick (1729-1816)

1904 Errata appended.

797573Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 08 — Campbell, Frederick (1729-1816)1886John Andrew Hamilton

CAMPBELL, Lord FREDERICK (1729–1816), lord clerk register, was third son of John, fourth duke of Argyll, by his wife, Mary, daughter of John, second lord Bellenden, and was M.P. for the Glasgow burghs from 1761 to 1780, and for the county of Argyll from 1780 to 1799. In 1765, being very intimate with Mr. Grenville, he was active in the arrangements for transferring the prerogatives and rights of the Duke of Atholl in the Isle of Man, then a nest of smugglers, to the crown, and in fixing the compensation to be given; but he felt and complained that the compensation was inadequate. In the same year he was for a few months lord keeper of the Scotch privy seal, and was succeeded by Lord Breadalbane. He was sworn of the privy council 29 May 1765, made lord clerk register for Scotland in 1768, and confirmed in that office for life in 1771. In 1778 he was colonel of the Argyll fencibles, in 1784 a vice-treasurer for Ireland under Viscount Townshend, the lord-lieutenant, and in 1786 a member of the board of control for India. In 1774 he had laid the foundation-stone for a register house at Edinburgh, and procured a permanent establishment for keeping the records, and received the thanks of the court of session. He was treasurer of the Middle Temple in 1803. As a member of parliament he seems to have been reticent; but it was on his motion in 1796 that Mr. Addington was elected speaker of the new parliament. He married, 28 March 1769, Mary, youngest daughter of Mr. Amos Meredith of Henbury, Cheshire, and widow of Laurence, fourth Earl Ferrars, and she was burnt to death at his house, Comb Bank, Kent, in 1807. He died 8 June 1816 in Queen Street, Mayfair, and was, by his own directions, buried in a private manner in the family vault at Sandridge, Kent.

[Hely Smith's MacCallum Mores; Gent.Mag. lxxxvi. 572, lxxxvii. 214; The Scotch Compendium; The House of Argyll, Anon., Glasgow, 1871, p. 68; Collins's Peerage, iv. 102; Parl. History, xxiv. 297, xxviii.]

Dictionary of National Biography, Errata (1904), p.50
N.B.— f.e. stands for from end and l.l. for last line

Page Col. Line
357 i 5 f.e. Campbell, Lord Frederick: after 1765 insert was secretary to the lord-lieutenant of Ireland 1767-8
3 f.e. for 1771 read 1777
2 f.e. for 1784 read 1787
l.l. omit the line
ii 1 omit tenant and for 1786 read 1790
2 after India insert He was a member of the committee of council for trade 1784-1801