The Biographical Dictionary of America/Auchmuty, Robert

AUCHMUTY, Robert (ok-mu-te), lawyer, was born in Scotland, and was the first one of his name to become an American. He immigrated from Ireland, to which country his father removed in 1699, settled in Boston early in the eighteenth century, and was admitted to the bar about 1715. In 1730 he was made judge of the admiralty court. In 1740 he was appointed a director of the Land bank, and the next year went to England as Massachusetts agent to settle the boundary dispute with Rhode Island. It is said that while in England he planned the expedition against Cape Breton; he certainly published there a pamphlet entitled, "The Importance of Cape Breton to the British Nation, and a Plan for taking the Place." He died in 1750.