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Scots Who Made A Difference

R
RAE, JOHN (1813-1893)
John Rae was born near Stromness, Orkney Islands. In 1880, because of his explorations in the Arctic, during which time he noted that his physical strength enabled him to walk a total of more than 23,000 miles, he was elected to the Royal Society. After studying medicine at Edinburgh, Rae was appointed surgeon to the Hudson's Bay Company in 1833, becoming resident surgeon at their trading post on James Bay. Beginning in 1846, Rae led four expeditions to the Canadian Arctic, surveying many hitherto unknown bays and peninsulars. He was appointed second in command to explorer Sir John Richardson on their search for the lost crew of Sir John Franklin's Arctic expedition.

Rae was then placed in charge of the MacKenzie River District by his company and led another party in search of Franklin. During this search for the ill-fated skipper and his crew, Rae covered about 5,500 miles and mapped about 700 miles of the southern coast of Victoria Island. Accounts of his travels are found in Narrative of an Expedition to the Shores of the Arctic Sea, in 1846 and 1847 (published in 1850).


RAEBURN, SIR HENRY (1756-1823)
In the collection of John Dewar and Sons, well-known Scotch whisky distiller, is a painting of a Highland chief, "The NcNab," showing us a romantic, idealized portrait of a Scottish Laird. It was painted by Henry Raeburn, of Stockbridge, near Edinburgh, perhaps the most famous of all Scots artists. Mostly self-taught, but heavily influenced by such English artists as Sir Joshua Reynold, Raeburn produced portraits of the old Highland families for the rapidly expanding mercantile and professional classes of Edinburgh, who were anxious to preserve their ancient Scottish heritage around the turn of the century. Raeburn was elected to the Royal Academy in 1815 after he had been President of the Edinburgh Society of Artists. His other well-known paintings include "Viscount Thurso," "Lord Newton" and "Mrs. James Campbell."


RALEIGH, SIR WALTER (ALEXNDER) (1861-1922)
Scotsman Sir Walter Raleigh was London-born, but of a Scottish family and of a Scottish bent. Following a career as Chairman of modern literature at Liverpool and of English at Glasgow, he became Oxford University's first professor of English literature in 1904. His brilliant and scholarly refinement made him the centre of the so-called Oxford School that came into being around 1894. Raleigh's brilliant essays include Style (1897), Wordsworth (1903), Shakespeare (1907) and Six Essays on Johnson (1910). He also completed volume one of the official history War in the Air (1922).


RAMSAY, ALLAN (1686-1758)
From Leadhills, Lanarkshire, Allan Ramsay was a poet and literary antiquary who maintained his nation's poetic traditions by not only writing poetry in Scots, but also by preserving the work of earlier Scottish poets such as Robert Henryson, William Dunbar and others. His work was especially important for later writers such as Robert Burns, for it was produced during a time when most Scottish poetry was becoming heavily anglicized. His prolific output of verse, modelled on classical styles and traditional metrical patterns, made full use of the Scots dialect. At Edinburgh, wigmaker Ramsay helped found the Easy Club, a Jacobite literary society.

In 1721, Ramsay produced an edition of his poetry, with a second volume appearing seven years later. His pastoral comedy, The Gentle Shepherds (1725) in the Scots language, was turned into a ballad opera in 1729. His Fables and Tales (1722-30) included versions of French writers La Fontaine and La Motte turned into Scots, and his collection of old songs, poems and aphorisms were published in The Teatable Miscellany (three volumes, 1724-37) and Scots Proverbs (1737).


RAMSAY, ALLAN (1713-84)
Sharing honors with Sir Henry Raeburn for foremost Scottish artist is Edinburgh-born Allan Ramsay, son of his poet father (also Allan). Unlike the mostly self-taught Raeburn, however, Ramsay was well tutored in his craft, having studied in London and Italy before settling in London to produce his portraits, mainly of royalty. His paintings, exemplified in "Dr. Mead," anticipated the work of Sir Joshua Reynolds. Praised by Dr. Samuel Johnson himself, Ramsay devoted his later years to painting royal portraits for hanging in government buildings.


RAMSAY, SIR WILLIAM (1852-1916)
Glasgow-born chemist William Ramsay studied under the famous analytical and pioneering chemist Robert Bunsen at Heidelberg in 1871. He then became professor of chemistry at the University of Bristol and London. He specialized in the study of alkaloids the complex chemical compounds derived from plants. One of his predictions was that nitrogen isolated from the atmosphere was contaminated with an unknown heavy gas. In 1894, by removing nitrogen and oxygen from the air, Ramsay found (along with English chemist John William Rayleigh) a chemically inert gas later called argon, that comprises about one percent of the atmosphere.

Ramsay's next important contribution to modern science later became of crucial importance to understanding nuclear reactions. He managed to liberate helium from the mineral cleveite, demonstrating that this gas (the lightest of the inert gases) is continually produced during the radioactive decay of radium. In 1898, by bringing air to a liquid state at low temperature and high pressure, Ramsay and Morris W. Travers isolated the three elements thought to have existed according to the positions of helium and argon in the table of elements, namely neon, krypton and xenon. In 1910, Ramsay then found the last of the noble gas series in the radioactive emissions of radium, now called radon.

Ramsay's writings include A System of Inorganic Chemistry (1891), Modern Chemistry (1900), Introduction to the Study of Physical Chemistry (1904) and Elements and Electrons (1913). His biography, Sir William Augustus Tilden's Sir William Ramsay was published in 1918, two years after the death of the distinguished Scottish chemist whose discoveries earned him the 1904 Nobel Prize for Chemistry.


RANKINE, WILLIAM JOHN MACQUORN (1820-72)
Edinburgh-born engineer and physicist William Rankine's discoveries make him one of the founders of the science of thermodynamics. His work is commemorated in the principle known as the Rankine cycle, in heat engines, an ideal cycle of operation approximated by an actual steam-engine cycle. It is used as a thermodynamic standard for rating the performance of steam-power plants.

Much of Rankine's pioneering and highly influential work is contained in his Miscellaneous Scientific Papers (1880). Design engineers and architects everywhere are greatly indebted to his Manual of Applied Mechanics (1858), and his Manual of the Steam Engine and Other Prime MoVers, is a classic, the first attempt at a systematic treatment of steam-engine theory.

Appointed Professor of civil engineering at the University of Glasgow in 1855, Rankin's studies of fatigue in metals of railway axles led to new methods of construction. He also did pioneering work in soil mechanics, in which his study of earth pressures and the stability of retaining walls made a notable contribution to that science.


REID, THOMAS (1710-96)
From Strachan, Kincardineshire, much of Thomas Reid's work is overshadowed by fellow Scots philosopher David Hume, whose skepticism Reid tried to counteract. Reid, a Presbyterian pastor as well as a university lecturer, was one of those who argued in favor of a "philosophy of common sense." His first critique of Hume, An Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense (1764) was favorably received in British philosophical circles, not quite ready for Hume's disquieting theories.

Reid argued that human behaviour and the use of language is more than enough evidence to support such truths as the existence of a material world and the retention of personal identity in the face of continuous change. He particularly found fault with Hume's notions of perception, that ideas are the direct object of the mind's awareness. Reid introduced the rather ambiguous idea that sensations "suggest" material objects.

Reid's thinking, which has had a strong influence on British philosophers of the present century, is found in Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man (first published in 1785, but reissued in 1941) and Essays on the Active Power of Man (1788). Books about him include Thomas Reid: Works (ed. Hamilton and Mansel (1846-63), A.C. Fraser, Thomas Reid (1898); O.M. Jones, Empiricism and Intuitionism in Reid's Common Sense Philosophy, (1927); and M.F. Sciacca, La filosofia di Tommaso Reid (1963).


REITH, JOHN CHARLES WALSHAM (1889-1971)
The first Director-General of the British Broadcasting Corporation was John Reith of Stonehaven, whose tenure exercised an enormous influence on the development of broadcasting worldwide. After service in the Scottish Regiment, the Cameronians in World War I, Reith began work for the infant BBC in 1922; it had a staff of four! Wishing to keep it free from commercial control, he oversaw its establishment as a public corporation. He saw the exciting new medium as a way of working for moral betterment and social improvement.

Constantly seeking new challenges, after he left the BBC, Reith became Chairman of Imperial Airways, which he turned into a public corporation similar to the BBC. In World War II he served under Prime Minister Churchill as Minister of Transport and Minister of Public Buildings and Works. He also served in the Royal Naval Voluntary Reserve to help prepare the allied invasion of Europe. After the War, he was busy in many civic organizations, but always stated that the BBC had given him the greatest challenges.


RENNIE, JOHN (1761-1821)
From Phantassie, East Lothian, John Rennie was one of the outstanding engineers at the end of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th century. In addition to building and improving a network of canals throughout Scotland and England, he also built locks, docks, harbors and bridges, including three crossings across the Thames at London. Rennie also supervised extensive drainage projects in the Fens of Lincolnshire.

Rennie's London bridges were the Waterloo, with its three cast iron arches; the new London Bridge of 1831, completed by his son George who continued the prestigious family engineering firm (and now found intact in Havasu City, Arizona) and the Southwark Bridge (1814-19). Rennie's work is found all over Britain, especially in harbours and docks.


RENWICK, JAMES (1662-88)
James Renwick, from Moniaive, Dumfries was hanged at Edinburgh, thus staking his claim to fame as the last of the prominent Covenanter martyrs of Scotland. His adherence to the perpetual obligation of the covenants of 1638 and 1643 had him declared a rebel by the Privy Council. In 1684, Renwick was largely responsible for the "apologetical declaration" by which he and his followers disowned the authority of King Charles II; the Council ordered it repudiated on pain of death. Renwick continued to preach; meeting illegally in the fields with his fellow Renwickites, after the declaration of indulgence allowed some liberty of worship to the Presbyterians. He was hanged for disowning the royal authority, and met his death bravely after refusing a pardon.


RICHARDSON, SIR JOHN (1787-1865)
The history of the exploration of Canada is studded with the names of the Scots, none more important than Sir John Richardson, of Dumfries, naval surgeon and naturalist, who made accurate surveys of more of the Canadian Arctic coast than any other explorer. Richardson's long career in the Royal Navy, where he rose from assistant surgeon to inspector of hospitals and fleets, put him in the teeth of battle at Copenhagen, the blockade of the Tagus and in many other naval operations. However, his service to Canada's future began when he was surgeon and naturalist to Sir John Franklin's first overland expedition to the Canadian Arctic in 1819-22.

Richardson wrote important works in many fields in natural history, specializing in Arctic biology and general ichthyology. He gained much of his knowledge in the second Franklin expedition serving as second in command and surveying some 900 miles of Canadian Arctic coast. With John Rae in 1848 he then made an overland journey to search for the third Franklin expedition, lost somewhere in the frozen Arctic wilds. Though he found no trace of Franklin, he made valuable surveys of the region between the MacKenzie estuary and Cape Kendall.


ROBERT I, THE BRUCE, OF SCOTLAND (1274-1329)
Earl of Carrick, Robert Bruce was born at Turnberry Castle, Ayrshire, in 1274, of both Norman and Celtic ancestry. Two years before his birth, Edward Plantagenet had become King Edward I of England. The ruthlessness of Edward, who earned the title "the Hammer of the Scots" brought forth the greatness of Bruce whose astonishing victory at Bannockburn in 1314 over the much larger and better-equipped forces of Edward II ensured Scottish freedom from control by the hated English.

This struggle for control of Scotland began when Alexander III died in 1286, leaving as heir his grandchild Margaret, the infant daughter of the King of Norway. English King Edward, with his eye on the complete subjugation of his northern neighbors, suggested that Margaret should marry his son, a desire consummated at a treaty signed and sealed at Birgham. Under the terms, Scotland was to remain a separate and independent kingdom, -- "separate, distinct and free in itself without subjection from the realm of England" --though Edward wished to keep English garrisons in a number of Scottish castles. On her way to Scotland, somewhere in the Orkneys, the young Norwegian princess died, unable to enjoy the consignment of sweetmeats and raisins sent by the English King. The succession was now open to many claimants, the strongest of whom were John Balliol and Robert Bruce.

John Balliol was supported by King Edward, who believed him to be the weaker and more compliant of the two Scottish claimants. Balliol was an English baron belonging to a house with an established tradition of loyalty to the English crown. At a meeting of 104 auditors, with Edward as judge, the decision went in favor of Balliol, who was duly declared to be the rightful king in November 1292. The English king's plans for a peaceful relationship with his northern neighbor now took a different turn. In exchange for his support, Edward demanded that he should have feudal superiority over Scotland, including homage from Balliol, judicial authority over the Scottish king in any disputes brought against him by his own subjects and defrayment of costs for the defence of England as well as active support in the war against France.

Even the weak Balliol could not stomach these outrageous demands. Showing a hitherto unknown courage, in front of the English king he declared that he was the King of Scotland and should answer only to his own people, refusing to supply military service to Edward. The impetuous man then concluded a treaty with France prior to planning an invasion of England.

Edward was ready. He went north to receive homage from a great number of Scottish nobles, as their feudal lord, among them none other than 21 year-old Robert Bruce, who owned estates in England. Balliol immediately punished this treachery by seizing Bruce's lands in Scotland and giving them to his brother-in-law, John Comyn. Yet within a few months, the Scottish king was to disappear from the scene. His army was defeated by Edward at Dunbar in April 1296. Soon after at Brechin, on 10 July, he surrendered his Scottish throne to the English king, who took into his possession the stone of Scone, "the coronation stone" of the Scottish kings. At a parliament, which he summoned at Berwick, the English king received homage and the oath of fealty from over 2,000 Scots. He seemed secure in Scotland.

Flushed with this success, Edward had gone too far. The rising tide of nationalist fervor in the face of the arrival of the English armies north of the border created the need for new Scottish leaders. Following a brawl with English soldiers in the market place at Lanark, a young Scottish knight, William Wallace, after killing an English sheriff found himself at the head of a fast-spreading movement of national resistance. At Stirling Bridge, a Scottish force led by Wallace won an astonishing victory when it completely annihilated a large, lavishly equipped English army under the command of Surrey, Edward I's viceroy.

Yet Wallace's great victory, successful because the English cavalry were unable to maneuver on the marshy ground and their supporting troops had been trapped on a narrow bridge, proved to be a Pyrrhic one. Bringing a large army north in 1298 and goading Wallace to forgo his successful guerrilla campaign into fighting a second pitched battle, the English king's forces were more successful. At Falkirk, they crushed the over-confident Scottish followers of Wallace.

Falkirk was a grievous loss for Wallace who never again found himself in command of a large body of troops. After hiding out for a number of years, he was finally captured in 1305 and brought to London to die a traitor's death similar to that meted out a few years earlier by King Edward to Prince Dafydd ap Gruffudd, Welsh leader of yet another fight for independence from England. With the execution of Wallace, it was time for Robert Bruce, whose heritage as Earl of Carrick made him much more than "a mere Anglo-Norman fish out of water, grassed on a Celtic river bank" to free himself from his fealty to Edward and to lead the fight for Scotland.

At a meeting in Greyfriar's Kirk at Dumfries between the two surviving claimants for the Scottish throne, the perfidious, but crafty Bruce murdered John Comyn, thus earning the enmity of the many powerful supporters of the Comyn family, but also excommunication from the Church. On March 27, 1306 he declared himself King of Scots. Edward's reply was predictable; he sent a large army north, defeated Bruce at the Battle of Methven, executed many of his supporters and forced the Scottish king into becoming a hunted outlaw.

Once again the indefatigable Scottish leader bided his time. After a year of demoralization and widespread English terror let loose in Scotland, during which two of his brothers were killed, Bruce came out of hiding. Aided mightily by his chief lieutenant, Sir James Douglas, "the Black Douglas" he won a first victory on Palm Sunday 1307. From all over Scotland, the clans answered the call and Bruce's forces gathered in strength to fight the English invaders, winning many encounters against cavalry with his spearmen.

The aging Edward decided to come to Scotland at the head of a large army to punish the Scots' impudence; but the now weak and sick king was ineffectual as a military leader. He could only wish that after his death his bones were to be carried at the head of his army until Scotland had been crushed. It was left to his son Edward II to try to carry out his father's dying wish. He was no man for the task.

Faced by too many problems at home and completely lacking the ruthlessness and resourcefulness of his father, the young Edward had no wish to get embroiled in the affairs of Scotland. Bruce was left alone to consolidate his gains and to punish those who opposed him. A series of successful campaigns against the Comyns and their allies left him in control of most of Scotland. In 1309 he was recognized as sole ruler by the French King and despite his earlier excommunication, even received the support of the Scottish Church. Thus emboldened, in 1311 Bruce drove out the English garrisons in all their Scottish strongholds except Stirling and invaded northern England. King Edward bestirred himself from his dalliances at Court to respond and took a large army north.

On Mid-Summer's Day, the 24th of June 1314 one of the most momentous battles in British history occurred. The armies of Robert Bruce heavily outnumbered by their English rivals, but employing tactics that prevented the English army from effectively employing its strength, won a decisive victory at Bannockburn. Scotland was wrenched from English control, its armies free to invade and harass northern England. Such was Bruce's military successes that he was able to invade Ireland, where his brother Edward had been crowned King by the exuberant Irish. A second expedition carried out by Edward II north of the border was driven back. Edward was forced to seek peace.

Robert Bruce followed up his outstanding military success by equally successful diplomatic overtures. After an appeal from the Scottish nobility even Bruce's excommunication was lifted by the new Pope at Rome. In May 1328 a peace treaty was signed at Northampton by the weary, helpless English king that recognized Scotland as an independent kingdom and Robert Bruce as king. The Declaration of Independence signed at Arbroath was the culmination of Bruce's career. All his dreams fulfilled, he died one year later. One who for years had been an Anglo-Norman vassal of the King of England had made himself into a truly national Scottish hero.

Under the Declaration, if Robert Bruce were to prove weak enough to acknowledge Edward as overlord, then he would be dismissed in favor of someone else. English kings still continued to call themselves rulers of Scotland, just as they called themselves rulers of France for centuries after being booted out of the continent, but Scotland remained fully independent until 1603 (when James Stuart succeeded Elizabeth i).

If Robert Bruce had done no more than defy the power of King Edward, restore the Scottish monarchy and win at Bannockburn, he would still be listed among the giants, but he did more. His view of his nation was truly international. Under the rule of he who was later to be known as "Good King Robert," Scotland had become the first nation state in Europe, the first to have territorial unity under a single king. Contained in the Declaration of Arbroath of 1320 was a letter to the Pope, who had excommunicated everyone in Scotland unless they swore allegiance to Edward II (such were the ways of medieval popes). In the letter, signed by representatives from all classes of Scots society, it was stated that since ancient times the Scots had been free to choose their own kings, a freedom that was a gift from God. And so it was, but a gift that had needed a Robert Bruce to deliver.


ROSS, SIR JOHN (1777-1856)
From Balsarroch, Wigtownshire, John Ross's name can be added to those of the other Scotsmen who did so much to inform the world of northern Canada and the Arctic. Ross's expeditions in search of the Northwest Passage, the waterway linking the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, led to the location of the north magnetic pole (discovered by his nephew James Clark Ross) and to important contributions to the new science of oceanography.

In 1833, Ross and his expedition were rescued from the ice where they had been imprisoned and their ship lost. His third expedition to the Canadian Arctic was to try to find Sir John Franklin and his crew. Ross's accounts include Narrative of a Second Voyage in Search of a Northwest Passage, published in 1835.


ROSS, JOHN (1790-1866)
Both Scotland and the Cherokee Nation can claim as one of its illustrious sons John Ross, a famous Cherokee chief. Born of a Scottish father and an Indian mother near Lookout Mountain, Tennessee, John grew up as an Indian though he did attend Kingston Academy. He married a full-blooded Cherokee and was able to bridge the severe gap between the cultures of the white settler and the native Indian.

Ross became the leader of the Cherokee people who fought against their deposition west by white settlers seeking to take over their long-held tribal territory. From 1819 to 1826, he served as president of the National Council of the Cherokees, helping expose the nefarious schemes of those who would settle on prime Cherokee land through bribery. He was later elected as principal chief of the Cherokee Nation, suffering imprisonment for his attempts to help his beleaguered people.

It would seem that Ross's military service under General Andrew Jackson in the Creek War of 1813 -14 would have stood him in good stead when Jackson became President of the United States in 1828. Sadly, his heroic efforts and impassioned pleas were ignored by Congress and in 1830, under the Indian Removal Act, Ross had to lead his people on their forced evacuation to an area of unproductive land in what later became part of Oklahoma. There in 1839 following their settlement after the notorious "trail of tears," the blue-eyed, fair-skinned Scottish Cherokee helped write a constitution for the United Cherokee Nation.


RUSSELL, SCOTT (1808-1882)
Glasgow-born John Scott Russell received his science degree at age 16 not too long before he began teaching at the University of Edinburgh. Here he experimented with steam engines and boilers, spending his free time in shops with mechanics and millwrights. A contemporary of English marine-engineer Brunet, Russell contributed much to the study of shipbuilding through his work with wave-forms. In 1844 he moved to London when his ship designs were adopted for the Royal Mail Company. He was appointed Joint Secretary to the Great Exhibition of 1851, which showed British engineering skills to the world.

Russell's theories led to new ways of plating the skins of vessels and the use of "the longitudinal system" employing lengthwise girders that were used in the construction of the Royal Navy Ship Bellerophon in 1863. Two years later he published his monumental work The Modern System of Naval Architecture. He also founded the Institution of Naval Architects, the forerunner of many other organizations throughout the world to study the science of shipbuilding.
  

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