East India Patronage and the British State: The Scottish Elite and
The Act of Union in 1707 brought with it a new 'Great Britain'. How did the English bind the Scottish elites to the new British State, ensuring the stability of this new power in the face of possible Jacobite and international threat? From 1725 a patronage system existed in Britain enabling government ministries to use posts in the East India Company and its shipping to secure political majorities in Scotland and Westminster. Scots went to India as Company servants, ships' crews, soldiers and free-merchants, bringing back exceptional wealth to a land starved of money and providing for commercial and industrial advances throughout Great Britain. The importance of the system of patronage which enabled so many Scots to go to the East has not hitherto been recognised and cannot be overestimated. It bound the Scots with their English neighbours in business, political management and empire, with consequences going far beyond the eighteenth century.
George McGilvary was previously Honorary Post-Doctoral Fellow at Edinburgh University, UK. He specialises in the E. I. Company and the political and commercial activities of the Scottish elite at home, within the India House and abroad. Publications include three academic monographs and numerous published articles and chapters.
East India Patronage and the British State: The Scottish Elite and
The Act of Union in 1707 brought with it a new 'Great Britain'. How did the English bind the Scottish elites to the new British State, ensuring the stability of this new power in the face of possible Jacobite and international threat? From 1725 a patronage system existed in Britain enabling government ministries to use posts in the East India Company and its shipping to secure political majorities in Scotland and Westminster. Scots went to India as Company servants, ships' crews, soldiers and free-merchants, bringing back exceptional wealth to a land starved of money and providing for commercial and industrial advances throughout Great Britain. The importance of the system of patronage which enabled so many Scots to go to the East has not hitherto been recognised and cannot be overestimated. It bound the Scots with their English neighbours in business, political management and empire, with consequences going far beyond the eighteenth century.
George McGilvary was previously Honorary Post-Doctoral Fellow at Edinburgh University, UK. He specialises in the E. I. Company and the political and commercial activities of the Scottish elite at home, within the India House and abroad. Publications include three academic monographs and numerous published articles and chapters.
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The Act of Union in 1707 brought with it a new 'Great Britain'. How did the English bind the Scottish elites to the new British State, ensuring the stability of this new power in the face of possible Jacobite and international threat? From 1725 a patronage system existed in Britain enabling government ministries to use posts in the East India Company and its shipping to secure political majorities in Scotland and Westminster. Scots went to India as Company servants, ships' crews, soldiers and free-merchants, bringing back exceptional wealth to a land starved of money and providing for commercial and industrial advances throughout Great Britain. The importance of the system of patronage which enabled so many Scots to go to the East has not hitherto been recognised and cannot be overestimated. It bound the Scots with their English neighbours in business, political management and empire, with consequences going far beyond the eighteenth century.
George McGilvary was previously Honorary Post-Doctoral Fellow at Edinburgh University, UK. He specialises in the E. I. Company and the political and commercial activities of the Scottish elite at home, within the India House and abroad. Publications include three academic monographs and numerous published articles and chapters.
