John Porteous

Background

John Porteous was born about 1695 in the Scottish Borders, Scotland. He was the son of Stephen Porteous, a tailor.

Career

Having served in the army, he was employed in 1715 to drill the city guard for the defence of Edinburgh in anticipation of a Jacobite rising, and was promoted later to the command of the force.

In 1736 a smuggler named Wilson, who had won popularity by helping a companion to escape from the Tolbooth prison, was hanged; and, some slight disturbance occurring at the execution, the city guard fired on the mob, killing a few and wounding a considerable number of persons.

Porteous, who was said to have fired at the people with his own hand, was brought to trial and sentenced to death. The granting of a reprieve was hotly resented by the people of Edinburgh, and on the night of the 7th of September 1736 an armed body of men in disguise broke into the prison, seized Porteous, and hanged him on a signpost in the street. It was said that persons of high position were concerned in the crime; but although the government offered rewards for the apprehension of the perpetrators, and although General Moyle wrote to the duke of Newcastle that the criminals were "well-known by many of the inhabitants of the town, " no one was ever convicted of participation in the murder.

The sympathies of the people, and even, it is said, of the clergy, throughout Scotland, were so unmistakably on the side of the rioters that the original stringency of the bill introduced into parliament for the punishment of the city of Edinburgh had to be reduced to the levying of a fine of £2000 for Porteous's widow, and the disqualification of the provost for holding any public office.

Achievements

• The incident of the Porteous riots was used by Sir Walter Scott in The Heart of Midlothian.