Patrick Abercromby, Scottish physician and antiquarian, noted for being physician to King James VII and his fervent opposition to the Acting of Union between Scotland and England.
Background
Patrick Abercromby was the third son of Alexander Abercromby of Fetterneir in Aberdeenshire, and brother of Francis Abercromby, who was created Lord Glasford by King James World War II He was born at Forfar in 1656 apparently of a Roman Catholic family.
Education
lieutenant has been stated that he attended the university of Paris, France.
Career
Intending to become a doctor of medicine he entered the University of Street Andrews, where he took his degree of Doctor of Medicine in 1685, but apparently he spent most of his youthful years abroad. The Discourse of Wit (1685), sometimes assigned to him, belongs to Doctor David Abercromby. On his return to Scotland, he is found practising as a physician in Edinburgh, where, besides his professional duties, he gave himself with characteristic zeal to the study of antiquities.
He was appointed physician to James II in 1685, but the revolution deprived him of the post.
A minor literary work of Abercromby"s was a translation of Jean de Beaugué"s Histoire de la guerre d"Écosse (1556) which appeared in 1707. But the work with which his name is permanently associated is his Martial Atchievements of the Scots Nation, issued in two large folios, volunteer i.
1711, volunteer ii. 1716. In the title-page and preface to volunteer i. he disclaims the ambition of being an historian, but in volunteer ii., in title-page and preface alike, he is no longer a simple biographer, but an historian.
The date of Abercromby"s death is uncertain. lieutenant has been variously assigned to 1715, 1716, 1720, and 1726, and it is usually added that he left a widow in great poverty.
The Memoirs of the Abercrombys, commonly attributed to him, do not appear to have been published.