RAMSAY, Sir Alexander, 3rd bt. (1813-1875), of Cheltenham, Gloucs. and Balmain, Kincardineshire

Ramsay was descended from a junior branch of an old Kincardineshire family, the Burnetts of Leys. In 1806, his grandfather, Alexander Burnett, took the name of Ramsay on succeeding to the Fasque and Balmain estates of his cousin, Sir Alexander Ramsay Irvine, 6th bt., and was created 1st baronet.1HP Commons, 1820-32. Ramsay was born in 1813 at Fasque, where his grandfather had caused the family financial problems by building an ‘almost palatial mansion’ at a cost of £30,000, which his father, who served as Whig MP for Kincardineshire, 1820-6, sold in 1829 to John Gladstone, father of the future prime minister.2S.G. Checkland, The Gladstones. A family biography 1764-1851 (1971), 281; J. Allardyce (ed.), The family of Burnett of Leys (1901), 102; HP Commons, 1820-32. Ramsay’s uncle, Edward Bannerman Ramsay (1793-1872) was Dean of the diocese of Edinburgh (1849-72) and a prominent figure in the Scottish Episcopal Church: Allardyce, Burnett of Leys, 104. Ramsay entered the army in 1830, resigning his commission upon his marriage to the eldest daughter of John Entwisle, Rochdale’s Conservative MP, 1835-7.3Leeds Mercury, 29 July 1837.

Described as ‘a young man of good and respectable Scotch connection; in person pleasing, of good address, and an excellent speaker, providing he had a good subject’, Ramsay first contested Rochdale in the Conservative interest at the 1837 general election, providing a late challenge to John Fenton, the Whig returned at the April 1837 by-election following Entwisle’s death.4Leeds Mercury, 29 July 1837. At the nomination, Ramsay declared himself to be a defender of the national Church, which he regarded as ‘the bulwark of our commercial prosperity’, and condemned the new poor law as ‘cruel and unjust’.5Preston Chronicle, 29 July 1837. He was defeated at the poll, and although he attended local Conservative dinners in 1837 and 1838, he declined to stand again.6The Times, 22 Dec. 1837; Hull Packet, 12 Oct. 1838; The Times, 30 May 1839. The Conservatives were unsuccessful in 1841 and did not challenge the incumbent MP, William Sharman Crawford, in 1847. However, with Edward Miall offering to come forward as Liberal candidate on Crawford’s retirement, Ramsay was again asked to stand. He had previously declined an informal approach, but in June 1852 a Conservative meeting convened by Abraham Brierley, a local cotton spinner, sent a formal deputation. While Brierley and others had been hesitant about supporting Ramsay due to the free trade views he now espoused, they were prepared to overcome these qualms in order to return an MP with sound views on the Church.7Manchester Times, 3 July 1852; Daily News, 3 July 1852. Ramsay was duly adopted, but suffered a heavy defeat at the poll.

He was finally returned for Rochdale at his third attempt in 1857. Shortly before the election, the Conservatives’ Central Committee had decided, following analysis of the register, not to contest the seat. However, a group of Conservative activists led by Hamlet Nicholson, a former shoemaker and organiser of the Conservative Sick and Burial Society, believed that this decision stemmed less from the state of the register and more ‘on account of Sir A. Ramsay’s Evangelical views’, which set some of the Puseyite members of the Central Committee against him.8H. Nicholson, An autobiographical and full historical account of the persecution of Hamlet Nicholson in his opposition to Ritualism at the Rochdale parish church: also an account of his work in the conservative interest from 1832 to 1892 together with other personal narratives (1892), 82-3, 87; J. Vincent, ‘The electoral sociology of Rochdale’, Economic History Review, 16:1 (1963), 88. Encouraged by Nicholson, Ramsay agreed to stand, but reportedly insisted that his expenses be guaranteed.9The Examiner, 21 Mar. 1857. In contrast with Miall, who warned against making Palmerston a ‘perpetual dictator’, Ramsay at the nomination proclaimed his support for ‘that able Minister who had conducted them safely and with honour to the conclusion of a great war’.10The Times, 30 Mar. 1857. Miall described Ramsay as representing Toryism ‘in a somewhat liberal shape – the lion conceals himself as much as possible, or at least conceals his claws’.11Rochdale Observer, 21 Mar. 1857. Aided by Liberal divisions, Ramsay defeated Miall, but faced a petition against his return, which alleged treating, bribery, disruption of meetings and abduction of Liberal voters. Although it was apparent that bribery had taken place, the committee found insufficient proof of agency to link this to Ramsay, and declared him duly elected, 1 July 1857.12The Times, 26 June 1857, 2 July 1857. At a celebratory banquet, Ramsay demonstrated his Evangelical sympathies with his assertion that ‘I hope the time is not far distant when the Ritualistic clergy in our Protestant Church will be taken by the scruff of the neck and cast without her pale’.13Nicholson, Autobiographical account, 86. He repeated these sentiments in a more measured way the following year, condemning the practice of confession.14Preston Guardian, 23 Oct. 1858. His attacks on Ritualism led some to assert that he was unlikely to be re-elected for Rochdale.15Nicholson, Autobiographical account, 86.

Although Ramsay did speak at Conservative gatherings, there was criticism of his failure to address the wider constituency.16Manchester Times, 11 Dec. 1858. In January 1859, the Rochdale Non-Electors Reform Association condemned him for reneging on a promise of July 1857 to address the borough’s electors and non-electors, and requested him to speak on parliamentary reform. Ramsay’s excuses received short shrift, particularly his claim that ‘now is not the time for a member to address his constituents on the subject of representative reform’.17Manchester Times, 5 Feb. 1859. Nor does he appear to have spoken in the House, prompting Jacob Bright to assert that ‘it was not creditable to the borough that they should be represented by a speechless member’.18Manchester Times, 27 Mar. 1858. He is not known to have served on any select committees, and was not a particularly diligent attender (voting in 61 out of 162 divisions in the 1857 session, he was the 12th most assiduous Lancashire MP).19Preston Guardian, 24 Oct. 1857. He was, however, evidently involved in behind-the-scenes activity, being among those MPs thanked by the General Association of Burial Societies for their efforts in amending the 1858 Friendly Societies Act.20Preston Guardian, 14 Aug. 1858. The members of burial societies were relieved of the 1s. tax imposed by the Act.

Dod incorrectly describes Ramsay as a Liberal, but is correct in noting his support for Palmerston’s foreign policy.21Dod’s Parliamentary Companion (1857, new parliament), 268. Yet Ramsay was not prepared to give Palmerston his unqualified support. He was criticised for dividing for Palmerston on bringing in the conspiracy to murder bill, 9 Feb. 1858, but argued that it was customary not to oppose the first reading of a government bill, especially as he felt that relations with France necessitated it. However, he abstained on the second reading, being unwilling to give a positive approbation of Palmerston’s conduct, yet not wishing to upset a government which he had indicated he would generally support, nor ‘to gratify a mere party spite’ on the part of Milner Gibson and others.22Manchester Times, 6 Mar. 1858. Ramsay did, however, support Palmerston on the government of India, 18 Feb. 1858. He regarded the change of government that year as ‘more a change of men than measures’, and pledged to give Derby’s ministry ‘a warm, an anxious, but at the same time an independent support’.23Preston Guardian, 23 Oct. 1858. The Rochdale Observer described his politics as ‘slip-shoddy’, and he was berated by the secretary of the Rochdale Non-Electors Reform Association for the ‘alacrity with which you are prepared for either alternative, Palmerston or Derby, no matter which’.24Rochdale Observer, 4 July 1857; Manchester Times, 5 Feb. 1859.

On religious questions, Ramsay sympathised with the admission of Jews to Parliament, supported the divorce bill, 31 July 1857, and divided for the Maynooth grant, 21 May 1857, 29 Apr. 1858.25Manchester Times, 7 Nov. 1857. When it came to the vexed issue of church rates, which had provoked bitter conflict in Rochdale during the 1840s, Ramsay, having at the 1857 contest declared his support for them, in 1858 ‘after great difficulty and doubt and due reflection’ divided for their abolition, believing that nothing less would satisfy the House and that ‘his constituents would much prefer quiet in their parish church to the scenes he had often seen there’.26R. Taylor, Rochdale retrospect (1956), 84; Rochdale Observer, 21 Mar. 1857; Preston Guardian, 23 Oct. 1858. Ramsay again voted in favour of abolition, 15 Mar. 1859. On electoral reform, he was a consistent opponent of the ballot, and also voted against triennial parliaments, 20 Apr. 1858, and the assimilation of the Scottish and English county franchise, 6 May 1858. He did, however, divide for making payment by candidates for conveyance to the poll illegal, 13 May 1857. He had revised his views on franchise extension during the 1857 contest, leading his opponents to pen a mock election address affirming that ‘I now believe seven pounds, or if it would secure your cordial support, six pounds nineteen shillings and eleven pence, is the precise limit within which every man ought to have a vote’.27Rochdale Observer, 28 Mar. 1857, cf. Rochdale Observer, 21 Mar. 1857. He voted for the second reading of the Derby ministry’s reform bill, 31 Mar. 1859.