FORDYCE, Alexander Dingwall (1800-1864), of Brucklay Castle, Aberdeenshire

A ‘gentleman of independent fortune’ and former sailor, Fordyce was a Liberal Free Churchman who supported free trade and religious liberty in his brief spell in Parliament.1Aberdeen Journal, 30 June 1847. He was a staunch opponent of ‘any farther extension by the State, of the system of Religious Endowments, in any quarter of the Empire’, and one of the leaders of the Free Church party in Aberdeen.2Ibid.

Fordyce was descended from the Dingwalls of Brucklay Castle and the Fordyces of Culsh. His father was an advocate and minor gentleman, but as a third son, Fordyce entered the navy ‘under the auspices’ of his relative Sir Arthur Farquhar.3Caledonian Mercury, 19 July 1864; Aberdeen Journal, 20 July 1864. He later reflected that ‘much of my life has been spent beyond the sphere of Politics, in the service of the State, abroad’.4Aberdeen Journal, 30 June 1847. In 1837 he published Outlines of naval routine, a summary of naval procedure, and retired on half-pay in May 1841 after being ‘invalided at Port Royal, Jamaica’.5F. Boase, Modern English biography (1892), i. 1081; Aberdeen Journal, 20 July 1864. In 1843 he inherited the Brucklay estate from his brother, to whom it had passed upon the extinction of the Dingwall line.6Burke’s landed gentry (1879), i. 582-3.

Fordyce had nominated Farquhar as the Conservative candidate for Aberdeen at the 1835 general election.7Aberdeen Journal, 21 Jan. 1835. His support was perhaps due to personal and familial loyalty, as Fordyce became one of the founders of the Aberdeen Reform Association in 1838.8Aberdeen Journal, 7 Nov. 1838. He was a prominent spokesman for Non-Intrusionist or Evangelical critics of lay patronage in the Church of Scotland and seceded with them to form the Free Church after the Great Disruption, or schism, in May 1843.9Aberdeen Journal, 15 Apr. 1840, 30 June 1841. Fordyce was one of the few country gentlemen in the Aberdeen Free Church, most of whom came from the new commercial middle class.10A.A. MacLaren, Religion and social class: the Disruption in Aberdeen (1974).

In 1845 Fordyce broke the stranglehold of the Whig-Conservative coalition that controlled Aberdeen burgh council and had marginalised Free Churchmen. He did so by rallying overwhelming opposition to the council’s proposed improvement plan, forming a diverse coalition, which included some Conservatives and Chartists.11M. Dyer, Men of property and intelligence: the Scottish electoral system prior to 1884 (1996), 76. He successfully mobilised this coalition at the 1847 general election in Aberdeen, but was only returned after a bitter campaign against another Liberal. Fordyce was attacked as ‘the nominee of the Free Church’ and the leader of the ‘do-nothings’ who had prevented improvements, including to sanitation.12Aberdeen Journal, 4 Aug. 1847. Although he voiced support for free trade and reform, Fordyce emphasised his religious views throughout the campaign. He opposed any endowment for the Free Church from public funds. In his opinion, ‘every man should pay his own clergymen’. He suggested that the Irish church establishment was ‘ripe for a change’, and declared ‘the bishops altogether out of place in the House of Lords’.13Ibid.

Fordyce was a silent member in the Commons, with a fluctuating attendance record. He voted in 53.4%, 23.5% and 37.7% of the divisions in the 1849, 1851 and 1852 sessions respectively.14Hampshire Telegraph, 20 Oct. 1849; Caledonian Mercury, 8 July 1852. He later reflected that ‘with little exception, I have supported [Russell’s] government and their policy’.15Aberdeen Journal, 18 Feb. 1852. His voting behaviour followed a consistent pattern. He voted with Liberals and occasionally radicals in favour of free trade and religious liberty, but generally opposed political reforms. Fordyce backed the repeal of the navigation laws in 1849 and was in the minority that supported Cobden’s ‘budget’ to reduce public expenditure by £10 million, 26 Feb. 1849. He opposed the numerous motions to relieve agriculture through readjusting taxation, reducing the malt tax, or restoring protection. Fordyce repeatedly cast votes in favour of Catholic and Jewish relief, but supported Russell’s ecclesiastical titles bill in 1851. He opposed the various reform schemes floated at this time, such as Hume’s ‘little charter’ in 1849, 1851 and 1852.

Drawing on his naval expertise, Fordyce was a member of the 1849 inquiry that recommended that merchant steam ships could form ‘a most useful auxiliary force for national defence’ if they were designed to be able to accommodate guns used in the royal navy.16PP 1849 (305), xvii. 454-5. In 1852 he served on a committee that recommended that preserved meats given to sailors in the royal navy should be henceforth produced exclusively in government factories.17PP 1852 (303), xv. 293, 297.

Fordyce opposed Palmerston’s amendment to the militia bill that brought down Russell’s government, 20 Feb. 1852, and was among the Liberal MPs who attended the meeting at Russell’s house the following month.18Morning Chronicle, qu. in Caledonian Mercury, 15 Mar. 1852. He retired at the 1852 general election and in his farewell address praised the repeal of the navigation laws and window taxes and the reduction of duties on sugar, coffee and timber for spreading a ‘degree of comfort and contentment throughout the community’.19Aberdeen Journal, 18 Feb. 1852. Thereafter, Fordyce ‘lived chiefly as a private country gentleman’, although he endorsed the Liberal candidate for Aberdeen at the 1857 general election.20Caledonian Mercury, 19 July 1864; Aberdeen Journal, 25 Mar. 1857.

On his death in 1864, Brucklay Castle passed to his eldest son, William Dingwall Fordyce (1836-75), Liberal MP for Aberdeenshire 1866-8, East Aberdeenshire, 1868-75, whose twin brother James, an advocate, succeeded to Culsh. Fordyce’s other sons were soldiers.21Burke’s landed gentry (1879), i. 582-3.