Alexander James Russell WS

FRSE Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland's national academy of science and Literature, letters, judged to be "eminently distinguished in their subject". ...

(1814–1887) was a Scottish lawyer.

Life

He was born at 101 George Street in

Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...

on 21 June 1814, the son of John Russell

Writer to the Signet The Society of Writers to His Majesty's Signet is a private society of Scottish solicitors, dating back to 1594 and part of the College of Justice. Writers to the Signet originally had special privileges in relation to the drawing up of documen ...

. He was apprenticed to his father as a lawyer and qualified as a Writer too the Signet in 1837. By 1840 he appears as a Clerk to the Signet (CS) living at 9 Shandwick Place at the west end of

Princes Street Princes Street () is one of the major thoroughfares in central Edinburgh, Scotland and the main shopping street in the capital. It is the southernmost street of Edinburgh's New Town, Edinburgh, New Town, stretching around 1.2 km (three quar ...

. By 1850 he is in partnership with his father as "J & A J Russell CS". In 1852 he was elected a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Edinburgh The Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE) is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was establis ...

. His proposer was James Thomson Gibson-Craig. By 1860 his father had retired and moved to the "south Bank" of Canaan Lane in the Morningside district. A few years after his father's death he went into business with James Nicolson to create the new firm of Russell & Nicolson at 11 George Street. The firm later evolved into Russell & Dunlop. He died at Shandwick Place in Edinburgh on 8 January 1887. He is buried in

Dean Cemetery The Dean Cemetery is a historically important Victorian cemetery north of the Dean Village, west of Edinburgh city centre, in Scotland. It lies between Queensferry Road and the Water of Leith, bounded on its east side by Dean Path and o ...

Family

He was married twice: firstly in 1839 to Magdalene Stein (1820-1857) and secondly in 1861 to Elizabeth Anne Lancaster (1835-1903), twenty years his junior. His son, born 1839, was army officer John Cecil Russell.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Russell, Alexander James 1814 births 1887 deaths Lawyers from Edinburgh Scottish lawyers Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh Burials at the Dean Cemetery