Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 16.djvu/190

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Dundas
183
Dundas

of the Agriculture of the County of Hereford,' 173 pp. 8vo, London, 1805, for the consideration of the Board of Agriculture and Internal Improvement. He also published two sermons, one preached 7 March 1796, the day appointed for the general fast, 16 pp. 8vo, London; the other preached in the cathedral church, 3 Aug. 1796, at the annual meeting of the subscribers to the General Infirmary in Hereford, and printed for the benefit of the charity, 16 pp. 8 vo, London, 1797 (Watt, Bibl. Brit. i. 323 o). By 1809 he had become a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries.

Duncumb died at Hereford 19 Sept. 1839, aged 74 (Gent. Mag. new ser. xii. 660-1), and was buried in the church of Abbey Dore, where a monument is placed to his memory. He married in 1792 Mary, daughter of William Webb of Holmer, near Hereford, by whom he had three children: Thomas Edward (d. 1823) and William George (d. 1834), and a daughter. All died unmarried. Mrs. Duncumb died in 1841. Duncumb's manuscript collections were sold by his widow to a local bookseller. He lived in Hereford from 1788 to his death, and was never resident on any of his various preferments.

[The above memoir has been for the most part compiled from information kindly communicated by Judge Cooke. See also Gent. Mag. vol. xciii. pt. ii. p. 644, new ser. i. 219, v. 209, xvi. 664; Oxford Graduates (1851), p. 199.]

G. G.

DUNDAS, CHARLES, Baron Amesbury (1751–1832), born 5 Aug. 1751, was younger son of Thomas Dundas of Fingask, M. P. for Orkney and Shetland 1768-71, and a commissioner of police in Scotland 31 Jan. 1771, who died 16 April 1786. His mother was his father's second wife, Janet, daughter of Charles Maitland, sixth earl of Lauderdale. He was called to the bar, but devoted himself to a political life. He first sat for the borough of Richmond in 1774, then for Orkney and Shetland (1781-4), again for Richmond, and finally for Berkshire, which he represented in ten successive parliaments (1794-1832). He was finally the second eldest member in the house. Dundas was a liberal in politics. In 1802, on the resignation of Mitford (afterwards Lord Redesdale), the then speaker, he was nominated by Sheridan as his successor in opposition to Abbot. He, however, withdrew from the contest. Dundas was counsellor of state for Scotland to the Prince of Wales, and colonel of the White Horse volunteer cavalry.

Dundas was twice married. His first wife, Anne, daughter of Ralph Whitley of Aston Hall, Flintshire, by whom he had one daughter, Janet, wife of Sir James Whitley Deans Dundas [q. v.], brought him the considerable estate of Kentbury-Amesbury, Wiltshire, and other property. His second wife, whom he married on 25 Jan. 1822, was his cousin, Margaret, daughter of Charles Barclay, and widow of (1) Charles Ogilvy, and (2) Major Archibald Erskine. Dundas was made a peer as Lord Amesbury by letters patent 11 May 1832. He died 7 July 1832 at his residence in Pimlico, whereupon the title became extinct. Lady Amesbury died 14 April 1841.

[Gent. Mag. August 1832; Burke's Dormant and Extinct Peerages (1883), pp. 183-4; Addit. MS. 2867, ff. 164, 166; Foster's Members of Parliament (Scotland).]

F. W-t.

DUNDAS, Sir DAVID (1735–1820), general, was the third son of Robert Dundas, a merchant of Edinburgh, by his wife Margaret, daughter of Thomas Watson of Muirhouse. He was educated at the Royal Academy at Woolwich, and assisted in the great survey of Scotland under his maternal uncle, General David Watson, and under General Roy from 1752 to 1755. He was appointed a lieutenant fireworker in the royal artillery in 1754, a practitioner engineer in 1755, and a lieutenant in the 56th regiment in 1756, in which year he received the post of assistant quartermaster-general to General Watson. He threw up his staff appointment in 1758 to join his regiment when ordered on foreign service, and was present at the second Duke of Marlborough's attack on St. Malo, at General Bligh's capture of Cherbourg, and at the fight at St. Cas. At the close of the same year he joined the army under the command of Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick in the threefold capacity of assistant quartermaster-general, engineer, and lieutenant of infantry, and left Germany on the conclusion of the campaign to join the 15th light dragoons, into which he had just been promoted captain. Colonel Eliott, afterwards Lord Heathfield, who commanded that regiment, took a fancy to Dundas, who acted as his aide-de-camp in the campaigns of 1760 and 1761 in Germany, when he was present at the battles of Corbach, Warburg, and Clostercampen, the siege of Wesel, and the battle of Fellinghausen, and also in the expedition to Cuba in 1762, when Eliott served as second in command to Lord Albemarle at the capture of Havana. At the end of the seven years' war Dundas commenced that study of his profession which eventually caused him to be considered the most profound tactician in England. He was present every year at the manœuvres of the French, Prussian, or Austrian armies, and was able to get a thorough insight into the