The poet’s house passed to his son, of the same name, eminent as a painter—portrait-painter to King George III and his queen and a man of high mental culture; consequently much a favourite in the circles of Johnson and Boswell.

The younger Allan enlarged the house, and built three additional houses to the eastward, bearing the title of Ramsay Garden

Allan Ramsay, went to London and Rome to study art. Returning to Edinburgh he undertook a number of portrait commissions and became an established artist. He moved to London and soon had a wide number of distinguished clients, including (of Bonnie Prince Charlie fame), Gibbon and Rousseau - but the latter did not like the result!

He led the way in a more relaxed style of presenting the subject of the portrait, instead of the previous more formal approach. He was a part of the intellectual society of the day and was a friend of. As the leading portrait painter of the day, he amassed a large fortune and spent some time in Italy before retiring to Dover where he died on August 10, 1784.

At his death, in 1784, the property went to his son, General John Ramsay, who, dying in 1845 left this mansion and a large fortune to Mrs. Murray of Henderland. So ended the line of the poet.

The wealth of the painter ultimately, on the death of his son in 1845, became the property of Mr. Murray of Henderland, a grandson of Sir Alexander Lindsay and nephew of Mrs. Allan thence it not long after passed to Mr. Murray’s brother, Sir J Archibald Murray.

This gentleman admired the poet, and reso1ved to raise a statue to him beside his goose-pie house on the Castlhill; but the situation proved unsuitable, and since his a lamented death, in 1858, the marble full length of worthy Allan, from the studio of John Steell, has found a place in the Princes Street Gardens, resting on a pedestal containing on its principal side a medallion portrait of Lord Murray, on the reverse one of General Ramsay, on west side one of the General’s lady, and on the east ~ representations of the General’s two daughters, Lady Campbell and Mrs. Malcolm. Thus we find owing to the esteem which genius ever commands—the poet of the Gentle Shepherd in the immortality of marble, surrounded by the figures of relatives and descendants who so acknowledged there aristocratic rank.

His daughter Christian, an amiable, kind-hearted woman, said to possess a gift of verse, lived for many years in New Street. At seventy-four she had the misfortune to be thrown down by a hackney-coach, and had her leg broken; yet she recovered, and lived to the age of eighty-eight.

Leading a solitary life, she took a great fancy for cats. Besides supporting many in her own house, curiously disposed in bandboxes, with doors to go in and out at, she caused food to be laid out for others on her stair and around her house. Not a word of obloquy would she listen to against the species, alleging, when any wickedness of a cat was spoken of, that the animal must have acted under provocation, for by nature, she asserted, cats are harmless. Often did her maid go with morning messages to her friends, inquiring, with her compliments, after their pet cats?

Good Miss Ramsay was also a friend to horses, and indeed to all creatures. When she observed a carter ill-treating his horse, she would march up to him, tax him with cruelty, and, by the very earnestness of her remonstrances, arrest the barbarian’s hand. So also, when she saw one labouring on the street, with the appearance of defective diet, she would send rolls to its master, entreating him to feed the animal. These peculiarities, although a little eccentric, are not unpleasant; and I cannot be sorry to record them of the daughter of one whose heart and head were an honour to his country.

1730 The Ramsay’s have not only contributed to the glories of Scotland, but many members of the family immigrated to North America where they and their heirs played prominent roles in establishing the United States and Canada.

One of the earliest known family members on record in America is Alexander Ramsay. Alexander settled on the Tugaloo River of South Carolina in about 1730. Today, many of his descendants are still living in that area.

1732 

James Ramsay of Lambhill in Perthshire, his brother Andrew, his sister Helen and her husband, Andrew Hutson, in Pliverhall, of Drumtuthell, near Dunfermline,were tried by the Court of Dumfermline in February, 1732, for cattle stealing.

The Judges at the trial were James Dewar of Lassodie, Captain Peter Halket, younger of Pitfirrane, and Henry Wellwood of Garvock, and a jury of fifteen.

James and Andrew Ramsay, after a long and violent resistance, were apprehended within a hut in dean-park, in the barony of Pitfirrane. The place where the hut stood, on a small eminence, was much covered with whins and broom to screen it from observation.

In the hut there were found a quantity of straw, two pairs of blankets, a bee-hive with some honey in it, the foot of a sheep, raw, a timber-plate, with mutton-collops, a cap which contained honey, and in which there were large lumps of fat, and livers, and also the lead of a window."

The crimes which the Jury found proven against James Ramsay were, the stealing four oxen and a quey from John Carswell, tenant in South Cults, in the parish of Saline, and a bee-hive out of the gardens of Pitfirrane.

The Sentence of the Court is dated 8th February, 1732, and so far as it relates to James Ramsay, was as follows:

The Judges of the Courts of Justiciary and Regality of Dunfermline having considered the foregoing Verdict of the date 5th current, Returned against James Ramsay, Andrew Ramsay, Andrew Hutson and Helen Ramsay.

James Ramsay to be taken fra the tolbooth of Dunfermline Upon Wednesday being the twenty second day of
March next to come, to that place of the common Muir of Dunfermline, called the witch Loan; and there betwixt the hours of two and four o'Clock afternoon of the said day to be hanged by the neck upon a gibbet, till he be dead. And ordains all his moveable goods and gear to be escheat and inbrought for the use of the ffiscal of court. Which is pronounced for Doom

In the Caledonian Mercury newspaper for 11th February, 1732, there is the following paragraph regarding this trial, "Dunfermline, February 8th, 1732. - This day was finished here a very tedious trial of four gypses, strollers, or vagabonds, which lasted between 18 and 19 hours, by the honoured Captain Halkett, James Dewar of Lassodie, and Henry Wellwood of Garvock - deputies of the most Honourable the Marquis of Tweeddale, as hereditary bailie of the justiciary and regality courts of Dunfermline; when on a full and plain proof James Ramsay, one of the gang, was sentenced to be hanged the 22d March next; and the other three to be whipped the first Wednesday of each month, for one half year, and afterwards to be banished the regality for ever."

James Ramsay has, since his sentence was pronounced, confessed to the Rev. Mr. Ralph Erskine that he stole the four oxen and young cow - one of the branches of the indictment. During his confinement in prison the Rev. Ralph Erskine frequently visited Ramsay for spiritual advice and consolation; he also went with him to his place of execution, soothing his mind, and offered up a fervent prayer in his behalf to the fountain of mercy, as he was turned off."

1735 Capt. James Ramsay appeared on a record in Baltimore, Maryland. It is believed that his line of the family extends back to a Scottish Sir James de Ramsay of Dalhousie. A Scottish merchant named William Ramsay in 1749 founded the city of Alexandria, Virginia. He belonged to the ancient house of Dalhousie and many of his descendants still live in Alexandria.

Both sons of James and Jane Montgomery Ramsay of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, proved to be exceptional men of character. Nathaniel, born in 1741, was an army officer and a Continental congressman from Maryland. He served at the Battle of Long Island in 1776 and at the Battle of Manmouth in 1778. His brother, David, born in 1749, was a Continental Congressman, physician and historian from South Carolina. David was later a member of the South Carolina Senate for three terms.

In the Clerk's office in Norfolk, Virginia there is recorded a will of Dr. George Ramsay dated June 22, 1756. The will contains a seal with the arms of Ramsay along with the family motto, "Ora ET Labora." The name of William Governor Ramsay appeared in Wilmington, Delaware in the later half of the 18th century. Major James Ramsey, an ancestor of President Harrison, owned the land where the town of Ligonier, Pennsylvania is now located. His son, John Ramsey, laid out the town in the late 1700's.

The 9th Earl of Dalhousie, General George Ramsay, played a prominent role in Canada in the early 19th century. He established Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia and also founded the City of Ottawa.

Many members of the family were active during the War Between the States. Thomas Ramsay was a Union soldier from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Robert, another Thomas, and Charles Ramsey were all Confederate brothers from New Hanover County, North Carolina.

1745 Culloden  Lord Ogilvy's Angus Regiment consisted mainly of members of Clan Ogilvy and Clan Ramsay. Not known if any Ramsay's survived.

Thanks to Rex Malcolm Ramsay for the above information

1759 The then current Earl acted a Signatory to the capitulation of Quebec to General Wolfe.

1778 Dean Ramsay Edward Ramsay, one of the more popular church figures in Edinburgh’s history, was born in Aberdeen In 1793. He spent much of his boyhood on his great-uncle’s Yorkshire estate and from 1806 attended the Cathedral Grammar School at Durham. Ramsay’s education continued at St John’s College, Cambridge, and in 1816, the same year that he gained his B.A., he was ordained as curate of Redden, Somerset. While a curate he spent much of his time studying botany, architecture and music. He was an accomplished flautist and, throughout his life he considered music to be amongst his chief interests.

In 1824, Ramsay moved to Edinburgh where he became curate of St George’s in York Place. This was followed in 1830 by his appointment as minister of St John’s. Princes Street, a position that he held until his death. In addition, he was made Dean of the Diocese of Edinburgh in 1841.

Dean Ramsay involved himself in a wide range of activities. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh In 1828 and, although his only contribution to its proceedings was a memoir of his close friend Thomas Chalmers, he became Vice-President of the society In 1862. Ramsay was chief founder of the Scottish Episcopalian Church Society in 1838 and also helped set up Trinity College, Glenalmond, in 1846.

As a man of the church, Ramsay was notable for his unsectarlan outlook; he consistently advocated (with eventual success), the removal of the barriers separating the Scottish Episcopalian and English churches, and his theological sympathies lay with the evangelical movement, rather than with the high church. As a preacher he was both practical and eloquent.

Ramsay provided the best of company on social occasions. His endless fund of anecdotes formed the basis of the work that was to earn him his widest reputation, ‘Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Character’, published in 1858. During his lifetime, that book ran to twenty-one editions.

‘The Dean’, as he was affectionately known, outlived his Canadian wife, Isabella, but his house In Ainslie Place continued to provide a home for her nephews and nieces, along with his brother, the retired Admiral Sir W. Ramsay. Dean Ramsay’s death in 1872 was greatly mourned; his congregation placed a commemorative tablet Inside St. John’s and his eight-metre high memorial cross was erected outside the church in 1879. It was designed by Rowand Anderson, and executed by Farmer and Brindley of London.

William Ramsay and his wife Anne had eight children and probably occupied the house only a short time before moving into a larger home. Like so many of Alexandria's founders, Ramsay was a hardworking, resourceful Scotsman who became very involved in trade and civic affairs. He served as town trustee, census taker, postmaster, member of the Committee of Safety and, according to tradition, Colonel of the Militia Regiment. He was highly respected by his fellow citizens and received many honours during his lifetime. Anne McCarty Ramsay was also a patriot and is reported to have been praised by Thomas Jefferson for having raised over $75,000 in funds to support the American Revolution. When Ramsay died in 1785, his close personal friend George Washington walked in his funeral.

1795 9th Earl George Ramsay, succeeded him in the family titles and estates. Earl George was the school and college companion of Sir Walter Scott, who held him in high and affectionate esteem. On meeting with the Earl in the evening of life, after a long separation, Sir Walter mentions him as still being, and always having been, ‘the same manly and generous character, that all about him loved as the Lordie Ramsay of the Yard’ (the playground of the Edinburgh High School). 

The Earl served with great distinction in the West Indies, Holland, and Egypt, and in the Spanish Peninsula, where he commanded the Second Division of the British army; and at the battle of Waterloo. He attained the full rank of general, was made a Knight Grand Cross of the Bath, was one of the general officers who received the thanks of Parliament, and was created a British peer by the title of BARON DALHOUSIE OF DALHOUSIE CASTLE. 

In 1816 he was appointed to the government of Nova Scotia; and, in 1819, he succeeded the Duke of Richmond as Captain-General and Governor-in-Chief of the forces in North America. He was Captain-General of the Royal Company of Archers, or Queen’s Body Guard in Scotland. 

The Earl died in 1838, in the sixty-eighth year of his age, universally regretted. Lord Ramsay’s eldest son, Charles, succeeded his grandfather as seventh Earl, in 1759. He attained the rank of lieutenant-colonel in the army, and died unmarried in 1764. His brother George, the eighth Earl, was twice elected one of the sixteen representative peers of Scotland, and held the office of Lord High Commissioner to the General Assembly of the Scottish Church for six years in succession (1777 - 1783). On the death of his uncle, William, Earl of Panmure, in 1782, the extensive estates of that nobleman William Ramsay. True to the hereditary instinct of the family, his third, fourth, and seventh sons entered the army, in which the two former attained the rank of lieutenant-general, and the last was a captain. The sixth son was in the naval service of the East India Company, and four of the grandsons of the eighth Earl entered the Indian army.

Earl George married, in 1805, Christian, the only child of Charles Broun, of Coalstoun, in East Lothian, the representative of a family, which had flourished in Scotland since the twelfth century. With this lady the Earl received a good estate and an heirloom besides, with which the welfare of the family was in old times supposed to be closely connected. This palladium was an enchanted pear, which came to the Brouns of Coalstoun through the marriage of the head of the family early in the sixteenth century to Jean Hay, daughter of the third Lord Yester, ancestor of the Marquis of Tweeddale. According to tradition, this pear had been invested with some invaluable properties by the famous wizard, Hugo de Gifford, of Yester, whose appearance is so vividly described in Sir Walter Scott’s poem of ‘Marmion.’

One of his daughters, it is said, was about to be married, and as the bridal party was proceeding to the church he halted beneath a pear-tree, and plucking one of the pears gave it to the bride, telling her that as long as that gift was kept good fortune would never desert her or her descendants.

This precious pear was given by the third Lord Yester to his daughter on her marriage to George Broun of Coalstoun, and at the same time he informed his son-in-law that, good as the lass might be, her tocher (dowry) was still better, for while she could only be of use in her own day and generation, the pear, so long as it continued in the family, would cause it to flourish till the end of time. This pear was accordingly preserved with great care in a silver case by the fortunate recipient and his descendants. About the beginning of the seventeenth century, however, it is said that the wife of one of the lairds, on becoming pregnant, felt a longing for the forbidden fruit and took a bite of it. According to another version of the story, it was a maiden lady of the family who out of curiosity chose to try her teeth upon the pear, and in consequence of the injury thus done to the palladium of the house, two of the best farms on the estate had soon afterwards to be sold. Another and more probable account of the incident in question, which is related by Crawford in his ‘Peerage,’ is that Lady Elizabeth Mackenzie, daughter of George, first Earl of Cromarty, on the night after her marriage to Sir George Broun, when she slept at Coalstoun, dreamt that she had eaten the pear. Her father-in-law regarded this dream as a bad omen, and expressed great fear that the new-married lady would be instrumental in the destruction of the house of Coalstoun. Her husband and she died in 1718, leaving an only daughter, who inherited the estate, and married George Brown, of Eastfield, while the Baronetcy descended to George Broun, of Thornydyke, male heir of the family. The pear has for generations been as hard as a stone, and is still in perfect preservation. It has been justly remarked that, apart from the superstition attached to it, this curious heirloom is certainly a most remarkable vegetable curiosity, having existed for upwards of five centuries. The heiress of the ‘Coalstoun pear,’ who died in 1839, bore Earl George three sons. The eldest died unmarried in 1832, at the age of twenty-six, the second in 1817, in his tenth year.

Sir Walter Scott stays at the Castle.