Events from the year 1789 in Scotland.
Incumbents
Law officers
Judiciary
Events
- 10 July â Scottish explorer Alexander Mackenzie reaches the Mackenzie River delta in North America.
- November â foundation stone for Old College, University of Edinburgh, laid.
- December â steamboat experiments on the Forth and Clyde Canal by Patrick Miller of Dalswinton.
- The original lighthouses at Eilean Glas on Scalpay, Outer Hebrides, and Dennis Head Old Beacon on North Ronaldsay, Orkney, are completed by Thomas Smith.
- Robert Adam designs a new house at Newliston.
- Andrew Duncan delivers the first lectures on forensic medicine in Britain, at the University of Edinburgh.
- The Aberdeen Medico-Chirurgical Society is founded by James McGrigor and James Robertson.
- Robert Burns is appointed an exciseman.
- New pump room for St Bernard's Well, Stockbridge, Edinburgh, designed by painter Alexander Nasmyth.
- John Ainslie completes and publishes his 9-sheet map of Scotland.
- Flax mill established at Old Deer.
- Clyde Model Dockyard is established as a toyshop in Glasgow.
Births
- 5 January â Thomas Pringle, writer, poet and abolitionist (died 1834)
- 28 February â David Duncan, Presbyterian minister (died 1829)
- 1 March â John Ramsay McCulloch, economist (died 1864 in London)
- 17 August â William Knox, poet and journalist (died 1825)
- 12 October â William Collins, publisher (died 1853)
- 30 October â Michael Scott, author (died 1835)
- 9 November â Robert Pearse Gillies, poet and writer (died 1858 in London)
- November â Peter Miller Cunningham, naval surgeon and pioneer in Australia (died 1864 in Greenwich)
- 3 December â Archibald Robertson, physician (died 1864 in Bristol)
- 20 December â William Burn, architect, pioneer of the Scottish Baronial style (died 1870)
- 23 December â George Douglas, 17th Earl of Morton, Tory politician (died 1858)
- Thomas Wright, prison visitor (died 1875 in Manchester)
Deaths
Sport
References