Dr. R.T.C Scott of Melby

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Dr. Robert Thomas Charles Scott (1812-1875) was born in Sandness, the second son of the laird, John Scott, and rose to become Deputy Inspector-General of Hospitals and Fleets and Deputy-Lieutenant of the County of Shetland. He unexpectedly inherited Melby estate when his brother died in 1850, and retired with his wife and young family to Melby House, Sandness in 1870, till his death in 1875. He had married late in life to the daughter of a Bank of Poland official.

As a landlord, Dr. Scott was well-liked. He was an improver by nature and built a number of new houses, arranged the drainage and the layout of the Melby meadows, and provided a plot of land for a new Sandness school at the request of Robert Jamieson (1827-1899). He was posthumously presented with a medal by the Royal Zoological Society for the protection of the Great Skua, which he had begun in the company of his friend Dr. Laurence Edmondston of Unst.

OBITUARY: The Scotsman - 1st December 1875

THE LATE DR SCOTT OF MELBY,- In our obituary column notice has already appeared of the death of Dr R.T.C. Scott of Melby, Deputy-Lieutenant of the county of Shetland. He had been in failing health for some time, and his friends had observed a great change coming over him during the last few month; but, at the same time, his death was quite unexpected, for he had only been seriously ill for about three days, and his death has thrown a gloom over the Westside. Dr Scott was born on the 1st of January 1812, and in the following year he lost his father, Mr. John Scott of Melby, by the wreck of the Shetland trader Doris, on her return voyage to Shetland from Leith. Having been carefully prepared for College under the tuition of the Rev A. Webster, minister of Quarff he studied at Marischal College, Aberdeen; and having then attended the usual medical curriculum in the University of Edinburgh, obtained his L.R.C.S at the early age of nineteen. Being passionately fond of the sea, he entered the navy as assistant-surgeon in 1833, and retired from the service as Deputy Inspector-General of Hospital and Fleets in 1870. The principle scenes of his foreign service were the Pacific, China, the Baltic, and Mediterranean stations, in the second acting as senior medical officer. Amongst the honours cvonferred upon him were Sir G. Blane's gold Medal for a medical history of the Burmese War in 1852, while serving in HMS Hastings; the silver medal of H.E.I.C for the same war; the baltic medal; the medal of the Royal Polytechnic Society of Cornwall, for Natural History; and his medical and surgical notes in the Royal Dockyard are printed in Parliamentary Blue Book 1869. His letter to the Lancet, complaining of having been ordered to use the stomach pump as a punishment on board HMS Vanguard, shortly after entering the navy, led to an Admiralty Order for the immediate abolition of the practice, though at the time his friends expected that he would be tried by a court-martial and dismissed the service for what they considered an act of madness. On his retiring from the medical superintendence of Sheerness Dockyard, a splendid testimonial was presented to him by the workmen; and on his arrvial in Shetland, a public dinner in honour of him was given at Walls.

In 1850 he succeeded his brother John in the Melby estates; but, till within the last few years, owing to his devotion to his profession, his tenants only received an occasional visit. For many years after his succession the rental was expended in building improved dwellings and making other improvements. He has left a valauble collection of curiosities and objets d'art gathered in his many wanderings, and presented by the many friends he had made in other lands. By his marriage with Agnes Catherine Watson, only daughter of Mr Alexander Scott Watson, C.E., he leaves a daughter and a son,who, being a minor, the estates fall under the management of trustees.

The funeral took place in the churchyard of Sandness on Tuesday, 12th, and notwithstanding the inclemency of the weather, was attended by about two hundred of his tenancy and friends from various parts of Shetland, with whom Dr Scott's name was a familiar and loved household word, and by whom his memory will be treasured as that of a just, generous and broad-minded man.