Chalmers, George, 1742-1825

George Chalmers was born in 1742, in Fochabers, Moray, Scotland, to John Chalmers and Isabella Ruddock. He studied law at the University of Edinburgh. He travelled to America to practice law in Maryland but returned to England after the Revolutionary War broke out. He was a fellow of the Royal Society and the Society of Antiquarians of London. He published several works to include biographical sketches of several prominent authors, a “hostile biography of Thomas Paine” which the British Government paid him £500, and he published under a pseudonym: Francis Oldys, A.M. He published Life of Mary, Queen of Scots, based on the manuscript of John Whitaker. His greatest work was Caledonia, a four-volume set of books that told the history of Scotland, but he was never able to finish. He died on May 31, 1825. Since he never married, he left his enormous library to his nephew, James Chalmers, who refused to gift it to the Faculty of Advocates at his death in 1841 because he didn’t like the Librarian, and the collection was sold in 5,800 lots containing thousands of books, maps, paintings, and manuscripts dating back to the first printings of Gutenberg in 1440.