George Lewis Scott - Mathematician and Commissioner of Excise

Biography

Mathematician. In June 1751 he married Sarah Robinson, a sister of the bluestocking leader Elizabeth Montagu (1718-1800), but the marriage was dissolved the next year.¹

Sometime sub-preceptor to George III. Commissioner of Excise (1758-1780). Member of the Royal Society. He had possibly been a student of French mathematician Abraham de Moivre (1667-1754).

Scott was much respected in his own time and a close friend of poet James Thomson and historian Edward Gibbons.

Life with James Boswell

Boswell visited Scott in London on November 21, 1762. Apparently Scott was a friend of Boswell's father, Lord Auchinleck. Boswell wrote that Scott "was very kind and polite to me".

Notes

Note 1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Scott

Recommended literature

Part of the correspondence between Scott and James Burnett, Lord Monboddo was published in William Knight's Lord Monboddo and some of his contemporaries in 1900. It can usually be found for between £40 and £60 via AbeBooks.

Mentioned in

George Lewis Scott is mentioned in:

• London Journal 1762-1763