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His life & work:

Charles Kingsley, English clergyman, novelist and poet, became curate of Eversley in 1842 and retained that living of Eversley during his later career, becoming professor of modern history at Cambridge 1860-69, canon of Chester in 1869, and of Westminster in 1873.

His many publications included poetry, sermons, and historical novels (eg 'Westward Ho!' in 1855) . His works powerfully expressed his opinions of the social and economic questions of the time. He also greatly admired Darwin and Huxley, maintaining that science (particularly the Darwinian theory) and theology were quite compatible.

His younger brother Henry was also elected an honorary member of Irvine Burns Club. It is possible that Henry's Scottish connections (refer to his entry) were the prompt to nominate Charles.

Dear Sir
     Your letter, & the valuable lithograph facsimile accompanying it, have only just reached me, as I have been away from home, & wandering about. So I beg to thank you & I beg you to present all thanks to the Members of the Irvine Burns Club - (Which I know well by name) for the honour which they have done me in electing me a member.
     Should I ever be in your part of Scotland, it would give me great pleasure to look at the M.s.s. of one whose noble handwriting I know so well - & for whose genius I have so profound a respect - as well as for his magnificent humanity.
     Believe me, my dear Sir,
     Yours faithfully & obliged
     C. Kingsley

His address is embossed on the writing paper, so does not show up in photocopies.

His life & work:

An English novelist, brother of Charles Kingsley - see preceding honorary member.

Other biographical notes may follow. Meanwhile, visit another site.

My dear Sir
     Would you be so kind as to convey to the members of the Irvine Burns Club, my sense of the high renown they have done me, in electing me a member of their body.
     I speak no mere compliment, (I never do that to any one,) when I say that I am extremely flattered and gratified. Had I even written in praise of your glorious poet, I could have understood the honour you have done me, but as I have never, at all events in adequate terms, expressed my intense admiration for him, I take this election as a very high and unsought compliment.
    I say "your poet": but he is as much ours as yours. We love him as you do; See the Burns festival of 1858. Scotch and English arms have been linked together so long now, that nothing will untwine them.
    In my case, of course, the language of Burns is as familiar as that of Devonshire, which is as much marked off from ordinary English as is Scottish. But it has often puzzled me, why so many Englishmen, who will not take the trouble to master the English of Chaucer, should take the trouble to master the Scottish of Burns. My answer to this is, that Burns, of all great poets is Lord and Master of the most gentle beautiful and humanizing side of the Scottish and English Character, their extreme and true tenderness: a quality which these nations possess only in common with the Scandinavian and Teutonic races. This opinion is of course open to Cavil from those who like the sentimentality of the Latin races, which never seems to me to ring true.
     My opinion of Burns as a poet, would be as absurd for me to give, as it would be ridiculous for you to value: save that you must know him even better than myself. His versification is always so perfect that it strikes one with amazement. For his wit! - who can analyse that?, for who can analyse wit? One can only say, that one man's opinion is, "Burns next after Shakespear was our greatest wit. Thackeray and Dickens must be .......ed by no man, I only say, following Shakespear.
     If an Englishman may speak and live, I should say that the culminating point of Burns wit (I have given up the distinction between Wit and Humour - they are either identical qualities or inseparable accidents) is the "Address to the Deil" and in that wonderful lyric the wittiest line to me is,
     "Ayont the Dyke She heard you bummin"
I frankly confess that out of Shakespear I know of nothing so outrageously quaint as that line. It would take a long essay by Charles Lamb to point out the concealed fun in it. His method would be, "What was the Devil doing beyond the ditch at that time of night? No good, of course, but what? It all came to nothing, he was unsuccessful as usual, the old lady gave the alarm, and he flew away. She heard him however. A man with the tender delicate wit of Charles Lamb would turn that single line over and over until he made an immortal essay out of it.
     Thanking you once more for the Compliment you have paid me.
     I remain dear Sir,
     Yours very truly
     Henry Kingsley

P.S. Many thanks for the facsimiles. I hope that the Member for Irvine, Ayr, Campbeltown, Inverary, and Oban, is a sound Liberal. But these new details bother me sadly. Mr Finnie is now member for North Ayr. And Crawfurd for Ayr. I suppose he is in the burghs.

'1858' - Kingsley here refers to the many special events of the Burns centenary in early 1859.

Shakespeare's name here has no final 'e'.

The Burns line is usually appears as: "Aft yont the Dyke she's heard you bummin."

Kingsley twice fails to close quotation marks, so we leave you to decide where he intended them.

Inverary nowadays appears as Inveraray.

From 1832 to 1950 Irvine, with the four other burghs named in the PS, formed the Ayr Burghs parliamentary seat, electing Edward Craufurd (sic), a Liberal, from 1852 to 1874. In 1868, the Ayrshire county seat was split into North and South Ayrshire and William Finnie of Newfield, Dundonald, served as Liberal MP for North Ayrshire until 1874. The 1867 Reform Act had extended the franchise to £10 householders (increasing the number of electors in Irvine from 271 to 611), but we do not know what new details bothered Kingsley.

His life & work:

The then well-known editor and founder of 'Good Works' had begun his ministry in Ayrshire, in the parish of Loudoun, where, as one with Conservative leanings, he gloried in arguing politics with the red-hot Radical weavers of Newmilns.

Other biographical notes may follow. Meanwhile, consult another site. Later in 1869, Dr Macleod served as Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland.

Dear Sirs
     I beg to acknowledge with many thanks your kind note and its very interesting addition and edition of the famous Poem.
     When I again visit Irvine I shall have peculiar pleasure in availing myself of your kind offers to show me the original M.S. of the Poet.
     I beg also to thank the office bearers of the Club for making me one of its honorary members.
     I remain
     Yours truly
     N Macleod

His life & work:

In 1869, Waddell was preaching in Glasgow as an independent preacher. He was a exceptional orator. In 1859, the Burns centenary, he presided at the meeting held in Burn’s cottage on 25 January in celebration of the poet’s birth, and then delivered an impassioned eulogy on Burns. His two-part Life and Works of Burns appeared after his election as an honorary member, in 1870, and in 1871 he published an edition of the Psalms translated from Hebrew into Scots.

Fuller biographical notes may follow. In the meantime, consult another site.

Sir,
     Your communication of the 25th instant, conveying to me information of the honour that had been unanimously conferred on me by them that evening, in electing me an honorary member, was received last night; and it is with sentiments of the highest respect and gratitude I now acknowledge that compliment.
     I esteem it a special honour that I should have been thus elected to your fellowship when personally unknown to you, and by a society who are the fortunate and privileged possessors of literary treasures so precious as the original Manuscripts of Robert Burns. I have to thank you also for the beautiful facsimile which accompanies the Minute of Election, and which together with that document I shall preserve with grateful care.
     If I have done anything by recent study and investigation to illustrate the life and works of our immortal fellow-countryman - which, by the distinction conferred upon me by your Club, I am warranted to believe is their opinion - I can only say that the highest reward, next to the good opinion of my readers, I can hope to enjoy for that labour is the satisfaction of having so far contributed to verify or explain his existence. I have learned more lessons already of faith, of patience, of humility, and of charity from the study of that life, than I ever expected to learn from the study of any mere mortal history. Surely God was there.
     Do me the favour, Sir, to convey to the Irvine Burns' Club the assurance of my highest respect and gratitude for the honour conferred upon me, and believe me Yours
     most respectfully and Sincerely,
     P. Haty Waddell LL.D.

The letter is addressed to James Dickie, Esq., Honorary Secy. Burns' Club, Irvine

He abbreviates his forename in signing off.

His life & work:

The American poet. We do not know why the Directors of Irvine Burns Club elected him in 1869, but it is interesting to note that, like Karl Blind (an honorary member in the following year), Longfellow was acquainted with the German poet Ferdinand Freiligrath, and to speculate whether this is merely coincidence. Another possible connection or, inn this case more likely, coincidence is that, when in London (1835), Longfellow called on the great Scottish historian Thomas Carlyle (honorary member 1863), who was at the time finishing his epic history of the French Revolution, and followed Carlyle's career in later years. Longfellow published a pleasant poem titled 'Robert Burns' in 1880. A third possible connection is the visit of Glasgow auctioneer Robert McTear to Italy, probably in that year.

Other biographical notes may follow. Meanwhile, consult another site.

My Dear Sir,
     Your letter and the facsimile of Burns's "Cottar's Saturday Night" have been forwarded to me at this place, and for both I beg you to accept my cordial thoughts.
     I am also much obliged to the Members of the Burns Club for the honor they have done me, and beg you to express to them the pleasure I feel in accepting this mark of their considerations.
     I remain, my Dear Sir, with great regard
     Yours truly
     Henry W Longfellow

His life & work:

General Giuseppe Garibaldi, the great Italian patriot, was described by the historian AJP Taylor as "the only wholly admirable figure in modern history". One of the four major nationalist leaders in Europe at the time (see our entry for Karl Blind), additional reasons for his nomination to honorary membership included his links with Scotland, with Freemasonry, and with the Burns Club of London. The link between Irvine and Garibaldi was through Robert McTear of Glasgow. That McTear visited Garibaldi in 1869 is indicated by the March 1870 lecture he gave on his return.

In 1834, at 27, as a supporter of Mazzini's Young Italy Movement, he took refuge in South America and there commanded the troops defending Montevideo. Returning to Italy in 1848, he commanded the defence of the Roman Republic against the French, but was again driven into exile, staying in New York City between 1851 and 1853. In 1859 he led guerillas against the Austrians in the region of the Italian lakes. In 1860, he sailed from Genoa in two ships with a thousand 'redshirts'; and conquered Naples and Sicily, forming the nucleus of a united Italy. He then joined forces with Cavour. In 1861, he was offered the position of a major-general in the American Army but refused, wishing a commander's role, and seeking a guaranteed end to slavery. From retirement in Caprera, he made two unsuccessful attempts to capture Rome (1862, 1867) and led volunteers in the Franco-Prussian War.

Scotland had given Garibaldi significant support - a concert in May 1860 raised funds for his cause. Scottish volunteers ('Garibaldi Excursionists') went to Italy and fought for unification. Working men in Glasgow gave up one afternoon a week to manufacture munitions for Garibaldi’s campaign. Reform societies and masonic lodges collected huge sums of money to send to the ‘redshirts’. A Scottish cattle-ship, ‘The City of Aberdeen’, carried (Genoese) reinforcements to meet up with Garibaldi’s ‘Thousand’ at Palermo. Scots joined other nations in the fight against the Royalists in Sicily and on to the mainland of Italy to get rid of the Bourbon tyranny, much as, 84 years later in 1944, Scottish soldiers were among the liberating forces there. When Garibaldi came to thank his British supporters in 1864, a million people thronged the streets of London, but the Duke of Sutherland derailed his planned visit to Glasgow, and the 200,000 applicants for tickets to Garibaldi meetings in Glasgow were, of course, very disappointed.

Garibaldi was the first honorary member of the Burns Club of London - nominated by his personal friend, Ray Brown of Kensington, who conducted many of its meetings. Like Robert Burns and many members of the Burns Clubs of the time, he was a Freemason - openly deprecating the esoteric and ritual trimmings, he saw the masonic organisation as a network able to unite the otherwise dispersed forces of the Italian renewal, encouraging its new leaders to look beyond the petty struggles for power and placing them in an intellectual circuit of worldwide humanity.

IJD

Stimatissimo Signore Dickie

Grazie, per l' onorevole titolo di membro onorario, con cui l' Irvine Burns Club ha voluto fregiare il mio nome; e per il fac-simile litografato, manuscritto, del grande poeta scozzese.
     Sono con gratitudine
     Vostro
     G Garibaldi

Translation:
Most esteemed Mr Dickie,
Thank you, for the distinguished title of honorary member with which the Irvine Burns Club has been pleased to dignify (1) my name; and for the lithographic facsimile, of the manuscript, of the great Scottish poet.
     I am, with gratitude, Yours, G Garibaldi

(1) 'fregiare': literally: to adorn, as on a frieze

His life & work:

David Dunbar was a local Dumfries poet and politician, best known for giving his home town its nickname. When he stood as a candidate for Parliament in the General Election of 1857, he lauded the town, in one of his addresses, as "Queen of the South", from the Old Testament tale of the Queen of Sheba, described in the New Testament Gospels of Matthew (12.42) and Luke (11.31) as the Queen of the South (where Jesus indicates that she and the Ninevites will judge the generation of Jesus' contemporaries who rejected him). The moniker thereafter became synonymous with the town.

When several local football sides merged to form one Dumfries team in 1919, various names were suggested, the name Queen of the South was adopted, and the team's first game took place on 16th August 1919, being a 2-all draw with Nithsdale Wanderers.

Sir,
     It was with lively satisfaction I got your kind intimation of 31st Jany that I had been chosen an Honorary Member of the Irvine Burns Club. I feel myself highly honoured by my admission into so distinguished a body whose efforts in extending the fame and defending the name of Burns have been so extensive and effectual.
     For many years past I have read with great interest the reports of the annual meetings of your Club, from all of which I gather that it possesses many members of high literary attainments who have done good service in strengthening the love and admiration all true Scotsmen feel for the Bard of Coila. These Meetings are productive of much good for they draw us out to the contemplation of what is elevating & ennobling.
     When we meet in honour of Burns, we simply meet to honour what is best and noblest in our country's history!
     I have to thank you for the excellent fac simile of the "Cotter's Saturday Night" - a document which I value exceedingly.
     Thanking you again for the courtesy of the Club,
     I am, Dear Sir,
     Yours most truly,
     D Dunbar

His life & work:

Karl Blind was one of the four major nationalist leaders in Europe of his day, the others being Garibaldi (1807-82), Mazzini (1805-72) [note 1] and Kossuth (1802-94) [2]. Blind was continually engaged in agitating or in heading risings in the cause of German freedom and union, being tried and comdemned on several occasions, and was imprisoned for his part in the Baden Insurrection of 1848.

When he settled in exile in London in 1852, the Blind family home became a regular meeting place for many European revolutionaries and champions of liberty, including Karl Marx (who had settled in London after the 1848 revolutions), Garibaldi and Mazzini. Blind interested himself in democratic movements, and cultivated his literary as well as his political interests, including contributing to magazines. The anti-establishment atmosphere influenced his children. Expelled from school for atheism, his step-daughter, Mathilde Cohen (1841-96) later took her stepfather's surname, and became a noted Anglo-German poet and biographer; her first book of poems was dedicated to Mazzini. In 1866 Blind's son Ferdinand attempted to assassinate Bismarck (who easily disarmed him).

Karl Blind was brought to the notice of Irvine Burns Club by Robert McTear, auctioneer & valuator on Renfield St., Glasgow. In a 1869 letter (regarding Garibaldi), he wrote: "It was he who recommended Freiligrath [3] the great German poet to translate Burns' works into German, since which seven translations have appeared in Germany. Mr & Mrs Blind are intimate friends of Irvine and both of them have an extraordinary knowledge of Burns' works and admire them accordingly. Karl Blind is in the best sense a great man and I know he would appreciate the attention, which should be accompanied by a copy of the fac-simile)".

[1] Giuseppe ('Joseph') Mazzini founded the 'Young Italy' movement which aimed to unite Italy as a republic, liberating Rome in 1848 with Garibaldi as his military commander, but disapproving of the Kingdom later created by Garibaldi & Cavour.
[2] Lajos ('Louis') Kossuth led the 1848 independence revolution in Hungary, becoming President briefly until Russian troops helped Austria to crush the rebellion.
[3] The republican Ferdinand Freiligrath (1810-76) took part in the revolutionary movements in Germany in 1848. His writings led to a charge of treason - he was acquitted, in the first jury trial ever held in Prussia. He produced a version of “Is There For Honest Poverty” in 1843 and many other admirable translations of works by several poets, including Burns, Tannahill, Longfellow, Shakespeare, and Victor Hugo.

Dear Sir,
     Had it not been for a relapse of illness, I would have acknowledged, ere this, your kind letter which contains so gratifying a communication. I feel and prize it as a great distinction to have been elected an honorary member of your old-established Club, which so nobly cultivates the memory of the great Scottish bard.
     Around the town of Irvine, such remembrances of the poet's early life are gathered that I was deeply moved when a fac-simile of his own handwriting, printed there, first met my eye. For years, I, and those around me, have turned with ever-renewed joy to the poems of Burns, whose very language stands even closer to our own than the English tongue, and whose sentiments always touch deep, whether they reflect the feelings of a loving heart, or are the utterance of a patriotic longing for freedom.
     Be kind enough, dear Sir, to convey to all the members of the Club my sincere and respectful thanks for the honour conferred upon me,
     and believe me
     Yours faithfully
     Karl Blind

His life & work:

A foremost Victorian poet and playwright, Browning had finally, in completing and publishing his long blank-verse poem 'The Ring and the Book' over the previous eighteen months, achieved the significant recognition which he had sought for forty years.

Other biographical notes may follow. For the present, consult another site. (The infomation about his son, below, comes from elsewhere.)

Dear Sir,
     Allow me to apologise both to you and to the Members of the Irvine Burns Club for some delay in acknowledging the flattering intimation that I have received the signal honor of being constituted one of the Body, - an honor indeed should be counted any association with those who thus interest themselves in the transcendent genius of the Poet. My delay in saying thus much, - or rather thus little, was caused by unforseen circumstances: pray offer my excuses for these, together with all thanks to the Club for what - I repeat is a signal honor conferred, however unworthily, upon,
    My dear Sir,
    Yours very obediently & faithfully
    Robert Browning

We do not know what the 'unforseen [sic] circumstances' of the delay were, but we can suggest a possibility. The admission of his only child, Robert, nicknamed 'Penini' or 'Pen', to Oxford University in 1869 had not ended his father's worry about him. Browning was happier by 24th Feb. 1870, writing in a letter: "Pen is at last round the corner of his career and fairly with his head in the right way - I do trust." Yet he was later to be disappointed, as his son did not succeed and left Oxford in June that year. Perhaps concern for his son had delayed Browning's answer to our invitation.

His life & work:

This honorary member is one of the younger nominees, being only 36 (or 37) at the time of his nomination. He would have been nominated by his former teacher Dr John White (hon. member 1881, see notes there), the Club President in 1871.

Born in Ayrshire, at Stewarton, he studied at Glasgow and Cambridge, and was appointed HM Inspector of Schools in the South West of Scotland District in 1860, then Professor of Natural History at Owen's College, Manchester, in 1866, before moving to the editorship of the 'Glasgow Herald' in 1870, presumably the prompt for his nomination by Irvine Burns Club in 1871. (Some years later, he sent the Club copies of the two editions of MacMillan's Magazine containing his articles on Burns' Common Place Book.)

After holding this position till 1876, he then became a member of the publishing firm Macmillan & Co in 1876, thereby creating another link between Irvine Burns Club and that Irvine-born publisher. Finally, he was appointed Professor of Mathematics at Glasgow in 1879, a chair he held for 30 years up to the age of 65.

For a contemporary pen and ink sketch of him, see this site.

My dear Sir,
     I have to ask you to express to the members of the Irvine Burns Club, my sense of the high honour they have done me, in electing me an honorary member. You are perfectly right in saying that I am not disposed to ungenerous reserves in my estimate of the most gifted Scotchman whom we have known for perhaps a couple of centuries.
     Very truly yours,
     William Jack

His address is embossed on the writing paper, so does not show up in photocopies.

The letter is addressed to James Dickie, Esq., Secretary, Irvine Burns Club

His life & work:

Edwin Jenkins is currently our mystery member, in that we - so far - know nothing of him, except that in our records he is noted simply as the "author of Jink's Baby". The address from which he wrote indicates that he was very likely a barrister. He does not appear in any of the lists of minor Victorian poets which we have so far consulted.

Sir,
     I have to acknowledge with great satisfaction and many thanks the honour done to me by the Irvine Burns Club in electing me an honorary member. I have also to express my gratitude for the interesting memorial of Burns which you have sent me.
     I well remember, as who could ever forget, the profound and pleasurable emotions awakened in me by the reading of the Cotters Saturday Night when a boy, in I think Chambers' Miscellany and the renewed pleasure its reading always affords me. This copy of it will always have a special value to me.
     I may also give expression to the gratification afforded me by the fact that this compliment implies on the part of those who confer it an acquaintance with and approval of some things I have written. I value it much as an evidence of your goodwill that you associate me with yourselves in the duty of doing honour to your matchless poet.
     I am Sir
     Yours truly
     Edwin Jenkins

The name 'Paper Buildings', part of the Inner Temple, comes from the timber and plaster 'paper work' construction of the first (1610) building on that site, destroyed by fire in 1838. No. 5 was rebuilt in 1847-49.

The letter was to Jas. Dickie, Esq., Honorary Secy.

His life & work:

At age 19, Henry Bartle Edwards Frere graduated from the East India Company's college and began a long career in the Indian Civil Service. Starting as an assistant revenue clerk, he rose to Commissioner in Sind (1850-59), where he suppressed the Indian Mutiny (War of Indian Independence) and was rewarded with a knighthood, and to Governor of Bombay (Mumbai) (1862-67), where he restructured the town along modern lines.

The date of his Honorary Membership has proved most interesting. The preceding year, 1873, had been one of success, including having a mountain in N E Queensland named in his honour by Scottish explorer George A F E Dalrymple. In 1865-66, Livingstone had stayed with Sir Bartle in Bombay - both were determined opponents of the east African slave-trade, Livingstone from his knowledge of the interior areas of Africa around Lake Nyasa, and Frere from the Anglo-Indians of Bombay who traded with the Zanzibar Arabs. Frere's assistance to Livingstone included arranging for him to take some freed slaves from a Bombay government school, and a dozen sepoys from the Bombay Marine Battalion, for his next African expedition. When Livingstone in 1870 reached what he thought were the sources of the four main African rivers, he named one of them Bartle Frere. In 1872 Gladstone's government decided to abolish the sale of all slaves, and Sir Bartle was appointed to sign a treaty with the Sultan of Zanzibar to that effect. Livingstone died on 30 April 1873. After Sir Bartle's threat of a British naval blockade, the Sultan signed on 5 June 1873, from which day the slave market in Zanzibar was closed for ever. It is therefore likely that the Irvine Burns Club approach to Frere, made in the following January, was not merely honouring "the distinguished traveller" (the phrase in our records), but recognising an outstanding humanitarian achievement which Burns would have celebrated - the ending of the last outpost of the trade in human beings - the cumulative result of Livingstone's reports, Stanley's reports, Sir Bartle's representations, and his role in the signing of the treaty. Sadly, Livingstone had not lived to see Frere's treaty.

In 1875, Frere accompanied the Prince of Wales to Egypt and India, a trip so successful that he was created a baronet. In 1877 was appointed Governor of Cape Province to implement the policy of confederation - he provoked a war with Zulu tribes, causing a disastrous British defeat in 1879, though eventually winning the trust of the Boers before recall to London in 1880. He died in 1884, while preparing to answer his critics with a vindication of his actions regarding Afghanistan as well as South Africa. In 1888, a statue of Frere, paid for by public subscription, was unveiled in the Victoria Embankment Gardens by the Prince of Wales.

IJD (with information from Tim Jeal, 'Livingstone' (Yale, 1973), p.353 & passim)

Dear Sir
     Will you return my warmest thanks to the members of the Irvine Burns Club for the honor they have done me in electing me an honorary member of their Club - Whenever I am in the neighbourhood of Irvine I shall hope to thank you and the other members of the Club in person - and to express to you how gratefully I appreciate the honor you have done me.
   Believe me,
     My dear Sir,
     Very faithfully and sincerely yours
     H B E Frere

His life & work:

James McKie was a printer and bookseller at 2 King Street in Kilmarnock. He collected rare editions of Burns and published facsimiles. His 'Bibliotheca Burnsiana' of 1866 listed all the various editions in his private library (the University of Michigan copy is viewable on the Web). In 1867, McKie published 600 copies of a facsimile of the Kilmarnock Edition, and in 1868-70, he published 600 copies of a 4-volume set titled the "Kilmarnock Complete Edition of Burns' Poems & Songs".

James McKie also published the poems of Kilmarnock poetess Marion P Aird in the 1840s and 1860s, as well as starting the 'Kilmarnock Journal' (1844-1857) and the 'Kilmarnock Weekly Post' (1856-1865). His 'Plan of the Town of Kilmarnock' of 1868, showing the newly constructed John Finnie Street, is still of use to planners..

East Ayrshire's 2009 'Burns First Edition Project' aimed, inter alia, to ensure that his important collection of Burns memorabilia, by then in storage for 30 years, is made available to the public.

In our minute book, James McKie is wrongly listed in the list of "gentlemen elected ordinary members of the Club", though there is a faint pencil cross in the margin opposite. From his letter of acceptance, we know that this enthusiastic Burnsian and literary publisher was indeed honoured by Irvine Burns Club in 1875, along with the Rev George Gilfillan (see next entry).

My Dear Sir
     I should & would have written you on receipt of your note I received with the pleasing intelligence that I was elected a member of the Irvine Burns Club.
     I delayed expecting to be in your Royal Burgh personally & in accepting the honour thank you over a dram - however although I have threatened over & over again to visit Irvine for the past fortnight I have not been able to accomplish it & hence my now writing you to say "thank you" for the honour your Club has conferred upon me by electing me one of your Members.
     Allow me to remark at same time that in the reports of your last Anniversary you noted as to me having presented you with an "Edition of Burns" while the expression ought to be a copy of the "Burns Calendar".
     I certainly am very sorry at the overlook & omission of not noticing the ring presented to the Monument at the Brig O' Doon by Mr Dick [?] but shall take the earliest possible opportunity I can place to remedy the omission.
     Do you know if Mr Murchland is alive & in his usual health as when I was last in Irvine I paid him half a guinea for a picture which he has never yet sent me ! ! !    I am
     My Dear Sir
     Yours faithfully
     James McKie
     P.S. no word of Mr Balsillie yet.

The letter heading bears the town name and a portrait of the Bard, as suited a Burns collector and a printer. His 'Burns Calendar' is not mentioned in our minutes.

Is the 'ring' the wedding ring of Jean Armour (1788) (still displayed there)?

Charles Murchland was Club President in 1879, while Provost of Irvine Burgh Council.

William Balsillie was a local businessman, perhaps by then retired (he had given up the lease of Duntonknoll Quarry in 1867)

His life & work:

Our minute book clearly records the reason for Rev Gilfillan's nomination, that he "had recently edited an Edition of the Works of Burns with a comprehensive Biography and criticism of the man and the Poet".

This Scotish author and poet is described as a spasmodic poet - a term applied by William Edmonstoune Aytoun (another honorary member) to a group of British poets of the Victorian era, certainly with some derogatory as well as humorous intention. A friend and inspiration of William McGonagall (whose first poetic production in 1877 was addressed to Gilfillan), Rev Gilfillan is best known for his encouragement of the young Spasmodics in his literary reviews written under the pseudonym Apollodorus.

Other biographical notes may follow. Meanwhile consult another site.

Dear Sir
     Please return my warm thanks to the Irvine Burns Club for the great honour they have done me in electing me a member of their body and also for their kindness in sending me a facsimile of the Poet's Masterpiece which I gladly receive and highly value.
     I am
     Dear Sir,
     Yours very truly
     George Gilfillan

His life & work:

Our minute book makes clear the reason for Sir James Salmon's nomination in these terms: "H M Inspector General of Hospitals and Fleets at Gosport and an Honorary Physician to the Queen, a native of Irvine". Thus, in two successive years, 1880 and 1881, the Club honoured two Irvine natives, the second (Dr White) having made his mark in his own town, the first (Sir James) having made his mark nationally.

Dr Salmon held the post at Gosport from 1869 to 1873, at that time being just "J Salmon MD". It would be interesting to discover his career from 1873 to 1880 and to discover what led him to be recognised by the Court. We cannot - yet - find any details of this career, nor in fact any record of his boyhood, his birth being before statutory records began in 1855, and dependent on the existence of the appropriate parish records.

My Dear Sir
     I beg to acknowledge the receipt of your kind letter of the 12th instant, conveying to me the honor done me by my fellow townsmen in electing me an Honorary Member of Irvine Burns' Club.
     I beg to assure you that I highly appreciate this kind remembrance of me, and I thank you very much for your own considerate kindness in sending me the fac simile of that beautiful poem, The Cotter's Saturday Night. - so true to nature and the character of our forefathers.
     I would wish to revisit once more my native town, but I fear much I can only visit it in memory for I am not likely to be able to travel so far.
     I am obliged to live by rule and to guard myself as much as possible from every thing that might produce a cold and I can only go out when the sun is shining and the wind moderate.
     I have been able however to go out more this winter than the one before, and in summer time. My walks extend to 4 miles a day.
     Till my illness 2 years ago I was an active I may say young man, but heavy disease has made me feel my years.
     I beg to remain with Every kind expression
     My Dear Sir
     Yours very truly
     J A Salmon

The letter is adressed to Jas. Dickie, Esquire, Town Clerk, Irvine (the Club's Honorary Secretary).

His life & work:

John White was commercial and later mathematics master for thirty-two years, from 1834 to 1866, at Irvine Academy (opened in 1816; the royal grant to the former burgh school justified the new title Irvine Royal Academy when the new building opened in 1901). Like the Rector and the English master, White was not a graduate, but was so outstanding as to be awarded an honorary doctorate. He was the son of James White, coal merchant.

White was the author of several textbooks as well as slim volumes of verse and essays. Taking the rector's mathematics classes from 1845, he taught so successfully that he had inscribed on a board a list of former pupils who had distinguished themselves, including thirty-six prize-winners at Glasgow University - among them was William Jack (hon. member 1871, see notes there). He was an enthusiast for archery, fishing and music, a Conservative and a churchman, fond of snuff and practical jokes. He was also a hard taskmaster who kept the pupils who boarded at his home in Bank Street at their studies even on Marymass Saturdays till after noon (John Strawhorn, "The History of Irvine", 1985).

Dr White had served as Irvine Burns Club President in 1871. He was the son of James White, coal merchant, and had married Grace Welsh. His house on Bank Street was "Cosie Ha'", more recently, until 2008, the office of T E Docherty, the coach hirers. He died in March 1896, a few months before the arrival in Irvine of the statue of Robert Burns.

My dear Sir,
     I duly received your official note informing me that I was, at a recent meeting of the Irvine Burns' Club, elected an Honorary Member. The honour I duly appreciate and I hope that you will, at your convenience, intimate to the members that I am proud of the compliment conferred upon me. I am
     My dear Sir,
     Yours Very(?) Truly
     John White

The letter is adressed to James Dickie, Esq., Solicitor, Irvine (the Club's Honorary Secretary).

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