Description:James Loch’s name is synonymous with the Sutherland estates. Through his employment as Chief Agent to the Marquis of Stafford and later to the Duke and Duchess of Sutherland, James Loch would become, as Professor Eric Richards writes, ‘widely regarded as the finest barrister-auditor of his day’.
From an early age James Loch gained experience and knowledge of estate administration from his uncle the lawyer and politician William Adam (1751–1839). After studying law at Edinburgh University, Loch pursued work in law and politics before deciding on a career in estate management.
In 1812 Loch was appointed as Chief Agent of the estates owned by George Granville Leveson-Gower, Marquis of Stafford (1758-1833) who became the first Duke of Sutherland in 1833. Professor Eric Richards describes Loch’s role which involved ‘centralizing decision making for the estate as a whole’ and overseeing the work of sub-agents employed on the Marquis’s individual estates in Staffordshire, Shropshire and Sutherlandshire. Loch worked closely as an advisor to the Marquis and later to his son George Granville Sutherland Leveson-Gower, the second Duke of Sutherland (1786-1861), overseeing the management and administration of the family’s estates and advising on investment policies.
During his time at Edinburgh University, Loch had grown interested in ideologies of industrial improvement which he applied to his management of the Sutherland estates. As Professor Eric Richards writes, Loch’s career remains ‘most publicly known’ for his involvement in the controversial Highland Clearances. In An Account of the Improvements on the Estates of the Marquess of Stafford’, an account which Loch published in 1820 defending the policy, he described the motivation behind the Clearances as being to improve ‘the industry’ of estates in Sutherlandshire in such a way that they would contribute ‘to the wealth of the empire’. Loch’s ideals of improvement led to his involvement in the passing of the Reform Bill in 1832.
Aside from his responsibilities as Chief Agent to the first and second Dukes of Sutherland, James Loch was instrumental in the development of both canal and railway networks in Britain. Appointed director of the Grand Junction Railway and also of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, Loch held a number of public offices and was one of the founding figures of London University.
James Loch’s influence over the Sutherland estates is evident in the huge number of documents which survive in the Sutherland Papers relating to his life and career. Loch was involved in every aspect of estate management, from daily correspondence with under-agents, to his public defence of the Highland Clearances. His immense importance to the Sutherland estates throughout the first half of the nineteenth century is well documented in letters advising the first and second Dukes of Sutherland on management policies, particularly concerning the family’s investment in inland transport during the 1820s.
James Loch died in London in 1855, leaving the management of the Sutherland estates to his son George Loch (1811-1877).
Click on the image on the left to learn about the ideologies behind James Loch’s policies of estate management in a letter written to Francis Suther in November 1813.
Biographical content here based on Eric Richards, ‘Loch, James (1780–1855)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/16883] and Eric Richards The Leviathan of Wealth (Routledge, 1973)