Fettes College

Image: © kim traynor Taken: 30 Apr 2013

The original building of the College which opened in 1870. The founder, Sir William Fettes (1750-1836), was the son of an Edinburgh merchant who died when William was 8 years old. After attending the High School, he started in business at the age of 18 as a tea and spirits merchant in the High Street, soon adding the sale of groceries. His business prospered when he won government contracts to supply meat and fodder to army barracks in Scotland during the Napoleonic Wars. In 1788 he became a member of Edinburgh's Town Council, serving twice as Lord Provost after 1800. He died heirless in 1836, having lost his only son to typhoid when the latter, aged 27, visited Berlin in 1815. Fettes' endowment for the maintenance and education of "young people whose parents have died without leaving sufficient funds for that purpose or who, from innocent misfortune during their own lives, are unable to give suitable education to their children" was allowed to accrue after his death until the Trustees gave the go-ahead for this school to be erected on his Comely Bank Estate. The building was designed by David Bryce in a mixture of the French château-style with Scottish Baronial elements which has been characterised as "Edinburgh Loire Gothic". (information from a school leaflet) For more information on Fettes and the school that bears his name, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Fettes and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fettes_College

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