Author: Pennecuik, Alexander
Biography:
PENNECUIK, Alexander (1652-1722: ODNB)
Little is known of his life and the poem by him in Comic Poems, of the Years 1685 and 1793 was first published in 1715. The other work listed under his name in this database, The Interlocutor, is traditionally ascribed to him but with no explanation of why it was not published until 1803. He was the elder son of Alexander Pennecuik, an army surgeon, and his wife Margaret Murray. The family home was at Newhall, Carlops, Midlothian, Scotland. An Alexander Pennecuik graduated MA from the University of Edinburgh in 1664 but it is scarcely credible that this was him. He trained as a physician, possibly in Edinburgh, and practiced in Edinburgh for many years. He was married and had at least two daughters. Possibly the most significant of his works is “A Description of the Shire of Tweeddale” which was printed in his Geographical, Historical Description of the Shire of Tweeddale. With a Miscellany and Curious Collection of Select Scotish [sic] Poems (1715). He died in 1722 and was buried at Newhall. The editor of Comic Poems, Robert Dunmore Craufurd Brown (q.v.), lived at Newhall after his grandfather purchased the estate for him in 1783. (ODNB 13 Sept. 2023; DNB; newhallestate.co.uk 13 Sept. 2023)