Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 20.djvu/229

 Burgoyne's troops, has left a painful narrative of his last hours, to which the American historian, Bancroft, makes ungenerous allusion. Burgoyne refers in touching terms to his death, and afterwards inscribed an ode, ‘To the Spirit of Fraser.’ He was buried in one of the British redoubts, and much feeling was caused at the time by the Americans, in ignorance of what was going on, opening a heavy fire on the work (Notes and Queries, 1st ser. ix. 161, 431). A large painting of the event by J. Graham, afterwards engraved by Nutter, is preserved at Farraline House, Stratherrick (ib. 6th ser. xi. 134, 238). Landmann states that the grave could just be traced at the end of the last century (Recollections, i. 221).

Fraser married 14 Oct. 1769 Mrs. Grant, of Percy Street, London (Scots Mag. xxxi. 558), who appears to have been a relative of Colonel Van Phran, then Dutch commandant at the Cape (Cal. Home Office Papers, 1770–1772, p. 278), and by that lady left issue.

[Anderson's Account of the Family of Frisel or Fraser (Edinburgh, 1825, 4to); London Gazettes; Army Lists; Stewart's Sketches of the Scottish Highlanders (Edinburgh, 1822); Knox's Hist. Memoirs (London, 1769); Calendars Home Office Papers, 1766–9, 1770–2; Bancroft's Hist. United States, vol. vi.; Beatson's Nav. and Mil. Memoirs (London, 1794), vols. iv–vi.; Burgoyne's Orderly Book, ed. Dr. O'Callaghan (Albany, N.Y., 1870); Gent. Mag. xlvii. 398, 455, 549, 576 et seq.]  FRASER, SIMON (1726–1782), sometime Master of Lovat, thirty-seventh Macshimi, a lieutenant-general, colonel 71st or Fraser highlanders, was eldest son, by his first wife, Margaret Grant, of Simon, twelfth lord Lovat [q. v.], who was executed in 1747. He was born 19 Oct. and baptised 30 Oct. 1726 (baptismal register, Kiltarlity parish). When the rebellion broke out in 1745, he was studying at the university of St. Andrews, and was sent for by his father to head the clan against his inclinations. When the rebels advanced southwards the clan Fraser set up a sort of blockade of Fort Augustus. With six hundred of his father's vassals Fraser joined Prince Charles at Bannockburn, before the battle of Falkirk, 17 Jan. 1746, and was one of those who met in the house of Mr. Primrose of Dumphall, on the evening of the battle, uncertain of the issue. Thenceforward he was active in the prince's cause. He was not at Culloden, where the Frasers were led by Charles Fraser, jun., of Inverallochy, who, according to stories current at the time, was cruelly shot by the personal order of the Duke of Cumberland when lying grievously wounded on the field of battle. The Frasers fought well and left the ground in some order, and when halfway between Culloden and Inverness met the master coming up with three hundred fresh men. He was one of forty-three persons included in the act of attainder of 4 June 1746. He surrendered to the government, and was kept a prisoner in Edinburgh Castle from November 1746 to 15 Aug. 1747, when he was allowed to proceed to Glasgow to reside there during the king's pleasure. A full and free pardon for him passed the seals in 1750. On 25 July 1752 Fraser entered as an advocate (, List of Advocates). He was one of the counsel for the pursuers in the trial of James Stewart of Aucharn, before a high court of justiciary, opened at Inverary 21 Sept. 1752, by Archibald Campbell, third duke of Argyll [q. v.], as lord justice-general, and Lords Elchies and Kilkerran as judges. The panel was arraigned as art and part in the murder, on 14 May previous, of Colin Campbell of Glenure, a factor appointed by the exchequer to the charge of a forfeited estate. A good deal of political significance attached to the trial, which is said to be the only one in which a lord justice-general and a lord advocate both took part (, pp. 225–9). The evidence on which a conviction was obtained was entirely circumstantial, and it is admitted that the view of the law upheld by the crown side was utterly indefensible. Fraser and James Erskine were counsel for the widow of the murdered man, and the former's address to the jury is given in full in a printed report (Trial of James Stewart, p. 81). Fraser appears to have come to London with Alexander Wedderburn, afterwards Earl of Rosslyn and lord chancellor. Boswell refers to kindnesses shown by the father of Richard Brinsley Sheridan to Fraser and Wedderburn when they came to London as young men (Life of Johnson, 1877 ed. p. 394). Wedderburn entered the Middle Temple in 1753. Fraser, by his own account, was offered a regiment in the French service, but declined, preferring to serve the British crown (petition in Gent. Mag. xliv. 137). At the commencement of the seven years' war Fraser obtained leave to raise a corps of highlanders for the king's service. By his influence with his clan, without the aid of land or money, he raised eight hundred recruits in a few weeks, to which as many more were shortly added. The corps was at first known as the 2nd highland battalion, but immediately afterwards became the 78th or Fraser highlanders, the first of three British regiments which in succession have borne that numerical title. Fraser's commission as colonel was dated 5 Jan. 1757. Under his command