Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 51.djvu/131

 colleagues, the ‘Glasgow Medical Journal,’ and in 1831 was one of the editors of Cheek's ‘Edinburgh Journal of Natural and Geographical Science.’ He contributed notes and an appendix to the fourth edition of Dr. King's ‘Principles of Geology explained,’ 8vo, Edinburgh, 1853. Scouleria, a genus of plants, and Scoulerite, a mineral, were named in his honour.

He bequeathed his books, which included many of great rarity, to Stirling's Library, Glasgow.

 SCOVELL, GEORGE (1774–1861), general, was born 21 March 1774. He was commissioned as cornet and adjutant in the 4th queen's own dragoons on 5 April 1798, became lieutenant on 4 May 1800, and captain on 10 March 1804. He exchanged to the 57th foot on 12 March 1807. He went to the Peninsula in the following year, and was employed in the quartermaster-general's department throughout the war. He was present at Coruña, the passage of the Douro, Talavera, Busaco, Fuentes d'Onoro, Ciudad Rodrigo, Badajoz, Salamanca, Burgos, Vittoria, the Pyrenees, Nivelle, Nive, the passage of the Adour, and Toulouse. He commanded the corps of guides and had charge of the postal service and the communications of the army till 1813, when he was appointed (on 15 June) to the command of the staff corps of cavalry. He had been made brevet-major on 30 May 1811, and lieutenant-colonel on 17 Aug. 1812, having been mentioned in Wellington's Salamanca despatch. At the end of the war he received the cross with one clasp, and on 2 Jan. 1815 was made K.C.B.

He was again employed in the Waterloo campaign as assistant quartermaster-general, and in command of the staff corps of cavalry; and during the subsequent occupation of France he was charged on different occasions with the duty of preventing collisions between the troops and the people. He received the medal for Waterloo and the Russian order of St. Wladimir (fourth class). On 25 Dec. 1818 he was placed on half pay, and on 23 March 1820 he was appointed to the command of the royal wagon train. He became colonel in the army on 27 May 1825, major-general on 10 Jan. 1837, lieutenant-general on 9 Nov. 1846, and general on 20 June 1854. He was lieutenant-governor of the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, from 25 April 1829 to 2 Feb. 1837, and governor from the latter date to 31 March 1856. He was given the colonelcy of his old regiment, the 4th dragoons, on 18 Dec. 1847, and received the G.C.B. on 18 May 1860. He died at Henley Park, Guildford, Surrey, on 17 Jan. 1861. There is a marble tablet to his memory in the church of the Royal Military College, and a portrait, painted in 1837, in the officers' room there.

 SCRATCHLEY, PETER HENRY (1835–1885), major-general royal engineers, special high commissioner in New Guinea, youngest of thirteen children of Dr. James Scratchley of the royal artillery, and of his wife Maria, daughter of Colonel Roberts, commanding the troops in Ceylon, was born in Paris on 24 Aug. 1835. He was privately educated in Paris, and, after passing through the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich, obtained a commission as second lieutenant in the royal engineers on 11 April 1854, and was promoted to be first lieutenant on 20 June of the same year.

After studying at Chatham, Scratchley was sent to Dover, whence, on 24 July 1855, he proceeded to the Crimea and did duty with a company of sappers and miners in the trenches before Sebastopol. He was present at the fall of Sebastopol, and took part in the expedition to and in the capture of Kinburn on the Black Sea. For his services he received the Crimean war medal, with a clasp for Sebastopol, and the Turkish war medal.

On his return to England in July 1856 Scratchley was stationed successively at Aldershot and Portsmouth. In October 1857 he joined in India the force of Major-general Sir Charles Ashe Windham [q. v.] at Cawnpore, and was appointed adjutant of royal engineers. He was present throughout the operations around the city against Tantia Topi from 24 to 30 Nov. 1857, and on 6 Dec. took part in the battle of Cawnpore, won by Sir Colin Campbell over the rebel Gwaliar force. He commanded the 4th company royal engineers in the subsequent operations of the commander-in-chief's army. On 18 Dec. he accompanied the column under Brigadier-general Walpole by Akbarpur to Itawa, where he was employed on 29 Dec. in blowing up the post held by the rebels. He then accompanied the column to Manipuri. On 3 Jan. 1858 this column joined that of