Thomas Forbes

This is almost certainly the Thomas Forbes involved in the printing Dr John Burton's Genuine and True Journal of the Most Miraculous Escape of the Young Chevalier, for which Forbes was prosecuted (and mistaken for the author) in 1753 (NA SP 36/161/1/252); the Jacobite sympathiser Thomas Carte (1686-1754) had also asked Thomas Forbes to prepare the fourth volume of his General History of England for print, prior to Forbes's papers being seized (SP 36/120/2/69). Although Thomas Forbes is not an uncommon name, this is possibly also the Thomas Forbes who witnessed Forbes's baptism of Charles Edward Carnegie Robertson (son of James Robertson, vintner) in June 1746 (Registers of the Episcopal Congregation in Leith, 1733-1775, p. 30). He might also be the Thomas Forbes in Rosebery's List of Persons Concerned in the Rebellion: a vintner (Copy of a Letter from Tam Forbes, London, July 28. 1749 is transmitted via vintner David Watson) originally from Peterhead (Aberdeenshire) who joined the Rising from Edinburgh. The Muster Roll of Prince Charles Edward Stuart's Army (ed. Livingstone, Aikman, and Hart) identifies this Thomas Forbes as a volunteer in Pitsligo's Horse (p. 58). There is also a Thomas Forbes (then of Castle Street, St Martin-in-the-Field) who in 1746 was sent by John Farquharson of Allargue to Scotland to find witnesses favourable to Farquharson's case (NA SP 36/89/2/9 ff. 15-16).