Colonial Despatches

Dundas was born in Edinburgh to Elizabeth and James Dundas. He schooled at Westminster and Oxford, where he received his BA in 1820, and his MA two years later. Dundas's life was a blend of law and politics, and by 1840, he was appointed to the Queen's Council. On 10 July 1846, he became solicitor-general under Lord John Russell. Dundas was knighted on 4 February, 1847, but would resign from office due to inconstant health in March of 1848. A more comfortable post was offered, as principal clerk of the House of Lords, but Dundas declined the position. He took office again in May of 1849 as judge-advocate-general; thereafter, he was sworn into the privy council on June 29th of the same year. He retired from political life altogether in 1852.1

In his role as Solicitor General, Dundas, along with Attorney General John Jervis, was instrumental in the Crown's deliberations on the Hudson's Bay Company's land-grant status following the Oregon Treaty of 1846. The two men signed-off on a Case, attached to an 1847 despatch, that detailed the complex legal arguments surrounding the HBC's position.2

• 1. Gordon Goodwin and H. C. G. Matthew, Dundas, Sir David, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
• 2. Pelly to Grey, 22 January 1847, 93, CO 305/1, 91.