Sir Peter Coats

Sir Peter Coats of Auchendrane FRSE DL (1808-1890) was a Scottish thread manufacturer and philanthropist of note. He was co-founder of the firm J & P Coats which later evolved into Coats Group.

He was born on 18 July 1808 in Paisley and is deeply associated with that town. He attended Paisley Grammar School and then the University of Glasgow, at first intending to study for as a minister. However he decided to follow his father, James Coats, as a thread manufacturer (largely in partnership with his younger brother Thomas Coats).

In 1850 he had a large mansion, Woodside House, built for him in Paisley. This was designed by Charles Wilson.

He was knighted in 1869. Following his wife’s death in 1877 he retired to Auchedrane near Maybole in Ayrshire, and lived there for more than twenty years. He is fondly remembered in Maybole.

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1881. His proposers were Sir Daniel Macnee, Sir Archibald Geikie, Alexander Buchan and Robert Mackay Smith.

He died in the Mustapha Superieur quarter of Algiers on 9 March 1890 aged 81. His body was returned to Paisley for burial in Woodside Cemetery, west of the town centre.

In the same vein as Carnegie, Coats believed that gain in personal wealth had to be balanced against good deeds in a public way. In 1870 Coats gifted his home town of Paisley a Free Library and Museum, built wholly at his expense, and intended for the improvement and education of all.

A statue of Peter Coats is paired with a statue of Thomas Coats in the centre of Paisley just west of the town hall. The pair were sculpted by William Birnie Rhind.

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