Sir William Forbes, 6th Baronet

Sir William Forbes, 6th Baronet of Monymusk and Pitsligo FRSE (5 April 1739 – 12 November 1806) was a Scottish banker. He was known also as an improving landlord, philanthropist and writer.

He was born in Edinburgh 5 April 1739. His father Willam Forbes, heir to a Nova Scotia baronetcy, was an advocate; the family estate at Monymusk in Aberdeenshire, had been sold by his grandfather. Forbes's maternal grandmother was a sister of Lord Pitsligo, whose activities in 1745 led to the forfeiture of his estate, also in Aberdeenshire. His mother, Christian Forbes, was a member of a collateral branch of the Monymusk family, and was left a widow when William, the elder of two surviving boys from a family of five, was only four years old. She settled in Aberdeen in 1745 for the education of her children, who were brought up as Scottish episcopalians. The younger boy died in 1749, and in October 1753 Lady Forbes, with her surviving son, settled in Edinburgh.

A friend of the family, Sir Francis Farquharson of Haughton, arranged with Messrs. Coutts, a prominent firm of bankers in Edinburgh, to admit Forbes as an apprentice, and he entered their service in 1754. It was run by the sons of John Coutts. The apprenticeship lasted four years, and then he was clerk in the counting-house for two years more, at the end of which he was given a small share in the business as a partner.

In 1761 John Coutts, the principal partner of the Edinburgh firm, died, leaving none of the sons of John Coutts the elder in a position to run it. A new partnership, including Forbes, was proposed and established in 1763. After seven years (in 1770) he married Elizabeth Hay, eldest daughter of Sir James Hay of Smithfield, bart. His mother died in 1789.

From 1763 to 1773 the active members of the firm, still under the original name, were Sir Robert Herries, Forbes, and James Hunter. The name Coutts was retained till 1773, when a new contract was made, and the firm became Forbes, Hunter, & Co., Sir William Herries having settled in London to conduct in St. James's Street the business later known as Herries & Co. Forbes now was the head of the firm, and decided to confine the transactions of the house to banking alone. The house became one of the most trusted in Scotland, and remained stable in the financial crises and panics of 1772, 1788, and 1793. In 1783 the firm, after difficult preliminaries, began to issue notes.

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