Records of James Watt of Greenock

The Books of Accounts include ledgers; daybooks; ships’ account books; an account book for North Carolina business; an account book with Robert Finlay; a pocket account book; an invoice book; a ‘cash received’ book; account books for the town of Greenock; books of debts; a book for work done by carpenters, and an inventory.
The Accounts Files include accounts for the town of Greenock; two series of miscellaneous accounts; discharged accounts; accounts with John Muirhead & Co.; accounts with George Anderson for the ship Mennie; and the papers about the settlement of outstanding accounts with William and James Weir and with James and Robert Muirhead.
The Correspondence and papers includes letter books (outgoing letters); letters from special correspondents; general business letters (for orders and shipping in Europe, North America, Antigua, etc.); general business letters and papers (for orders and shipping in North Carolina etc.); papers and correspondence with trading associates Robert Finlay and David Cation and Walter Maxwell; miscellaneous letters and papers.

James Watt of Greenock was the second son of Thomas Watt and the father of James Watt. According to J.P.Muirhead, Life of James Watt (1858), he was apprenticed to a builder and shipwright in Crawfordsdyke, and moved to Greenock about 1729
when he married Agnes Muirhead, the daughter of Robert Muirhead, merchant, in Glasgow.
James Watt of Greenock was occupied as a merchant, a builder, a ship’s chandler and a shipwright and had an interest in the American shipping trade. He also served as a member of the Town Council of Greenock for over twenty years.
Three of their children survived, James (the engineer); John Watt jr., who entered the shipping business, but was drowned at sea in the Bahamas in 1763; and Jean, (died 1771), who married John Cochrane, schoolmaster of Inverkip.

The records of James Watt of Greenock have been arranged as follows:
Part 1. Books of Accounts.
Part 2. Accounts files.
Part 3. Correspondence and papers.
Each of the above parts have been separately listed to bundle level. Some bundles have been listed to item level and this is indicated by an asterisk. Numbering is consecutive throughout.
There is a conspectus of new and previous reference numbers.

After his death in August 1782, his papers passed to James Watt. There is a letter from James Walkinshaw to Watt dated 25 April 1801 which includes a bill of lading for sending a chest of drawers and two chests containing James Watt’s father’s papers and models from Greenock to Birmingham [Finding no. MS 3219/4/43].|A letter from Thomas Cochrane (Crawfordsdyke) to James Watt (Glasgow; Candlerigs, at Mr McGrigor's) dated 26 December 1787, [Finding no. MS 3219/3/79] mentions that he has looked over James Watt of Greenock’s records and is trying to sort the accounts out. Jean and Thomas Cochrane (James Watt of Greenock’s daughter and son-in-law) had also been involved in trying to sort out the accounts with the town of Greenock in 1775 - 1776, when those account books could not be found [Finding no. MS 3219/4/80A]. |After the death of James Watt, the papers then came into the possession of James Watt jr., and after his death in 1848, the majority of the paper’s went to the family’s Welsh estate and were part of the ‘James Watt Papers’ purchased in 1994, when they were located in cardboard boxes 4 and 7 [JWP C4 and C7].|The remainder of the papers were in the possession of the Muirhead family and formed part of the donation to the Reference Library in 1921. These included accounts for the town of Greenock and a series of business letters which were found in ‘Muirhead II’, and some personal letters and papers in ‘Muirhead IV’. |The collection was re-arranged and described by Fiona Tait, Project Archivist, Birmingham City Archives, under the Archives of Soho Project, November 1998 - September 2003.

A single receipt from 1744 was discovered at Doldowlod in 2002 and donated to the City Archives. It is listed in the ‘Later additions to the papers of James Watt and Family’ part of the MS 3219 catalogue. [Finding number MS 3219/9/4]|The Watt and Muirhead papers were microfilmed by Adam Matthew Publications as part of Industrial Revolution: A Documentary History. ‘Muirhead I’ was published in file One: part 2 in 1993; ‘Muirhead II-IV’ in file One: parts 6 and 8, in 1997; and the ‘James Watt Papers’ in file Three, in 1999. All the microfilms are available in Birmingham City Archives.

Three Generations of Watts. Extracts from the Doldowlod Papers, by Julian Gibson-Watt (1995), has a section on the trading correspondence of James Watt of Greenock and on the Finlay & Cation papers. [B&W Pamphlets G/7]