FORBES, WILLIAM [SSNE 4675]
Text source
William Forbus was born in Aberdeen, Scotland. He became a merchant burgess of Bergen on 31 May 1706 and thereafter served as Scottish Consul and merchant in the city, even after the Treaty of Union of 1707. He married Maren Jensdatter Beck and they had numerous children including Alexander (02/10/1709), Totbor (30/01/1711), Jens Beck (27/04/1712) and Alexander (18/11/1713). On 9 February 1716 Forbes wrote to the magistrate of Bergen to say how unhappy he was being the Scottish Consul as it resulted in harm and ruin. In this letter he noted that the town bailiff Ole Larsen and Peder Hejberg were his brothers-in-law, and they witnessed his demands on the named Scottish skippers and merchants. On the 27th of the same month, Forbes's wife Maren wrote, in her husband's absence, specifying her husbands debts as attested by the court of Sunhordlen and counter signed again by his brothers-in-law.
Sources: Bergen Statsarkiv, Sollied Archive, Forbus, William; N. Nicolaysen, Bergens Borgerbog 1550-1751 (Oslo, 1878), p.135. It is not clear if this is the same William Forbes who authored Metholodical Treatise concerning Bills of Exchange (1718) noted in T. C. Smout, Scottish Trade on the Eve of Union (Edinburgh & London, 1963), p.122; Steve Murdoch, Network North: Scottish Kin, Commercial and Covert Associations in Northern Europe, 1603-1746 (Brill, Leiden, 2006), p.157.
Service record
- DENMARK-NORWAY, BERGEN, NORWAY
- Arrived 1706-04-30
- Departed 1715-12-31
- Capacity BURGESS, MERCHANT CONSUL, purpose CIVIC, MERCANTILE DIPLOMACY, TRADE