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We have no information as
to where Lieutenant-Colonel Duncan was born, but he settled in our district
about 1799, when he appears to have purchased part of the lands of Glenfuir,
Falkirk residing in the house of that name erected in 1763-64. In heritors’
affairs, he took an active part, and, as we have seen, he was keenly alive
to the necessity for keeping our citizen army in a thorough state of
preparedness during the period when Napoleon threatened our shores. Colonel
Duncan, with his wife and family, appear to have left Falkirk and settled in
Dublin, as during the last two years of his life he was a prisoner for debt
under a Coroner’s warrant, at the State side of Newgate Prison, Dublin. His
death, which took place there on 25th November, 1830, was very sudden, and
from various peculiarities which Colonel Duncan latterly exhibited, he was
much spoken of in and out of prison, and various reports had got into
circulation respecting the cause of death.
A searching inquest was held by Alderman Archer into all the circumstances
attending Colonel Duncan’s death, but we have no space for particulars.
Suffice it to say, that he had become addicted to the drinking of laudanum,
from which it was thought he had died. The inquest, which lasted upwards of
seven hours, was closed by the jury ascertaining that Colonel Duncan’s death
was occasioned by excessive use of laudanum. They returned a verdict of
“Died by the Visitation of God.” |
