FORBES-GORDON, Benjamin 8th of Skellater and 4th of Balbithan, Lieutenant-General ^{1 2}

  General Notes:

"VIII. Benjamin Forbes of Skellater and Balbithan, Lieut.-General of the 80th Regiment, died 1803, aged 84 (See Note below), when the estate of Skellater was bought on behalf of Charles Forbes, afterwards Sir Charles, 1st Baronet of Newe, for £24,000, and Balbithan passed to Benjamin Abernethie Gordon.

General Benjamin Forbes left three daughters: Margaret, who married Captain Thomas :Mosse. Elizabeth, married Colonel Jerney. Isabella, married the Rev. Samuel Lindsay; so that the male line of the original Skellater Forbeses has died out, though descendants of Auchernach and Belnabodach still exist."

from House of Forbes

Note:

This is an error. The author has confused this man with Benjamin Gordon, 2nd of Balbithan.




"On his death in 1815 he (William Forbes) was succeeded by his son, General Benjamin Forbes. The general was born in 1768, and apparently commissioned in 1779 at the age of eleven in the 73rd Ft. His military career was distinguished but he was largely an absentee laird and in consequence Balbithan suffered. In 1816 he adopted the additional surname of Gordon, and began a long struggle to break the entail. This he succeeded in doing temporarily, upon which he dropped the name of Gordon, but on the entail being proved valid he resumed it. During his life Balbithan was neglected, and many of the fittings sold or destroyed. The only building General Forbes Gordon seems to have been interested in was the erection of a monument to his illegitimate daughter on the Law of Heatherwick, which was removed by his successor. By the end of the general's life the house was in such a sorry state that it was said that lambs were jumping in and out of the windows. He died in 1840 at his Chateau at Baignes de Bigorre, near Paris, and was succeeded by his cousin Benjamin Abernethie, who assumed the name of Gordon."

from Balbithan House ^{1 2}