Millar, John 1735-1801
Archival location guide — where this economist’s surviving papers are held, their notable correspondents, and key published sources.
Millar's papers are said to have been destroyed by a descendant c. 1943: see Lehmann (below).
Millar’s lectures on government, 1787-88 are preserved in students’ notes, in GULSC,Gen. MSS 289-93.
His lectures on civil law are in the Hamilton papers in GULSC.
Another set of notes on his lectures on the institutions of civil law is in EULSC, MSS Dc 2,45-6
Two sets of lecture notes on civil law, and one on government. National Library of Scotland (NLS), MSS. 2743, 3930. 3931. UL
A set of notes from his lectures on government, 1782. Aberdeen UL
Correspondents
WILLIAM ADAM, several letters, 1784-1799. Adam papers, National Register of Archives (NRA) 9954.
JOHN BOYES, 2 letters, 1778-80, NAS
EDMUND BURKE, four letters, 1784-1785. Wentworth Woodhouse Muniments, Sheffield City Library; 1 letter in Lamport Hall Burke Collection, GUL, MS Gen. 502/36
EDMUND BURKE, one letter, 1784.
Fitzwilliam MSS., Northamptonshire RO
DAVID DOUGLAS, two letters, 1790. Bannerman collection, GULSC
DAVID HUME, one letter, c.1776. Hume papers, Royal Society of Edinburgh.
LAUDERDALE, 1 letter, 1777, Lauderdale papers
JOHN MURRAY, 20 letters, in NLS, Murray papers
WILLIAM PITT the Younger, three letters, n.d. Chatham papers, Public Record Office (PRO)
ADAM SMITH, one letter, 1764. Bannerman collection, Glasgow UL
Printed Material
W. C. LEHMANN, John Millar of Glasgow, 1735-1801 ( Glasgow, 1960).
4 letters to Christopher Wyvill in Political papers, Comprising the Correspondence of Several distinguished Persons in the years 1792, 1793 &c with the Editor, Rev. Christopher Wyvill (York, n.d.),
1 letter to Dugald Stewart, early 1793 in Stewart’s Account of the life and Writings of Adam Smith (1793)
An edition of Letters and Occasional Writings edited by John Cairns and Aaron Garrett will be the third volume devoted to Millar’s writings in the Natural Law and Enlightenment Classics series published by the Liberty Fund under the general editorship of Knud Haakonssen. The other volumes are Historical View of the English Government ed. Mark Phillips and Dale R. Smith ( Indianapolis, 2006); and Origin of the Distinction of Ranks, ed. Aaron Garrett ( Indianapolis, 2006)
New Palgrave ; ODNB XIII 401; IESS x 348.
Portraits: NPG(A); see Lehmann (above).