The Right Honourable Alexander Maconochie, Lord Meadowbank of Garvock and Pitliver (2 March 1777 – 30 November 1861), was a Scottish advocate, judge, landowner and politician. After 1854 he took the surname Maconochie-Welwood.
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Life
Maconochie was born on 2 March 1777 in "Society" a district in south Edinburgh, Midlothian (now known as the Pleasance), the eldest son of Elizabeth Welwood of Garvock and Allan Maconochie, Lord Meadowbank. He was educated at the Royal High School, Edinburgh, and at the University of Edinburgh. He was admitted as an advocate in 1799, and in 1800 admitted to the Highland Society.
He served as Sheriff of Haddington from 1810 and Solicitor General for Scotland from 1813, and as Lord Advocate from 1816 to 1819.
He was Member of Parliament for Yarmouth, Isle of Wight, England, from 1817–1818, and for the Kilrenny district of Anstruther Burghs from 1818 to 1819. He made his Parliamentary debut during a period of considerable unrest in both Scotland and England in 1817, choosing to mark it by announcing the existence of a seditious conspiracy of weavers in the suburbs of Glasgow. The ensuing prosecutions were spectacularly unsuccessful, however, and caused considerable embarrassment, both to the government and to Maconochie himself, who, as Lord Advocate, was directly responsible.
In 1817 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. His proposers were Sir William Arbuthnot, 1st Baronet, Thomas Allan, Sir David Brewster and Sir Henry Jardine. He served as a Councillor of the Society during 1822-5 (Literary section) and 1835–7.