Law officers edit

• Lord Advocate – Henry Dundas;
• Solicitor General for Scotland – Alexander Murray

Judiciary edit

• Lord President of the Court of Session – Lord Arniston, the younger
• Lord Justice General – Duke of Queensberry
• Lord Justice Clerk – Lord Barskimming

• 21 June – Encyclopædia Britannica Second Edition begins publication in Edinburgh.
• 11 September – first minister ordained to United Presbyterian Church, Thurso; first church building opens this year.
• 73rd (Highland) Regiment of Foot (MacLeod's Highlanders) raised.
• Erskine Ferry established.

• 22 January – Joseph Hume, army surgeon and radical politician (died 1855 in London)
• 3 February – John Cheyne, physician (died 1836 in England)
• 24 June – John Ross, naval officer and Arctic explorer (died 1856 in London)
• 26 July – Robert Hamilton Bishop, Presbyterian minister and educator (died 1855 in the United States)
• 27 July – Thomas Campbell, poet (died 1844 in France)
• 21 December – John Campbell, 7th Duke of Argyll, peer and Whig politician (born in London; died 1847)

• 3 January – William Leslie, British Army captain (born 1751; killed at Battle of Princeton)
• 12 January – Hugh Mercer, surgeon and American Continental Army brigadier general (born 1726; died of injuries received at Battle of Princeton)
• 13 January – James Rait, Episcopalian Bishop of Brechin since 1742 (born 1689)
• 23 March – Sir Hugh Paterson, 2nd Baronet, Jacobite (born 1685)
• 7 October – Simon Fraser of Balnain, British Army general (born 1729 in Scotland; killed at Battle of Bemis Heights)

• Fraserburgh Golf Club established.
• Wanlockhead curling club established.

• Timeline of Scottish history