Law officers edit

• Lord Advocate – Francis Jeffrey until May; then John Murray until November; then Sir William Rae, Bt
• Solicitor General for Scotland – Henry Cockburn; then Andrew Skene; then Duncan McNeill

Judiciary edit

• Lord President of the Court of Session – Lord Granton
• Lord Justice General – The Duke of Montrose
• Lord Justice Clerk – Lord Boyle

• May – Dean Bridge in Edinburgh opened to horse and cart traffic.^[1]
• 29 July – a steam carriage designed by John Scott Russell on the Glasgow–Paisley road overturns and suffers a boiler explosion causing the death of four passengers.^[2]
• 11 September – emigrant ship Sybelle out of Cromarty wrecked off St. Paul Island (Nova Scotia) with the loss of all 316 passengers and all but six of her crew.^[3]
• 9 October – first shipment of tea direct from India arrives at the Broomielaw quay in Glasgow.^[4]
• 26 December – Ursulines of Jesus take up residence at St Margaret’s Convent in the Whitehouse in Edinburgh, the first Roman Catholic convent established in Scotland since the Reformation;^[5] it will be another 5 years before the first such modern establishment in England.
• Naval architect John Scott Russell first observes a nondecaying solitary wave (a soliton, which he calls "the Wave of Translation") while watching a boat hauled through the water of the Union Canal near Edinburgh, subsequently using a tank to study the dependence of solitary wave velocities on amplitude and liquid depth.^[6]
• Thomas Henderson is appointed first Astronomer Royal for Scotland.
• Edinburgh Geological Society is established.
• Princess Royal Maternity Hospital is established as the Glasgow Lying-in Hospital and Dispensary.
• Annan Bridge built by Robert Stevenson.
• Moffat Academy is established by merger of the local grammar and parish schools.
• Charles Randolph establishes the millwrighting business of Randolph & Elliott in the Tradeston district of Glasgow, predecessor of the Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Company.^[7]
• The McGeoch family establish a pawnbrokers in Paisley, predecessor of the chain store M&Co. (Mackays).
• The Second (New) Statistical Account of Scotland begins publication under the auspices of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland.
• The Evangelical Thomas Chalmers becomes chairman of the General Assembly's church extension committee.^[8]
• The Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews gains its royal patronage.

• 27 January – Alexander Asher, politician and Solicitor General for Scotland (died 1905)
• 16 March – James Hector, geologist (died 1907 in New Zealand)^[9]
• 5 April – Robert Rowand Anderson, architect (died 1921)
• 12 April – William Hope, soldier, recipient of the Victorian Cross (died 1909 in London)
• 27 April – Margaret Macpherson Grant, heiress and philanthropist (died 1877)
• 4 July – Christopher Dresser, designer influential in the Anglo-Japanese style (died 1904 in England)
• 22 August – George Kynoch, businessman (died 1891 in South Africa)
• 17 September – Robert Simpson, retail merchant (died 1897 in Canada)
• 1 October – Mary Mackellar, née Cameron, Gaelic poet and translator (died 1890)
• 12 October – Mark MacTaggart-Stewart, né Stewart, politician (died 1923)
• 23 November – James Thomson ("B.V."), poet (died 1882 in London)
• Probable date – Peter Dodds McCormick, schoolteacher, composer of the Australian national anthem (died 1916 in Australia)

• 26 March – Jean Armour, widow of Robert Burns (born 1765)
• 9 June – John Henry Wishart, surgeon (born 1781)
• 12 July – David Douglas, botanist (born 1799; died in Hawaii)
• 2 September – Thomas Telford, civil engineer (born 1757; died in London)
• 16 September – William Blackwood, publisher and writer (born 1776)
• 21 September – Robert Edmonstone, painter (born 1794)
• 24 November – John Gillies, botanist (born 1792)
• 5 December – Thomas Pringle, writer, poet and abolitionist (born 1789; died in London)
• 7 December – Edward Irving, founder of the Catholic Apostolic Church (born 1792)
• Anne Forbes, portrait painter (born 1745)
• Probable date – Sarah Bezra Nicol, actress (born in England)

• 1834 in Ireland