BRUCE, Hon. James (1769-98), of Broom Hall, nr. Dunfermline, Fife.

In 1796 Bruce entered Parliament on the interest of his kinsman, the 1st Earl of Ailesbury, as a supporter of administration. On being appointed précis writer at the Foreign Office he vacated his seat, so as to claim his salary of £300 p.a. He was drowned while crossing the river on horseback at Barneby-upon-Don, Yorkshire, on 10 July 1798. ‘He supported, through his short career, the character of an amiable and virtuous man’, according to an obituary notice.PRO FO366/671, p. 45; Gent. Mag. (1798), ii. 635.