James Braidwood
We stumbled across Mr Braidwood when in Edinburgh, we can't resist a statue and when we looked him up (as of course we had never heard of him) we knew that he was more than deserving of his own historical blog post. James Braidwood was born in 1800, in Edinburgh, the 10th child to his parents. 10 years later his family set up an upholstery firm, but that isn't the occupation that James chose when it came down to it, no. He is credit as the first Master of Engines in Edinburgh's first municipal fire service in 1824. He went on to be the first director of the London Fire Engine Establishment (later the London Fire Brigade) and also progressed modern municipal fire services. It seems the fire service was his life work, and ultimately it was also what killed him. Braidwood became Master of Fire Engines at the young age of 24. He was appointed only 2 months before the Great Fire of Edinburgh and thanks to his background and training in surveying, he established pri...
