SPALDING, JOHN, author of ‘Memorialls of the Trubles in Scotland and in England from the year 1624 to 1645,’ was commissary-clerk of Aberdeen in the reign of Charles I. He is described also as a lawyer or advocate in Aberdeen. His work was first printed in 1792 from a manuscript preserved in the library of the King’s college, Aberdeen. In 1829 a new edition was published at Aberdeen in one volume 8vo, and in 1828 and 1829 another was printed by the Bannatyne Club, under the editorship of Mr. Skene of Rubislaw. The name of Spalding, of whose personal history scarcely anything is known, has been adopted as the designation of an antiquarian club instituted in Aberdeen in December 1839. Lord Saltoun, one of its members, printed, as his contribution to the Club, an edition, said to be the only correct one, of Spalding’s ‘Memorialls,’ from a copy in the collection of the earl of Fife, at Skene house, in 2 vols. 4to. 1850.

According to Nisbet, (Heraldry, vol. i. p. 114), the first of the name of Spalding in Scotland was an Englishman who assisted Sir Thomas Randolph, earl of Moray, in rescuing Berwick from the English in 1318, for which service he got lands in Scotland. Richard Spalding had a charter of confirmation from Prince David, the unfortunate duke of Rothesay, eldest son of Robert III., of Lumletham and Craigaw, Fifeshire.