Edward Scott

Edward John Long Scott, Keeper of the Muniments at Westminster Abbey from 1891 to his death in 1918 has an oval bronze memorial tablet in the Muniment Room where he worked tirelessly to sort and catalogue thousands of Abbey archives. The Latin inscription can be translated:

In honour of a man outstanding for his piety as for his diligence, Edward John Long Scott, M.A. D.Litt.Oxon, from the year of salvation 1893 to the year of salvation 1918 Keeper of the Muniments of this Church, who so set in order, with the greatest care and enthusiasm, the gathered treasures of the archives as they became accessible to other historians also. The Dean and Chapter saw to the erection of this tablet in memory of one who well deserves it, in the year of salvation 1933.

The tablet gives slightly wrong dates for his time at the Abbey. He was a son of the Reverend George Scott and his wife Mary and was born in Bridgewater on 11th April 1840. He was educated at Marlborough school and Oxford and was a classical and Sanskrit scholar. From 1868 he worked at the British Museum becoming Keeper of Manuscripts in 1888 and Egerton librarian. In 1868 he married Anna Donoghue and they had three sons and two daughters. He was the author of several books on varying subjects. During the morning service at the Abbey on 19th May 1918 he was taken ill and died that afternoon in Westminster Hospital.