Alexander John Scott a chaplain in the Royal Navy who served under and was a friend of Lord Nelson on board HMS Victory during the Battle of Trafalgar.
In April 1887 Gatty moved to Yeovil where he became editor of the Western Chronicle (a newspaper with Liberal interests started by Lord Wolverton).
The first Mass celebrated in Yeovil since the Reformation 350 years previously was held on Sunday 13 November 1887 in Gatty's drawing room at 137 Hendford Hill.
A year later religious intolerance led to a "great and bitter" anti-Catholic demonstration at the Town Hall; following this the Chantry windows were broken and the Carmelite Fathers were intimidated by "the rough element".
His opponents included author and publisher Sampson Low who wrote a book aimed at Gatty and defending the English Church.
In March that year his opponent Henry Richard Farquharson began a 'drirty tricks' campaign and told St John Brodrick in the House of Commons that Gatty had been expelled from Charterhouse aged 13.
The jury reached their decision "without leaving the box" and the verdict "was received with applause"[10] Shortly after the trial Gatty served as secretary to the Chief Ministerial Whip, T. E. Ellis.
Between 1898 and 1905 Gatty was joint editor, with the Henry Fitzalan-Howard, 15th Duke of Norfolk, of the hymnal Arundel Hymns, to which Pope Leo XIII contributed a preface in form of a personal letter.
[16][17] A letter exists from the Irish Art Companions to Patrick Pearse dated 7 March 1910 asking him to "give bearer cheque as promised".
His obituary stated "By his death there is removed a cultured and interesting personality, a man with a great number of friends both in this country, and in Ireland" Among the bequests in his will was "a framed page of fourteenth-century Liturgical MS. "given me by John Ruskin".