William Dick of Braid

Sir William Dick of Braid (1580–1655) was a 17th-century Scottish landowner, banker and merchant who served as Lord Provost of Edinburgh from 1638 to 1640.

[5] As a banker in 1617 he loaned £66,666 to the treasurer-depute Gideon Murray for the visit of James VI and I to Scotland, indicating his enormous wealth and power.

[6] In 1639 he loaned the Covenanting Army under James Graham, Marquess of Montrose a staggering £200,000 (£24 million in current terms).

Much of this building (which he built in 1630) still survives (behind a new office on Advocates Close) and is known by the name of an earlier occupier of the site as Adam Bothwell's House.

[14] During the English Civil War his Royalist sympathies came home to roost when Cromwell's troops camped at the Braid and demanded compensation for his loyalist support.

Although some records state he died in prison, he had been confined in private lodgings in Westminster in London.