Born
Charles Fergusson, he was the second surviving son of
Sir Charles Dalrymple Fergusson, 5th Baronet, and grandson of Sir James Fergusson, 4th Baronet, and his wife Jean, daughter of
David Dalrymple, Lord Hailes.
Sir James Fergusson, 6th Baronet, was his elder brother. On the death of his father in 1849 he assumed the surname of Dalrymple in lieu of Fergusson. He was educated at
Harrow School and
Trinity College, Cambridge, graduating with third-class honours in classics. He was called to the bar at
Lincoln's Inn in 1865. In 1849 he assumed the surname Dalrymple in lieu of his patronymic in accordance with the will of his great-grandfather
David Dalrymple, Lord Hailes He was a
Justice of the Peace and
Deputy Lieutenant for
East Lothian, and a JP for Midlothian and Ayrshire, and a captain in the Prince Regent's Ayr and Wigtown Militia. His seat was at
Newhailes, Musselburgh. He entered Parliament for
Buteshire in 1868, a seat he held, with a brief interruption from April to July 60, until 1885, and later represented
Ipswich from
1886 to 1906. He was created a
baronet, of New Hailes in the County of Midlothian, in 1887, and sworn of the
Privy Council, in 1905. From 1894 to 1896 he was Grand Master of the Freemasons in Scotland. Dalrymple died on 20 June 1916, aged 76. He is buried in
Inveresk churchyard. The grave lies in the north-west corner of the first Victorian cemetery extension, west of the main churchyard. ==Family==