Charles Pasley wrote the defining text on the role of the post-American revolution British Empire. He came from Eskdalemuir in Dumfriesshire. An Essay on the Military Policy and Institutions of the British Empire, published in 1810, changed how Britains thought their empire should relate to the rest of the world. He warned that Britain could not keep its Empire by its 'splendid isolation'. Britain would need to fight to gain its empire, and by using the colonies as a resource for soldiers and sailors it grew by an average of 100,000 square miles per year between the Battle of Waterloo and the American Civil War.

He was highly intelligent, translating the New Testament from Greek at the age of eight. Serving in the Royal Engineers in the Napoleonic Wars he was Europe's leading demolitions expert and siege warfare specialist.