Clementina was the indirect heir of John Graham of Claverhouse, and was born in the Seagate at a time when the garden reached the foreshore. As a young woman she was a favourite member of the social circles in which Sir Walter Scott, Lord Jeffrey and other notables moved. She published in 1806 a volume, Mystifications, which “afforded endless amusement and much innocent mirth…. extraordinary cheerfulness and vivacity.’”

Scott described her conversation as “shrewd and sensible but not brilliant.” She was mainly known for her impersonations (aged 18) of a fictional 80-year old woman, Lady Pitlyal, which fooled everyone. (The “Pitlyal” came from the name of Pitlyal Loch in her grandfather’s lands near Lundie.) In 1829 she published The Bee Preservers, a translation for which she was awarded the Highland Society Medal.

She owned a sawmill and a quarry. On her death she left her Duntrune estate to John E Lacon, her nephew and factor. He tried but failed to change his name to Graham, and died in 1894.

Later in life she was described as “the true type of a Scottish gentlewoman” who “never had an enemy”, and was much loved as a considerate proprietor. She personally vaccinated 300 tenants’ children against smallpox. There is a plaque in Dundee City Council’s store, and a stained glass window donated by her nephew in St Mary’s Episcopal Church, Broughty Ferry, Dundee.