Born on Aros, Kintyre, to a family of very modest means, his father an agricultural laborer who frequently moved his family for work, William McTaggart showed early signs of interest in the arts and a talent for drawing and painting. The twelve year-old McTaggart was apprenticed with the apothecary Dr John Buchan in Campbeltown, who appears to have had an active role in encouraging and nurturing the talent of the boy, introducing him to the painter Daniel MacNee.

McTaggart was fortunate enough to be able to enroll into the Trustees' Academy in Edinburgh in 1852 and attend courses for free, earning his lodgings and living by painting portraits. His arrival at the Academy coincided with the arri...