PEERAGES | ||||||
Last updated 21/07/2018 (30 Sep 2024) | ||||||
Date | Rank | Order | Name | Born | Died | Age |
DUGAN OF VICTORIA | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
7 Jul 1949 to 17 Aug 1951 |
B | 1 | Winston Joseph Dugan Created Baron Dugan of Victoria 7 Jul 1949 Governor of South Australia 1934‑1939 and of Victoria 1939‑1949 Peerage extinct on his death |
3 Sep 1876 | 17 Aug 1951 | 74 |
DUKESTON | ||||||
1 Apr 1947 to 14 May 1948 |
B | 1 | Charles Dukes Created Baron Dukeston 1 Apr 1947 MP for Warrington 1923‑1924 and 1929‑1931 Peerage extinct on his death |
28 Oct 1881 | 14 May 1948 | 66 |
DULVERTON | ||||||
8 Jul 1929 | B | 1 | Sir Gilbert Alan Hamilton Wills, 2nd baronet Created Baron Dulverton 8 Jul 1929 MP for Taunton 1912‑1918 and Weston-super-Mare 1918‑1922 |
28 Mar 1880 | 1 Dec 1956 | 76 |
1 Dec 1956 | 2 | Frederick Anthony Hamilton Wills | 19 Dec 1915 | 17 Feb 1992 | 76 | |
17 Feb 1992 | 3 | Gilbert Michael Hamilton Wills | 2 May 1944 | |||
DUMBARTON/DUNBARTON | ||||||
9 Mar 1675 | E[S] | 1 | Lord George Douglas Created Lord Douglas of Ettrick and Earl of Dunbarton 9 Mar 1675 KT 1687 |
c 1635 | 20 Mar 1692 | |
20 Mar 1692 to Jan 1738 |
2 | George Douglas On his death the peerage is presumed to have become extinct |
Jan 1738 | |||
16 Jul 2018 | E | 1 | HRH Henry Charles Albert David Created Baron Kilkeel, Earl of Dumbarton and Duke of Sussex 19 May 2018 See "Sussex" |
15 Sep 1984 | ||
DUMFRIES | ||||||
12 Jun 1633 | E[S] | 1 | William Crichton, 9th Lord Crichton of Sanquhar Created Lord of Sanquhar and Viscount of Air 2 Feb 1622, and Lord Crichton, Viscount of Air and Earl of Dumfries 12 Jun 1633 |
1643 | ||
1643 | 2 | William Crichton | 1691 | |||
1691 | 3 | William Crichton | 28 Feb 1694 | |||
28 Feb 1694 | 4 | Penelope Dalrymple | 6 Mar 1742 | |||
6 Mar 1742 | 5 | William Dalrymple-Crichton, later [1760] 4th Earl of Stair KT 1752 |
1699 | 27 Jul 1768 | 69 | |
27 Jul 1768 | 6 | Patrick Macdonnell-Crichton | 15 Oct 1726 | 7 Apr 1803 | 76 | |
7 Apr 1803 | 7 | John Crichton-Stuart He succeeded to the Marquessate of Bute 1814 with which title this peerage then merged and still remains so |
10 Aug 1793 | 18 Mar 1848 | 54 | |
DUMFRIESSHIRE | ||||||
3 Nov 1684 | M[S] | 1 | William Douglas, 1st Marquess of Queensberry Created Lord Douglas of Kinmont, Viscount of Nith, Torthorwald & Ross, Earl of Drumlanrig and Sanquhar, Marquess of Dumfriesshire and Duke of Queensberry 3 Nov 1684 See "Queensberry" |
1637 | 28 Mar 1695 | 57 |
DUNALLEY | ||||||
31 Jul 1800 | B[I] | 1 | Henry Prittie Created Baron Dunalley 31 Jul 1800 MP [I] for Banagher 1767‑1768, Gowran 1769‑1776 and Tipperary County 1776‑1790 |
3 Oct 1743 | 3 Jan 1801 | 57 |
3 Jan 1801 | 2 | Henry Sadlier Prittie MP [I] for Carlow Borough 1798‑1800; MP for Carlow 1801 and Okehampton 1819‑1824 |
3 Mar 1775 | 19 Oct 1854 | 79 | |
19 Oct 1854 | 3 | Henry Prittie | Jan 1807 | 10 Sep 1885 | 78 | |
10 Sep 1885 | 4 | Henry O'Callaghan Prittie Lord Lieutenant Tipperary 1905‑1922 |
21 Mar 1851 | 5 Aug 1927 | 76 | |
5 Aug 1927 | 5 | Henry Cornelius O'Callaghan Prittie | 19 Jul 1877 | 3 May 1948 | 70 | |
3 May 1948 | 6 | Henry Desmond Graham Prittie | 14 Oct 1912 | 26 Jun 1992 | 79 | |
26 Jun 1992 | 7 | Henry Francis Cornelius Prittie | 30 May 1948 | |||
DUNBAR | ||||||
1072 | E[S] | 1 | Gospatric Created Earl of Dunbar 1072 |
c 1115 | ||
c 1115 | 2 | Gospatric de Dunbar | 22 Aug 1138 | |||
22 Aug 1138 | 3 | Gospatric de Dunbar | 1166 | |||
1166 | 4 | Waltheof de Dunbar | 1182 | |||
1182 | 5 | Patrick de Dunbar | 31 Dec 1232 | |||
31 Dec 1232 | 6 | Patrick de Dunbar | 1248 | |||
1248 | 7 | Patrick de Dunbar | 1213 | 24 Aug 1289 | 76 | |
24 Aug 1289 | 8 | Patrick de Dunbar | 1242 | 10 Oct 1308 | 66 | |
10 Oct 1308 | 9 | Patrick de Dunbar For information on this peer's wife, see the note at the foot of this page |
1284 | 11 Nov 1368 | 84 | |
11 Nov 1368 | 10 | George Dunbar | c 1336 | c 1416 | ||
c 1416 to 10 Jan 1435 |
11 | George Dunbar His peerage was forfeited in 1435 |
c 1370 | 1457 | ||
5 Mar 1580 to 29 Mar 1586 |
B[S] | 1 | Robert Stuart Created Lord of Dunbar and Earl of March 5 Mar 1580 Peerages extinct on his death |
29 Mar 1586 | ||
3 Jul 1605 to 29 Jan 1612 |
E[S] | 1 | George Howme Created Hume of Berwick 7 Jul 1604 and Earl of Dunbar 3 Jul 1605 KG 1608 On his death the peerages became dormant |
29 Jan 1612 | ||
14 Nov 1620 | V[S] | 1 | Sir Henry Constable Created Lord Constable and Viscount of Dunbar 14 Nov 1620 |
c 1588 | 1645 | |
1645 | 2 | John Constable | 1615 | c 1668 | ||
c 1668 | 3 | Robert Constable | 1651 | 23 Nov 1714 | 63 | |
23 Nov 1714 to 15 Aug 1718 |
4 | William Constable On his death the peerage became dormant |
1654 | 15 Aug 1718 | 64 | |
DUNBARTON | ||||||
See "Dumbarton" | ||||||
DUNBOYNE | ||||||
11 Jun 1541 | B[I] | 1 | Sir Edmond Butler Created Baron of Dunboyne 11 Jun 1541 |
May 1566 | ||
May 1566 | 2 | James Butler | 18 Feb 1624 | |||
18 Feb 1624 | 3 | Edmond Butler | 17 May 1640 | |||
17 May 1640 | 4 | James Butler | 1662 | |||
1662 | 5 | Pierce Butler | 3 May 1690 | |||
3 May 1690 | 6 | James Butler | Jan 1701 | |||
Jan 1701 | 7 | Pierce Butler | c 1718 | |||
c 1718 | 8 | Edmond Butler | Nov 1732 | |||
Nov 1732 | 9 | James Butler | 12 Dec 1768 | |||
12 Dec 1768 | 10 | Pierce Butler | 20 Aug 1773 | |||
20 Aug 1773 | 11 | Pierce Edmond Creagh Butler | Dec 1785 | |||
Dec 1785 | 12 | John Butler Bishop of Cork 1763‑1786 |
c 1720 | 7 May 1800 | ||
7 May 1800 | 13 | James Butler For further information on this peer, see the note at the foot of this page |
25 Jul 1780 | 6 Jul 1850 | 69 | |
6 Jul 1850 | 14 | Theobald Fitzwalter Butler | 11 Feb 1806 | 22 Mar 1881 | 75 | |
22 Mar 1881 | 15 | James Fitzwalter Clifford‑Butler | 20 May 1839 | 17 Aug 1899 | 60 | |
17 Aug 1899 | 16 | Robert St. John Fitzwalter Butler | 20 Jan 1844 | 29 Aug 1913 | 69 | |
29 Aug 1913 | 17 | Fitzwalter George Probyn Butler | 20 Mar 1874 | 9 May 1945 | 71 | |
9 May 1945 | 18 | Patrick Theobald Tower Butler | 27 Jan 1917 | 19 May 2004 | 87 | |
19 May 2004 | 19 | John Fitzwalter Butler | 31 Jul 1951 | 11 Jul 2013 | 61 | |
11 Jul 2013 | 20 | Richard Pierce Theobald Butler | 5 Jul 1983 | |||
29 Nov 1719 | B[I] | 1 | William Grimston Created Baron Dunboyne and Viscount Grimston 29 Nov 1719 See "Grimston" |
c 1683 | 19 Oct 1756 | |
DUNCAN | ||||||
30 Oct 1797 | V | 1 | Adam Duncan Created Baron Duncan and Viscount Duncan of Camperdown 30 Oct 1797 See "Camperdown" |
1 Jul 1731 | 4 Aug 1804 | 73 |
DUNCAN OF SPRINGBANK | ||||||
14 Jul 2017 | B[L] | Ian James Duncan Created Baron Duncan of Springbank for life 14 Jul 2017 MEP for Scotland 2014‑2017 |
13 Feb 1973 | |||
DUNCANNON | ||||||
28 Feb 1723 | V[I] | 1 | William Ponsonby Created Baron Bessborough 11 Sep 1721 and Viscount Duncannon 28 Feb 1723 See "Bessborough" |
1659 | 17 Nov 1724 | 65 |
19 Jul 1834 | B | 1 | John William Ponsonby, later [1844] 4th Earl of Bessborough Created Baron Duncannon 19 Jul 1834 See "Bessborough" |
31 Aug 1781 | 16 May 1847 | 65 |
DUNCAN-SANDYS | ||||||
2 May 1974 to 26 Nov 1987 |
B[L] | Duncan Edwin Duncan‑Sandys Created Baron Duncan-Sandys for life 2 May 1974 MP for Norwood 1935‑1945 and Streatham 1950‑1974; Minister of Works 1944‑1945; Minister of Supply 1951‑1954; Minister of Housing & Local Government 1954‑1957; Minister of Defence 1957‑1959; Minister of Aviation 1959‑1960; Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations 1960‑1964; PC 1944; CH 1973 Peerage extinct on his death |
24 Jan 1908 | 26 Nov 1987 | 79 | |
DUNDAFF | ||||||
24 Apr 1707 | V[S] | 1 | James Graham, 4th Marquess of Montrose Created Lord Aberruthven, Viscount of Dundaff, Earl of Kincardine, Marquess of Graham and Duke of Montrose 24 Apr 1707 See "Montrose" |
1682 | 7 Jan 1742 | 59 |
DUNDALK | ||||||
18 Jul 1716 to 10 May 1743 |
B[L] | Ermengarde Melusina Schulenberg Created Baroness of Dundalk, Countess and Marchioness of Dungannon and Duchess of Munster for life 18 Jul 1716, and Baroness Glastonbury, Countess of Feversham and Duchess of Kendal for life 19 Mar 1719 Mistress of George I Peerages extinct on her death |
1659 | 10 May 1743 | 83 | |
DUNDAS | ||||||
13 Aug 1794 | B | 1 | Sir Thomas Dundas, 2nd baronet Created Baron Dundas 13 Aug 1794 MP for Richmond 1763‑1768 and Stirlingshire 1768‑1794; Lord Lieutenant Orkney and Shetland 1794‑1820 |
16 Feb 1741 | 14 Jun 1820 | 79 |
14 Jun 1820 | 2 | Lawrence Dundas He was created Earl of Zetland 1838 with which title this peerage then merged |
10 Apr 1766 | 19 Feb 1839 | 72 | |
DUNDEE | ||||||
1661 | E[S] | 1 | John Scrymgeour, 3rd Viscount Dudhope Created Lord Scrimgeour, Viscount of Dudhope and Earl of Dundee 1661 On his death, the peerages became dormant. The descent is shown below:- |
23 Jun 1668 | ||
23 Jun 1668 | 2 | [John Scrymgeour] | 1628 | 1698 | 70 | |
[1698] | 3 | [James Scrymgeour] | 1664 | 1699 | 35 | |
[1699] | 4 | [Alexander Scrymgeour] | 1669 | 1739 | 70 | |
[1739] | 5 | [David Scrymgeour] | 1702 | 1772 | 70 | |
[1772] | 6 | [Alexander Scrymgeour-Wedderburn] | 1742 | 1811 | 69 | |
[1811] | 7 | [Henry Scrymgeour-Wedderburn] | 1755 | 1841 | 86 | |
[1841] | 8 | [Frederick Lewis Scrymgeour-Wedderburn] | 1808 | 1874 | 66 | |
[1874] | 9 | [Henry Scrymgeour] | 1840 | 1914 | 74 | |
[1914] | 10 | [Henry Scrymgeour] | 1872 | 1924 | 52 | |
[1924] 1953 |
11 | Henry James Scrymgeour‑Wedderburn MP for Renfrewshire West 1931‑1945; Minister without Portfolio 1958‑1961; Minister of State for Foreign Affairs 1961‑1964; PC 1959 He was created Baron Glassary 30 Jul 1954 Claim to Viscountcy of Dudhope admitted 1952 and claim to Earldom of Dundee admitted 1953 For further information about these successful claims, see the note at the foot of this page |
3 May 1902 | 29 Jun 1983 | 81 | |
29 Jun 1983 | 12 | Alexander Henry Scrymgeour [Elected hereditary peer 1999-] |
5 Jun 1949 | |||
12 Nov 1688 | V[S] | 1 | John Graham Created Lord Grahame of Claverhouse and Viscount of Dundee 12 Nov 1688 For further information on this peer, see the note at the foot of this page |
c Jul 1648 | 27 Jul 1689 | 41 |
27 Jul 1689 | 2 | James Graham | Dec 1689 | |||
Dec 1689 to 13 Jun 1690 |
3 | David Graham Peerages forfeited 1690 |
1700 | |||
DUNDONALD | ||||||
12 May 1669 | E[S] | 1 | Sir William Cochrane Created Lord Cochrane of Dundonald 26 Dec 1647, and Lord Cochrane of Paisley & Ochiltree and Earl of Dundonald 12 May 1669 |
1686 | ||
1686 | 2 | John Cochrane | 16 May 1690 | |||
16 May 1690 | 3 | William Cochrane | 1686 | 22 Nov 1705 | 19 | |
22 Nov 1705 | 4 | John Cochrane | 4 Jul 1687 | 5 Jun 1720 | 32 | |
5 Jun 1720 | 5 | William Cochrane | 1708 | 27 Jan 1725 | 16 | |
27 Jan 1725 | 6 | Thomas Cochrane | 1702 | 28 May 1737 | 34 | |
28 May 1737 | 7 | William Cochrane | 1729 | 9 Jul 1758 | 29 | |
9 Jul 1758 | 8 | Thomas Cochrane MP for Renfrewshire 1722‑1727 |
23 Jul 1691 | 27 Jun 1778 | 86 | |
27 Jun 1778 | 9 | Archibald Cochrane | 1 Jan 1749 | 12 Jul 1831 | 82 | |
12 Jul 1831 | 10 | Thomas Cochrane MP for Honiton 1806 and Westminster 1807‑1814 For further information on this peer, see the note at the foot of this page |
14 Dec 1775 | 31 Oct 1860 | 84 | |
31 Oct 1860 | 11 | Thomas Barnes Cochrane For further information on this peer, see the note at the foot of this page |
28 Apr 1814 | 15 Jan 1885 | 70 | |
15 Jan 1885 | 12 | Douglas Mackinnon Baillie Hamilton Cochrane | 29 Oct 1852 | 12 Apr 1935 | 82 | |
12 Apr 1935 | 13 | Thomas Hesketh Douglas Blair Cochrane | 21 Feb 1886 | 23 May 1958 | 72 | |
23 May 1958 | 14 | Ian Douglas Leonard Cochrane | 6 Dec 1918 | 4 Oct 1986 | 67 | |
4 Oct 1986 | 15 | Iain Alexander Douglas Blair Cochrane | 17 Feb 1961 | |||
DUNEDIN | ||||||
9 Mar 1905 17 Feb 1926 to 21 Aug 1942 |
B V |
1 1 |
Andrew Graham Murray Created Baron Dunedin 9 Mar 1905 and Viscount Dunedin 17 Feb 1926 MP for Buteshire 1891‑1905; Solicitor General for Scotland 1891‑1892 and 1895‑1896; Lord Advocate 1896‑1903; Secretary of State for Scotland 1903‑1905; Lord Justice General of Scotland 1905‑1913; Lord of Appeal in Ordinary 1913‑1932; Lord Lieutenant Bute 1901‑1905; PC 1896 Peerages extinct on his death |
21 Nov 1849 | 21 Aug 1942 | 92 |
DUNFERMLINE | ||||||
4 Mar 1605 | E[S] | 1 | Alexander Seton Created Lord Fyvie 4 Mar 1598 and Earl of Dunfermline 4 Mar 1605 Chancellor of Scotland 1604‑1622 |
16 Jun 1622 | ||
16 Jun 1622 | 2 | Charles Seton | 11 May 1673 | |||
11 May 1673 | 3 | Alexander Seton | 1677 | |||
1677 to 1690 |
4 | James Seton Peerage forfeited 1690 |
26 Dec 1694 | |||
7 Jun 1839 | B | 1 | James Abercromby Created Baron Dunfermline 7 Jun 1839 MP for Midhurst 1807‑1812, Calne 1812‑1830 and Edinburgh 1832‑1839; Speaker of the House of Commons 1835‑1839; PC 1827 |
7 Nov 1776 | 17 Apr 1858 | 81 |
17 Apr 1858 to 12 Jul 1868 |
2 | Ralph Abercromby Peerage extinct on his death |
6 Apr 1803 | 12 Jul 1868 | 65 | |
DUNGAN OF CLANE | ||||||
2 Jan 1686 | V[I] | 1 | Sir William Dungan, 4th baronet Created Viscount Dungan of Clane and Earl of Limerick 2 Jan 1686 See "Limerick" |
c 1630 | Dec 1698 | |
DUNGANNON | ||||||
1 Sep 1542 | B[I] | 1 | Matthew O'Neill Created Baron of Dungannon 1 Sep 1542 |
1558 | ||
1558 | 2 | Brien O'Neill, later [c 1559] 2nd Earl of Tyrone | 12 Apr 1562 | |||
12 Apr 1562 | 3 | Hugh O'Neill, 3rd Earl of Tyrone | c 1540 | 20 Jul 1616 | ||
1587 | 4 | Hugh O'Neill (confirmed in this title 10 May 1587) |
23 Sep 1609 | |||
23 Sep 1609 to 28 Oct 1614 |
5 | Henry O'Neill The peerage was forfeited 28 Oct 1614 |
c 1626 | |||
28 Aug 1662 | V[I] | 1 | Marcus Trevor Created Baron Trevor and Viscount Dungannon 28 Aug 1662 PC [I] 1660 |
15 Apr 1618 | 10 Jan 1670 | 51 |
10 Jan 1670 | 2 | Lewis Trevor | 3 Jan 1693 | |||
3 Jan 1693 to 8 Nov 1706 |
3 | Marcus Trevor Peerage extinct on his death |
1669 | 8 Nov 1706 | 37 | |
18 Jul 1716 to 10 May 1743 |
M[L] | Ermengarde Melusina Schulenberg Created Baroness of Dundalk, Countess and Marchioness of Dungannon and Duchess of Munster for life 18 Jul 1716, and Baroness Glastonbury, Countess of Feversham and Duchess of Kendal for life 19 Mar 1719 Mistress of George I Peerages extinct on her death |
1659 | 10 May 1743 | 83 | |
17 Feb 1766 | V[I] | 1 | Arthur Hill-Trevor Created Baron Hill of Olderfleet and Viscount Dungannon 17 Feb 1766 MP [I] for Hillsborough 1715‑1727 and Down County 1727‑1766; PC [I] 1750 |
c 1694 | 30 Jan 1771 | |
30 Jan 1771 | 2 | Arthur Hill-Trevor | 2 Oct 1763 | 14 Dec 1837 | 74 | |
14 Dec 1837 to 11 Aug 1862 |
3 | Arthur Hill-Trevor MP for New Romney 1830 and Durham 1831 and 1835‑1841 Peerage extinct on his death |
9 Nov 1798 | 11 Aug 1862 | 63 | |
DUNGARVAN | ||||||
26 Oct 1620 | V[I] | 1 | Richard Boyle, 1st Baron Boyle of Youghal Created Viscount Dungarvan and Earl of the County of Cork 26 Oct 1620 See "Cork" |
3 Oct 1566 | 15 Sep 1643 | 76 |
28 Jan 1663 | Charles Boyle He was summoned to the Irish House of Lords by a Writ of Acceleration as Viscount Dungarvan 28 Jan 1663 and to the House of Lords as Baron Clifford of Lanesborough 16 Jul 1689 MP for Tamworth 1670‑1679 and Yorkshire 1679‑1689 He was the son and heir apparent of the 2nd Earl of Cork, but died before he could succeed to that title |
17 Nov 1639 | 12 Oct 1694 | 54 | ||
DUNGLASS | ||||||
4 Mar 1605 | B[S] | 1 | Alexander Home, 6th Lord Home Created Lord Dunglass and Earl of Home 4 Mar 1605 See "Home" |
c 1566 | 5 Apr 1619 | |
DUNIRA | ||||||
24 Dec 1802 | B | 1 | Henry Dundas Created Baron Dunira and Viscount Melville 24 Dec 1802 See "Melville" |
28 Apr 1742 | 2 May 1811 | 69 |
DUNKELD | ||||||
15 May 1645 | B[S] | 1 | Sir James Galloway Created Lord Dunkeld 15 May 1645 |
2 Dec 1660 | ||
2 Dec 1660 | 2 | Thomas Galloway | c 1680 | |||
c 1680 to 1690 |
3 | James Galloway He was attainted and the peerage forfeited |
2 Jul 1664 | 16 Aug 1705 | 41 | |
DUNKELLIN | ||||||
1 Jul 1543 | B[I] | 1 | Ulick de Burgh Created Baron of Dunkellin and Earl of Clanricarde 1 Jul 1543 See "Clanricarde" |
19 Oct 1544 | ||
3 Aug 1711 | Michael Bourke Summoned to the Irish House of Lords by a Writ of Acceleration as Baron Dunkellin 3 Aug 1711 He succeeded as 10th Earl of Clanricarde in 1722 |
1686 | 29 Nov 1726 | 40 | ||
DUNKERRON | ||||||
29 Apr 1719 to 17 Apr 1751 |
V[I] | 1 | Henry Petty Created Baron Shelburne 16 Jun 1699 and Viscount Dunkerron and Earl of Shelburne 29 Apr 1719 MP for Great Marlow 1715‑1722 and Wycombe 1722‑1727; PC 1704 Peerages extinct on his death |
22 Oct 1675 | 17 Apr 1751 | 75 |
7 Oct 1751 | B[I] | 1 | John Petty Created Baron Dunkeron and Viscount Fitzmaurice 7 Oct 1751, Earl of Shelburne 6 Jun 1753 and Baron Wycombe 20 May 1760 See "Shelburne" |
1706 | 10 May 1761 | 54 |
DUNLEATH | ||||||
29 Aug 1892 | B | 1 | John Mulholland Created Baron Dunleath 29 Aug 1892 MP for Downpatrick 1874‑1885 |
16 Dec 1819 | 11 Dec 1895 | 75 |
11 Dec 1895 | 2 | Henry Lyle Mulholland MP for Londonderry North 1885‑1895 |
30 Jan 1854 | 22 Mar 1931 | 77 | |
22 Mar 1931 | 3 | Charles Henry George Mulholland | 19 Aug 1886 | 20 Jul 1956 | 69 | |
20 Jul 1956 | 4 | Charles Edward Henry John Mulholland | 23 Jun 1933 | 9 Jan 1993 | 59 | |
9 Jan 1993 | 5 | Sir Michael Henry Mulholland, 2nd baronet | 15 Oct 1915 | 3 May 1997 | 81 | |
3 May 1997 | 6 | Brian Henry Mulholland | 25 Sep 1950 | |||
DUNLO | ||||||
3 Jan 1801 | V[I] | 1 | William Power Keating Trench Created Baron Kilconnel 25 Nov 1797, Viscount Dunlo 3 Jan 1801 and Earl of Clancarty 12 Feb 1803 See "Clancarty" |
1741 | 27 Apr 1805 | 63 |
DUNLOP | ||||||
26 May 2015 | B[L] | Andrew James Dunlop Created Baron Dunlop for life 26 May 2015 |
21 Jun 1959 | |||
DUNLUCE | ||||||
12 Dec 1620 | V[I] | 1 | Randal Macdonnell Created Viscount Dunluce 28 May 1618 and Earl of Antrim 12 Dec 1620 See "Antrim" |
10 Dec 1636 | ||
13 Oct 1755 | V[I] | 1 | Randall William Macdonnell Created Viscount Dunluce and Earl of Antrim 19 Jun 1785 and Marquess of Antrim 18 Aug 1789 See "Antrim" |
4 Nov 1749 | 29 Jul 1791 | 41 |
DUNMORE | ||||||
11 Jul 1619 to 28 Oct 1628 |
B[I] | 1 | Richard Preston, 1st Lord Dingwall Created Baron Dunmore and Earl of Desmond 11 Jul 1619 Peerages extinct on his death |
28 Oct 1628 | ||
16 Aug 1686 | E[S] | 1 | Lord Charles Murray Created Lord Murray of Blair, Viscount of Fincastle and Earl of Dunmore 16 Aug 1686 MP for Wigan 1685 |
28 Feb 1661 | 19 Apr 1710 | 49 |
19 Apr 1710 | 2 | John Murray | 31 Oct 1685 | 18 Apr 1752 | 66 | |
18 Apr 1752 | 3 | William Murray | 2 Mar 1696 | 1 Dec 1756 | 60 | |
1 Dec 1756 | 4 | John Murray Governor of New York 1770‑1771, Virginia 1771‑1775 and the Bahamas 1787‑1796 For further information on this peer, see the note at the foot of this page |
1730 | 25 Feb 1809 | 78 | |
25 Feb 1809 10 Sep 1831 |
B |
5 1 |
George Murray Created Baron Dunmore [UK] 10 Sep 1831 MP for Liskeard 1800‑1802 |
30 Apr 1762 | 11 Nov 1836 | 74 |
11 Nov 1836 | 6 | Alexander Edward Murray | 1 Jun 1804 | 15 Jul 1845 | 41 | |
15 Jul 1845 | 7 | Charles Adolphus Murray Lord Lieutenant Stirling 1875‑1885 For further information on this peer, see the note at the foot of this page |
24 Mar 1841 | 27 Aug 1907 | 66 | |
27 Aug 1907 | 8 | Alexander Edward Murray VC For further information on this peer and VC winner, see the note at the foot of this page |
22 Apr 1871 | 29 Jan 1962 | 90 | |
29 Jan 1962 | 9 | John Alexander Murray | 3 Apr 1939 | 12 Aug 1980 | 41 | |
12 Aug 1980 | 10 | Reginald Arthur Murray | 17 Jul 1911 | 14 Jun 1981 | 69 | |
14 Jun 1981 | 11 | Kenneth Randolph Murray | 6 Jun 1913 | 28 Sep 1995 | 82 | |
28 Sep 1995 | 12 | Malcolm Kenneth Murray | 17 Sep 1946 | |||
DUNN | ||||||
24 Aug 1990 | B[L] | Dame Lydia Selina Dunn Created Baroness Dunn for life 24 Aug 1990 |
29 Feb 1940 | |||
DUNNING | ||||||
29 Jun 1869 | B | 1 | John Rogerson Rollo, 10th Lord Rollo Created Baron Dunning 29 Jun 1869 See "Rollo" with which title this peerage remains united |
24 Oct 1835 | 2 Oct 1916 | 80 |
DUNOON | ||||||
19 Oct 1706 | B[S] | 1 | Archibald Campbell, 3rd Duke of Argyll Created Lord Oronsay, Dunoon and Arase, and Viscount and Earl of Ilay 19 Oct 1706 See "Argyll" |
Jun 1682 | 15 Apr 1761 | 78 |
DUNRAVEN AND MOUNT EARL | ||||||
5 Feb 1822 | E[I] | 1 | Sir Valentine Richard Quin, 1st baronet Created Baron Adare 31 Jul 1800, Viscount Mount Earl 5 Feb 1816 and Viscount Adare and Earl of Dunraven & Mount Earl 5 Feb 1822 MP [I] for Kilmallock 1799‑1800 |
30 Jul 1752 | 24 Aug 1824 | 72 |
24 Aug 1824 | 2 | Windham Henry Wyndham‑Quin MP for co. Limerick 1806‑1820 |
24 Sep 1782 | 6 Aug 1850 | 67 | |
6 Aug 1850 | 3 | Edward Richard Wyndham‑Quin Created Baron Kenry 12 Jun 1866 MP for Glamorganshire 1837‑1851; Lord Lieutenant Limerick 1864‑1871; KP 1866 |
19 May 1812 | 6 Oct 1871 | 59 | |
6 Oct 1871 | 4 | Windham Thomas Wyndham‑Quin Lord Lieutenant Limerick 1894‑1922; KP 1876; PC [I] 1899 |
12 Feb 1841 | 14 Jun 1926 | 85 | |
14 Jun 1926 | 5 | Windham Henry Wyndham‑Quin MP for Glamorganshire South 1895‑1906 |
7 Feb 1857 | 23 Oct 1952 | 95 | |
23 Oct 1952 | 6 | Richard Southwell Windham Robert Wyndham‑Quin | 18 May 1887 | 28 Aug 1965 | 78 | |
28 Aug 1965 to 25 Mar 2011 |
7 | Thady Windham Thomas Wyndham‑Quin Peerages extinct on his death |
27 Oct 1939 | 25 Mar 2011 | 71 | |
DUNROSSIL | ||||||
12 Nov 1959 | V | 1 | William Shepherd Morrison Created Viscount Dunrossil 12 Nov 1959 MP for Cirencester & Tewkesbury 1929‑1959; Financial Secretary to the Treasury 1935‑1936; Minister for Agriculture & Fisheries 1936; Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster 1939‑1940; Postmaster General 1940‑1943; Minister for Town & Country Planning 1943‑1945; Speaker of the House of Commons 1951‑1959; Governor General of Australia 1960‑1961; PC 1936 |
10 Aug 1893 | 3 Feb 1961 | 67 |
3 Feb 1961 | 2 | John William Morrison Governor of Bermuda 1983‑1988; Lord Lieutenant Western Isles 1993‑2000 |
22 May 1926 | 22 Mar 2000 | 73 | |
22 Mar 2000 | 3 | Andrew William Reginald Morrison | 15 Dec 1953 | |||
DUNSANDLE AND CLANCONAL | ||||||
6 Jun 1845 | B[I] | 1 | James Daly Created Baron Dunsandle and Clanconal 6 Jun 1845 MP for Galway 1805‑1811 and co. Galway 1812‑1830 and 1832‑1834 |
1 Apr 1782 | 7 Aug 1847 | 65 |
7 Aug 1847 | 2 | Denis St. George Daly | 10 Jul 1810 | 11 Jan 1893 | 82 | |
11 Jan 1893 | 3 | Skeffington James Daly | 25 Dec 1811 | 7 Sep 1894 | 82 | |
7 Sep 1894 to 25 Nov 1911 |
4 | James Frederick Daly Peerages extinct on his death |
29 Aug 1849 | 25 Nov 1911 | 62 | |
DUNSANY | ||||||
1439 | B[I] | 1 | Sir Christopher Plunkett Created Baron Dunsany 1439 |
c 1410 | c 1463 | |
c 1463 | 2 | Richard Plunkett | c 1480 | |||
c 1480 | 3 | John Plunkett | c 1500 | |||
c 1500 | 4 | Edward Plunkett | 24 Jan 1521 | |||
24 Jan 1521 | 5 | Robert Plunkett | 1559 | |||
1559 | 6 | Christopher Plunkett | c 1564 | |||
c 1564 | 7 | Patrick Plunkett | 17 Mar 1601 | |||
17 Mar 1601 | 8 | Christopher Plunkett | 15 Dec 1603 | |||
15 Dec 1603 | 9 | Patrick Plunkett | Mar 1595 | c 1668 | ||
c 1668 | 10 | Christopher Plunkett | 1690 | |||
1690 | 11 | Randall Plunkett | 16 Mar 1735 | |||
16 Mar 1735 | 12 | Edward Plunkett | 1713 | 9 Jun 1781 | 67 | |
9 Jun 1781 | 13 | Randall Plunkett | Mar 1739 | 4 Apr 1821 | 82 | |
4 Apr 1821 | 14 | Edward Wadding Plunkett Lord Lieutenant Meath 1835‑1848 |
7 Apr 1773 | 11 Dec 1848 | 75 | |
11 Dec 1848 | 15 | Randall Edward Plunkett MP for Drogheda 1835‑1837 |
5 Sep 1804 | 7 Apr 1852 | 47 | |
7 Apr 1852 | 16 | Edward Plunkett | 29 Nov 1808 | 22 Feb 1889 | 80 | |
22 Feb 1889 | 17 | John William Plunkett MP for Thornbury 1886‑1892 |
31 Aug 1853 | 16 Jan 1899 | 45 | |
16 Jan 1899 | 18 | Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett For further information on this peer, see the note at the foot of this page |
24 Jul 1878 | 25 Oct 1957 | 79 | |
25 Oct 1957 | 19 | Randal Arthur Henry Plunkett | 25 Aug 1906 | 6 Feb 1999 | 92 | |
6 Feb 1999 | 20 | Edward John Carlos Plunkett | 10 Sep 1939 | 24 May 2011 | 71 | |
24 May 2011 | 21 | Randal Plunkett | 9 Mar 1983 | |||
DUNSFORD | ||||||
2 Feb 1920 | V | 1 | William St. John Fremantle Brodrick, 9th Viscount Midleton Created Viscount Dunsford and Earl of Midleton 2 Feb 1920 See "Midleton" |
14 Dec 1856 | 13 Feb 1942 | 85 |
DUNSMORE | ||||||
31 Jul 1628 to 21 Dec 1653 |
E | 1 | Sir Francis Leigh, 1st baronet Created Baron of Dunsmore 31 Jul 1628 He was subsequently created Earl of Chichester in 1644 - this peerage extinct on his death |
21 Dec 1653 | ||
DUNWICH | ||||||
18 Jul 1821 | V | 1 | John Rous, 1st Baron Rous Created Viscount Dunwich and Earl of Stradbroke 18 Jul 1821 See "Stradbroke" |
30 May 1750 | 27 Aug 1827 | 77 |
DU PARCQ | ||||||
5 Feb 1946 to 27 Apr 1949 |
B[L] | Sir Herbert du Parcq Created Baron du Parcq for life 5 Feb 1946 Lord Justice of Appeal 1938‑1946; Lord of Appeal in Ordinary 1946‑1949; PC 1938 Peerage extinct on his death |
5 Aug 1880 | 27 Apr 1949 | 68 | |
DUPPLIN | ||||||
4 May 1627 25 May 1633 |
V[S] V[S] |
1 1 |
George Hay Created Lord Hay of Kinfauns and Viscount Dupplin 4 May 1627, and Lord Hay of Kinfauns, Viscount Dupplin and Earl of Kinnoull 25 May 1633 See "Kinnoull" |
1572 | 16 Dec 1634 | 62 |
31 Dec 1697 | V[S] | 1 | Thomas Hay, later [1709] 7th Earl of Kinnoull Created Viscount Dupplin 31 Dec 1697 See "Kinnoull" |
c 1669 | Jan 1719 | |
DURAS | ||||||
29 Jan 1673 to 19 Apr 1709 |
B | 1 | Louis de Duras Created Baron Duras 29 Jan 1673 He succeeded to the Earldom of Feversham in 1677 - both peerages extinct on his death |
1641 | 19 Apr 1709 | 67 |
DURHAM | ||||||
For information on the "Lambton Worm," see the note at the foot of this page | ||||||
29 Jan 1828 23 Mar 1833 |
B E |
1 1 |
John George Lambton Created Baron Durham 29 Jan 1828 and Viscount Lambton and Earl of Durham 23 Mar 1833 MP for co. Durham 1813‑1828; Lord Privy Seal 1830‑1833; Governor General of Canada 1838‑1839; PC 1830 |
12 Apr 1792 | 28 Jul 1840 | 48 |
28 Jul 1840 | 2 | George Frederick D'Arcy Lambton Lord Lieutenant Durham 1854‑1879 |
5 Sep 1828 | 27 Nov 1879 | 51 | |
27 Nov 1879 | 3 | John George Lambton Lord Lieutenant Durham 1884‑1928; KG 1909; PC 1911 |
19 Jun 1855 | 18 Sep 1928 | 73 | |
18 Sep 1928 | 4 | Frederick William Lambton MP for Durham South 1880‑1885 and Durham South East 1900‑1910 |
19 Jun 1855 | 31 Jan 1929 | 73 | |
31 Jan 1929 | 5 | John Frederick Lambton | 7 Oct 1884 | 4 Feb 1970 | 85 | |
4 Feb 1970 to 23 Feb 1970 |
6 | Antony Claud Frederick Lambton MP for Berwick upon Tweed 1951‑1973 He disclaimed the peerage for life 23 Feb 1970 For further information on this peer, see the note at the foot of this page |
10 Jul 1922 | 30 Dec 2006 | 84 | |
30 Dec 2006 | 7 | Edward Richard Lambton | 19 Oct 1961 | |||
DURSLEY | ||||||
11 Sep 1679 | V | 1 | George Berkeley Created Viscount Dursley and Earl of Berkeley 11 Sep 1679 See "Berkeley" |
1627 | 14 Oct 1698 | 71 |
DUTTON | ||||||
10 Sep 1711 | B | 1 | James Hamilton, 4th Duke of Hamilton Created Baron of Dutton and Duke of Brandon 10 Sep 1711 See "Hamilton" |
11 Apr 1658 | 15 Nov 1712 | 54 |
4 Nov 1806 | Alexander Hamilton He was summoned to Parliament by a Writ of Acceleration as Baron Dutton 4 Nov 1806 He succeeded as Duke of Hamilton and Brandon in 1819 |
3 Oct 1767 | 18 Aug 1852 | 84 | ||
DUVEEN | ||||||
3 Feb 1933 to 25 May 1939 |
B | 1 | Sir Joseph Duveen, 1st baronet Created Baron Duveen 3 Feb 1933 Peerage extinct on his death |
14 Oct 1869 | 25 May 1939 | 69 |
DYKES | ||||||
21 Jun 2004 | B[L] | Hugh John Maxwell Dykes Created Baron Dykes for life 21 Jun 2004 MP for Harrow East 1970‑1997; MEP 1974‑1977 |
17 May 1939 | |||
DYNEVOR | ||||||
17 Oct 1780 | B | 1 | William Talbot, 1st Earl Talbot (creation of 1761) Created Baron Dinevor 17 Oct 1780 For details of the special remainder included in this creation, see the note at the foot of this page |
16 May 1710 | 27 Apr 1782 | 71 |
27 Apr 1782 | 2 | Cecil Rice [female] | Jul 1735 | 14 Mar 1793 | 57 | |
14 Mar 1793 | 3 | George Talbot Rice MP for Carmarthenshire 1790‑1793; Lord Lieutenant Carmarthen 1804‑1852 |
8 Oct 1765 | 9 Apr 1852 | 86 | |
9 Apr 1852 | 4 | George Rice Rice‑Trevor MP for Carmarthenshire 1820‑1831 and 1832‑1852 |
5 Aug 1795 | 7 Oct 1869 | 74 | |
7 Oct 1869 | 5 | Francis William Rice | 10 May 1804 | 3 Aug 1878 | 74 | |
3 Aug 1878 | 6 | Arthur de Cardonnel Rice | 24 Jan 1836 | 8 Jun 1911 | 75 | |
8 Jun 1911 | 7 | Walter Fitz-Uryan Rhys MP for Brighton 1910‑1911; Lord Lieutenant Carmarthen 1928‑1949 |
17 Aug 1873 | 8 Jun 1956 | 82 | |
8 Jun 1956 | 8 | Charles Arthur Uryan Rhys MP for Romford 1923‑1929 and Guildford 1931‑1935 |
21 Sep 1899 | 15 Dec 1962 | 63 | |
15 Dec 1962 | 9 | Richard Charles Uryan Rhys | 19 Jun 1935 | 12 Nov 2008 | 73 | |
12 Nov 2008 | 10 | Hugo Griffith Uryan Rhys | 19 Nov 1966 | |||
DYSART | ||||||
3 Aug 1643 | E[S] | 1 | William Murray Created Lord Huntingtower and Earl of Dysart 3 Aug 1643 |
c 1600 | Dec 1655 | |
Dec 1655 | 2 | Elizabeth Tollemache For further information on this peeress, see the note at the foot of this page |
c 1625 | 16 Jun 1698 | ||
16 Jun 1698 | 3 | Sir Lionel Tollemache, 4th baronet MP for Orford 1679‑1681 and 1685‑1687 and Suffolk 1698‑1707; Lord Lieutenant Suffolk 1703‑1705 |
30 Jan 1649 | 23 Feb 1727 | 78 | |
23 Feb 1727 | 4 | Lionel Tollemache KT 1743 |
1 May 1708 | 10 Mar 1770 | 61 | |
10 Mar 1770 | 5 | Lionel Tollemache | 6 Aug 1734 | 22 Feb 1799 | 64 | |
22 Feb 1799 | 6 | Wilbraham Tollemache MP for Northampton 1771‑1780 and Liskeard 1780‑1784 |
23 Oct 1739 | 9 Mar 1821 | 81 | |
9 Mar 1821 | 7 | Louisa Manners | 2 Jul 1745 | 22 Sep 1840 | 95 | |
22 Sep 1840 | 8 | Lionel William John Tollemache MP for Ilchester 1827‑1830 |
18 Nov 1794 | 23 Sep 1878 | 83 | |
23 Sep 1878 | 9 | William John Manners Tollemache Lord Lieutenant Rutland 1881‑1906 For information on the Dysart peerage claim of 1881, see the note at the foot of this page |
3 Mar 1859 | 22 Nov 1935 | 76 | |
22 Nov 1935 | 10 | Wenefryde Agatha Greaves | 13 Nov 1889 | 2 Jun 1975 | 85 | |
2 Jun 1975 | 11 | Rosamund Agnes Greaves | 15 Feb 1914 | 17 Dec 2003 | 89 | |
17 Dec 2003 | 12 | Katherine Grant | 1 Jun 1918 | 8 Nov 2011 | 93 | |
8 Nov 2011 | 13 | John Peter Grant | 22 Oct 1946 | |||
"Black" Agnes, wife of Patrick Dunbar, 9th Earl of Dunbar | ||
Black Agnes is one of the national heroines of Scotland, famous for her defence of Dunbar Castle during the wars with England during the 14th century. The following edited version of her story is taken from the July 1950 issue of the Australian monthly magazine Parade. | ||
The story of Black Agnes dates back to the days of Bannockburn, when brave Robert the Bruce reassured Scottish independence by victory over the forces of the decadent English king, Edward II. Agnes came of a great line, being a daughter of Bruce's nephew, Thomas Randolph, Earl of Moray. Her swarthy complexion, flashing eyes and untamed spirit soon won her the title of "Black". She was a lass "of a proud and goodly presence", lithe, athletic and of ready wit. One chronicler describes her as "wise and ware". Another said rather sourly that she was "ane woman of great spirit, more nor came ane woman to be" - in other words, with a touch of the vixen or termagant in her, but possibly he was on the side of the humbled English and therefore biased. | ||
Her husband, Patrick, ninth Earl of Dunbar and second Earl of March, was of royal Scottish descent from a natural daughter of William the Lion [i.e. William I, King of Scotland 1165‑1214]. At the outset he was opposed to the Bruce and supported the weakling King Edward II. When, after Bannockburn, Edward fled with Black Douglas and 80 horsemen hot on his heels and thirsting for his blood, Earl Patrick gave him sanctuary behind the sturdy walls of Dunbar Castle. One misty morning as Douglas raged about the castle walls, the fugitive king stole out of the harbour postern and down a hazardous causeway cut in the rocks to a fishing boat waiting below, by which he escaped to England. | ||
But later - perhaps due to the fanatical loyalty of his wife, Black Agnes, Patrick became reconciled to the Bruce and defended Berwick Castle for him till hope was gone, and even pulled down his own stronghold of Dunbar so that it should not fall into the hands of the English. Thirteen years passed. The weak-minded Edward II had been deposed by his strong-minded spouse, Queen Isabella, supported by her lover, Mortimer, and foully put to death; his son, the valiant Edward III, though only a boy of 14, was leading an army to reconquer Scotland. | ||
The Earl Patrick had his castle rebuilt on a precipitous crag high above the sea, embodying all that was new in the science of fortification. Known as "Earl Patrick's Strong House" it was deemed impregnable. By a trick, Edward's men were prevented from occupying it before it was ready for siege, and it was under the firm control of Black Agnes when the warring Edward crossed the border at the head of a powerful army. Patrick had gone off in command of a wing of the Scottish army that massed to repel the invaders; so Black Agnes alone held the stronghold of Dunbar as an English force advanced upon it. | ||
The English were commanded by such notable medieval strategists as William Montague [or Montacute], Earl of Salisbury, renowned for his valour at Poitiers, and the Earl of Arundel, later Constable at the Battle of Crecy. Though her husband was away fighting to the north and her brother was a prisoner in English hands, the heart of Black Agnes did not quail, and her subsequent defence of Dunbar has become history. | ||
The elements were her ally. The English had not timed their campaign well, and a great blizzard was blanketing the towers of Dunbar in dense snow flurries as they plodded forward in that January of 1338. Salt spray topped the cliffs as the waves whipped up by an easterly gale hammered and thundered against them. Montague was forced to encamp his armies and wait for the weather to abate before laying siege to the fortress. Meanwhile, he blockaded it by land while two Genoese war galleys hired by the English maintained a ceaseless vigil on the castle and port from the sea. Dunbar was thus completely cut off from the world with its garrison commanded by a woman greatly outnumbered. | ||
When the weather abated Montague called upon Black Agnes to yield. Her reply was defiant. So the English brought up their engines of war-great catapults and battering rams to hurl rocks at the walls and batter them down. Showers of darts, arrows and [crossbow] bolts sprayed the battlements. The garrison, whipped up by the swarthy chatelaine, responded with even greater vigour. As the fight waged on in spasmodic bursts of fury Black Agnes and her handmaids would often walk on the battlements to show their contempt of the English engines, and ironically wipe with their kerchiefs those parts of the wall that were struck by the enemy's rocks, Agnes' wild anger sometimes overwhelmed her breeding and inflamed her to rail and jeer at the invaders like a fish‑wife abusing a bailiff. | ||
After weeks of fruitless attack, Montague assembled his greatest engine of war. Known to the English as a "sow", it consisted of a strong shed of timber or wicker with sides of dressed leather, within which soldiers could advance to ply a giant battering ram while others undermined the walls immune from assault from above. Montague brought up the sow under cover of darkness and the first the beleaguered garrison knew of it was the thud of the great ram against the walls. It was greeted with cries of dismay from all within the castle except the redoubtable Agnes. | ||
For an hour there was silence broken only by the thud of the ram. Then Agnes and her maids appeared on battlements. Waving to the enemy she called in a clear disdainful voice: | ||
"Beware Montagow For farrow shalt thy sow." |
||
A derrick swung over the walls. From it was suspended an enormous rock, which, suddenly released, plunged unerringly through the wood-and-wicker roof of the engine of war. The thud of the ram ceased as the soldiers crawled from the battered hulk and fled, leaving some of their comrades crushed and groaning under Black Agnes's rock. | ||
A peal of feminine laughter came from the castle. "Look, Montague's sow has farrowed", jeered Black Agnes, as the fleeing soldiers looked, from the battlements, like a litter of little pigs. Burning pitch now poured from the battlements. Soon Montague's sow was a smoking wreck, and the stench of roasting flesh filled the air as the flames consumed the dead and injured trapped within the shattered contraption. Montague himself narrowly escaped with his life. As he stood with a knight on one of the trenches, a Scottish archer, William Spens, recognised him and took a pot‑shot. He missed the earl but hit the knight. So great was the power behind the shaft that it pierced his surcoat, and three folds of his mailed coat and quilted tunic and came to rest with its point buried deep in his heart. "That is one of my lady's hatpins", muttered Montague grimly as the knight clanged dead at his feet. "Black Agnes' love shafts go straight to the heart." | ||
The giant battering-ram having failed to gain him entry to the castle, he now tried treachery. By some means he communicated with the chief keeper of the sally port, and promised him wealth and high honour if he would betray his trust and admit a party of besiegers to the castle. The keeper told Black Agnes. "Agree", she said, "We'll give him such a welcome as he will never forget". Montague himself led the treacherous force. As he stealthily led his men beneath the shade of the great walls, the portcullis rose slowly with jar of chains and pulleys and the castle gate swung open. Just as he was entering, his intermediary pressed ahead. The portcullis clanged down. Montague. just managed to leap to safety but his man was caught. Black Agnes had sprung the trap too soon. There was disappointment in her voice as she taunted from the battlements: "Farewell, Monsieur Montagow. I intended you should sup with me tonight and help me hold Dunbar against the Southrons." | ||
Rations were now running short within the castle. The defenders had pulled in their belts to the last hole to stifle their ravenous hunger. But the heroic Agnes still defied the besiegers. Death from starvation was facing Dunbar's defenders when at last relief came from Sir Alexander Ramsay of Dalhousie, who with a roving band had been harassing the English from hideouts in the caverns of Hawthornden. Loading several row-boats with provisions on a dark moonless night, he and his men risked their lives with every swing of the muffled oars to run the gauntlet of the now reinforced blockading fleet to gain the rocks below the castle postern, where they were welcomed deliriously by the famished garrison. | ||
Ramsay decided to make a surprise sortie in force from the castle. The sally took the English advance posts unprepared and threw them back with bloody losses on to their main lines. Angered by this cheeky manoeuvre, Montague tried to force Black Agnes to yield by a dastardly expedient. He sent a message back across the border for Agnes' imprisoned brother, the Earl of Moray, to be sent to him. "Yield or we slay him", was his ultimatum to Black Agnes. "I deliver to none", came the proud reply. "I hold the castle for Scotland's King!" It is to Montague's credit that faced with this magnificent defiance from a woman he did not carry out his threat. | ||
On June 10, 1338, five months after the first rock had crashed against the walls, he raised the siege, struck camp and marched away with the taunts of Black Agnes ringing in his ears. | ||
The valiant chatelaine of Dunbar lived to a good old age [she died in 1369]. She is commemorated in the parish church at Whitekirk near Dunbar, where she built a chapel in thankfulness for a miracle cure at a holy well. She was in flight by sea in one of the alarms that preceded the siege when she was thrown against the thwart of a boat in stormy seas and forced to land in agony. A hermit told her to drink with faith from the holy well. She did and was instantly restored, so the story goes. Pilgrims flocked to the shrine she built. Among the pilgrims of 1435 was Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini, later Pope Pius II, who, caught by a tempest in the North Sea while on a mission to Scotland, vowed he would go barefoot to the nearest shrine if he were spared. He walked barefoot in the frozen snow to the shrine of Black Agnes to fulfil the vow - and, it is recorded, ever afterwards suffered from rheumatism. He was the only Pope ever to visit Scotland, and he probably regretted his visit. | ||
James Butler, 13th Baron Dunboyne | ||
In 1850, Dunboyne was tried for perjury for incorrectly describing himself in the parish register of St. George's, Hanover Square, as a widower. The following report is from Freeman's Journal and Daily Commercial Advertiser (Dublin) of 21 June 1850:- | ||
Mr. Sergeant Wilkins, in opening the case for the prosecution, stated that the defendant, the Baron Dunboyne, was married on the 25th August, 1842, to Margaret Ann Vincent Vaughan, at the parish church of Paddington. A settlement had been drawn up two days before the marriage settling the property on the wife under certain restrictions, to which the defendant was a party. After the marriage, on the 27th August, 1842, it was obvious that the name of the lady ceased to be Vaughan. She was no longer a widow, nor was he a widower. The marriage was kept a profound secret except to persons present at it solemnization, for reasons which he was not at liberty to explain. Even the servants in Mrs. Vaughan's house were not privy to it. On the 19th Dec., 1843, Lord Dunboyne went to St. George's church, Hanover‑square, with the same lady, describing himself as the Baron Dunboyne, a widower, and the lady as Mary Ann Vincent Vaughan, which description was, consequently, untrue. The learned sergeant then called the attention of the jury to the 41st section of the 6th and 7th Wm IV., cap 8, under which the prosecution was instituted. That section enacted that every person who should wilfully make, or cause to be made, false entries in the register of births, deaths and marriages, should be subject to the same pains and penalties as if they were guilty of perjury. The learned sergeant then called the following witnesses to support the indictment:- | ||
The Rev. E. H. Stevenson, curate of the church at Paddington, proved that in 1842 he solemnized a marriage between Lord Dunboyne and Mrs. Vaughan. The particulars in the entry of marriage were written by witness. | ||
Mr. John Burley proved that the signature to the register of marriage was that of Lord Dunboyne. | ||
Mr. Withers, a clerk to Simmons & Co., bankers, at Reading, with whom Mrs. Vaughan kept an account, proved that the signature to the register of marriage was in that lady's handwriting. | ||
Mr. Dyke, Registrar of Doctors' Commons, produced an affidavit sworn in December, 1843, on the application for a marriage licence. | ||
Dr. Waddilove proved that it was his duty to administer the oath to parties coming before him for a marriage licence. (The affidavit, which was in the usual form, was here read). | ||
Mr. C. H. Powell said, in December, 1843, he was the parish clerk of St. George's, Hanover‑square. Witness produced the marriage licence and register‑books for the marriage of Lord Dunboyne and Mrs. Vaughan, respectively described as widower and widow. | ||
The Rev. W. E. Dickenson, curate of St. George's Hanover‑square, proved that he solemnized a marriage between Lord Dunboyne and Mrs. Vaughan on the 19th December, 1843. He also proved the signatures of Lord Dunboyne and Mrs. Vaughan to the entry of the marriage. | ||
Ann Roche proved that she was sometime ago a servant to Mrs. Vaughan. Remembered her marriage in December, 1843 at St. George's, Hanover‑square, and had lived with her since 1842. Previous to 1843 she was always addressed as Mrs. Vaughan. Major Marshall married a daughter of Lord Dunboyne and Mrs. Marshall was present at the marriage of Lord Dunboyne and Mrs. Vaughan, in December, 1843. | ||
By Mr. Cockburn -- In 1842, Mrs. Vaughan lived at Belle Hatch, near Henley. Lord Dunboyne sometimes visited at that place. She lived with her grandmother, Mrs. Halloway, and sometimes she lived at her own house. Witness was not aware of the first marriage with Lord Dunboyne. For a long time in 1843 Mrs. Halloway was poorly. She was possessed of some property. She died on the 5th of September, 1844. After the marriage in 1843, Mrs. Vaughan took the name of Lady Dunboyne. She died in 1846. | ||
By Mr. Sergeant Wilkins -- They lived together till the 7th of November, 1844, after which Lord Dunboyne never came back. | ||
Mr. Cockburn, in his address to the jury on the part of the defence, characterised the present indictment as the most cruel proceeding that had come within his professional experience, seeing that Lord Dunboyne whom he had the honour of representing was now eighty [sic] years of age, and on the verge of the grave, and that the lady whom he had married, and with respect to which marriage this indictment was preferred, was now removed from this world. He contended that what had been done by Lord Dunboyne in this case was nothing more than what took place every day in the marriages of Roman Catholics, who were now in the habit of being married in the first instance at the superintendent registrar's office, and then going immediately afterwards to be a second time married in a Roman Catholic church. At that second marriage they denied the first, on the ground that being only a civil contract it was not a marriage in the eyes of the Roman Catholic church, which regarded marriage as a sacrament. He submitted that no one would think of indicting any of the parties of the marriage for having on the second marriage at the Roman Catholic church denied that which took place at the superintendent registrar's office. The learned counsel also cited the case of the late Lord Eldon, who having been married in Scotland, was subsequently married in England, on which last marriage he described himself in the marriage register as "John Scott, bachelor", and his lady as "Elizabeth Surtees, spinster", notwithstanding they had previously contracted a valid marriage by the law of Scotland. | ||
Lord Campbell having summed up the case, the jury found a verdict for the defendant, thus acquitting Lord Dunboyne of the imputed perjury. | ||
Dunboyne's defence counsel was certainly correct when he described his client as being 'on the verge of the grave', since Lord Dunboyne died a fortnight later. The reference to Lord Eldon is also quite correct, since John Scott, who later became the 1st Earl of Eldon, married Elizabeth Surtees firstly in Scotland on 19 November 1772 and again in England on 19 January 1773. | ||
John Graham, 1st Viscount Dundee | ||
The following biography of Viscount Dundee is taken from the March 1966 issue of the Australian monthly magazine Parade:- | ||
On the afternoon of July 27, 1689, an army of 4000 English, Dutch and Lowland Scottish soldiers were winding through the Pass of Killiecrankie, the wild gorge that formed one of the gateways to the central Highlands of Scotland. For four months they had been hunting John Graham of Claverhouse, Viscount Dundee, the ruthless military commander who only a few years before had spread terror throughout half the country. Bloody Claverhouse he was called by his enemies, the Presbyterian Covenanters whom he had mercilessly harried with fire and sword in the name of the Stuart monarchs Charles II and James II. Round his name many dark legends had gathered. It was whispered that because of his pact with the Devil he could only be killed by a silver bullet and that his great black horse was a gift from Satan himself. | ||
Every atrocity that stained Scotland during the "Killing Time" of religious civil war was blamed on Claverhouse by the Covenanting fanatics. No man was more hated by his foes or more idolised by his own followers. Now, however, with James II in exile and William of Orange on the English throne, Claverhouse was a hunted fugitive. The last act in the stormy drama of his life was played on the bloodsoaked heather of Killiecrankie. There he died, shot from his black horse just as he led the final charge of his Highland clansmen down the slope of the pass. | ||
John Graham of Claverhouse, the son of a substantial laird and a remote kinsman of the noble house of Montrose, was born on his family's estate near Dundee probably in 1649. He grew up a handsome, high-spirited youth with a romantic passion for poetry and history and an equal ambition to make his name as a soldier. In his 20s he served as a volunteer in the wars against France in Flanders. By 1678 he had returned to England and was a captain in the regiment of Horse Guards newly raised by Charles II's brother, James, Duke of York. | ||
The Horse Guards, the Dark Dragoons that many of the Scottish Lowlanders were soon to curse so bitterly, had been raised for a specific purpose. Since the Restoration of King Charles in 1660 the royal government had been determined to enforce the Anglican church system in Scotland as well as England, a plan that aroused violent resistance among the Presbyterians of the Lowlands. Most Presbyterians clung to their Covenant, a pledge that bound them to deny the authority of the king's bishops and to uphold their own church organisation. In defiance of the law Covenanting preachers travelled the countryside holding services on the bleak moorlands, risking death or prison to keep the zeal of their followers at fever pitch. | ||
The dragoons were sent to Scotland to strike terror into the Covenanting districts. And of all their commanders none proved more ruthless than Captain Graham of Claverhouse, especially after his first humiliating encounter on Drunclog Moor. In May 1679 the brutal murder of Archbishop Sharpe led to reprisals that set the whole Lowlands ablaze. It was the beginning of the Killing Time that filled the country with horror for the next 10 years. | ||
Learning that a Covenanting army was mustering at Drumclog near Glasgow, Claverhouse rode against them with 800 dragoons, planning to surprise them, cut them to pieces and seize their three most notorious leaders, Robert Hamilton [1650‑1701], David Hackston [d 1680] and John Balfour. Instead it was Claverhouse who was surprised. Overwhelmed by a horde of armed farmers the dragoons broke and fled. Claverhouse barely escaped with his life when his horse's flank was laid open by the slash of a scythe. With the Covenanters hot on their heels the royal cavalry retreated into Glasgow, where they beat off two desperate assaults in the town streets before reinforcements turned the tide. | ||
The rout of Drumclog caused panic in the royal council at Edinburgh. More troops were rushed from England. With them as supreme commander came the king's illegitimate son, the Duke of Monmouth. On June 22, 1679, the overconfident Covenanters were taught a terrible lesson. Trapped at Bothwell Brig on the River Clyde they were crushingly defeated and 500 of the fugitives were butchered by Claverhouse's vengeful dragoons in the pursuit that followed. Another 100 prisoners were herded into cattle-pens in Edinburgh to await execution, prison or exile to the West Indian plantations. | ||
Monmouth's mildness soon brought his recall to England. The task of stamping out the Covenanting rebels was handed over to other military chiefs among whom Claverhouse quickly earned a sinister prominence. He campaigned with the fury of a crusader, outraging many of the powerful Scottish royalist nobles by his "high proud humour" and refusal to accept any compromise. | ||
By 1682 Claverhouse was a colonel with his own regiment of dragoons and throughout south‑western Scotland, the main stronghold of the Covenanters, people shivered at the sound of his name. His horsemen rode through Ayrshire, Galloway, Dumfries and Lanark, harrying preachers into the hills, burning and plundering the farms of Covenanting families and executing suspects without any pretence of a trial. Claverhouse was not personally responsible for what was possibly the worst horror of the campaign but it happened in the area he controlled and his brother was one of the judges who passed sentence. The victims were two women, one elderly and the other a teenage girl, who were convicted of having refused to take an oath abjuring the Covenant. They were chained at stakes on the sands of Solway Firth and left there to drown in the incoming tide. No other incident stirred such burning and hatred of Claverhouse's name. [For further information on this incident, see the note under the Grierson baronets.] | ||
In 1683 Claverhouse visited Charles II at Newmarket in England, where the king spared enough time from his jockeys and mistresses to load the colonel with favours and grant him £4000 worth of estates confiscated from Presbyterian lairds. But no severity could break the spirit of the Covenanters. The Killing Time went on. Many of the great Scottish peers, including the Duke of Hamilton and Marquess of Queensberry, advocated a compromise peace. Claverhouse refused to listen. "I will have no peace but submission", he vowed. | ||
The turmoil reached its climax during the brief reign of James II when Claverhouse, now a major-general and the most powerful man in Scotland, made a final effort to bludgeon the Covenanters into surrender. He failed, while the Earl of Argyll's revolt and the seething discontent in the towns showed that opposition to King James was spreading far beyond the Presbyterian extremists. | ||
Then late in 1688 stunning news reached Edinburgh from London. England was rising against King James, Prince William of Orange was about to sail from Holland to claim the throne of his father-in-law and the king was desperately appealing to his Scottish subjects for aid. In October 4000 troops left Scotland under the nominal command of Archibald Douglas but with Claverhouse leading the dragoons and the dominant figure in the hopeless expedition. A few weeks later Claverhouse reached the royal camp at Salisbury only to find James in despair at the news of his rival's landing and already determined on flight from England. | ||
Claverhouse urged the king to stay and fight it out. His angry pleas were useless. After creating his supporter Viscount Dundee, James fled from his camp to London to begin his escape into exile. With tears in his eyes and rage in his heart, Claverhouse gathered the few dragoons who remained loyal to the Jacobite cause and set out back to Scotland, still determined to fight. In Edinburgh he found most of the nobles and magnates determined to support King William. Only the great, rock-perched castle was held for the fallen monarch by the Duke of Gordon. | ||
Fearing assassination and threatened with imminent arrest for treason, Claverhouse decided to make for the Highlands and raise an army of clansmen round the nucleus of his handful of dragoons. Before quitting Edinburgh he scaled the precipitous cliff below the castle walls, held a hurried conference with Gordon and begged him to hang on until the host of Jacobite Highlanders swept into the city to relieve him. Then Claverhouse galloped north, raiding Perth and Dundee to seize arms and ammunition on the way before he entered the wild country ruled by the patriarchal chieftain, Cameron of Lochiel. For two more months, with several thousand Camerons, Murrays of Atholl and other clansmen, Claverhouse roamed the Highlands eluding every attempt by King William's general, Hugh Mackay [c 1640‑1692], to bring him to open battle. | ||
Then at last, when Mackay was advancing to seize Blair Atholl Castle, Claverhouse laid a trap in the Pass of Killiecrankie. Swarming at dusk down the heather-clad slopes, the claymore-wielding Highlanders hacked Mackay's small army to pieces, killing or capturing 2000 men. But in the heat of the charge Claverhouse rolled from his saddle with a fatal bullet lodged under his armpit. "The day goes ill for me, but it goes well for King James", he said. | ||
The successful claims made by Henry James Scrymgeour-Wedderburn to the Viscountcy of Dudhope in 1952 and the Earldom of Dundee in 1953 | ||
The following edited account of the successful claim to the Viscountcy of Dudhope appeared in The Times of 31 July 1952:- | ||
The Committee of Privileges of the House of Lords yesterday announced that in their view Mr. Henry James Scrymgeour-Wedderburn, of Birkhill, near Cupar, Fife, had made out his claim to the titles of Viscount Dudhope and Lord Scrymgeour in the Peerage of Scotland. | ||
The Attorney-General [Sir Lionel Heald] had said that there were four main issues before the Committee. The first was the creation by Charles I in 1641 of Sir John Scrymgeour, Constable of Dundee, "and his heirs male lawfully begotten … whom failing his heirs male whomsoever" as Viscounts of Dudhope and Lords Scrymgeour. The patent by which the title was created could not itself be produced but it was accepted that secondary evidence, coupled with general historical background, was sufficient to establish creation of a title. | ||
Secondly, the petitioner had to show that there were no remaining heirs male of the original grantee. | ||
Thirdly, the petitioner claimed that he was descended from a common ancestor with the patentee. There was no doubt that both the petitioner and the patentee were descendants of a common ancestor, a great warrior, Sir James Scrymgeour, Constable of Dundee, who was killed at the Battle of Harlaw in Aberdeenshire in 1411. In the early documents the name Scrymgeour was spelled "Skyrmisher" and there was some reason to suppose that it was because Sir James was a great fighter that he had that name. | ||
The fourth issue was whether, as claimed by the petitioner, all intervening heirs male were deceased and the male line was now extinct. In such matters circumstantial evidence was just as convincing as direct evidence. | ||
Lord Normand, with whom the other members of the Committee concurred, said that Mr. Scrymgeour-Wedderburn had to show first that the viscountcy was created with the destination which he alleged. There was a difficulty in that neither the signature nor the patent creating the title in 1641 was in Mr. Scrymgeour-Wedderburn's possession, and was not even known by him to exist. There were, however, other records which satisfactorily established the point. The fact that the peerages held by the third Viscount, also created Earl of Dundee in 1660, had never been claimed since his death in 1668, was itself strong evidence that at that time there were no heirs male of the first Viscount. | ||
Referring to the "processed and most unscrupulous covetousness" of the second Earl of Lauderdale, who was Secretary for Scottish Affairs from 1660 to 1680, Lord Normand said that as a result of his action in 1670 the family of Scrymgeour were deprived of their archives which passed into the possession of the Earl of Lauderdale. Thus it came about that the petitioner's family were deprived of the documents which might have enabled them to put forward their present claim at an earlier date. Mr. Scrymgeour-Wedderburn's evidence, with many corroborative circumstances, proved that his family had long believed they were entitled to the peerages now claimed. When a claim was put forward after three centuries, however, it was incumbent on the claimant to explain the delay. He (his Lordship) was clearly of the opinion that the petitioner had satisfactorily explained the delay, at least for the period ending in 1937. | ||
Mr. Scrymgeour-Wedderburn had successfully traced his descent from a common ancestor and scrutiny of the evidence revealed no flaw or weakness. | ||
It was more difficult for him to establish the extinction of all intermediate collateral heirs male, and family traditions must be accepted with caution for they might be flattering and deceptive myths. There had been, however, an intense search for evidence and much of it supported the present claim. It would be surprising if any new evidence were to be found which would show that the petitioner was not entitled to the office of Standard Bearer and to the peerages he had claimed. On the case as a whole Mr. Scrymgeour-Wedderburn's claim succeeded. | ||
The Committee directed that a resolution to that effect be presented to the House of Lords for approval. | ||
In May 1953, a further petition made by the then Viscount Dudhope was successful, as reported in The Times of 19 May 1953:- | ||
The House of Lords Committee for Privileges yesterday decided in favour of the petition of Viscount Dudhope, of Birkhill, Fife, Hereditary Royal Standard Bearer for Scotland, to be recognised as Earl of Dundee and Lord Inverkeithing. They reported that in their view he had made out his claim to be the "heir male whomsoever" of the first Earl, who was also the third Viscount Dudhope, who died in 1668. | ||
Lord Normand, delivering the principal judgment, with which the Chairman (the Earl of Drogheda) and the other members of the committee agreed, said that the petitioner had relied on the evidence given in his claim to the Dudhope Viscountcy, and that evidence satisfactorily explained the petitioner's inability to produce the Patent of the Earldom and the Signature, although the Signature ought to have been retained in the public records when the Patent was granted, and the Patent itself should have been recorded in the Great Seal Register of Scotland. | ||
The committee's report will now be submitted to the House of Lords in the form of a resolution which will be considered this week. | ||
Thomas Cochrane, 10th Earl of Dundonald | ||
Before he succeeded to the title in 1831, the 10th Earl was styled Lord Cochrane, and it is this name which will be used to refer to him for the greater part of this note. | ||
After a naval career, Cochrane entered politics in 1806 when he was returned for the seat of Honiton. In the following year he was elected for the seat of Westminster, for which he continued to sit until 1814. During this period, in August 1812, he secretly married Catherine Barnes. In June 1818, he again married her, but this time publicly. While not of any relevance to this note, the secret marriage plays an important role in the note below regarding the 11th Earl of Dundonald. Also during this period, Cochrane was knighted in 1809. | ||
On 21 February 1814, a man dressed in a red jacket (note that the colour of the jacket is important) who called himself Colonel de Bourg arrived in Dover from France, bearing the news that Napoleon had been captured and killed by the Cossacks. As a result, prices on the London Stock Exchange rose sharply, including a stock called Omnium, which jumped by 20% from 26.5 to 32. | ||
It soon became clear, however, that the news was a hoax. The Stock Exchange examined the trading patterns in Omnium stock and found that six men had sold Omnium stock during its rise in price. The six included Cochrane, who had sold £139,000 worth of Omnium stock, at a profit of £2,470. Also in the six were Cochrane's uncle, Andrew James Cochrane Johnstone (MP for Grampound since 1812), who made a profit of £4,931, and Cochrane's broker, Richard Butt, who profited to the extent of £3,048. | ||
Within a few days, an anonymous tip-off informed the Stock Exchange that de Bourg was in reality a Prussian named Charles Random de Berenger, and that he had been seen entering Cochrane's house on the day of the hoax. As a result, Cochrane and de Berenger were charged with conspiring with each other and with six other men in a fraudulent conspiracy to deceive the public into thinking that the war with France had been won and that Napoleon was dead, with the object of causing Government securities to rise in value, so that the conspirators might sell such securities at a profit. The six other men were Andrew James Cochrane Johnstone, Richard Butt, a wine merchant named Holloway and three other men named Sandon, M'Rae and Lyte. The last three defendants were accused of having assisted in the hoax by posing as French officers who had distributed leaflets celebrating the downfall of Napoleon. Holloway admitted that he had instigated their actions in order to profit from the subsequent rise in stock prices, but all four denied any connection with de Berenger. | ||
Their trial commenced in the Court of King's Bench at the Guildhall in London on 8 June 1814. The evidence against Cochrane was largely circumstantial. One of the most important points was the colour of the uniform that de Berenger had been wearing when he called at Cochrane's house. Cochrane insisted that de Berenger was wearing a green uniform, and was backed up in this belief by a number of his servants. However, a cab-driver named Crane swore that de Berenger had been wearing a red uniform when he drove him to Cochrane's house. The judge who presided at the trial was the Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench, Lord Ellenborough, who made no secret of the fact that he considered Crane's testimony as to the colour of de Berenger's uniform to be damning evidence against Cochrane. After two and a half hours deliberation the jury found all defendants guilty as charged. | ||
Two of the defendants, Andrew James Cochrane Johnstone and M'Rae, fled the country before they could be sentenced. The remaining defendants were each sentenced to 12 months' imprisonment, and, in Cochrane's case, ordered to pay a fine of £1,000 and to spend an hour in the pillory opposite the Royal Exchange at lunch-time. The pillory sentence was subsequently remitted, partly because Sir Francis Burdett, Cochrane's fellow MP for Westminster, said that he would stand there too if the sentence were carried out, and partly because the government feared that the carrying out of the sentence would cause a riot. | ||
In subsequent weeks, Cochrane suffered further humiliation. On 5 July 1814, both Cochrane and his uncle were expelled from the House of Commons. During the same period, Cochrane was dismissed from the Royal Navy and was also stripped of his knighthood. However, on 16 July 1814, Cochrane was again returned unopposed as MP for Westminster, and, as the House of Commons did not see fit to interfere further in this matter, he continued to represent this seat until 1818. | ||
In 1817 Cochrane, still in official disgrace, left England to further his naval career elsewhere. In May 1817, he took command of the navy of Chile in its fight for independence from Spain and was instrumental in achieving the independence of both Chile and Peru. In 1823, at a time when Brazil was struggling for its independence from Portugal, he took command of the Brazilian navy and was again an important factor in achieving Brazil's independence, being rewarded by Emperor Pedro I who created him Marquess of Maranhão, a title still held by his descendants. He then went to Europe, where he fought for Greece against the Ottoman Empire. | ||
After having succeeded to the Earldom of Dundonald in 1831, he was reinstated in the Royal Navy as a Rear Admiral in 1832, and his knighthood was restored in 1847. His career as a naval officer is almost certainly reflected to some extent in the fictional characters of Captain Horatio Hornblower and of Jack Aubrey in Patrick O'Brian's series of nautical novels. In particular, the eleventh novel of the Aubrey series, The Reverse of the Medal, is based upon Cochrane's trial. | ||
A number of books have been written which debate the guilt or innocence of Lord Cochrane. In compiling this note, I have relied to a large extent on A Matter of Speculation: The Case of Lord Cochrane by Henry Cecil [Hutchinson, London, 1965]. | ||
Thomas Barnes Cochrane, 11th Earl of Dundonald | ||
Between June 1862 and June 1863, the Committee for Privileges of the House of Lords heard a claim made by Thomas Barnes Cochrane to the Earldom of Dundonald. There was no doubt that Cochrane was the eldest son of the 10th Earl of Dundonald, but the point at issue was whether he was considered to be legitimate. | ||
As mentioned in the note above relating to the 10th Earl, he and Miss Catherine Barnes were married in a secret ceremony in Scotland in August 1812, and were subsequently married publicly in 1818. Their eldest son, the claimant, was born in April 1814. Initially, the claim was opposed by Captain Leopold Cochrane, the eldest son born after the public marriage of 1818. He subsequently withdrew his opposition to the claim, but the House of Lords appears to have considered the case of sufficient importance to continue to hear evidence, probably because the right of Lord Dundonald to vote at the election of Scottish representative peers would depend upon the case's outcome. | ||
The following is extracted from a report which appeared in the Birmingham Daily Post of 26 July 1862. I have taken the liberty of excising some of the less relevant portions of the report. | ||
Her ladyship [the Dowager Countess of Dundonald, widow of the 10th Earl and the mother of the claimant] now appeared to give evidence. She stated that her maiden name was Catherine Corbett Barnes, and that her parents died when she was very young. She was now 64 years of age. [If this is true, she was only 14 when she married in 1812. Burke's Peerage states that she was 69 when she died in 1865, which makes her 16 in 1812 - a more likely age to my mind]. She was brought up by her aunt, Mrs. Jackson, who resided at 9, Bryanston Street, Bryanston Square. Whilst living in Bryanston Street, in 1811, she was introduced to her late husband, then Lord Cochrane, by his cousin, Captain Nathaniel Day Cochrane, who was a friend of her aunt's. He was then living with his uncle, Mr. Basil Cochrane, at 20, Portman Square. He made love to her and offered her marriage, which she at first refused, but eventually she accepted him. He asked her to be privately married, and to keep the marriage secret, as his uncle had promised him a large fortune if he married another lady. She refused, but on his being taken ill he sent to her, begging her to walk opposite his uncle's house, as he was dying. She complied with the request, and on his being lifted to the window the sight of his corpse-like form softened her heart, and she consented to a private marriage. | ||
Her ladyship then proceeded to say that she and her late husband went to Scotland in a carriage, attended by her maid and her husband's man, and, on their arrival at Annan, on the 8th of August, 1812, they went to the Queensberry Arms Hotel, where Lord Cochrane wrote out a paper, and she copied out another, which they signed. They ran as follows:- | ||
"I, Sir Thomas Cochrane, commonly called Lord Cochrane, of the kingdom of Scotland, being desirous for particular reasons, to avoid a public marriage, do hereby acknowledge and receive Catherine Corbett Barnes as my lawful wife. COCHRANE" | ||
"I, Catherine Corbett Barnes, of the parish of Marylebone, county of Middlesex, do accept and declare Sir Thomas Cochrane, commonly called Lord Cochrane, to be my lawful husband, promising faithfully to keep secret this deed of marriage until I shall be permitted in writing under the hand of my accepted husband to disclose the same. CATHERINE CORBETT BARNES" | ||
"Done at Queensberry Arms, in the town and parish of Annan, in the county of Dumfries, in the kingdom of Scotland, the 8th day of August, 1812. Anne Moxam : Richard Carter" | ||
Lord Cochrane told Carter that he had come there to be married. He also told her that the marriage was legal. He left for London immediately, scarcely stopping for refreshment. She returned on the 10th, when she went to her aunt's house, where she remained until the 18th, when she went with Lord Cochrane to the Isle of Wight, where they stayed two months, and she lived with him from that time until his death. They were afterwards married in England and at Edinburgh. [During Cochrane's subsequent naval career in the service of Chile, Brazil and Greece, his wife was invariably aboard the ships he commanded.] | ||
Eventually, on 15 June 1863, the Committee allowed the claim of Thomas Barnes Cochrane to the earldom. The Committee found that the Dowager Countess's evidence was true, and that the papers signed by she and her late husband were genuine, and not forgeries as had been suggested. In an early example of forensic detection, it was shown that the watermarks contained in the papers proved that the paper had been manufactured in 1811, a year before the secret marriage, and that it was extremely unlikely that, if the papers were forged, the forger would have been able to obtain, or even think of obtaining, paper with such watermarks. | ||
John Murray, 4th Earl of Dunmore | ||
Dunmore has the dubious distinction of having a war named after him - Lord Dunmore's War. After serving as Governor of New York in 1770 and 1771, he was appointed Governor of Virginia in September 1771. He had no particular qualifications for the post, other than a soldierly reputation and a determination to uphold the authority of British rule. | ||
At first he was very popular, especially among the slave-owning plantation gentry whom he entertained lavishly and who regarded him as a kindred spirit. But already trouble was brewing as discontent with British taxation and trading restrictions spread from the northern colonies to the previously loyal inhabitants of Virginia. In March 1773, Dunmore abruptly dissolved the Virginia Assembly because it dared to propose consultations with the other colonies about their common grievances. A year later, the outbreak of a ferocious native American war temporarily shelved all political considerations. | ||
The area south of the Ohio River had long been claimed by the Iroquois Confederacy. In 1768, under the Treaty of Fort Stanwix, the British had acquired this land, but a number of other native American nations, in particular the Shawnees and the Mingos, had refused to sign the treaty and continued to hunt in the area. | ||
Following the 1768 Treaty, British explorers, surveyors and settlers began pouring into the region, but the native American nations which were opposed to the Treaty increasingly attacked settlers, killing the men and taking the women and children as slaves. One of the first events in Lord Dunmore's War was the killing in October 1773 of James, the son of a then obscure hunter by the name of Daniel Boone. | ||
Until April 1774, the Mingo nation, under its chief, known to the settlers as John Logan, had been peaceful toward the settlers. This all changed on 30 April when a group of native Americans who were camped on the west bank of the Ohio at Yellow Creek crossed the river to a tavern at Baker's Bottom. When the native Americans all became intoxicated by rum, a group of settlers lying in wait massacred all of them. Collecting his surviving warriors, Logan took to the woods and over the next few months swooped on every isolated settlement within reach, killing, raping and burning in a frenzy of vengeance. | ||
His men were few and might still have been easily crushed had not a further senseless outrage by the white settlers against the brother of the chief of the Shawnees, a native American named Cornstalk, caused the Shawnees to join forces with Logan's tribe. | ||
Early in May 1774, Dunmore received word of the native American rising and immediately requested the formation of a militia force. This force was split in two, Dunmore commanding one and Colonel Andrew Lewis the other. The two forces moved along the Ohio valley, slaughtering every native American they found, including women and children. The climax came on 10 October 1774 at the Battle of Point Pleasant where Cornstalk's forces were defeated and peace negotiations were commenced. Logan, however, refused to give up and he lived to become a bloodthirsty ally of the British during the War of Independence, being eventually murdered by his own followers. | ||
For the moment, however, Dunmore was the hero of Virginia, but the honeymoon was brief. In early 1775, Dunmore again dissolved the Virginia Assembly while mobs in the streets threatened to drag him from his house and hang him. On the night of 20 April 1775, he ordered his British troops to move all of the gunpowder and shot from the Williamsburg magazine to a Royal Navy warship in the James River. A fresh outburst of rioting followed and the Assembly resumed its sittings in defiance of the governor's command. | ||
In June came the sensational news from far-off Boston of the Battle of Bunker Hill; the War of Independence had begun. Dunmore knew he had no hope of holding Williamsburg and resistance might lead to a massacre of loyalists. With his handful of soldiers and every man who would follow him, he fled overland, reaching Yorktown. Lying in the harbour he found a British man‑of‑war, the 74‑gun Fowey, and on board her he set up the shadow of the last loyalist government of Virginia. Dunmore now commenced a ruthless guerrilla campaign to drive the colonists back to their proper allegiance. | ||
Although Dunmore's campaign was a mere sideshow in the whole of the War of Independence, it was fought with a bitterness that made his name more hated than many a more famous British commander. He set to work to collect a flotilla of ships manned by loyalist seamen and with them he sailed up the rivers, burning farms and villages and trying vainly to stir up a mass counter-rising against the 'traitors' in Williamsburg. Within a few months his depredations were so serious that the rebel Assembly appointed a Committee of Public Safety to organise defence of the colony's coastal regions. | ||
At first the patriot forces were little more than an undisciplined rabble who fled at the first rattle of musketry from Dunmore's small army, but gradually resistance stiffened. On 25 October 1775 Dunmore was repulsed from Hampton and six weeks later he suffered a heavier and bloodier defeat at the Battle of Great Bridge, near Norfolk. Still the war dragged on, stained by atrocities on both sides. Dunmore routinely hanged captured officers as traitors, while the rebels retorted by shooting redcoat prisoners as looters and arsonists. | ||
By early 1776 Dunmore had established a new base on Gwynn's Island in Chesapeake Bay, from where he made his last desperate throw of the dice. He issued a proclamation promising freedom and arms to all Negro slaves who ran away from their plantations and joined the royalist forces. Even the remotest prospect of a slave revolt was enough to goad Virginians into a supreme effort and on 8 July 1776, a rebel army led by his former comrade in the native American campaign, Colonel Lewis, landed on Gwynn's Island, forcing Dunmore to flee. | ||
Dunmore's loyalty did not go unrewarded. For nearly 10 years he was Governor of the Bahamas, making the islands a haven for royalist refugees who fled across the water from the newly-founded United States of America. His daughter, Augusta, married the Duke of Sussex, sixth son of King George III, although the marriage was considered to be void since it was made in contravention of the Royal Marriages Act of 1772. For further information, see the note at the foot of the page containing details of the Sussex peerage. | ||
Charles Adolphus Murray, 7th Earl of Dunmore | ||
On 8 November 1861, during the American Civil War, Captain Charles Wilkes, commander of the sloop San Jacinto arrested two Confederate delegates who were on board the British ship Trent. Because the arrests had taken place on the high seas, Wilkes created a diplomatic incident that endangered relations between the Union and the neutral United Kingdom. The President of the Confederate States, Jefferson Davis, had selected James M Mason and John Slidell to ask the UK and France for material aid and diplomatic recognition. After running the Union blockade, Mason and Slidell took passage on the Trent in Havana, Cuba. The next day, while in international waters, Wilkes stopped the Trent, removed Mason and Slidell and then allowed the Trent to continue on its way. | ||
Although Wilkes was merely following the orders of the Secretary of the Navy, Gideon Welles, Wilkes had violated accepted maritime behaviour. International law would have dictated that the Trent be taken to the nearest harbour where a prize court would have decided whether the Trent had violated neutrality. Wilkes' act of arresting Mason and Slidell without taking the Trent as a prize was considered to be an illegal act. | ||
The British immediately protested this act and demanded the release of the prisoners. When it became clear that the British were preparing to go to war with the Union over this affair and had begun to transfer troops to Canada, the two prisoners were released. | ||
One of the soldiers who was sent with his regiment to Canada as a result of the Trent Affair was Charles Murray, 7th Earl of Dunmore. After Mason and Slidell had been released and the prospect of war between Britain and the Union averted, Dunmore sought a little recreation. He obtained leave from his regiment and, travelling under the name of Mr Murray, he ran the Union blockade and entered the Confederate states, being feted in Richmond and Charleston. While he was in the Confederate states, the Confederate ship Nashville broke through the Union blockade and Dunmore was presented with the Nashville's flag, which he wrapped around his body beneath his shirt. Dunmore then took passage aboard an outward-bound blockade runner but the ship was captured by the Union navy. When the flag was found upon him, Dunmore was imprisoned at Fort Lafayette (in New York Harbour) as a 'secessionist sympathiser'. It was only after a great deal of difficulty than Dunmore was eventually released, largely because the commander of Fort Lafayette denied that the Earl of Dunmore was being held there, not realising that Mr Murray and the Earl were the same person. | ||
The 7th Earl was probably the leading member of the Christian Science religion in the United Kingdom. | ||
Alexander Edward Murray VC, 8th Earl of Dunmore | ||
Dunmore (at that time known by the courtesy title of Viscount Fincastle) was a recipient of the Victoria Cross, awarded during the Tirah Campaign of 1897‑1898. The Tirah Campaign was directed against the Afridi tribesmen near the Khyber Pass between modern-day Pakistan and Afghanistan. | ||
On 17 August 1897, Fincastle, a lieutenant in the 16th Lancers, together with two other officers, Robert Bellew Adams and Hector Lachlan Stewart MacLean, and five men, went to the rescue of a lieutenant of the Lancashire Fusiliers who had been injured by a bullet wound and was now surrounded by enemy swordsmen. In spite of heavy fire, the wounded officer was brought under cover but was killed by an enemy bullet. MacLean was also killed in this rescue attempt. Fincastle, Adams and MacLean (posthumously) were all awarded the Victoria Cross for their bravery. | ||
Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, 18th Baron Dunsany | ||
In Brewer's Rogues, Villains Eccentrics by William Donaldson, there is a story relating to Dunsany's well-known hobby of hunting big game. According to the story, in the 1930s the proprietors of Lobb & Co., the gentlemen's shoe shop in St James's, advertised their premises by means of a trap drawn by two zebras. Never having bagged a zebra, Dunsany took up a position between Fortnum and Mason and Hatchard's, the bookshop, and shot them both dead as they trotted down Piccadilly. Although to my mind this seems highly unlikely (and I have never seen any corroborating evidence), it's a great story. | ||
The Lambton Worm | ||
The legend of the Lambton Worm is one of north-east England's most famous items of folklore. There are many versions of the legend, each slightly different from the rest, but they all agree on the essential details. This version is taken from English Fairy and other Folk Tales selected and edited by Edwin Sidney Hartland, published as part of the Camelot Series in 1890. Bram Stoker's 1911 novel The Lair of the White Worm draws heavily upon the legend. It is also worth noting that, in Old English, "wyrm" meant dragon, or serpent. | ||
The park and manor-house of Lambton lie on the banks of the Wear, to the north of Lumley. The family is a very ancient one, much older, it is believed, than the twelfth century, to which date its pedigree extends. The old castle was dismantled in 1797, when a site was adopted for the present mansion on the north bank of the swiftly-flowing Wear, in a situation of exceeding beauty. The park also contains the ruins of a chapel, called Brugeford or Bridgeford, close to one of the bridges which span the Wear. | ||
Long, long ago - some say about the fourteenth century - the young heir of Lambton led a careless, profane life, regardless alike of his duties to God and man, and in particular neglecting to attend mass, that he might spend his Sunday mornings in fishing. One Sunday, while thus engaged, having cast his line into the Wear many times without success, he vented his disappointment in curses loud and deep, to the great scandal of the servants and tenantry as they passed by to the chapel at Brugeford. | ||
Soon afterwards he felt something tugging at his line, and trusting he had at last secured a fine fish, he exerted all his skill and strength to bring his prey to land. But what were his horror and dismay on finding that, instead of a fish, he had only caught a worm of most unsightly appearance! He hastily tore the thing from his hook, and flung it into a well close by, which is still known by the name of the Worm Well. | ||
The young heir had scarcely thrown his line again into the stream when a stranger of venerable appearance, passing by, asked him what sport he had met with; to which he replied: "Why, truly, I think I have caught the devil himself. Look in and judge." The stranger looked, and remarked that he had never seen the like of it before; that it resembled an eft [i.e. a young newt], only it had nine holes on each side of its mouth; and, finally, that he thought it boded no good. | ||
The worm remained unheeded in the well till it outgrew so confined a dwelling-place. It then emerged, and betook itself by day to the river, where it lay coiled round a rock in the middle of the stream, and by night to a neighbouring hill, round whose base it would twine itself, while it continued to grow so fast that it soon could encircle the hill three times. This eminence is still called the Worm Hill. It is oval in shape, on the north side of the Wear, and about a mile and a half from old Lambton Hall. | ||
The monster now became the terror of the whole countryside. It sucked the cows' milk, worried the cattle, devoured the lambs, and committed every sort of depredation on the helpless peasantry. Having laid waste the district on the north side of the river, it crossed the stream and approached Lambton Hall, where the old Lord was living alone and desolate. His son had repented of his evil life, and had gone to the wars in a distant country. Some authorities tell us he had embarked as a crusader for the Holy Land. | ||
On hearing of their enemy's approach, the terrified household assembled in council. Much was said, but to little purpose, till the steward, a man of age and experience, advised that the large trough which stood in the courtyard should immediately be filled with milk. This was done without delay; the monster approached, drank the milk, and, without doing further harm, returned across the Wear to wrap his giant form around his favourite hill. The next day he was seen recrossing the river; the trough was hastily filled again, and with the same results. It was found that the milk of "nine kine" was needed to fill the trough; and if this quantity was not placed there every day, regularly and in full measure, the worn would break out into a violent rage, lashing its tail round the trees in the park, and tearing them up by the roots. | ||
The Lambton Worm was now, in fact, the terror of the North Country. It had not been left altogether unopposed. Many a gallant knight had come out to fight with the monster, but all to no purpose, for it possessed the marvellous power of reuniting itself after being cut asunder, and thus was more than a match for the chivalry of the North. So, after many conflicts, and much loss of life and limb, the creature was left in possession of its favourite hill. | ||
After seven long years, however, the heir of Lambton returned home, a sadder and wiser man - returned to find the broad lands of his ancestors waste and desolate, his people oppressed and well-nigh exterminated, his father sinking into the grave overwhelmed with care and anxiety. He took no rest, we are told, till he crossed the river and surveyed the Worm as it lay coiled round the foot of the hill; then, hearing how its former opponents had failed, he took counsel in the matter from a sibyl or wise woman. | ||
At first the sibyl did nothing but upbraid him for having brought this scourge upon his house and neighbourhood; but when she perceived that he was indeed penitent, and desirous at any cost to remove the evil he had caused, she gave him her advice and instructions. He was to get his best suit of mail studded thickly with spear-heads, to put it on, and thus armed to take his stand on the rock in the middle of the river, there to meet his enemy, trusting the issue to Providence and his good sword. But she charged him before going to the encounter to take a vow that, if successful, he would slay the first living thing that met him on his way homewards. Should he fail to fulfil this vow, she warned him that for nine generations no lord of Lambton would die in his bed. | ||
The heir, now a belted knight, made the vow in Brugeford chapel. He studded his armour with the sharpest spear-heads, and unsheathing his trusty sword took his stand on the rock in the middle of the Wear. At the accustomed hour the worm uncoiled its "snaky twine", and wound its way towards the hall, crossing the river close by the rock on which the knight was standing eager for the combat. He struck a violent blow upon the monster's head as it passed, on which the creature, "irritated and vexed", though apparently not injured, flung its tail round him, as if to strangle him in its coils. | ||
Now was seen the value of the sibyl's advice. The closer the Worm wrapped him in its folds, the more deadly were its self-inflicted wounds, till at last the river ran crimson with its gore. Its strength thus diminished, the knight was able at last with his good sword to cut the serpent in two; the severed part was immediately borne away by the swiftness of the current, and the Worm, unable to reunite itself, was utterly destroyed. | ||
During this long and desperate conflict the household of Lambton had shut themselves within-doors to pray for their young lord, he having promised that when it was over he would, if conqueror, blow a blast on his bugle. This would assure his father of his safety, and warn them to let loose the favourite hound, which they had destined as the sacrifice on the occasion, according to the sibyl's requirements and the young lord's vow. When, however, the bugle-notes were heard within the hall, the old man forgot everything but his son's safety, and rushing out of doors, ran to meet the hero and embrace him. | ||
The heir of Lambton was thunderstruck; what could he do? It was impossible to lift his hand against his father; yet how else to fulfil his vow? In his perplexity he blew another blast; the hound was let loose, it bounded to his master; the sword, yet reeking with the monster's gore, was plunged into its heart; but all in vain. The vow was broken, the sibyl's prediction fulfilled, and the curse lay upon the house of Lambton for nine generations. | ||
For further reading on the folklore of such creatures, I recommend Dragons and Dragon Slayers by Frederick W. Hackwood, published by the Religious Tract Society in 1923. | ||
The legend of the supposed curse was revived by the newspapers in 1941 after a number of untimely deaths within the Lambton family. Foremost among these was the suicide of Lord Lambton, son and heir of the 5th Earl of Durham, who killed himself in February 1941. This led The Washington Post to speculate whether the curse was still active. The paper pointed out that Lord Lambton's cousin, Gervase Lambton, had disappeared from a liner while passing through the Red Sea in October 1937. Another cousin, D'Arcy Lambton, died following a car crash in November 1938. Further, Beatrix, Dowager Countess of Durham and widow of the 4th Earl, fell while shopping for a grand-daughter's wedding present in April 1937 and died a week later, on the day of the wedding. | ||
Antony Claud Frederick Lambton, 6th Earl of Durham | ||
When his father, the 5th Earl, died in 1970, Lambton disclaimed the peerage for life so that he could continue to sit in the House of Commons as MP for Berwick upon Tweed. In spite of a ruling made by the House of Lords Privileges Committee, he continued to use the style of Lord Lambton. Married with one son and five daughters, he sat in the House of Commons for Berwick upon Tweed between 1951 and 1973, being appointed as a junior minister in the Department of Defence in 1970. | ||
In 1972, he was making regular use of a high-class call-girl service run by Mrs Jean Horn. Among her girls his favourite was an ex-dancer named Norma Levy, whom he visited once a week in her Maida Vale apartment. Mrs Levy was often partnered on these occasions by one or more of her girlfriends, and cannabis was sometimes smoked. | ||
On one occasion Lambton grew careless and paid Mrs Levy for her services by cheque. Mrs Levy's husband, Colin, installed a camera and microphone in his wife's bedroom and was able to film Lambton in bed with his wife. In May 1973, he offered the film to the News of the World for £30,000. The paper thought that the quality of the film was too poor to use, so they installed their own equipment, including a teddy bear whose nose was a concealed microphone. They also fitted a two-way mirror to a wardrobe in which a photographer was concealed, enabling photos to be taken of Lambton, Mrs Levy and a friend of hers. For some reason, however, the paper decided not to use the story and handed their evidence over to Levy, who then offered it to the Sunday People for £45,000, but accepted £750. The paper gave the evidence straight to the police. | ||
The whole matter would possibly have blown over had it not happened that Mrs Levy mentioned the matter to the proprietor of a club where she worked as a 'hostess'. The proprietor's wife contacted James Prior, then leader of the House of Commons, who in turn advised his Prime Minister, Edward Heath. Lambton immediately resigned as a minister and from the House. | ||
A security inquiry was held due to fears that the prostitution scandal may have involved an actual or potential security breach, given Lambton's role in the Department of Defence, but the inquiry concluded that the risk of such a breach was negligible. After he resigned, he re-located to Italy, but not before appearing on a television programme where he remarked that he couldn't 'think what all the fuss was about; surely all men visit whores?' | ||
The special remainder to the Barony of Dynevor created in 1780 | ||
From the London Gazette of 26 September 1780 (issue 12122, page 1):- | ||
The King has been pleased to grant to the Earl Talbot, and his Heirs Male, the Dignity of a Baron of the Kingdom of Great Britain, by the Name, Stile and Title of Baron Dinevor, of Dinevor, in the County of Carmarthen; with Remainder to his Daughter Lady Cecil Rice, Widow, and her Heirs Male. | ||
Elizabeth Tollemache, Countess of Dysart in her own right and Duchess of Lauderdale | ||
Elizabeth was the daughter of William Murray, who was created Earl of Dysart in the peerage of Scotland in 1643. Murray was a Royalist who went into exile after the execution of Charles I. Having no sons, the Letters Patent creating the Earldom of Dysart provided that the title could descend in the female line. | ||
Elizabeth did not accompany her father into exile, but remained in England where she was raised by relatives. Since her father had bankrupted himself in the Royalist cause, she knew that her future depended upon making a good match. In 1647, she married Sir Lionel Tollemache, 3rd baronet, by whom she had eleven children. | ||
After her father drank himself to death in exile, Elizabeth became Countess of Dysart in 1651. Before long, scandalmongers fastened on her lifestyle. It was rumoured that one of her lovers was Oliver Cromwell, although most historians seem to have ridiculed this story. Whatever the truth, it is apparent that Sir Lionel Tollemache had plenty of other reasons to suspect his wife's fidelity. | ||
When the Restoration occurred in 1660, Elizabeth at last found a stage worthy of her talents. The collapse of the Puritan Commonwealth and the return of Charles II ushered in the most immoral court in English history, which attracted large numbers of drunken spendthrift parasites. Among them was the Countess of Dysart, now virtually separated from her husband, and who already had a reputation for the large number of lovers she had taken and her ability to extract rich rewards from them. | ||
It was during this period that she met John Maitland, Earl of Lauderdale. He had been imprisoned in the Tower under Cromwell and had now restored his fortune by becoming one of Charles II's favourites. He was one of the 'cabal', so-named after the initials of Charles' ministers - Clifford, Arlington, Buckingham, Ashley and Lauderdale. Even in the tolerant atmosphere of Court, Lauderdale's excesses were notorious, and Elizabeth, who was by now his mistress, became detested due to her arrogance and avarice. She decided that the only way to secure her position was by marrying Lauderdale, despite the fact that both parties were already married. | ||
Sir Lionel died in March 1669, leaving Elizabeth the mistress of Ham House on the banks of the Thames near Richmond (now owned by the National Trust and reputedly one of the most haunted houses in England). There she wasted no time in useless grief. With Lauderdale at her side, she gave herself up to a hectic life of pleasure that quickly drained her inheritance. | ||
In November 1671, the final obstacle was removed when Lauderdale's wife died in Paris. Elizabeth and Lauderdale were married in February 1672, and the next few years saw her at the height of her remorseless money-grasping activities. Within three months of the marriage Lauderdale had been promoted to Duke of Lauderdale and virtual dictator of Scottish affairs. All the patronage of Scotland went through his hands or, more often, through the even more greedy hands of his wife. Official appointments and titles were sold to the highest bidder and huge bribes were extorted to 'protect' the estates of former anti-Royalists from confiscation. | ||
Not even Lauderdale's influence could protect Elizabeth from the flood of mockery, bitter lampoons or scurrilous abuse that blackened her name. Broadsheets were scattered around the coffee houses and once a hooting mob surrounded her coach until she was rescued by a detachment of soldiers. In the Restoration comedy, The Plain Dealer written by William Wycherley, audiences were delighted to find that the greedy harpy, Widow Blackacre, appeared to have been based on the Duchess of Lauderdale. | ||
In 1680, Elizabeth's influence began to decline, following her husband's resignation from office due to ill-health. She now attempted to persuade her husband to disinherit his heir, his younger brother, and leave her his entire fortune. When Lauderdale died in August 1682 the Dukedom became extinct and the Earldom of Lauderdale was inherited by his brother. At once, a bitter battle over his estate began. Elizabeth opened the campaign by giving her husband the most extravagant funeral possible and paying for it out of money that legally belonged to Lauderdale's brother. She then refused to surrender to the new Earl the family estates in Scotland. | ||
For years the litigation dragged on, the Duchess using bribes and various devious ruses until the Earl was reduced to near ruin. But with the death of Charles II in 1685, her once all-powerful influence disappeared. The new King, James II, hated her, and when she made the mistake of secretly backing the Duke of Monmouth's rebellion, she was forced to retire into obscurity for the rest of the reign. The advent of William III and Mary did nothing to restore her fortunes and she lived on for a further nine years, an embittered harridan, as arrogant and hated as ever. When she died in June 1698, there were very few who mourned her. | ||
The Dysart peerage claim of 1881 | ||
Lionel William John Tollemache (or Talmash), succeeded as the 8th Earl of Dysart in 1840. When he died in 1878, he was succeeded by his grandson, William John Manners Tollemache. | ||
The reason why the grandson succeeded is that the 8th Earl's son, William Lionel Felix Tollemache, who went by the courtesy title of Lord Huntingtower, had pre-deceased his father. Huntingtower was born 4 July 1820 and was married on 26 September 1851 to his cousin, Catherine Elizabeth Camilla Burke, daughter of Sir Joseph Burke of Glinsk, 11th baronet. He died, aged 52, on 21 December 1872, leaving an only son who became 9th Earl of Dysart on the death of his grandfather in 1878. | ||
When the 9th Earl reached his majority in 1880, he petitioned the Crown, in the normal way, to admit his succession to the dignities of Earl of Dysart and Lord Huntingtower in the peerage of Scotland. However, his petition was opposed by Elizabeth Tollemache (née Acford), who claimed to have been the wife, and to be now the widow, of Lord Huntingtower. She was acting on behalf of her son, Albert Edwin Tollemache, and she claimed that the dignities were rightfully his. | ||
The case occupied large amounts of print in contemporary newspapers, and to provide verbatim reports from the newspapers would expand this note to an unmanageable size. I have therefore contented myself with providing a summary of the case which appeared in the Hobart Mercury on 30 April 1881:- | ||
The Dysart peerage case, which has been under the notice of the Committee for Privileges of the House of Lords for some considerable time, has ended in a way on the whole satisfactory. The question to be decided was which of the claimants to the earldom of Dysart was the rightful heir, and this turned on the question [of] which of the two was the legitimate son of the late Lord Huntingtower, the son of the sixth earl [actually the eighth earl, since there had also been two Countesses of Dysart in their own right], who predeceased his father. That both William John Manners Tollemache and Albert Edwin Acford were his sons was indisputable; and it was also common ground that the former was born after his father and mother had publicly gone through the form of marriage. The real question in issue was whether Lord Huntingtower had not previously contracted a marriage with Elizabeth Acford, the mother of the second claimant. She was lady's maid to Lady Dysart, Lord Huntingtower's mother, in 1840, and it was not denied that she was seduced by his mistress' son. | ||
According to her account, the intimacy was commenced by a breach of the criminal as well as the moral law, but this is not very important as affecting the main question. Miss Acford's story was that in 1844, when travelling in Scotland with Lord Huntingtower, and before the birth of the second claimant, he acknowledged himself to be her husband in the presence of witnesses; and, if that were so, they clearly would have been married according to the very unsatisfactory marriage law which then existed in Scotland. In 1851 Lord Huntingtower went through the form of marriage with Miss Burke, the mother of William Tollemache, the first claimant, but of course if what took place in 1844 amounted to a legal marriage, this second one was bigamous and the issue of it illegitimate. | ||
This, then, was the question the Committee had to decide; and it took the Law Lords many prolonged sittings to sift the matter to the bottom. On the one hand it was shown that Lord Huntingtower had on one occasion pleaded in an action that he was the husband of Miss Acford, with whom he continued to live intermittently long after his subsequent marriage with Miss Burke. On the other hand, there was a letter from Miss Acford to her "husband", in which she offered to marry somebody else if Lord Huntingtower would give her £1,000. This letter she alleged to have been written "in joke", an explanation which, however, did not recommend itself to the Judges who had to decide the case; and ultimately they came to the conclusion that Miss Acford was never anything more than Lord Huntingtower's mistress. | ||
Accordingly they decreed that the son born of the subsequent marriage was legitimately entitled to the rights and dignities of the earldom of Dysart, thus upholding the public marriage, about which there was no doubt. | ||
Scotch marriages are proverbial for the crimes, romances, and litigations they have given rise to. At present the parties must have lived in the country for some three weeks before a mutual avowal can bind them together as man and wife, but the element of secrecy still remains. It is still possible for a man to marry in Scotland and for the fact to be kept a secret from all but two or three dependents and any libertine may thus do today what, as it happens, Lord Huntingtower is found not to have done in 1851. | ||
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