Douglases and Hamiltons
The Douglas-Hamiltons are descended from two of Scotland’s most powerful families. ‘The Good Sir James’, patriot and founder of the Black Douglases, was killed in battle in Spain, carrying the heart of his lifelong friend, King Robert the Bruce, to the Holy Land. Marriage to a Stewart Princess bought wealth and prestige to his great-nephew the 2nd Earl of Douglas, later to die in his moment of victory at Otterburn. Sir James’s illegitimate son, Archibald ‘The Grim’ became the 3rd Earl and consolidated the family’s position. The 4th Earl married James I’s sister, but he and his son were killed in fighting the English in France. Despite this and other set-backs, in the early fifteenth century the Douglases had become so powerful that they were seen as a threat to the nation’s stability. In 1440 the young 6th Earl and his brother were invited by a rival to dine in Edinburgh castle with the ten year old King James II. A black bull’s head, the symbol of death, was bought in, and the Douglas boys were dragged away, given a mock trial, and beheaded. The King was horrified, but twelve years later he invited their cousin the 8th Earl under a safe-conduct to Stirling Castle, were he was murdered, the King having struck the first blow. The 9th Earl prudently spent much of his adult life in England. When he returned in 1484 with a small invading army, to recover his possessions, he was captured and confined in Lindores Abbey. He died in 1491, last of his line.
Meanwhile, another of Sir James’s great nephews, George 1st Earl of Angus, was the first of the Red Douglases. He too married a Stewart Princess. Archibald, the 5th Earl earned the nickname ‘Bell the Cat’, when he led a revolt against James III, and hanged the King’s favourites. His grandson the 6th Earl made himself guardian of James VI by marrying Margaret Tudor, the young king’s widowed mother. He was still taking to the field of battle against the English when over the age of sixty. James, Earl of Morton, younger brother of the 7th Earl, was a bitter enemy of Mary, Queen of Scots. He was one of the murderers of her secretary David Rizzio, and was deeply implicated in the assassination of her second husband Lord Darnley. A brutally effective regent of Scotland during the infancy of James VI, he fell from power in 1581 and was executed on ‘The Maiden’, the guillotine that he had introduced into Scotland.
The history of the Hamiltons is also highly eventful. Their ancestors, Walter Fitz Gilbert, originally no friend to Robert the Bruce, sensibly changed sides just after Bannockburn, and was much rewarded. The 1st Lord Hamilton strengthened his position by marrying James III’s sister, Princess Mary, securing for his family an important place in the line of succession. The Earl of Arran, their head, was Regent for the first twelve years of Queen Mary’s reign, and would have become King had she died childless.
The Hamiltons were often accused of coveting the Scottish throne (they had no claim to the English) but Arran’s sons faithfully supported Queen Mary much to the detriment of their own fortunes. The 1st and 2nd Dukes lost their lives because of their loyalty to Charles I and Charles II. The 4th duke, a most devious opponent of the Act of Union, took his claim to the Scottish crown seriously but married an English heiress and saw that his interests lay in the south. He was killed in a duel in Hyde Park. The 10th Duke, not renowned for his reticence, declared himself to be ‘rightful heir to the Scottish throne’. As far as the Hamiltons were concerned, the claim was extinguished in 1895. That year the 12th Duke died and any right to the Scottish crown passed to his daughter while his titles passed to his fourth cousin.
NB For those interested in such things, of the 114 people whose deaths are noticed in the table, five were beheaded, six were otherwise murdered, twelve were killed in battle, two died as prisoners of the English, and at least five were bastards.
More information can be found at the Clan Hamilton website