James Hamilton, Duke of Châtellerault

James Hamilton, Duke of Châtellerault, 2nd Earl of Arran (c. 1519 – 1575) was a regent for Mary, Queen of Scots from 1543 to 1554.

James Hamilton
Duke of Châtellerault 2nd Earl of Arran Governor and Protector of Scotland
Reign	1529–1575
Predecessor	James, 1st Earl of Arran
Successor	James, 3rd Earl of Arran
Born	c. 1516
Died	22 January 1575
Spouse(s)	Margaret Douglas
Detail Issue James, Gavin, John, David, Claud; Barbara, Jean, Anne, Margaret
Father	James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran
Mother	Janet Bethune of Easter Wemyss

Birth and origins

James was born about 1519 in Hamilton, Lanarkshire, Scotland.[1] He was the eldest legitimate son of James Hamilton by his second wife, Janet Beaton (or Bethune). His father was the 1st Earl of Arran. His paternal grandmother, Mary, was the eldest daughter of King James II. James's mother was the daughter of Sir David Beaton of Crich, the widow of Robert Livingstone of Easter Wemyss and the second wife of the 1st Earl of Arran.[2][3] Both parents were Scottish. They married in 1516 and had at least three children.

He appears below among his siblings as the second child:

1. Helen, married Archibald Campbell, 4th Earl of Argyll;
2. James (c. 1519–1575); and
3. Gavin (died before 1549).

Earl of Arran

In 1529 he succeeded his father as the 2nd Earl of Arran.[4]

Marriage and children

In 1532 Lord Arran, as he now was, married Margaret Douglas, who was about ten years older than him. She was a daughter of James Douglas, 3rd Earl of Morton, and Catherine Stewart, herself a natural daughter of James IV. The marriage was arranged by Arran's elder half-brother and guardian James Hamilton of Finnart. Margaret Douglas was given the house and lands of Kinneil House for her lifetime should her husband die before her. His elder half-brother James Hamilton of Finnart paid Morton 4,000 marks as part of the marriage settlement.[5] They had nine children, five boys and four girls.

Family tree

James Hamilton with wife, parents, and other selected relatives. Eupheme Graham d. 1468 James 1st Lord Hamilton c. 1415 – 1479 Mary Stewart Princess of Scotland d. 1488 James 1st Earl c. 1475 – 1529 Janet Beaton c. 1490 – c. 1522 James 2nd Earl c. 1516 – 1575 Margaret Douglas b. c. 1510 James 3rd Earl 1537–1609 John 1st Marquess 1540–1604 Claud 1st Ld Paisley 1546–1621 James 2nd Marquess 1589 – 1624/25 James 1st Earl Abercorn 1575–1618 Legend XXX James Hamilton XXX Earls of Arran XXX Marquesses of Hamilton This family tree is partly derived from the Abercorn pedigree pictured in Cokayne.[6] Also see the list of siblings in the text.

The five boys were:

1. James (1537–1609), succeeded him as the 3rd Earl of Arran but became insane in 1562;[7]
2. Gavin, died young;[8]
3. John (1540–1604), became the 1st Marquess of Hamilton;[9]
4. David (died 1611);[10][11] and
5. Claud (1546–1621), from whom descend the earls, marquesses, and dukes of Abercorn.[12]

The four girls were:

1. Barbara, married in 1553 James Fleming, 4th Lord Fleming;[13][14]
2. Jean, married Hugh Montgomerie, 3rd Earl of Eglinton in 1555;[15][16]
3. Anne (c. 1535 – before April 1574), married George Gordon, 5th Earl of Huntly;[17] and
4. Margaret, married Sir Alexander Pethein (Peden).[18]

In 1544 Arran tried to divorce his wife. She seemed to have been suffering of poor mental health.[19] Significantly two of their sons, James and Claud, later became insane. An inventory of a chest of Margaret Douglas' clothes includes a purple velvet night gown with gold passementerie lined with red taffeta, a gown of black cloth of gold with gold passementerie lined with black taffeta, and other gowns and kirtles.[20]

Regent of Scotland

In 1536, on the death of John Stewart, Duke of Albany, grandson of James II, Lord Arran, came to stand next in line to the throne after the King's descendants. Several of the children of the immediate royal family proved to be short-lived, so on the death of James V of Scotland on 14 December 1542 at only 30, the Earl of Arran stood next in line to the Scottish throne after the king's six-day-old newborn baby daughter Mary, Queen of Scots, for whom Arran was appointed Governor and Protector of Scotland.[21] In 1543, supporters of Matthew Stewart, 4th Earl of Lennox, challenged Arran's claim and legitimacy by suggesting that his father's divorce and second marriage were invalid.[22][23]

Initially, Arran was a Protestant and a member of the pro-English party. In 1543 he helped to negotiate the marriage of the Queen of Scots to the infant Prince of Wales (the future Edward VI of England); in the same year he authorised the translation and reading of the Bible in the vernacular.[24] On 27 January 1543 he arrested Cardinal Beaton, who favoured the Auld Alliance. Beaton was imprisoned at Dalkeith Palace and then Blackness Castle. However, Henry VIII of England doubted Arran's commitment to English policy and wanted him deposed. On 18 March 1543, Sir George Douglas of Pittendreich, brother of the Earl of Angus, told the English ambassador, Ralph Sadler, that:

"if there be any motion now to take the Governor from his state, and to bring the government of this realm to the king of England, I assure you it is impossible to be done at this time. For, there is not so little a boy but that he will hurl stones against it, and the wives will handle their distaffs, and the commons universally will rather die in it, yea, and many noblemen and all the clergy be fully against it."[25]

However, in September 1543 Arran turned around. He secretly met Cardinal Beaton at Callendar House[26] and reconciled himself with his former enemy. Shortly after he became Catholic and joined the pro-French faction. He signed the Treaty of Haddington, consenting to the marriage of the Queen to the French Dauphin (the future Francis II of France), earning the Duchy of Châtellerault in the process.[27] This led to the seven-year war with England now called the Rough Wooing, which was declared on 20 December 1543, and signed by Châtellerault the following month.[28] The declaration of war was brought by Henry Ray to give to the Parliament of Scotland. Châtellerault replied that the parliament was dissolved, and so he thought it expedient not to answer Henry VIII on the points raised at the time.[29]

In 1544 an attempt was made to transfer the regency from him to Mary of Guise, Queen Mary's mother, but Arran fortified Edinburgh and her forces retired. However, in March 1545 he agreed to abandon some of his responsibilities to her.[30]

In June 1547 Arrran gathered a large army to expel the English from Langholm and the surrounding area. A Scottish spy, David Maitland, who signed himself "Ye Wait Quha" wrote of the preparations to Thomas Wharton, that it was "the starkest host and the monest, and with the best order that wes sen Flodwn", that is, "the strongest host and most numerous, in the best order since Flodden."[31] In September 1547 Arran assembled a large Scottish army to resist an English invasion led by Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset but was defeated at the battle of Pinkie.[28] He nevertheless held onto the regency and continued to lead forces against the occupying troops. He reluctantly agreed in July 1548 to Mary's marriage to the Dauphin.

Henry II of France rewarded him for his support and his part in the marriage negotiations by creating him Duke of Châtellerault, and making him a knight of the Order of Saint Michael. His eldest son James was thenceforth styled Earl of Arran by courtesy.[28] Mary embarked for France on ... from Dumbarton. She then lived at the French court.

The Duke of Châtellerault wearing the collar of the Order of St Michael

The Duke and the reformation

In 1554, Châtellerault, as he was now, surrendered the regency to Mary of Guise, and was appointed her lieutenant in Scotland.[32] He gave up the regency on the condition that he would be the Queen's heir, if she died childless. But the Scottish succession had been secretly promised to France.

In the first months of the Scottish Reformation Châtellerault continued to support Mary of Guise. He faced a Protestant army with the French commander at Cupar Muir in June 1559. He changed his allegiance in August 1559, joining the Protestant Lords of the Congregation to oppose the regency of Mary of Guise, and lost his French dukedom as a result. In order to discredit him with the English government a letter was forged by his enemies, in which Châtellerault declared his allegiance to Francis II of France, but the plot was exposed. On 27 February 1560 he agreed to the Treaty of Berwick with Elizabeth I, which placed Scotland under English protection.[33]

After the death of Mary of Guise on 15 June 1560, Châtellerault persuaded the Parliament of Scotland to back a plan to marry his son James to Elizabeth I,[34] and then after the death of Francis II on 5 December 1560 he attempted, without success, to arrange for James to marry the young widowed Queen Mary.[28] However, Mary married Lord Darnley in 1565.

In 1566 Châtellerault withdrew to his estates in France, where he made vain attempts to regain his confiscated duchy. In 1569, he returned to Scotland in support of Mary but was imprisoned by Murray who assembled a parliament and had him declared a traitor. Murray was assassinated on 23 January 1570 while Châtellerault was still in prison. Nevertheless, Châtellerault was rumoured to have been an accomplice in the regent's murder.[35] Châtellerault was released from prison on 20 April 1570. In 1573 he gave up his support for Mary and recognised Mary's infant son James as King of Scotland.[36]

Kinneil House

A building from Châtellerault's heyday as regent survives at Kinneil in West Lothian, his Eastern residence, including carvings and paintings of his heraldry with the collar of Saint Michael.[37]

Arms of the earl of Arran (left) and his wife Margaret Douglas (right), Kinneil House.

Death, succession, and timeline

Châtellerault died at Hamilton on 22 January 1575.[38] He was succeeded by his eldest son James as the 3rd Earl of Arran. However as James was insane, John his younger brother stood in for him.

Timeline
As his birth date is uncertain, so are all his ages.
Age	Date	Event
0	1519, about	Born, probably in Hamilton, South Lanarkshire, Lanarkshire, Scotland.
3	1522, about	His mother died
10	1529	His father died; he succeeded as the 2nd Earl of Arran
13	1532	Married Margaret Douglas
23	1542, 14 Dec	James V of Scotland died
24	1543, early	Appointed regent for Mary Queen of Scots
24	1543, Sep	Turns around: Met Cardinal Beaton at Callendar House and became Catholic shortly after
24	1543, 20 Dec	England declared war, thus starting the Rough wooing
25	1544	He tried to get a divorce but failed
28	1547, 10 Sep	His forces defeated by the English at the Battle of Pinkie Cleugh
29	1548	Created Duke of Châtellerault by Henry II of France
35	1554	Lost the regency to Mary of Guise
39	1558	Mary married Francis, Dauphin of France
40	1559, 10 Jul	Henry II of France died.
41	1560, 27 Feb	Treaty of Berwick negotiated.
41	1560 5 Dec N.S.	Francis II of France died.
43	1562	James, his eldest son, declared insane
46	1565	Mary remarried to Darnley
49	1568, 13 May	Mary loses the Battle of Langside and flees to England.
51	1570, 23 Jan	Regent Moray murdered; Châtellerault might have been involved.
56	1575, 22 Jan	Died at Hamilton, South Lanarkshire[38]

Appendices

See also

• Duke of Châtellerault – for his principal title
• Earl of Arran (Scotland) – for his subsidiary title
• House of Hamilton – for his wider family
• Marquess of Hamilton – for his son John's title

References

Citation notes

1. Merriman 2004, p. 827, right column: "Hamilton, James, second Earl of Arran ... (c. 1519–1575) ... was born at Hamilton, Lanarkshire, the eldest son of James Hamilton, first Earl of Arran (1475?) and his second wife, Jane Beaton (d. c. 1522). "
2. Paul 1907, p. 360: "The Earl married secondly Janet Beaton, said to be a daughter of Sir David Beaton of Creich, widow of Sir Robert Livingstone of Easter Wemyss and Drumry ..."
3. Dunlop 1890, p. 168, left column, line 1a: "... Janet Beaton of Easter Wemyss ..."
4. Dunlop 1890, p. 168, left column, line 1b: "... succeeded to the earldom on the death of his father in 1529."
5. Laing 1850, p. 72, line 5: "Appended to a Receipt granted by him [Hamilton, Sir James] to James Earl of Morton for 3400 merks ... for the marriage of Margaret Douglas, daughter of the Earl of Morton, with his brother James, Earl of Arran. A.D. 1532."
6. Cokayne 1910, p. 4: "Tabular pedigree of the Earls of Abercorn"
7. Paul 1907, p. 368, line 34: "... who was born in 1537 or in 1538 ..."
8. Paul 1907, p. 369, line 11: "Gavin, styled second son ... appears to have died before August 1547 in his youth."
9. Debrett 1828, p. 443, line 10: "John, 2d son of the Duke of Chatelherault, succeeded on his father's death to the family estates ..."
10. Chatellherault's will, NAS ECC8/8/4
11. Burke 1869, p. 2, right column, line 37: "d. unm. 1611."
12. Debrett 1828, p. 443, line 9: "Claud, ancestor of the marquess of Abercorn ..."
13. Dunlop 1890, p. 170, line 32: "Barbara, who married James, fourth lord Fleming, high chamberlain of Scotland."
14. Paul 1907, p. 370, line 4: "Barbara, the eldest daughter, was first contracted to Alexander, Lord Gordon ... but it is not certain that the marriage took place ... She mas married (contract dated 22 December 1553) to James, Lord Fleming, chamberlain of Scotland."
15. Dunlop 1890, p. 170, right column, line 37: "Jane, who married Hugh Montgomery, third earl of Eglintoun."
16. Paul 1907, p. 370, line 15: "Jean or Jane ... was married (contract dated 13 February 1553-4) to the earl of Eglinton."
17. Dunlop 1890, p. 170, right column, line 36: "Anne who married George, fifth Earl of Huntly."
18. Dunlop 1890, p. 170, right column, line 34: "Margaret, who married Alexander, lord Gordon, eldest son of George, fourth earl of Huntly;"
19. Amy Blakeway, 'The attempted divorce of James Hamilton, earl of Arran, Governor of Scotland', The Innes Review, Volume 61 Issue 1 (May 2010), pp.1–23 ISSN 0020-157x
20. Melanie Schuessler Bond, Dressing the Scottish Court 1543-1553: Clothing in the Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland (Boydell, 2019), p. 657-8.
21. Chisholm 1910, p. 643, left column, line 43: "... was, in consequence of his position as next successor to the throne after the infant Mary, proclaimed protector of the realm and heir-presumptive of the crown in 1543"
22. Dickinson 1942, p. 7, line 25: "Further, the Earl of Lennox had been put forward by the French as the rightful heir, after Mary, to the throne; and Arran was not considered legitimate by Protestants or by Catholics because of the uncertain validity of his mother's marriage and the particular circumstances of his father's divorce ..."
23. Bain 1898, p. 691: "LENNOX - If you had been lawfully begotten, I should have nothing to say. But it is most true that your father was married to Elizabeth Hume daughter to Lord Alexander Hume, about the year 1493, and she lived till the year 1543. Many years before her death, your father 'took to his company' Dame Jenet Beton, by whom he had you, and was not his lawful wife."
24. Chisholm 1910, p. 643, left column, line 47: "... authorized the translation and the reading of the Scriptures in the vulgar tongue ..."
25. Clifford 1809, p. 70, line 19(Sadler later attributed a similar speech to Adam Otterburn.)
26. Bain 1892, p. 15, line 15: "... there was an appoyntement betwixt the Governour and the Cardynall to convene and mete togither this daye at an abbey ... orelles at Lord Levenstons house [i.e. Callender House] ..."
27. "The French Marriage". NQ Higher: Scottish History. Education Scotland. Archived from the original on 2 July 2012. Retrieved 26 September 2012.
28. Chisholm 1911.
29. Bain 1892, p. 238, line 41: "My lord Governour understanding that the said officiar was direct for shawing of the said writing to the thri estatis of parliament, quhilk was befor his cuming disolvit and thai departit lang of befor : Tharfor douting giff his ansuer wald be acceptible to the King of Ingland and to his msatisfactioun or nocht, thocht nocht expedient to giff ansuer presentlie in that behalf."
30. Chisholm 1910, p. 643, left column, line 59: "In March 1545 a truce was arranged by which each had a share in the government."
31. Joseph Bain, Calendar State Papers Scotland: 1547-1563, vol. 1 (Edinburgh, 1898), p. 8: Amy Blakeway, 'Spies and Intelligence in Scotland', in Sara Butler & Krista Kesselring, Crossing Borders: Boundaries and Margins in Medieval and Early Modern Britain (Leiden, 2018), pp. 95-6: See Arran's household book, National Records of Scotland, E31/9 ff. 57-59.
32. Blakeway 2015, p. 23, line 17: "... Chatelherault, likewise, held the position lieutenant of Mary, Queen of Scots, under Marie de Guise."
33. Chisholm 1910, p. 643, right column, line 9: "On the 27th of February 1560 he agreed to the treaty of Berwick with Elizabeth, which placed Scotland under her protection."
34. Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland, vol. ii, (1814), 605–606; HMC Hamilton, (1887), 42, August 1560.
35. Merriman 2004, p. 833, left column, line 28: "The murder of Murray on 23 January 1570, a deed plotted by Archbishop John Hamilton and carried out by James Hamilton of Bothwellhaugh led to accusations that Châtelherault had himself been implicated."
36. Dunlop 1890, p. 170, right column, line 15: "... till 23 Feb. 1573, when action in union with the Earl of Huntly, heconsented to acknowledge the king's authority and lay down his sword.
37. JS Richardson, PSAS, vol. 75, (1940–41), 184–204, "Mural Decorations at Kinneil" (PDF).
38. Paul 1907, p. 368, line 28: "... died at Hamilton on 22 January 1574-75."

Cited references

• Bain, Joseph, ed. (1898), Calendar of the State Papers Relating to Scotland and Mary, Queen of Scots 1547–1603, 1 A. D. 1547–1563, Edinburgh: H M General Register House
• Bain, Joseph, ed. (1892), The Hamilton Papers, 2, Edinburgh: H M General Register House - Letter dated the 4 September 1543 from Ralph Sadler to Suffolk and Tunstall
• Blakeway, Amy Louise (2015), Regency in Sixteenth-Century Scotland, Woodbridge, Suffolk: The Boydell Press, ISBN 978-1-84383-980-4
• Burke, Bernard (1869), A Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Peerage and Baronetage of the British Empire (31st ed.), London: Harrison
• Clifford, Arthur (1809), The State Papers and Letters of Ralph Sadler, Knight-Banneret, 1, Edinburgh: Archibald Constable
• Cokayne, George Edward (1910), Gibbs, Vicary (ed.), The complete peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, extant, extinct, or dormant, 1 (2nd ed.), London: St Catherine Press – Ab-Adam to Basing
• Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1910), "ARRAN, EARLS OF", Encyclopædia Britannica, 12 (11 ed.), New York: Encyclopædia Britannica Company, pp. 642–644
• Debrett, John (1828), Peerage of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, 2 (17th ed.), London: F. C. and J. Rivington - Scotland and Ireland
• Dickinson, Gladys (1942), "Two Missions of Jacques de la Brosse", Publications of the Scottish History Society, 3, 36: 7–8
• Dunlop, Robert (1890), "Hamilton, James, second Earl of Arran and Duke of Châtelherault (d. 1575)", in Lee, Sidney (ed.), Dictionary of National Biography, 24, New York: MacMillan and Co., pp. [167–170 https://archive.org/details/dictionaryofnati25stepuoft/page/167/]
• Laing, Henry, ed. (1850), Descriptive Catalogue of Impressions from Ancient Schottish Seals, Edinburgh: T. Constable
• Merriman, Marcus (2004), "Hamilton, James, second earl of Arran (c. 1519–1575)", in Matthew, Colin; Harrison, Brian (eds.), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 24, New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 827–833, ISBN 978-0198614111
• Paul, Sir James Balfour (1907), The Scots Peerage, Founded on Wood's Edition of Sir Robert Douglas's Peerage of Scotland, 4, Edinburgh: David Douglas – Fife to Hyndford (for Hamilton)

Attribution

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Arran, Earls of". Encyclopædia Britannica. 2 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 642–644.

Further reading

• Franklin, David Byrd (1995). The Scottish Regency of the Earl of Arran: A Study in the Failure of Anglo-Scottish Relations. Edwin Mellen Press.
• Melanie Schuessler Bond, Dressing the Scottish Court: 1543-1553 (The Boydell Press: Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2019).

External links

• Genealogy of James Hamilton, 2nd Earl of Arran on The Peerage website

Peerage of Scotland
Preceded by James Hamilton	Earl of Arran 1529–1548	Succeeded by James Hamilton
French nobility
Vacant Title last held by Charles de Valois	Duke of Châtellerault 1548–1559	Vacant Title next held by Diane de France