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James Hamilton, 2d
Marquis of Hamilton, was born in 1589 into the premier hereditary
peerage of Scotland. The
son of John, 1st Marquis of Hamilton, and Lady Margaret Lyon
of Glamis, he was descended through his mother from the Scottish King
Robert II (as well as being eventually related to Lady Elizabeth Bowes
Lyon – our modern Queen Elizabeth’s “Queen Mum”
– who grew up in Glamis Castle in the early years of the 20th
century).
He was descended, through his father, from several Scottish
Kings, a shrewd series of dynastic alliances, including the marriage in
1474 of the 1st Lord Hamilton to a daughter of King James II,
having made the Hamiltons one of Scotland’s most powerful families.
For many years Hamilton’s grandfather James Hamilton, 2nd
Earl of Arran, was heir presumptive to the Scottish throne.
If Mary Stuart (aka Mary Queen of Scots) had died without
children, Arran would have succeeded her as king.
Mary Stuart had ascended to the throne as an infant upon the death of
her father, King James V of Scotland, in 1542.
In March 1543, the Scottish Parliament appointed Arran the Lord
Governor, or Regent, of Scotland.
Arran has been variously described as faithless, inept,
vacillating and indecisive. All
agree that his overriding purpose in life was self-interest,
occasionally broadening to include the advancement of his immediate
family. As
a Protestant lord, Arran proposed, first, the betrothal of the infant
Queen Mary to his own son. When
the other Scottish lords did not support him, he then proposed Mary’s
betrothal to the 5-year-old son of Henry VIII.
Their marriage would have united England and Scotland under a
Protestant Tudor king. Mary’s mother, being both French and Catholic, was
adamantly opposed to this marriage as were most Scots, concerned less
with religion than with maintaining their national identity.
When the Scottish Parliament refused to approve the match with
England, Arran once again began plotting the marriage of the little
queen to his own son. By
1548, however, he was drawn into the camp of the Queen Mother, converted
to Roman Catholicism, and began to negotiate a marriage between Mary and
the Dauphin (Crown Prince) of France.
The price of his support? A
French dukedom.
The match with the Dauphin did
come to fruition, 5-year-old Mary sailed off to France in 1548 to be
raised at the court of her little fiancé’s parents and Arran gained
the French title of Châtelherault.
His blatant self-promotion, however, lessened his prestige and,
although Arran remained Regent of Scotland in name for six more years,
power really resided in the hands of the Queen Mother.
When Mary, widowed at 18, returned from France to rule in Scotland,
Arran – hoping to regain power – once again changed sides and
rejoined the Protestants, leading the Lords of the Congregation who
carried the Reformation through the Scottish Parliament.
He opposed
the marriage of Queen Mary with Darnley, and was, in consequence,
obliged to leave the kingdom when Mary insisted on marrying this highly
unsatisfactory young man. After
the murder of Darnley and the abdication of Mary from the Scottish
throne in favor of her infant son James, Arran made an unsuccessful
attempt to regain the supreme rule by being named Regent for James.
These
upheavals affected Arran’s lands and tenants, as well as his family,
as opposing armies laid waste to Hamilton properties.
After Arran died in 1575, his son – whom his father had hoped at several times to marry to Mary Stuart - became the
third Earl of Arran. A
highly nervous and unstable young man, he was at one point incarcerated
as insane. Badly
treated in confinement, he was ultimately released and lived on
unhappily and in seclusion until his death in1609.
The real head of the Hamilton family was James Hamilton’s second son,
Lord John Hamilton of Arbroath.
Lord John became a favorite of the young King James VI, who
created him Marquis of Hamilton in 1599.
Lord John’s son, our James Hamilton (hereafter referred to
simply as “Hamilton”), succeeded his father as 2nd
Marquis of Hamilton in 1604 and his uncle as Earl of Arran in 1609.
Hamilton
was one of the Scots peers who accompanied King James VI of Scotland to
England when he also became King James I of England on the death of
Queen Elizabeth in 1603. His
family’s ancestral stature and his father’s connection with King
James eased Hamilton’s entry into court; his personal charm rapidly
brought him a string of honors and offices.
He was granted an English peerage as Earl of Cambridge in 1619,
was appointed a gentleman of the bedchamber in 1621, a Knight of the
Garter in 1623, and lord steward of King James’ household in 1624 upon
the death of his predecessor, Ludovic Stuart,
Duke of Lennox (who had also signed the Peirce Patent).
Hamilton’s first foray into
colonial speculation was with the Somers Island Company.
Shipwrecked Englishmen heading for Virginia in a fleet commanded by
Admiral Sir George Somers had first settled Bermuda in 1609. The crew and passengers – including future Mayflower passenger
Stephen Hopkins - were stranded in Bermuda for 10 months while they
built two new ships, which they ultimately sailed to Virginia. Three men chose to remain behind on Bermuda.
Three years later, the Virginia Company of London laid claim to the
island and sent additional settlers.
In 1615 King James granted an independent charter to the Somers
Island Company, which administered Bermuda until 1684.
It was
as a member of the English Privy Council, to which he was appointed in
1617, that young Hamilton first became acquainted with England’s
foreign “plantations.” Other
members of the Privy Council, such as Ludovic Stuart, 2nd
Duke of Lennox, and Robert Rich, 2nd Earl of Warwick – both
of whom also signed the Pierce Patent - were taking the lead in
supporting efforts to establish overseas English settlements.
Hamilton was not one of
the original investors in the Somers Island Company.
He purchased his shares after the Company was formed, buying out
Lucy Harrington, Countess of Bedford, the only woman among the 117
original “adventurers.”
Although he never visited the island, Hamilton Parish in Bermuda is
named for him. It is one of
Bermuda’s most eastern counties, located between St. George’s and
the City of Hamilton (the city is named for another, unrelated later
Hamilton). Hamilton Parish is known for its limestone caves with their
dramatic stalactites and stalagmites and deep subterranean passages.
Hamilton’s next colonizing venture was as a member of the Council for
New England; again in the company of Lennox and Warwick.
Hamilton’s adventuring days were cut short, however, when he died of a
malignant fever in 1625 at the age of 36.
His death (popularly but undoubtedly erroneously attributed to
poison administered by the Duke of Buckingham) is said to have hastened
that of his much older friend, King James.
Hearing of Hamilton’s death the King, who was gravely ill, said, “If
the branches be thus cut down, the stock cannot long continue.” The poet John Donne wrote “An Hymne to the Saints, and to
the Marquesse Hamylton” to commemorate him.
Hamilton had married Lady Anne Cunningham, daughter of the Earl of
Glencairn, in 1603. Their
first child, another James (3rd Marquis and later first Duke
of Hamilton), was born in 1606; another son and three daughters
followed. Anna very capably managed the vast Hamilton estates in
Scotland, where the children were raised.
Anna, who outlived her husband by 22 years, was deeply Calvinist.
She gained notoriety by raising a troop of horse in support of
the covenanters during the English Civil War and by threatening to shoot
her royalist son James, who was in command of the fleet of Charles I and
planning to land troops on the east coast of Scotland.
In 1649, this son led an army into England to free Charles I; he
was defeated at the Battle of Preston and executed.
This defeat did much to ensure the downfall of the Royalist cause
and Charles I was executed not long after.
All of the male children of royalist James having predeceased
him, the Hamilton title was inherited by royalist James’ younger
brother William. After
Charles I’s execution, William (also a Royalist) was among the Scots
who were defeated by Oliver Cromwell in 1651 at the Battle of Worcester.
William died of his wounds.
The title “Duchess of Hamilton” was inherited by Anne,
daughter of royalist James, granddaughter of the signer of the Peirce
Patent.
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