WILLIAM, SECOND DUKE OF HAMILTON.
After Vandyck.
BORN 1616, DIED 1651.
Mantle, Ribbon, and Star of Garter.
SECOND son of James, second Marquis of Hamilton, by Anne, daughter of James Conyngham, seventh Earl of Glencairn. Educated at the University of Glasgow, and afterwards travelled in foreign countries. His brother, who was ten years his senior, was the friend and companion of King Charles I., who raised him to a Dukedom. William, in returning home after his tour, reckoned on his brother’s influence for promotion at Court, and applied for the post of Master of the Horse to the Queen. The refusal he met with, although founded on the plea of a previous promise to another, so angered young Hamilton that he announced his intention of going back to France, and it was with difficulty he was dissuaded from so doing by prospects of speedy advancement. He had not long to wait. In 1639 he was created Baron Polmont and Machanshire, and Earl of Arran and Lanark, and the following year Secretary of State for Scotland, honours which must surely have satisfied this ardent and ambitious spirit, although Scotland was at that moment in such a state of fermentation that the direction of her affairs was far too arduous for a young man totally unacquainted with public business. Lord Lanark therefore looked to his brother as a man of ability and experience for advice and guidance. The mother of the two Hamiltons, a determined and energetic woman, had early instilled into the mind of her first-born the religious tenets in which she had been educated by her father, a staunch Covenanter; and the elder had no difficulty in imparting his views to the younger brother, and the two young men conceived, says Lodge, ‘the impracticable scheme of uniting and reconciling the actual monarchy with a Calvinistic Church.’
For two years Lord Lanark strove, on the one hand, to persuade the King to make all manner of humiliating concessions to the Covenanters, while on the other he used fruitless endeavours to stem the tide of the rebellious outbreak; and naturally he was unsuccessful in both instances. Charles’s partiality for the house of Hamilton was no help to him in his troubles north of the Tweed. In 1642, the Scotch having called a Parliament without the royal sanction, the King wrote,—‘If, notwithstanding our refusal, and the endeavours of our well affected subjects and servants to hinder it, there shall be a Convention of the Estates, we wish all those who are right affected to us should be present at it, but do nothing but only protest against their meeting and actions.’ The Hamiltons accordingly took their seats, but were silent members on most occasions. Their conduct in several instances was most inconsistent, and when the Scotch Parliament, following the example of their English brethren, levied troops in the King’s name to make war on Charles himself, Lanark actually affixed the royal signet to the proclamation for the levy!
Such behaviour naturally incensed all true-hearted Royalists, and the Duke of Montrose especially was so disgusted that he hastened to Oxford, where the Court then was, to denounce the brothers. They on their part, discovering his intention, thought it wisest to follow him, but were arrested and imprisoned on their arrival. Lanark soon found means to escape to London, and afterwards to Scotland, where he recommenced his temporising policy, professing all the while deep attachment to the King, which did not prevent his joining the Covenanters against the Duke of Montrose. So contradictory a proceeding led to the rumour that he acted in obedience to secret orders from the King himself, who soon afterwards received him back into favour, and reinstated him in the Secretaryship of which he had been deprived. Charles’s conduct with regard to the Duke was inexplicable, for when that nobleman, who had been for some time a prisoner in Pendennis Castle, Cornwall, (whence he was released by the chances of war,) joined the King at Newcastle, he was received without the slightest signs of anger. Neither did Charles resent the manner in which Lanark endeavoured to enforce the bitter terms proposed by the Scottish Parliament, although he resolutely refused to submit to such conditions. This was in 1646, when the idea was entertained of delivering up the person of the King to the English Commissioner. Lanark, however, was roused on this occasion, and exclaimed indignantly, ‘As God shall have mercy on my soul at the great day, I would choose rather to have my head struck off at the Market Cross of Edinburgh than give my consent to this vote.’ He was now in constant attendance on the King, who treated him with great confidence. The Duke of Hamilton placed himself at the head of an army of Scottish Royalists, and made an irruption into England, but was defeated by Cromwell’s forces and taken prisoner. His trial and execution followed shortly after that of the King himself; and about the same time, Lanark, being deprived of his public offices and proscribed by the Government, fled to Holland.
It was not, indeed, till his arrival in that country, Clarendon says, ‘that he knew he was Duke Hamilton by the slaughter of his brother;’ Charles II. received the new Duke with affection and sympathy. Lanark had loved his brother with a blind affection, which led to his following him on many occasions against his own views.
He said his condition had been very hard, for having been bred up in the Church of England, for which he had a great reverence, he had been forced to comply with the Covenant, which he perfectly detested. Charles gave him the Garter, and took him in his suite to Scotland, where, not being permitted to enter the capital, he retired to the isle of Arran, whence he was recalled by the King’s orders.