Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745. Volume III.

by Mrs. A. T. Thomson

The unfortunate nobleman who is the subject of this Memoir, could boast of as long line of ancestors as most families in Europe. Among his forefathers were men eminent for loyalty, and distinguished for bravery, and of honour as untainted as their blood; but when William, fourth Earl of Kilmarnock, succeeded to his title, there was little except this high ancestry to elate him with pride, or to raise him above dependence upon circumstances.

The Earl of Kilmarnock derived his title from a royal borough of the same name, in the shire of Cunningham in Ayrshire; and, in former times when the chieftainship was in repute in that part of Scotland, that branch of the family of Boyd, or Boyde, from whom the Earl was descended, claimed to be chiefs.

The greatness of the Boyd family commenced with Simon, the brother of Walter, first High Steward of Scotland, and founder of the Monastery of Paisley, in 1160. Robert, the son of Simon, is designated in the foundation church of that monastery, as nephew of Walter, High Steward; and is distinguished on account of his fair complexion, by the word Boyt, or Boyd,[316] from the Celtic Boidh, signifying fair, or yellow. "He was," says Nisbet, "doubtless, predecessor to the Lords Boyd, and Earls of Kilmarnock."[317]

The family of Boyd continued to flourish until, in the fifteenth century, it was ennobled by James the Third, who owed to one of its members, Sir Alexander Boyd of Duncow, esteemed to be a mirror of chivalry, an inculcation into the military exercises, which were deemed, in those days, essential to the education of royalty. But the sunshine of kingly favour was not enjoyed by the Boyds without some alloy. Robert Boyd of Kilmarnock, who was raised to the peerage, under the title of Lord Boyd, and whose eldest son was created Earl of Arran, experienced various vicissitudes. He died in England, in exile; and his brother, Sir Alexander, perished in 1469, on a scaffold, erected on the Castle Hill of Edinburgh. The fortunes of the family were, however, restored in the person of Thomas, Earl of Arran, who married the eldest sister of King James the Third. The beautiful island of Arran was given as the dower of this lady: and her husband, who is said in the Paston Letters to have been a "light, clever, and well-spoken, fair archer; devoutest, most perfect, and truest to his lady, of Knights," enjoyed a short gleam of royal favour. His vicissitudes, however, befel him whilst on an embassy in Denmark, his enemies undermined him at home: he was driven to wander in foreign countries, and died at Antwerp, where a magnificent monument was erected to his memory, by Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy. His title was attainted, but his property was restored to his son; and in 1655, the title of Earl of Kilmarnock was added to that of Lord Boyd, which alone seems to have been retained by the family during the intervening generations.

During the reign of Charles the First, his descendants were considered to be steady Royalists; but, notwithstanding their claiming descent from the Stuarts, the views and principles of the family in the troublous period of the Revolution of 1688, underwent a total change. William, the third Earl of Kilmarnock, and the father of the unhappy adherent of Charles Edward, took the oaths of allegiance to the reigning family, and supported the Treaty of Union; joining at first the party entitled the Squâdrone volante; but eventually deserting them for the Whigs. When the Insurrection of 1715 broke out, this nobleman plainly manifested that the notions which had actuated his ancestor to join the association at Cumberland in favour of Charles the First, were no longer deemed valid by him. The superiority of the Burgh of Kilmarnock having been granted in 1672 to his ancestors, the Earl summoned the inhabitants of the Burgh to assemble, and to arm themselves in support of Government. At the general meeting of the fencible corps at Cunningham, Lord Kilmarnock appeared, followed by five hundred of his men, well armed, and so admirably trained, that they made the best figure on that occasion among the forces collected.[318] In compliance with orders which he received from the Duke of Argyll, Lord Kilmarnock marched with his volunteers to garrison the houses of Drummakil, Cardross, and Gastartan, in order to prevent the rebels from crossing the Forth. Unhappily for the fortunes of his family, the Earl died two years afterwards: and in the year 1717, his son, then a boy of fourteen years of age, succeeded to his title.

The mother of the young nobleman still survived: she was the Lady Eupheme, daughter of William, eleventh Earl of Ross; and one child only, the Earl of Kilmarnock, had been the issue of her marriage.

The youth, whose fate afterwards extorted pity from the most prejudiced spectators of his fate, was educated in the principles of the Scottish Church. These, as the chaplain who attended Lord Kilmarnock in the last days of his existence observes, are far from "having the least tendency to sedition," and a very different bias was apparent in the conduct of the Presbyterian ministers during the whole course of the insurrections of 1745. The young nobleman appears to have imbibed, with this persuasion, a sincere conviction of those incontrovertible, and all-important truths of Christianity which, happily, the contentions of sect cannot nullify, nor the passions of mankind assail. "He always believed," such is his own declaration, "in the great truths of God's Being and Providence, and in a future state of rewards and punishments for virtue and vice." He had never, he declared at that solemn moment when nothing appeared to him of consequence save truth, "been involved in the fashionable scepticism of the times." As he grew up, a character more amiable than energetic, and dispositions more calculated to inspire love than to insure respect, manifested themselves in the young nobleman. He was singularly handsome, being tall and slender, and possessing what was termed by an eyewitness of his trial, "an extreme fine person;" he was mild, and well-bred, humble, and conscientious. It is true, that in his hours of penitence he recalled, with anguish, "a careless and dissolute life," by which, as he affirmed, he reduced himself to great and perplexing difficulties; he repented for his "love of vanity and addictedness to impurity and sensual pleasure," which had "brought pollution and guilt upon his soul, and debased his reason, and, for a time, suspended the exercise of his social affections, which were, by nature, strong in him, and, in particular, the love of his country." Such was his own account of that youth, which, deprived of the guidance of a father, with high rank and great personal attractions to endanger it, was passed, according to his own confession, in dissipation and folly. It appears, nevertheless, that he was greatly respected by his neighbours and tenantry, who were not, perhaps, disposed to judge very severely the errors of a young and popular man.

When only eleven years of age, Lord Kilmarnock, then Lord Boyd, had appeared in arms for Government with his father; on which occasion he conducted himself so gracefully as to attract the admiration of all beholders.[319] His early prepossessions, granting that they may have accorded with those of his father, were, however, soon dissipated when he allied himself with a family who had been conspicuous in the Jacobite cause. This was the house of Livingstone, Earl of Linlithgow and Calendar; George, the fourth Earl, having, in 1715, been engaged in the insurrection under Lord Mar, had been attainted, and his estate of one thousand two hundred and ninety-six pounds yearly forfeited to the Crown. Nor has this forfeiture ever been reversed; and the present representative of the family, Sir Thomas Livingstone, of Westquarter and Bedlormie, remains, notwithstanding an appeal in 1784 before Lord Kenyon, then Attorney-General, a commoner.[320]

Lady Anne Livingstone, who was the object of the young Lord Kilmarnock's choice, is reported to have been a woman of great beauty, and, from her exertions in her husband's behalf, appears to have possessed a fine, determined spirit. Although her father's title was not restored, she had sufficient interest, in 1721, to obtain from the English Government a lease of the forfeited estates for fifty-nine years, at the rent of eight hundred and seventy-two pounds, twelve shillings per annum.[321] This was, no doubt, a source of considerable pecuniary benefit to her, and also of assistance, very greatly required by Lord Kilmarnock, who was in impoverished circumstances. Honours, indeed, centered in him, but were productive of no real benefit. By the grandmother of his wife, the Lady Margaret Hay, sole surviving daughter of Charles the twelfth Earl of Errol, he had a claim to that Earldom, which, coupling with its dignity that of the hereditary High Constable of Scotland, descended in the female line, and after the death of a brother in infancy, constituted the Lady Anne Livingstone a Countess of Errol in her own right. Thus, Lord Kilmarnock had, to borrow Horace Walpole's expression, "four earldoms in him," Kilmarnock, Errol, Linlithgow, and Calendar; and yet he is said to have been so poor, as "often to have wanted a dinner." But to this mode of expression we must not entirely trust for accuracy. With the inheritance of the Earldoms of Errol, and of Linlithgow, and Calendar, there came a stock of old Jacobite principles; Lord Linlithgow had, indeed, suffered what was perhaps worse than death for his adherence to James Stuart. The Earl of Errol, the grandfather of Lady Kilmarnock, had led a more prudent course. Still he was a hearty Jacobite, and though, as Lockhart declares, he did not at first make a "great outward appearance," yet he was much trusted by the party; his family had always been favourable to the Stuarts, and he was, also, generally considered to cherish similar sentiments.[322] He had, nevertheless, taken the oaths to Government in 1705; yet on the alarm of an invasion in 1708, he was deemed so dangerous a person that he was sent as a prisoner to Edinburgh Castle, where he died.

The love suit of Lord Kilmarnock was not likely, under his impoverished circumstances, to prosper uninterruptedly. When he succeeded to his estate he had found it much encumbered, and a considerable portion of the old inheritance alienated. Lord Kilmarnock's disposition was not formed for economy; he was generous even to profusion, and, as we have seen had not escaped the temptations incident to his age. His addresses to the Lady Anne Livingstone are said to have been prompted by his necessities; her fortune was deemed considerable; and her family, well knowing the state of the Earl's affairs, regarded his proposals of marriage unfavourably. But the young nobleman during the course of his courtship, and in opposing these objections, formed an interest in the heart of the young lady. He was, indeed, a man born to charm the imagination of the romantic, if not at that period of his youth, to rivet affection by esteem. In his boyhood, although he made some degree of progress in classical attainments, and even in philosophy and mathematics, thus proving that natural ability was not wanting, he was far more successful in attaining mere accomplishments, which add a powerful charm to comeliness and symmetry than in mastering more solid studies. He became an adept in fencing, in riding, in drawing, and also in music; and acquired the distinctive and comprehensive designation, of being "a polite gentleman."[323]