Sir Alexander Fraser of Philorth,
from Pinkerton’s Scotish Gallery.
The ancient family of the Frasers of Philorth in Aberdeenshire, who have enjoyed since 1669 the title of Lord Saltoun, is immediately descended from William, son of an Alexander Fraser, who flourished during the early part of the fourteenth century, and inherited from his father the estates of Cowie and Durris in Kincardineshire.
The proper Highland clan Fraser was that headed by the Lovat branch in Inverness-shire, as mentioned above.
Unlike the Aberdeenshire or Salton Frasers, the Lovat branch, the only branch of the Frasers that became Celtic, founded a tribe or clan, and all the natives of the purely Gaelic districts of the Aird and Stratherrick came to be called by their name. The Simpsons, “sons of Simon,” are also considered to be descended from them, and the Tweedies of Tweeddale are supposed, on very plausible grounds, to have been originally Frasers. Logan’s conjecture that the name of Fraser is a corruption of the Gaelic Friosal, from frith, a forest, and siol, a race, the th being silent (that is, the race of the forest), however pleasing to the clan as proving them an indigenous Gaelic tribe, may only be mentioned here as a mere fancy of his own.
Simon Fraser, the first of the Frasers of Lovat, fell at the battle of Halidon Hill, 19th July 1333. His son, Hugh Fraser of Lovat, had four sons; Alexander, who died unmarried; Hugh, created a lord of Parliament, under the title of Lord Fraser of Lovat; John, ancestor of the Frasers of Knock in Ayrshire; and another son, ancestor of the Frasers of Foyers.
Hugh, first Lord Lovat, was one of the hostages for James I., on his return to Scotland in 1424, and in 1431 he was appointed high sheriff of the county of Inverness. His son, also named Hugh, second Lord Lovat, was father of Thomas, third lord; Alexander, ancestor of the Frasers of Fanaline, the Frasers of Leadclune, baronets, and other families of the name; and James, ancestor of the Frasers of Ballyfurth and Ford, of whom Major-General Simon Fraser, late of Ford, is the lineal male descendant and representative.
Thomas, third lord, held the office of justiciary of the north in the reign of James IV., and died 21st October 1524. He had four sons: Thomas, master of Lovat, killed at Flodden, 9th September 1513, unmarried; Hugh, fourth Lord Lovat; Alexander, fifth lord; and William Fraser of Struy, ancestor of several families of the name in Inverness-shire.
Hugh, fourth lord, the queen’s justiciary in the north, resigned his whole estates into the hands of King James V., and obtained from his majesty a new charter, dated 26th March 1539, uniting and incorporating them into the barony of Lovat, to him and the heirs male of his body, failing whom to his nearest lawful heirs male, bearing the name and arms of Fraser, and failing them to his heirs whatsoever. With his eldest son Hugh, Master of Lovat, he was killed in an engagement with the Macdonalds of Clanranald at Lochlochy, Inverness-shire, 2d June 1544.[249] His brother, Alexander, fifth Lord Lovat, died in 1558. With one daughter, the latter had three sons: Hugh, sixth lord; Thomas, ancestor of the Frasers of Strichen, from whom Lord Lovat of Lovat is descended; and James of Ardochie.
Hugh, sixth Lord Lovat, had a son, Simon, seventh lord, who was twice married, and died 3d April 1633. By his first wife, Margaret, eldest daughter of Sir Colin Mackenzie of Kintail, he had two sons,—Simon, Master of Lovat, who predeceased him, without issue, and Hugh, eighth Lord Lovat, who died 16th February 1646. By a second wife, Jean Stewart, daughter of Lord Doune, he had Sir Simon Fraser, ancestor of the Frasers of Innerallochy; Sir James Fraser of Brae, and one daughter. Hugh, eighth lord, had, with three daughters, three sons, namely,—Simon, Master of Lovat, and Hugh, who both predeceased their father, the one in 1640 and the other in 1643, and Thomas Fraser of Beaufort, eleventh Lord Lovat. The second son, Hugh, styled after his elder brother’s death, Master of Lovat, left a son Hugh, ninth lord, who succeeded his grandfather in February 1646, and married in July 1659, when a boy of sixteen years of age at college, Anne, second daughter of Sir John Mackenzie of Tarbet, baronet, sister of the first Earl of Cromarty, and by her had a son, Hugh, tenth lord, and three daughters.
Hugh, tenth lord, succeeded his father in 1672, and died in 1696, when Thomas Fraser of Beaufort, third son of the eighth lord, became eleventh Lord Lovat, but did not take the title. The tenth lord married Lady Amelia Murray, only daughter of the first Marquis of Athole, and had four daughters. His eldest daughter, Amelia, assumed the title of Baroness Lovat, and married in 1702, Alexander Mackenzie, younger of Prestonhall, who assumed the name of Fraser of Fraserdale. His son, Hugh Fraser, on the death of his mother, adopted the title of Lord Lovat, which, however, by decree of the Court of Session, 3d July 1730, was declared to belong to Simon, Lord Fraser of Lovat, as eldest lawful son of Thomas, Lord Fraser of Lovat, grand-uncle of the tenth lord. This judgment proceeded on the charter of 1539, and though pronounced by an incompetent court, was held to be right. To prevent an appeal, a compromise was made, by which Hugh Mackenzie ceded to Simon, Lord Lovat, for a valuable consideration, his pretensions to the honours, and his right to the estates, after his father’s death.