LINDSAY,
an ancient surname erroneously supposed to have been derived from
the manor of Lindsai in Essex. By Sir David Lindsy of the Mount, it
is called “Ane surname of renown.”
The first of the name in Scotland appears to have been Walter
de Lindsay, an Anglo-Norman, who was a witness or juror in the
celebrated ‘Inquisitio,’ or Inquest of David I., when prince of
Strathclyde or Cumbria, into the possessions and rights of the see
of Glasgow within his territories, in 1116. After David’s accession
to the throne, this Walter de Lindsay was one of his great barons.
Although the surname is territorial, it does not appear to have been
derived from the district of Lindeseye or Lindesey in Lincolnshire,
for the Lindsays had no property in or connexion with that county
till long after their settlement in Scotland. Lord Lindsay says:
“There appears every reason to believe that the Scottish Lindsays
are a branch of the Norman house of Limesay, long since extinct in
the direct male line, both in Normandy and England, but which for
several generations held a distinguished station, more particularly
in the latter country. The name Lindesay and Limesay are identical,
both of them implying ‘Isle of limetrees.’” (Lives of the
Lindsays, vol. i. p. 3.) The old English word for limetree is
linden, and in the appendix to the first volume of his family work
Lord Lindsay gives 88 different forms in which the name has been
spelled in charters and other ancient documents. The legendary
accounts of the origin of the name are all now rejected. Wyntoun (Chron.
B. 8. 7. 159), with a prudent reserve says:
“Of England came the Lyndysay,
Mair of them I can nocht say.”
Families of this surname are now spread all over Scotland.
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William de Lindsay, apparently the son of the above-mentioned
Walter de Lindsay, the progenitor in Scotland of the Lindsays “light
and gay,” is also frequently mentioned as a witness to the royal
charters. He is supposed to have had two sons, Walter and William de
Lindsay. The latter, who carried on the line of succession, had his
residence at Ercildon, now Earlston, in Roxburghshire, and was a
liberal benefactor to Dryburgh abbey, as was also his son, Walter de
Lindsay. Among other grants made to it was a portion of land at
Cadeslea, on the banks of the Cadden water, near to where it joins
the Tweed, the scene of the beautiful ballad of ‘Katherine Janfarie,’
from which Sir Walter Scott took the hint of his spirited ballad of
‘Lochinvar.’ Walter de Lindsay and his son William also granted
chargers to the abbey of Kelso. “The seals,” says Lord Lindsay, “of
these two latter barons, Walter and William, preserved in the
Chapter-house of Durham cathedral, exhibit a lively type of the
character of the young Norman noble. They are represented on
horseback, riding gently along, with falcon on wrist, unhelmeted,
and with their shields hung carelessly behind them, – the only
variation being that the father, Walter, rides without bridle or
stirrup, and the bird rests placidly on his hand, while the latter,
William, is in the act of slipping it on its prey,” The following is
the seal of William de Lindsay:
[seal of William de Lindsay]
His grandson, William de Lindsay of Ercildun, styled also of
Luffness, is witness to the charters of Malcolm IV. and William the
Lion from 1161 to 1200. Between 1189 and 1199 he was high justiciary
of Lothian. He was the first of the Lindsays connected with the
territory of Crawford in Lanarkshire, which from them came
afterwards to be called Crawford-Lindsay. He married Marjory,
daughter of Henry, prince of Scotland; issue, 3 sons, Sir David,
lord of Crawford; Sir Walter, ancestor of the Lindsays of Lamberton;
and William, progenitor of the Lindsays of Luffness, who ultimately
succeeded to the male representation of the Lindsays.
Sir Davie, the eldest son, succeeded his father in 1200. He
was high justiciary of Scotland, and is a frequent witness to the
charters of his uncle, David earl of Huntingdon, the Sir Kenneth of
Sir Walter Scott’s chivalrous romance of ‘The Talisman.’ He died in
1214. He had married an English kinswoman of his own, Aleonora de
Limesay, the coheiress ultimately of the barons of Wolverley, to
whom he had, with one daughter, Alice, four sons, David, Gerard,
William, supposed to be identical with a ‘W. de Lindissi,’ who was
chancellor of Scotland in 1231, and Walter. The eldest son, David, a
minor at his father’s death, had been one of the hostages for King
William in England. On the death, in 1222, of his mother’s brother,
Sir John de Limesay, the English property which devolved on him
extended over no less than seven counties. He was high justiciary of
Lothian in 1238. He died in 1241, and was succeeded by his brother,
Sir Gerard, on whose death in 1249, his two younger brothers having
predeceased him, the whole of his extensive estates both in Scotland
and England, devolved on his sister Alice de Lindsay, the wife of
Sir Henry Pinkeney, a great baron of Northamptonshire, of whom
mention has already been made (see CRAWFORD, earl of).
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Sir Walter de Lindsay, ancestor of the Lamberton family, was
high justiciary of Lothian and constable or sheriff of Berwick, in
the reign of William the Lion. His father, William de Lindesay, of
Ercildun and Luffness, and first of Crawford, “dominus de Lamberton,’
in Berwickshire, granted to the monks of Coldingham the church of
Ercheldun, with one ploughgate of land, (Chart. of Newbottle.
Raine’s Hist. of N. Durham, App. p. 39). Lamberton fell to Sir
Walter’s share. In 1215 he was sent ambassador to King John, with
the bishop of St. Andrews, Ingelram de Baliol, and three other great
barons, by King Alexander II. He joined the latter with the English
barons against King John, who, in consequence, seized his lands in
Huntingdonshire. He died either in 1221 or 1222. His son, Sir
William, was one of the guarantees of peace with England at the
convention of York in 1237, and with Sir David Lindsay of Luffness,
at the still more important one of 1244. He married Alice, sister
and coheiress of William de Lancaster, lord of Kendal, a descendant
of the earls of Anjou, with whom he got various estates in
Westmorland, Yorkshire, and Lancashire. His son, Walter de Lindsay,
was succeeded by his son, Sir William, who married Ada, eldest
surviving sister of the unfortunate King John Baliol, and ultimately
eldest coheir of her nephew, Edward, pseudo-king of Scotland. He was
killed in battle against Llewellyn, prince of Wales, 6th
November 1283. His daughter and heiress, Christiana de Lindsay, was
married by her cousin Alexander III. before 1285, to Ingelram de
Guignes, second son of Arnold III., count of Guignes and Namur, and
Sire de Couci (in 1311) in right of his mother Alice, the heiress of
that illustrious house (see ALEXANDER ii.). It was in his wife’s
right that he sat as a Scottish magnate in the great assemblies at
Scone 5th February 1283-4, and at Brigham 17th
March 1290, and on various other occasions both in England and
Scotland. To Edward I. he devotedly adhered in the wars of the
Scottish succession. Christiana’s direct representative was the late
Duchesse d’Angouleme, the daughter of Louis XVI. of France. (See
Lives of the Lindsays, vol. i. pp. 31, 32, and App. No. 3.)
William de Lindsay, third son of William of Ercildon and first
of Crawford, obtained from his father the barony of Luffness, near
Aberlady, in Haddingtonshire. Dying in 1236, he was succeeded by his
eldest son, Sir David Lindsay of Brenwevil and the Byres, in the
same county. He was high justiciary of Lothian from 1243 to 1249,
and in the convention between Scotland and England in 1244, one of
the four great barons who swore, on the soul of their lord the king,
that the conditions then entered into should be kept inviolate by
him and his posterity.
His son, Sir David, was one of the regents of Scotland during
the intestine struggles of 1255, and high-chamberlain in 1256. He
granted a charter of freedom to the abbey of Aberbrothwick from toll
and custom in all the ports of his territories. He perished in the
Holy Land, it is supposed in the last crusade of St. Louis in 1268,
which had been joined by many of the Scottish nobles. His son, Sir
Alexander de Lindsay, was high-chamberlain for several years under
Alexander III., and one of the magnates Scotiae who, in the
celebrated convention at Scone in February 1283-4, acknowledged
Margaret of Norway, granddaughter of that monarch, as the heiress to
the Scottish crown. In 1289, his son, also Sir Alexander, having
been knighted by Edward I. himself, was one of the Scottish barons
who, at the convention held at Brigham, after the death of Alexander
III., agreed to the marriage of Margaret of Norway to the youthful
Edward prince of Wales. His name, with those of seven other Lindsays,
then all great feudal barons in Scotland, appears in the Ragman Roll
as having sworn fealty to Edward I. in 1296. He was among the
patriotic band who joined the banner of Wallace, but on 9th
July 1297, he submitted unconditionally to Edward. Soon after,
however, he is again found fighting for Scotland’s independence, and
at the close of the protracted struggle in 1304-5, he was one of the
seven adherents of Wallace specially excepted by the English king
out of the general conditions of pardon offered to the rest of their
countrymen. In 1307, with Edward Bruce and “the good” Sir James
Douglas, he invaded Galloway, and sat as one of the great barons in
the parliament of 16th March 1308-9, which acknowledged
Robert the Brus as rightful king of Scotland. His son, described by
Wyntoun (Chron. lib. viii. c. 40) as
“Schir Daivy the Lyndyssay,
That was true and of stedfast fay,”
throughout his life adhered to the cause of the Brus. His father,
Sir Alexander, is said to have had two other sons, namely, William
de Lindsay, rector of Ayr, and chamberlain of Scotland from 1317 to
1322, and Sir James Lindsay, who was with Brus at Dumfries in 1306,
when Comyn was assassinated. With other Lindsays he had sworn fealty
to King Edward I. in 1296, and was ancestor of the once great house
of Lindsay of Dunrod. (Nisbet’s Heraldry, vol. ii. p. 47).
Alexander de Lindsay, killed at Halidonhill, 19th July
1333, is also supposed to have been a younger son of his (Douglas’
Peerage, Wood’s edition, vol. i. p. 372 Note).
Sir David, the eldest son, was either taken prisoner at the
battle of Bannockburn, or some time before, as with two of his
brothers, Reginald, and Alexander, and Sir Andrew Moray, he was
exchanged five months afterwards. He was one of the Scots nobles who
signed the famous letter to the Pope in 1320, asserting the
independence of Scotland, in which it was declared that “never, so
long as one hundred Scots are alive, will we be subject to the yoke
of England.” IN 1323 he was one of the Scottish guarantees for the
observance of a treaty of peace with England, to last for thirteen
years. He was captured at the battle of Halidonhill in 1333 with his
brother, Sir Alexander, and his kinsman Sir John Lindsay of
Wauchopdale, at one time governor of Perth, all three knights
bannerets. From Robert I. he received several grants of land and an
hereditary annual rent of one hundred marks, then a very large sum,
from the great customs of Dundee. In 1325 he married Mary, coheiress
of the Abernethies, and received with her large estates in the
shires of Roxburgh, Fife, and Angus. At one period he was governor
of Berwick castle, and in 1346 he was appointed keeper of the castle
of Edinburgh. Wyntoun (Chron. b. ii. p. 266) says of him in
this capacity:
“Intil his time with the countrie,
Na riot, na na strife made he.”
In 1349, and again in 1351, he was one of the commissioners
appointed to treat about the ransom of King David II. He died after
November 1355. He had four sons; namely, David, killed at the battle
of Durham, 17th October 1346, unmarried, and only
twenty-one; Sir James, who succeeded Sir Alexander, of whom
immediately; and Sir William, whose appanage was the Byres in
Haddingtonshire, (see next article). Sir Alexander, the third son,
was twice married; first, to Catherine, daughter of Sir John de
Stirling, and heiress of Glenesk and Edzell in Angus, besides lands
in Inverness-shire, and by her had Sir David, of Glenesk, the first
earl of Crawford, and Sir Alexander; and secondly, to Marjory
Stuart, niece of Robert II., by whom he had, with one daughter, two
sons, Sir William of Rossie, ancestor of the Lindsays of Dowhill;
and Sir Walter, sheriff of Aberdeenshire in 1417, and styled of
Kinneff in 1422.
Sir James, the eldest surviving son of Sir David, was one of
the great barons who sat in the parliament at Edinburgh, 26th
September 1357, and became bound for the fulfilment of the
conditions of the release of David II., at Berwick, on the 3d of the
following month, and is supposed to have died the same year. He
married his cousin, Egidia, daughter of Walter, high-steward of
Scotland, and sister of King Robert II., and by her had an only son,
Sir James Lindsay, lord of Crawford, and a daughter, Isabella, wife
of Sir John Maxwell of Pollock, The lady Egidia afterwards married
Sir Hugh Eglinton of Eglinton.
The son, Sir James Lindsay of Crawford, was present at the
coronation of his uncle, King Robert II. at Scone, 26th
March 1371, and next day took the oaths of homage and fealty to him.
In 1374, and again in 1381, he was a commissioner to treat with
England. Besides being high justiciary of Scotland, he was also
sheriff of Lanarkshire. In 1382, the feuds which so long subsisted
between the Glammis family and the Lindsays originated in the
following circumstance: Sir John Lyon, the ancestor of the house of
Glammis, a young man of comely appearance and winning manners, had
been recommended by Sir James Lindsay to the king, who made him his
private secretary, bestowed on him the castle and thanedom of
Glammis, gave him one of his daughters in marriage, and finally
created him high chamberlain of Scotland. Sir James Lindsay seems to
have taken high umbrage at this signal advancement, which seemed
greater than his own. “Finding,” says Godscroft, “his own credit
with the king to decrease, and Lyon’s to increase, and taking Lyon
to be the cause thereof, esteeming it great ingratitude after so
great benefit, he took it so highly and with such indignation that,
finding him accidentally in his way a little from Forfar, he slew
him very cruelly, and fearing the king’s wrath, fled into a
voluntary exile.” By this unhappy event he incurred the displeasure
of the king; but the earls of Douglas and March pleading his cause
at court, after a short absence, during which he went on pilgrimage
to Thomas a Beckett’s shrine at Canterbury, (his safe-conduct is
dated 16th January 1383), he was recalled and pardoned.
The Scotichronicon, in alluding to this affair, styles Sir James
“lord of Crawford and Buchan;” he was also lord of Wygton, by
charter, 19th April 1372. (Lives of the Lindsays,
vol. i. p. 73.)
In 1383, the “Sire de Lindsay,” as Sir James is called by
Froissart, with the other knights of the family, called “the
children of Lindsay,” [“six frères, tous chevaliers,”] and the earls
of Moray and Douglas, and some other barons, entered England at the
head of 15,000 men, and wasted the lands of the Percies and Mowbrays,
and the whole country to the gates of Newcastle. Soon after a French
force, under John de Vienne, admiral of France, was sent over to
assist the Scots against the English, bringing large subsidies to be
distributed among the principal Scots nobles, towards the expenses
of the war; of which Sir James Lindsay received 2,000 livres
tournois, equal to £8,000 of our money, Sir David Lindsay of Glenesk,
500, equal to £2,000, and Sir William Lindsay of the Byres the like
sum. (Rym. Faed. tom. vi. p. 485, quoted by Lord Lindsay.) In
1388 Sir James accompanied the earl of Douglas in his incursion into
England, and witnessed the death of that hero at the battle of
Otterburn, 19th August of that year. In the ancient
ballad descriptive of that battle, the Lindsays are thus mentioned,
as forming part of Douglas’ array:
“He has chosen the Lindsays licht,
With them the Gordons gay.”
And in the account of the battle it is said,
“The Lindsays flew like fire about
Till a’ the fray was dune.”
In the English ballad of Otterburn, Sir James is styled the lord of
Buchan:
“The lord of Bowghan in armure bright.”
After the battle Sir James was taken prisoner, under the
following circumstances, as related by Froissart. Followed by his
squire he had pursued on horseback, lance in hand, Sir Matthew
Redman, governor of Berwick, and joint commander of one of the two
divisions of Percy’s force. After a chase of more than three English
leagues, he came up with him, and a combat ensued between them by
the light of the moon. Sir James aimed at him with his lance, but
Sir Matthew avoided the blow, and the point of the lance being
buried in the ground, Sir Matthew cut it in two with his sword. Sir
James then seized his battle-axe, which hung from his neck, and
assailed Sir Matthew, who defended himself bravely. After thus
fighting for a long time, Sir Matthew’s sword was struck out of his
hand, and he yielded himself prisoner, rescue or no rescue, but
requested to be allowed to return to Newcastle, promising by St.
Michael’s day to render himself at Dunbar, or Edinburgh, or at any
port in Scotland which Sir James might choose. “I am willing,” said
the latter; “let it be at Edinburgh on the day you name.” They then
took leave of each other, and on their return to the Scottish army,
Sir James and his squire lost themselves in a heath, the moon having
gone down and the night being dark. coming at last to a path, they
followed it, but it was the direct road to Newcastle, and on their
way they fell in with the bishop of Durham, who had been too late
for the battle, and at that very time was returning to Newcastle at
the head of 500 men. Into the midst of this company Sir James rode,
thinking they were his friends, and that they were close to
Otterburn. He thus became the bishop’s prisoner. At Newcastle, Sir
Matthew Redman, having gone next day to see the bishop, was informed
by Richard Hebeden, or Hepburn, Sir James’ squire, of his master’s
misadventure. He accordingly waited on him, when Sir James said that
there would be no need of his going to Edinburgh to obtain his
ransom, as they might be exchanged for each other. They then dined
together, Sir James being entertained by Sir Matthew. When the news
of Sir James’ capture reached King Richard, who was then at
Cambridge, he despatched a mandate to the earl of Northumberland,
not to dismiss him, either for pledge or ransom, till farther
orders. He subsequently, however, obtained his liberty.
In 1395, his wife, Margaret Keith, daughter of Sir William
Keith, great marischal of Scotland, having had a quarrel with her
nephew, Robert de Keith, was besieged by him in her castle of Fyvie
in Aberdeenshire. she sent notice to her husband, Sir James Lindsay,
who was then at court, on which he hastened north with 400 men, but
was intercepted by Keith near the Kirk of Bourtie, in the Garioch,
when Sir James defeated him with the loss of 50 of his men. In 1386,
Sir James and the earl of Moray, two of the leading men of the
kingdom, were sent by Robert III. to endeavour to effect an amicable
arrangement between the clan Chattan and the clan Kay; but having
failed in the attempt, they proposed that the differences between
them should be decided in open combat before the king, which led to
the celebrated judicial conflict, on the North Inch of Perth, in the
manner so graphically described in Sir Walter Scott’s ‘Fair Maid of
Perth.’ In 1392 Sir James founded the convent of Trinity Friars at
Dundee, for the ransom of Christian captives from Turkish slavery,
which gradually assumed the character of an hospital for decayed
burgesses of that town. Sir James died in 1397, without male issue,
leaving two daughters, Margaret and Euphemia, respectively married
to Sir Thomas Colville and Sir John Herries of Terreagles. He was
succeeded in the chiefship of the Lindsays, and the barony of
Crawford, and the other entailed estates of the family, by his
cousin-german, Sir David Lindsay of Glenesk, first earl of Crawford
(see CRAWFORD, earl of). Sir David’s father, Sir Alexander Lindsay
of Glenesk, third son of Sir David Lindsay of Crawford, was one of
the commissioners appointed to treat of peace with the English in
1367, one of the guarantees of a truce with them in 1369, and high
justiciary of the north of Scotland. The barony of the Byres in
Haddingtonshire, which had been conferred on him by Sir James, his
elder brother, was resigned by him in 1366, to his younger brother,
Sir William, of whom mention is made in the next article. With Sir
John Edmonstone, he had a safe-conduct, 4th December
1381, to pass through England towards the Holy Land, and he died in
1382, in the island of Candia, on his pilgrimage to Jerusalem,
leaving four sons and a daughter.
_____
LINDSAY, earl of,
a title (dormant since 1808), in the peerage of Scotland, conferred
in 1633, on John, tenth Lord Lindsay of the Byres, grandson of Sir
William Lindsay of the Byres, fourth son of Sir David Lindsay of
Crawford. Sir William obtained from King David II. a charter of the
lands of Byres, on the resignation, as already stated, of his
brother, Sir Alexander de Lindsay, to him and the heirs male of his
body, 17th January 1365-6. From Sir Alexander also he had
the offices of hereditary bailie and seneschal of the regality of
the archbishopric of St. Andrews (which had been granted to him by
the archbishop of that see, 9th April 1378). With his
wife, Christiana, daughter of Sir William Mure of Abercorn, whom he
married about 1374, he acquired the barony of Abercorn and other
extensive estates. Like his brother Sir Alexander, he also went on
pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and knighted the son of St. Bridget of
Sweden at the Holy Sepulchre, but the date of this expedition has
not been ascertained. (Lives of the Lindsays, vol. i. p. 74.)
He was the father of another Sir William Lindsay of the Byres, who
is often confounded with him. The latter, by his marriage with
Christiana, daughter of Sir William Keith, hereditary marischal of
Scotland, obtained the barony of Dunottar, with its impregnable
castle, in Kincardineshire, which, sometime between 1382 and 1397,
he exchanged, with his father-in-law, for the estate and castle of
Struthers in Fife, the Keiths becoming bound that, in time of war,
the infant heir of the Lindsays of the Byres should reside, with his
attendants, in Dunottar. Soon after the battle of Otterburn, Sir
William Lindsay of the Byres, the bishop of Aberdeen, Sir Archibald
Douglas, and Sir John Sinclair, were sent to France, as
commissioners for Scotland, to protest against a proposed truce for
three years between the English and French, but on their arrival
they found the treaty concluded. From King Robert III. he had a
charter of the sheriffship of Edinburgh and the constabulary of
Haddington, in liferent. In 1398 he was one of the guarantees of a
truce with England. He died before 1424. He had three legitimate
sons, and one illegitimate. The latter, Andrew, to whom he gave the
lands of Garmilton, in East Lothian, was great-grandfather of Sir
David Lindsay of the Mount, lord lion king at arms, of whom a memoir
follows.
Sir John Lindsay of the Byres, the eldest son, was one of the
hostages for King James I. in 1424. He was created in 1445, a lord
of parliament, under the title of Lord Lindsay of the Byres. In 1451
he was a commissioner to treat of peace with England, and obtained a
safe-conduct into that kingdom in July of that year. He was one of
the privy councillors of James II., and held the office of
justiciary of Scotland beyond the Forth from 1457 to 1466. In the
latter capacity he presided, in association with Walter Lindsay of
Beaufort, ancestor of the Lindsays of Edzell and Balcarres, then
acting as sheriff of Aberdeenshire, during the minority of his
nephew, David fifth earl of Crawford, in the solemn assize, of
justice-ayre, held in the tolbooth at Aberdeen, on 5th
November 1457, when James II. appeared in person before them, to
claim the earldom of Mar, attended by the chancellor, constable,
marischal, and other high officers of state, and splendid train of
courtiers and nobles. He died in 1479. He had, with four daughters,
nine sons. David, the eldest son, John the second, and Patrick, the
fourth, were successively lords Lindsay of the Byres. Sir Walter
Lindsay, the fifth son, preceptor of Torphichen, and lord of St.
John, had fought in the wars in Italy and Spain, and against the
Turks, in company with the knights of Rhodes. He was a lord of
session, under the title of Lord St. John, and died in 1538.
David, the eldest son, second Lord Lindsay of the Byres,
distinguished himself in the foreign wars, and in 1488, when the
insurgent nobles appeared in arms against James III., he adhered
faithfully to that unfortunate monarch. At the head of the Fifeshire
men he joined the forces of the king, and according to Lindsay of
Pitscottie, *vol. i. p. 216,) he presented “ane great grey courser,”
of remarkable spirit and beauty, which he rode, to his majesty,
assuring him that whether for flight or pursuit, it “would waur (or
beat) all the horse of Scotland at his pleasure, if he would sit
well.” At the battle of Sauchieburn which ensued, 9th
June 1488, Lord Lindsay was one of the commanders of the third
division of his army.
On the meeting of parliament in October following the death of
James III., summonses were issued to the chief adherents of the late
king, to appear at Edinburgh and answer for their treasonable
convocation in his defence against his son, James IV. Lord Lindsay
of the Byres was one of those thus summoned, and he made appearance
accordingly. An account is given by Pitscottie of his trial on the
occasion “a trial,” says Lord Lindsay, “of which no trace now
remains in the public records, and which the learned Pinkerton
consequently believes to refer to an insurrection which broke out in
the summer and autumn of 1489, headed by the earl of Lennox, Lord
Forbes, and a few other adherents of the late king, and which was
soon put down.” On 10th May 1489, his lordship and his
associates were arraigned before the king and council assembled in
the Tolbooth, Lord Lindsay’s name being first specified in the
summons. He was called upon to “answer for the cruel coming againes
the king at Bannockburn with his father, and in giving him counsel
to have debarred his son the king’s grace here present; and to that
effect gave him ane sword and ane good horse, to fortify him againes
his son.” Being totally unacquainted with forms of law, and having
no lawyer to speak for him, the stout Lord Lindsay, who was a
soldier, and did not understand the proceedings, started up and said
hastily and rashly, “Ye are all lurdanes, my lords! I say ye are
false trators to your prince, and that I will prove with my hands on
any of ye whilk halds you best, from the king’s grace down. For ye,
false lurdanes! Hes caused the king to come againes his father in
plain battle, where that noble prince was cruelly murthered among
your hands by your advice, though ye brought the prince in presence
for your behoof, to make him the buckler of your enterprise.
Therefore, false lurdales; an the king punish you not hastily for
that murther, ye will murther himself when ye see time, as ye did
his father.” Then addressing the king, he advised him to beware of
them and give them no credence, for they who were false to his
father could never be true to himself. The chancellor endeavoured to
excuse his “rude speech and sharp accusation,” by saying to the king
that Lord David Lindsay was “but ane man of the auls warld,’ and
could not “answer formally, nor yet speak reverently in his grace’s
presence,” and he advised his lordship “to come in the king’s will,”
that is, submit to the king’s mercy. His brother, Patrick Lindsay,
being present, stamped on Lord Lindsay’s foot, to make him
understand that he should not do so; and he, having, as Pitscottie
says, “ane sair tae,” the pain was so great as to cause him to
exclaim to his brother, “Thou art ower pert, loon! To stramp upon my
foot; wert thou out of the king’s presence, I should take thee on
the mouth.” But Patrick, having obtained permission to speak for his
brother, objected to the king sitting in judgment in a matter to
which he was himself a party, on which the king was advised to
withdraw. He then pointed out a defect in the citation which
rendered it null, and al the persons summoned were accordingly
released, and no farther steps were ever taken against them. This
successful defence pleased his brother so much that he exclaimed,
“By St. Mary, you shall have the Mains of Kirkforthar for your day’s
labour.” The king, on the other hand, was so incensed against
Patrick that he committed him to the castle of Rothesay, where he
kept him a prisoner for a whole year. Lord Lindsay died in 1492, and
was succeeded by his brother, John, third Lord Lindsay of the Byres,
commonly called “John out with the sword,” who died in 1497, without
male issue.
Patrick, above mentioned, became fourth Lord Lindsay of the
Byres. He accompanied James IV. in his fatal expedition to England
in September 1513. Previous to the battle of Flodden, a council was
called to discuss the propriety of hazarding the king’s person, in
the fight that was about to ensue, of which he was appointed
president, as being “the most learned of their number, and of the
greatest age, and of the greatest experience amongst them all.” (Pitscottie,
p. 179.) His opinion being asked in the first place, he advised
that his majesty should be removed to a secure distance from the
field, with some of his nobles. To this conclusion the rest of the
council agreed, when James, who was present in disguise, broke out
into a furious exclamation that he would fight against England with
his own arm, and swore that he would hang Lord Lindsay over his own
gate, when he returned to Scotland. His lordship escaped the carnage
of that disastrous day, and was one of the four lords appointed by
parliament, 1st December 1513, continually to remain with
the queen-mother, to give her counsel and assistance. He died in
1526. He had, with a daughter, three sons: Sir John, master of
Lindsay, styled Sir John Lindsay of Pitcruvy, who died before his
father in 1525; David of Kirkforthar, slain at Flodden; and William
Lindsay, ancestor of the Lindsays of Pyetstone and Wormestone, the
former represented in the collateral and the latter in the direct
male line by the Lindsay Bethunes of Kilconquhar. John, master of
Lindsay, had married Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Sir Robert Lundin
of Balgony in Fife, high-treasurer of Scotland, and by her had, with
a daughter, John, fifth Lord Lindsay of the Byres; Patrick, killed
under the king’s standard in 1526; and David Lindsay of Kirkforthar.
John, fifth lord, was sheriff of Fife in 1526, the year of his
accession to the title. Having supported the earl of Lennox in his
ineffectual attempt to rescue the young king from the hands of the
Douglases, Angus, among other lands, took for himself “the ample
principality of Lord Lindsay.” Pitscottie (vol. ii. p. 330) says,
“At this time the Douglases pat sair at the Lord Lindsay, and thocht
to have forfault him, but he gave largely of his lands and geir to
escape that envy for the present time, thinking that that court wald
nocht continue lang.” He was appointed an extraordinary lord of
session, June 27, 1532, and in 1540 he was present at the
condemnation of Sir John Borthwick, for heresy. He was also on the
assize of Sir James Hamilton of Finnart, for treason. In 1542 he
witnessed the death of James V. at Falkland, and was one of the four
noblemen to whom the charge of the infant Queen Mary was committed.
In 1544 he was a principal commander at Ancrum Muir, when Sir Ralph
Evers and Sir Brian Layton were defeated by the earl of Angus.
On 13th June 1559, when the French troops and those
of the Congregation confronted each other on Cupar muir, Lord
Lindsay was employed by the queen-regent, Mary of Guise, to mediate
between them, which he did with so much skill, addressing himself to
all the parties in their turn, that hostilities were averted, and a
truce agreed to, which, however, was soon broken by the queen. He
was present in the convention of 1st August 1560, when
the reformed religion was sanctioned and popish supremacy abolished
in Scotland. Rising up in his place, and alluding to his extreme
age, he declared that since God had spared him to see that day, and
the accomplishment of so worthy a work, he was ready, with Simeon,
to say, “Nune dimittis.” He was appointed one of the twenty-four
lords from among whom the crown was to choose eight and the nobility
six for the government of the country. With the other lords of
council, he signed, on 17th January 1561, an approbation
of the Book of Discipline. He died in 1563.
His eldest son, Patrick, sixth Lord Lindsay of the Byres, is
noted in history for his harsh conduct to Queen Mary when confined
in Lochleven castle. He was, when master of Lindsay, one of the
first of the nobility who joined the Reformers, and he became an
enthusiast in their cause. It has been remarked that the Lindsays of
the Byres were always distinguished “for the fervour of their zeal
abut the reformation of religion, for the warmth of their attachment
to every image of liberty, and for the steadiness of their adherence
to all those measures which they supposed would promote them.” Lord
Lindsay, who quotes this remark (from Wallace on Ancient
Peerages, p. 322), adds, “This adherence and attachment ran to
the length of fanaticism, rendering each successive head of the
family the zealot of his time – whether under Mary, Charles I., or
James II.” (Lives of the Lindsays, vol. i. p. 267.) He
assisted his friend, the celebrated Kirkaldy of Grange, in harassing
the French forces in Fife, night and day, and on one occasion had
his horse killed under him. He and Kirkaldy besieged and took an old
ruin called Glennis House, which a French officer, of the name of La
Bastie, has fortified. The latter defended himself for a long time
with a halbert, till Lindsay, in a hand to hand combat with him,
slew him. His zeal against popery was so great that on the first
Sunday after Mary’s arrival from France in 1561, when he heard that
mass was about to be celebrated in her private chapel at Holyrood,
“he buckled on his harness, assembled his followers, and rushing
into the court of the palace, shouted aloud that the idolatrous
priests should die the death,” and they were only saved by the
interference of the queen’s half-brother, Lord James Stuart,
afterwards the regent Moray.
Soon after, on a petition being presented to the queen, from
the leaders of the Congregation, praying that the earl of Bothwell
and some other young noblemen, who had created a riot in the town,
should be punished, “the flatterers of the court,” says Knox, “at
the first stormed, and asked, ‘Who durst avow it?’ To whom the
master of Lindsay answered, ‘A thousand gentlemen within Edinburgh!’
– they said no more. The queen reprimanded the rioters, and banished
Bothwell from court for ten days.” (Knox’s Historie, vol. ii.
p. 317.) When Mary resided at St. Andrews, the master of Lindsay,
rude and blunt as he was, was a sharer of her sports in the privy
gardens there, where, as Randolph wrote to Burleigh, it “would have
well contented your honour, to have seen the queen and the master of
Lindsay shoot at the butts against the earl of Mar and one of the
ladies.” He was one of the leaders of the royal army that on 20th
October, 1563, defeated the earl of Huntly at Corrichie in
Aberdeenshire. In the ancient ballad of the ‘Battle of Corrichie’ he
is thus mentioned:
“Moray gart raise the hardy Mersemen,
An’ Angus and mony ane mair,
Erle Morton and the Byres Lord Lindsay,
An’ campit on the Hill o’Fare.”
He succeeded his father in 1563. He had a charter of the Dominical
lands of the monastery of Haddington, with the tithes of Muirtown,
Drem, and Drymhills, 9th December 1580, and obtained a
confirmation of his hereditary office of justiciary of St. Andrews,
to be held thenceforth of the crown. On the evening of the murder of
Rizzio, 9th March 1565-6, he and Morton, with 150 men,
occupied the palace-court of Holyrood and Darnley’s apartments on
the ground-floor, while Ruthven and Darnley with their followers
were in the queen’s apartments committing the deed. On the retreat
of the conspirators to England, the earl of Crawford obtained a gift
of the forfeiture of Lord Lindsay, but they were pardoned at the
request of Huntly and Argyle, and returned to Scotland towards the
beginning of 1567. He does not appear to have had any concern in the
murder of Darnley, on the 9th February of that year.
After the marriage of the queen with Bothwell he subscribed the bond
of association for her rescue from that profigate nobleman, the
preservation and safe-keeping of the infant prince, and the
punishment of the king’s murderers. He was at Carberry Hill, with
the other confederated lords, on the 15th June, and when
Bothwell challenged Morton, who accepted the challenge, to single
combat, “Lord Lindsay,” says Godscroft, (p. 297) “stepping forth,
besought Morton and the rest, for all the service that ever his
predecessors or himself had done or could do unto their country,
that they would do him that honour as to suffer him to undertake
that combat, which, he said, did also duly belong to him in regard
of his nearness of blood to the defunct king.” His request was
granted, and Morton presented him with a famous two-handed sword,
which had belonged to his ancestor Bell-the-Cat, earl of Angus, in
the reign of James III., and which, in spite of its cumbrous size,
Lindsay wore ever afterwards. He “then proceeded to arm himself, and
kneeling down before the ranks, audibly implored God to strengthen
his arm to punish the guilty and protect the innocent. Bothwell too
seemed eager to fight, but at this critical juncture Mary
interfered, and resolutely forbade the encounter.” After the
surrender of Mary, “she called for Lindsay, one of the fiercest of
the confederated barons, and bade him give her his hand. He obeyed.
‘By the hand,’ she said, ‘which is now in yours, I’ll have your head
for this!’” (Tytler’s Hist. of Scotland, vol. vii. p. 137.)
The following day, the unfortunate queen was sent to the castle of
Lochleven, and confined there under the charge of Lindsay and
Ruthven. By the confederated lords he was sent to Lochleven to
prevail upon the queen to resign the crown, bearing with him the
necessary papers for her signature. Mr. Tytler observes: “From
Lindsay Mary had everything to dread; her passionate menace to him
on the day she was taken prisoner at Carberry had not been
forgotten, and he was not selected as a man whom she would hardly
dare to resist.” “When Lindsay was admitted, his stern behavior at
once terrified her into compliance. He laid the instruments before
her, and with eyes filled with tears, and a trembling hand, she took
the pen and signed the papers without even reading their contents.
It was necessary, however, that they should pass the privy seal, and
here a new outrage was committed. The keeper, Thomas Sinclair,
remonstrated, and declared that, the queen being in ward, her
resignation was ineffectual; Lindsay attacked his house, tore the
seal from his hands, and compelled him by threats and violence to
affix it to the resignation.” (Tytler’s Hist. of Scotland,
vol. vii. p. 165.) Lord Lindsay’s alleged personal ill usage of the
queen on this occasion, as related by Sir Walter Scott, has ho
foundation in fact.
At the battle of Langside, a charge by Lindsay, at the
critical moment, decided the fate of the day. He attended, with
Moray, Lethington, and others, at the trial of Queen Mary, before
the commissioners of Elizabeth. Lord Herries having, about the end
of 1568, accused the regent’s party of Darnley’s murder, Lord
Lindsay wrote him a letter stating that he had “therein lied in his
throat,” which he would “maintain, God willing, against him, as
became him, of honour and duty.” Lord Herries, in reply, denied that
he had meant to include Lord Lindsay, in particular, in the
accusation, “but let any,” he added, “of the principals that were
there, subscrive the like writing ye have sent to me, and I shall
point him forth, and fight with any of the traitors therein.” His
lordship acted a prominent part in the hostilities carried on
between the rival factions, the king’s men and the queen’s men, and
on 16th June 1571, he and Morton slew the commendator of
Kilwinning and 60 others, and took Lord Home and 80 gentlemen of the
queen’s party prisoners. Soon after 60 of Lord Lindsay’s cows were
driven away from his estate of the Byres, but on the following day
he defeated Spens of Wormestone, Lord Seton, and others in the High
Street of Edinburgh, Seton being taken and carried away by Lord
Lindsay. His lordship was at this time governor of Leith, during the
absence of the regent at the parliament at Stirling. When his old
friend, Kirkaldy of Grange, held the castle of Edinburgh for the
queen, Lord Lindsay was appointed in his stead provost of Edinburgh,
and closely invested the castle with batteries of cannon and
artillery. He visited John Knox on his deathbed, and when Kirkaldy
at last surrendered, he used his utmost efforts with the regent to
save him, but in vain.
He afterwards became estranged from Morton, and in March
1577-8, he was one of the leaders of the party which effected his
fall. On the 1st April the castle of Edinburgh was
surrendered by Morton’s lieutenant to Lindsay and Ruthven, and
Lindsay was appointed one of the council of twelve in whom the
administration was vested. On Morton regaining power, he issued
summonses in the king’s name, commanding the attendance of the
malcontent nobles at a convention to be held at Stirling. Refusing
attendance, they sent Lindsay and the earl of Montrose to protest
against the convention, as in no sense a free parliament. On Lindsay
doing so, Morton, interrupting him, commanded him and his companion
to take their places; to which Lindsay answered that he would stand
there till the king ordered him to his seat. James then repeated the
command, and the old lord sat down. On the Estates proceeding to
choose the Lords of the articles, as the committee of parliament was
called, Lindsay again protested against the proceedings, calling all
to witness that every act of such a parliament was null, and the
choosing of the lords an empty farce. “think ye, Sir,” said Morton,
in a rage, “that this is a court of churls or brawlers? Take your
own place, and thank God that the king’s youth keeps you safe from
his resentment!: :I have served the king in his minority,” said
Lindsay, “as faithfully as the proudest among ye, and I think to
serve his grace no less truly in his majority.” On this Morton
whispered something in the king’s ear, whereupon James said, “Lest
any man should judge this not to be a free parliament, I declare it
free, and those who love me will think as I think.” The dissentient
lords immediately gathered their followers, and marched to Falkirk,
7,000 strong. They were there met by Morton, at the head of 5,000
men, but a compromise being effected, Lindsay, Montrose, Argyle and
their friends were re-elected into the privy council. On the
downfall of Morton, he abandoned his seat at the council, and
retired to his own house “much discontented.” In 1582 he was one of
the noblemen and others concerned in seizing the king’s person at
the raid of Ruthven. On the king recovering his liberty, he with the
rest fled into England. In 1584 he was committed to Tantallan
castle, as a suspected partaker in the conspiracy of Gowrie, Angus,
Marr, and others, for a second seizure of the king’s person, and
surprise of the castle of Stirling. After his release from prison,
being an old man, he retired almost wholly from public affairs, and
died on 11th December 1589. His character is thus summed
up by Lord Lindsay: “Fiercest and most bigoted of the lords of the
Congregation, and doomed to an unenviable immortality in the pages
of Sir Walter Scott, he was yet an honester man than most of his
contemporaries, and his zeal for the establishment of Protestantism
seems to have been sincere, however alloyed by meaner motives.
Personally, he was an excellent soldier, accomplished in all warlike
exercises, though extremely short-sighted, – quick and hasty in
temper; in manners bluff and rude, in intellect uncrafty,
straight-forward, and unsuspicious – ‘the hero,’ in short, ‘of the
party,’ and ‘a man they could not weill want’ (Crawford’s Hist.
of the Lindsays, MS.) ‘To execute their boldest enterprises,’ –
a bitter enemy, I may add, while his rival’s star prevailed, but the
first to forgive and take his part when his own had gained the
ascendant,’ (Lives of the Lindsays, vol. i. p. 176.) He
married the regent Moray’s half-sister, the beautiful Euphemia
Douglas, the eldest of the seven daughters of Sir Robert Douglas of
Lochleven, commonly called the seven fair porches of Lochleven, and
with two daughters, he had a son, James, seventh Lord Lindsay of the
Byres. His brother, Norman Lindsay, was ancestor of the Lindsays of
Kilquhiss. He had six sisters, married respectively to Norman
Leslie, master of Rothes, the assassin of Cardinal Bethune, Thomas
Myreton of Cambo, David Bethune of Melgum, a natural son of the
cardinal, Sir George Douglas, the deliverer of Queen Mary from
Lochleven, Thomas Fotheringham of Powrie, and David Kinnear of
Kinnear.
James, seventh Lord Lindsay of the Byres, also distinguished
himself in the Protestant cause. He joined in a band against Huntly
and the papists, in March 1592, and in October of the same year,
during the king’s progress in the north, it was chiefly through “the
good Lord Lindsay’s” instance that he destroyed Huntly’s castle of
Strathbogie and others. On 5th January 1593, a meeting of
barons and ministers took place in Mr. Robert Bruce’s gallery at
Edinburgh, when it was agreed that an expostulation should be made
to the king on account of his encouragement of the papists. Some of
those present, however, expressed themselves, in the afternoon of
the same day, anxious that the commissioners appointed to go down to
the palace to the king should not go, as he was highly offended with
the meeting, and his presence would only irritate him more; but Lord
Lindsay put an end to the debate by saying boldly, “I will goe doun
with the barons, go who will. We will not desist from our conclusion
made before noone.” So accordingly they went. (Calderwood,
vol. v. p. 216.)
During the famous tumult of December 17, 1596, he acted a
conspicuous part. He and three other barons, with the two ministers,
Bruce and Watson, were sent by the noblemen and barons convened in
the Little church, to the king, then sitting in the upper Tolbooth,
with some of his privy council, for redress of the wrongs done to
the kirk, and to avert the dangers threatened to religion. “What
dangers?” said James, after listening to a speech from Bruce, “I see
none; and who dares convene, contrary to my proclamation?” “Dares!”
retorted Lord Lindsay, “we dare more than that, and shall not suffer
the truth to be overthrown.” Alarmed at the language and gestures of
Lindsay, with the rush of people into the apartment, the king
retreated from the room and the protestant lords and ministers
returned to the Little kirk, where great confusion prevailed, and
Lindsay, to prevent them separating, cried aloud, “There is no
course but one; let us stay together that are here, and promise to
take one part, and advertise our friends and the favourers of
religion to come unto us, and let the day be either theirs or ours.”
This speech increased the uproar, and violence would undoubtedly
have ensued, had not the provost, Sir Alexander Hume, brought the
armed crafts of the city, and put down the riot. In the kirk yard at
the back of the church, some hot words passed between the earl of
Mar, who had been sent by the king to remonstrate with the
ministers, and Lord Lindsay, and they could not be pacified for a
long time. For his share in this tumult, the latter “was compelled
to pay ane great sum of money.” He died 5th November
1601. With three daughters he had two sons. John, eighth lord, who
died 5th November 1609, without male issue, and Robert,
ninth Lord Lindsay of the Byres, who died at Bath, 9th
July 1616. With one daughter the latter had a son, John, tenth Lord
Lindsay of the Byres, born in 1596, and created earl of Lindsay and
Lord Parbroath, to him and his heirs male, bearing the name and arms
of the Lords Lindsay, by patent, dated at Theobald’s 8th
May 1633. In 1644 he assumed the title of earl of Crawford, and was
thenceforth known under the name of Crawford-Lindsay. (See CRAWFORD,
earl of.)
LINDSAY, SIR DAVID,
of the Mount, a celebrated poet, moralist, and reformer, descended
from the noble family of Lindsay of the Byres in Haddingtonshire,
was born in 1490. His birthplace is supposed to have been his
father’s seat, called the Mount, near Cupar-Fife. He was educated at
the university of St. Andrews, which he entered in 1505, and quitted
in 1509. In 1512 he became an attendant on the infant prince,
afterwards James V., and his duty seems to have been t take the
personal charge of him in his hours of recreation. He held this post
till 1524, when he was dismissed on a pension, through the intrigues
of the four guardians, to whose care the young king was committed in
that year. In 1528 he produced his ‘Dreame,’ written during his
banishment from court. In this poem he exposes, with great truth and
boldness, the disorders in Church and State, which had arisen from
the licentious lives of the Romish clergy, and the usurpations of
the nobles. In the following year he presented his ‘Complaynt’ to
the king, in which he reminds his majesty of his faithful services
in the days of his early youth. In 1530 James appointed him lyon
king-at-arms, and conferred on him the honour of knighthood. In the
‘Complaynt of the King’s Papingo,’ Sir David’s next production, he
makes the royal parrot satirise the vices of the Popish clergy, in a
style of such pungent humour as must have been most galling to the
parties against whom his invective is directed. He was, however,
protected by the king against their resentment.
In 1531 Sir David was sent, with two other ambassadors, to
Antwerp, to renew an ancient treaty of commerce with the
Netherlands; and on his return he married a lady of the Douglas
family. In 1535 he produced before the king, at the Castlehill of
Cupar, a drama, entitled ‘A Satyre of the Three Estatis.’ In the
same year, he and Sir John Campbell of Loudon were sent as
ambassadors into Germany, to treat of a marriage with some princess
of that country, but James afterwards preferred a connexion with
France. In 1536 he wrote his answer to the ‘Kingis Flyting,’ and his
‘Complaynt of Basche, the King’s Hound;’ and in 1538, ‘The
Supplication against Syde Taillis,’ part of women’s dress. On the
death of Magdalene of France, two months after her marriage with
James V., Lindsay composed his ‘Deploratioun of the Death of Queen
Magdalene.’ In 1538, on the arrival in Scotland of Mary of Guise,
James’ second consort, Sir David superintended a variety of public
pageants and spectacles for the welcoming her majesty at St.
Andrews. In 1541 he produced ‘Kitty’s Confession,’ written in
ridicule of auricular confession.
In 1542 King James died, and during the succeeding regency,
the Romish clergy obtained an act to have Lindsay’s satirical poems,
against them and their corruptions, publicly burnt. In 1544, and the
two succeeding years, he represented the town of Cupar-Fife in the
estates of parliament. In 1546 was printed at London, Lindsay’s
‘Tragical Death of David Beatoun, Bishoppe of St. Andrewes, in
Scotland; whereunto is joined the Martyredom of Maister George
Wyscharte, for whose sake the aforesaid Bishoppe was not long after
slayne.’ His pithy stanza about the foulness of the deed, combined
with its desirableness, has been often quoted (see BETHUNE).
In 1548 Sir David Lindsay was sent on a mission to Denmark to
solicit the aid of some ships to protect the coasts of Scotland
against the English, a request that was not granted, and to
negotiate a free trade in grain for the Scottish merchants, which
was readily conceded. In 1550 he published the most pleasing of his
compositions, ‘The History and Testament of Squire Meldrum;’ and in
1553 appeared his last and greatest work, ‘The Monarchie.’ The date
of his death is unknown; but Dr. Irving places it in 1567. His
portrait is subjoined, taken from a plate forming the frontispiece
to the 1st vol. of Scottish Poems collected by Pinkerton,
in 3 vols. London, 1792:
[portrait of Sir David Lindsay]
As a poet Sir David Lindsay is esteemed inferior to Dunbar and
Gawin Douglas, The whole of his writings are in the Scottish
language, and his satirical powers and broad humour long rendered
him an especial favourite with the common people of Scotland, with
whom many of his moral sayings passed into proverbs. The most
accurate edition of his works is that published by Mr. George
Chalmers in 1806.
LINDSAY, ROBERT,
of Pitscottie, the compiler of the curious work, entitled ‘The
Chronicles of Scotland,’ was born about the beginning of the 16th
century. Beyond the fact that he was a cadet of the noble family of
Lindsay, nothing else has been recorded of his personal history. His
‘Chronicles’ include the period between 1436 and 1565, and are
remarkable for the prosing simplicity of the style, and the
credulity of the author, whose testimony is only to be relied upon
when corroborated by other authorities. A correct edition of the
‘Chronicles of Scotland’ was published in 1814, by Mr. John Graham
Dalyell, in 2 vols. 8vo.
Sir David Lyndsay of the Mount
(1490-1542) (pdf)
