COUPAR, LORD,
a title in the peerage of Scotland (attainted in 1746) conferred in
1607, on the Hon. James Elphinston, second son of James first Lord
Balmerinoch, by his second wife Marjory, daughter of Hugh Maxwell of
Tealing. On the distribution made by James the Sixth of the lands
which fell to the crown on the dissolution of the religious houses,
after the Reformation, his majesty erected the Cistertian abbey of
Coupar in Angus into a temporal lordship in his favour, by the title
of Lord Coupar, and the heirs male of his body, which failing, to his
father and his heirs male and entail, by royal charter, dated 20th
December 1607. His name after this often occurs in the rolls of
parliament, the influence and superior talents of his elder brother,
Lord Balmerinoch, having forced him into notice. In January 1645 he
was one of the committee of four of each of the three estates sent by
the parliament to Perth to assist General Baillie in opposing the
progress of the marquis of Montrose, and on the subsequent 29th
November, he was one of the commissioners appointed to be judges of
the processes of all delinquents cited by the estates, with power to
examine witnesses, &c. On 7th June 1649, his lordship was
constituted one of the extraordinary lords of session, in room of his
brother, Lord Balmerinoch, deceased. Speaking of this appointment, Sir
James Balfour says: “The Lord Balmerinoch’s extraordinary place of the
session they have bestowed on his brother, the Lord Coupar, whose head
will not fill his brother’s hat.” [Annals, vol. iii. page 390.]
The following epitaph, quoted in Brunton and Haig’s Lives of the
Senators of the College of Justice, from the Balfour MS., A. 7. 34, in
the Advocates’ Library, is to the same effect:
“Fy upon death.
He’s worse than a trooper,
That took from us, Balmerinoch,
And left that howlet Coupar.”
In 1650 Lord
Coupar was appointed a colonel of one of the regiments of foot for the
county of Perth, raised to resist Cromwell, and for his loyalty a fine
of three thousand pounds was imposed upon him by that personage, 12th
April 1654. He married, first, Margaret, daughter of Sir James
Halyburton of Pitcur; secondly, Lady Marion Ogilvy, eldest daughter of
James, second earl of Airlie, who afterwards became the wife of John,
third Lord Lindores; but had no issue by either wife. He died in 1669.
A curious
decision of the court of session, in a case in which his lordship was
concerned, preserved by Lord Stair, and quoted by Douglas, in his
Peerage (vol. i. p. 363, note, Wood’s edition), was given 3d
July 1662. Lord Coupar, sitting in parliament, taking out his watch,
handed it to Lord Pitsligo, who refusing to restore it, an action was
brought for the value. Lord Pitsligo said that Lord Coupar having put
his watch in his hand to see what hour it was, Lord Sinclair putting
forth his hand for a sight of the watch, Lord Pitsligo put it into
Lord Sinclair’s hand, in the presence of Lord Coupar, without
contradiction, which must necessarily import his consent. Lord Coupar
answered, that they being then sitting in parliament, his silence
could not import a consent. The Lords repelled Lord Pitsligo’s defence,
and found him liable in the value of the watch.
The title
and estates of the first Lord Coupar devolved upon his nephew, John,
third Lord Balmerinoch, whose grandson, John, fifth Lord Balmerinoch,
on being appointed a lord of session, 5th June 1714,
assumed the title of Lord Coupar. The titles were forfeited by his
half-brother, Arthur, fourth Lord Coupar and sixth Lord Balmerinoch,
in 1746. – See BALMERINO, Baron, ante, and ELPHINSTON, ARTHUR.
