Earl of Argyll

“ Argyll was frequently consulted by the government in the more important matters relating to Scotland, and there are a large number of his letters in the Carstares ‘State Papers.’ By letters patent dated at Kensington 23 June 1701, he was created duke of Argyll, marquis of Lorne and Kintyre, earl of Campbell and Cowal, viscount of Lochow and Glenisla, lord Inverary, Mull, Morven, and Tyree. ”

“ At the time of the revolution Breadalbane was, next to his kinsman, the Earl of Argyll, the most powerful of the highland nobles, while he was not regarded by the other clans with the same uncompromising hostility as Argyll. His greed was indeed notorious, and his double-faced cunning made him feared and distrusted by many of the chiefs, but his actions were not like those of the Argylls, regulated by lowland opinion, and he was not the recognised representative of lowland authority. ”

“ The fugitives were welcomed back to the capital with the assurance that they were honest men, loyal subjects, and good patriots. Argyll on his return carried all before him. The offices of State were filled with his nominees. The Privy Council was carefully weeded to make room for his friends. The unfortunate King, to [Pg 122] fill the cup of his humiliation full, scattered titles with a lavish hand. Argyll was raised to a marquisate; Almond was created Earl of Callendar; bluff old Leslie took his seat among the peers of Scotland as Earl of Leven. ”

“ Campbell, Archibald, 5th Earl of Argyll : for death read divorce 318 ii 34 Campbell, Archibald, 7th Earl of Argyll : for the nearest heir read near heir 319 ii 29 ⁠for one son and one daughter read five daughters and three sons, including James, colonel of the Scots Guard in France, created earl of Irvine in 1642, who died in 1645 320 i 23 Campbell, Archibald, Marquis of Argyll : for 1660 read 1661 ii 26 ⁠for tutor read guardian 13 f.e. ”

“ Of this committee Argyll was not a member, but he was ‘major potestas,’ and ‘all knew that it was his influence that gave being, life, and motion to the new-modelled governors.’ On 12 June a commission of ‘fire and sword’ was issued by the committee of estates to Argyll against the Earl of Atholl and the Ogilvies, who had taken up arms in behalf of the king. With a force of four thousand men he swept over the districts of Badenoch, Atholl, and Mar, according to the hostile chroniclers stripping the fields of the sheep and cattle. ”

“ All was involved in mystery, and this was no little increased by Hamilton and Argyll returning to Edinburgh in the course of a few weeks, and Hamilton declaring that there was nothing in the affair which reflected any dishonour on the king. Still more to confound all reasoning on the matter, the plotters and incendiaries not only were liberated on bail, but Argyll was placed at the head of the treasury, was created a marquis, Hamilton a duke, and Leslie an earl, with the title of Leven. ”

“ On his way to join them, Argyll, with a body of highlanders, was surprised by the Earl of Lanark while dining with the Earl of Mar at Stirling, but galloping across Stirling bridge he reached North Queensferry, and crossed the Firth in a small boat to Edinburgh, where the ‘Whigamores,’ as they were afterwards called, had already arrived. The incursion known as the ‘Whigamore Raid’ dealt the final blow to the cause of the king. At Edinburgh a new committee of estates was formed with Argyll at its head. ”

“ The Mother Gunning has published her letter to the Duke of Argyll, and it disappoints every body. It is neither romantic, nor entertaining, nor abusive, but on the General and Mr. and Mrs. Bowen, and the General's groom. On the Bowens it is so immeasurably scurrilous, that I think they must prosecute her. She accuses them and her husband of a conspiracy to betray and ruin his own daughter, without, even attempting to assign a motive to them. Of the House of Argyll she says not a word. ”

“ The Earl of Crawford, convinced that Argyll's conduct on the occasion of a duel arranged between them at Musselburgh in August 1648 (see Balfour's Annals, iii. 395) could only be accounted for by his being ‘naturally a very great coward,’ stoutly contested the proposition of Middleton that Argyll's ‘soul was in hell,’ asserting that such resolution as he showed on the scaffold must have been due to ‘some supernatural assistance; he was sure it was not his natural temper’ (Burnet's Own Time, i. 126) . ”

“ You ask about the house of Argyll. You know I have no connexion with them, nor any curiosity about them. Their relations and mine have been in town but four days, so I know little from them: Mrs. Grenville, to-day, told me the Duke proposes to continue the same life he used to lead, with a cribbage-table and his family. Every body admires the youngest daughter's (729) person and understanding. ”

“ There you have Duke of Argyll—God bless him!—addressing House of Lords. He is not one piper, but many. As he proceeds, intoxicated with sound of his own voice, ecstatic in clearness of his own vision, he competes with himself as the pipers struggle with each other until at last he has, in a Parliamentary sense of course, swollen to such a size that there is no room in the stately chamber for other Peers. Nothing and nobody left but His Grace the Duke of Argyll. Towards end of sixty minutes spectacle begins to pall on wearied senses ”

“ He saw that the policy of the king was doing violence to the deepest convictions of the nation, and that the only chance of preventing a catastrophe was to present a firm front of resistance to his unreasonable demands. When advice and soft words proved of no avail in altering the bent of the king's purpose, he resolved to stake his all with the covenanters. Argyll was the only member of the privy council who did not retire with the Marquis of Hamilton when the assembly was dissolved from sitting any longer. ”

“ The ministers of the Kirk in astonishment met to consult and to protest; they sent a deputation to the king with a remonstrance; but they arrived at a time likely to inspire them with awe, and did not escape without a painful evidence that they were no longer in the proud position of their fathers. Charles had shed the blood of vengeance plentifully in England, and there were those in Scotland whom he looked on with a menacing eye. The chief of these was the Marquis of Argyll. Argyll had been the head and leader of the Covenanters. ”

“ Though Argyll held the chief power in Scotland, and was on friendly terms with Cromwell, he could not prevent a strong public feeling showing itself on the approaching trial of the king. The Scots reproached themselves for giving up Charles to the English army, and considered that heavy disgrace would fall upon the country if the king should be put to death. They demanded, therefore, that a strong remonstrance should be sent to the parliament of England, and Argyll was too timid or too cautious to oppose this. ”

“ In the series of tangled incidents which followed, Argyll lost control of the national policy. He describes himself at this period as “a distracted man ... in a distracted time” whose “remedies ... had the quite contrary operation.” He supported the invitation from the Covenanters to Charles II. to land in Scotland, gazed upon the captured Montrose, bound on a cart on his way to execution at Edinburgh, and subsequently, when Charles II. came to Scotland, having signed the Covenant and repudiated Montrose, Argyll remained at the head of the administration. ”

“ Returning to Scotland in 1679, he again got into trouble in 1681, from the accidental discovery among the Argyll papers of a memorandum in his hand reflecting on the government, but, as usual, made his escape, and this time took refuge in The Hague. He was present at the meeting at Amsterdam in 1685, when the expedition of Argyll was resolved on, and, having prepared Argyll's declaration of war, was accused of treasonably consulting and contriving Argyll's rebellion, was found guilty in his absence, and was sentenced to be executed whenever he could be found. ”

“ The professions of Argyll, as interpreted by Charles, were to a certain extent carried out in his speech on 25 June in the Painted Chamber before the committee of the lords and commons, in which he deprecated the persecution of ‘peaceable men who cannot through scruple of conscience come up in all things to the common rule,’ but he was careful to add that the personal regard for the king in Scotland ‘hath never made them forget that common rule, “The safety of the people is the supreme law”’ (The Lord Marques of Argyle's Speech, London, printed for Laurence Chapman, 27 June 1646) . ”

“ From this time the supremacy of Argyll in the affairs of Scotland terminated both in name and reality. For some months, though retaining his place at the helm of affairs, he had been helplessly drifting at the mercy of contending factions. As the extreme covenanters now held aloof from the king, Argyll, at the parliament which met at Perth on 13 March, found his counsels completely overruled, and from this time the struggle of Charles II against Cromwell was directed by the Hamilton faction. ”

“ On 20 Feb. 1639 Argyll sent a letter to Laud in defence of the Scots, containing a statement which rested the position they had taken up on unassailable constitutional principles (Melbourne MSS., quoted in Gardiner's Hist. of England, viii. 392) . Meanwhile he took the precaution of raising a force of nine hundred men, a portion of whom he left in Kintyre to watch the Irish, another portion in Lorne to hold the Clandonalds in check, while with the remainder he passed over into Arran, where he seized the castle of Brodick, belonging to the Marquis of Hamilton. ”

“ It was to no purpose they were assured, that there were a great many arms and a good supply of powder in the town, which they might secure, and that the Duke of Argyle, whom they appeared to dread, was in no condition to injure them, as he had scarcely 2,000 men under him, and was in daily expectation of being attacked by the Earl of Mar, whose forces were then thrice as numerous;—these and similar arguments were entirely thrown away upon men who had already determined at all hazards to adhere to their resolution of carrying the war into England. ”

“ If, on the one hand, it is to be regretted that we have not more memorials left of passages so interesting, and that even of those which we do possess, a great part is obscured by time, it must be confessed, on the other, that we have quite enough to enable us to pronounce that for constancy and equanimity under the severest trials, few men have equalled, none ever surpassed, the Earl of Argyle. ”

“ EARLE, GILES (1678?–1758) , politician and wit, came from a family resident at Crudwell, near Malmesbury. He served in early life in the army, attaining to the rank of colonel, and was attached to John, the second duke of Argyll, who was distinguished both in war and in politics. This connection had lasted in 1716 for twenty years, and was so marked that Sir Robert Walpole, in a letter written in that year, styles him ‘the Duke of Argyll's Erle.’ On the accession of George I he plunged into political life, and in that king's first parliament (1715–22) sat for Chippenham. ”

“ The Duke of Argyll’s interests were less of a political than of a dilettante literary character. He seldom spoke in parliament, and never held ministerial office. Possibly his relation with the Crown made a party career difficult. ”

“ He blamed the bishops for persuading the king to bring in the English liturgy and canons in so abrupt and violent a manner; that their pride was great, their folly greater. He gives the king his opinion of the character and degrees of the trustworthiness of the different Ministers, and bids him beware of the Earl of Argyle, whom he declares to be the most dangerous man in the State; so far from favouring episcopacy, as had been supposed, that nobleman wished it abolished with all his soul. This was immediately afterwards, as we shall see, made clear by Argyle himself. ”

“ Argyll thereupon advised that sentence of forfeiture should be passed against him, and on this being refused he took a solemn protest before parliament that neither he nor his heirs should be liable for any mischiefs that might in future arise from rebellions in the Isles. The death of Sir Donald not long afterwards relieved Argyll from further anxiety on his account, and he took advantage of the interval of tranquillity which followed to extend his influence among the chiefs, and to promote the aggrandisement of his family and clan. ”

“ Her husband succeeded to the dukedom of Argyll in 1770, and on 4 May 1776 she was created Baroness Hamilton of Hambledon in Leicestershire, with remainder to her male issue as barons. SirN. Wraxall says that 'even when far advanced in life, and with very decayed health,' she was remarkably beautiful, and 'seemed composed of a finer clay than the rest of her sex.' By her second husband she had three sons: George John, died in infancy; George William and John Douglas, who both became dukes of Argyll ”

“ He compelled Huntly to retreat in April, and in July advanced to meet the Irish troops now landed in Argyllshire, which were acting in conjunction with Montrose, who had put himself at the head of the royalist forces in Scotland. A campaign followed in the north in which neither general succeeded in obtaining any advantage over the other, or even in engaging battle. Argyll then returned to Edinburgh, threw up his commission, and retired to Inveraray Castle. ”