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 porter left Douglas, as men said, ‘all begylit,’ and ‘men wist nocht,’ says the chronicler, ‘quhar the Douglas was.’ In fact the large force which he had collected for the relief of Abercorn melted, and the earl himself now or soon after escaped to England, leaving his followers to maintain the unequal struggle as they best might. Within a month Abercorn was taken by escalade, and burned to the ground. The three brothers of the earl, Ormonde, Moray, and Lord Balvenie, were met at Arkinholm on the Esk by the king's forces, headed by their kinsman the Earl of Angus, and utterly defeated. Moray was killed, Ormonde taken prisoner and executed. It passed into a proverb that the ‘Red’ Douglas (Angus) conquered the ‘Black,’ and a vaunting epigram declared that as Pompey by Cæsar only was undone, None but a Roman soldier conquered Rome; A Douglas could not have been brought so low Had not a Douglas wrought his overthrow. As a result of this defeat the castles of Douglas and Strathavon and other minor strongholds surrendered, and Thrieve in Galloway, which alone held out, after a long siege, in which the king took part, capitulated. Royal garrisons were placed in it and Lochmaben. The power of Douglas was now completely overthrown. The usual forfeitures followed in June 1455 of the earl, his mother, Beatrix, and his brothers. The act of attainder (Act Parl. ii. 75) recites the treasons, and shows how extensive the conspiracy of the Douglases had been. From Lochindorb and Darnaway in the north, to Thrieve in Galloway, they had fortified all their castles against the king, and from them they had made raids wasting the king's lands with fire and sword. Ettrick Forest was now annexed to the crown, and the other estates of the Douglases divided among the chief supporters of the king. Several families rose to greatness out of the ruin of the Douglases. One of their own kindred, George, fourth earl of Angus, was created Lord of Douglas, and a second line of Angus-Douglases almost rivalled the first. Another Douglas, James of Dalkeith, was made Earl of Morton.

On 4 Aug. the exiled earl received a pension of 500l. from the English for services to be done to the English crown, which was to continue till the estates taken from him ‘by him that calleth himself king of Scots’ were restored. In the war with England during this and the next reign Douglas, who remained in that country, appears to have taken no part. The historian of his house says, reproachfully: ‘For the space of twenty-three years, until the year 1483, there is nothing but deep silence with him in all histories.’

This silence is broken only by the record of his being the first Scotchman who received the honour of being made a knight of the Garter, in return for his services to Edward IV. During the reign of James III Douglas again for a brief moment appears in history. He took part in 1483 in a daring raid which Albany, the exiled brother of James III, made at the instance of Richard III on the borders during the fair of Lochmaben, when it was hoped his influence might still be felt. But the name of Douglas was no longer one to conjure by, and its representative showed the same incapacity for active warfare which he had displayed in the rebellion. A reward of land had been offered for his capture, and he surrendered to an old retainer of his house, Kirkpatrick of Closeburn, that he might earn it, and, if possible, save the life of his former master. The king granted the boon, and the old earl was sent to the abbey of Lindores in Fife, where he remained till his death four years later. Two anecdotes related by Hume of Godscroft illustrate his character. When sent to Lindores he muttered, ‘He who can no better be must be a monk,’ and shortly before his death, when solicited by James, sorely pressed by his mutinous nobles, to give him his support, he replied, ‘Sire, you have kept me and your black coffer at Stirling [alluding to the king's mint of black or debased coins] too long—neither of us can do you any good.’

He died on 14 July 1488, and was buried at Lindores. With him the first line of the earls of Douglas ended, for he had no children by his wife, Margaret, the Maid of Galloway. That lady, like others of his kin, deserted him when in exile in England, and returning to Scotland was given by James II in marriage to his uterine brother, John, earl of Atholl, the son of Queen Joanna, wife of James I and Sir John Stewart, the Black Knight of Lorne. Her former marriage was treated as null, notwithstanding the dispensation by the pope. A single record (Inquisitiones post mortem 2 Henry VII) is supposed to prove a second marriage of this earl when in England to Anne, daughter of John Holland, duke of Exeter, and widow of Sir John Neville.

[The Short Chronicle of James II; Major and Lindsay of Pitscottie's Histories and the Acts of Parliament, Scotland, are the chief original sources. The Exchequer Rolls with Mr. Burnett's prefaces and Pinkerton's History should also be referred to. See also Hume of Godscroft's History and Sir W. Fraser's Douglas Book.] 

DOUGLAS, JAMES, fourth (d. 1581), regent of Scotland, was the younger son of Sir George Douglas of Pittendriech [q. v.], younger brother of