Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 16.djvu/42

 queen's party (ib. pp. 643, 772). He was in consequence released from prison and freed from his forfeiture, 22 Nov. 1516. He died at Drummond Castle, Strathearn, in 1519, and was buried in the church of Innerpeffray. He was succeeded by his great-grandson David. In Douglas's ‘Peerage of Scotland’ (ed. Wood, ii. 361) Drummond is absurdly stated to have married ‘Lady Elisabeth Lindsay, daughter of David, duke of Montrose.’ His wife was Elizabeth Lindsay, daughter of Alexander, fourth earl of Crawford, and by her he had three sons and six daughters. Malcolm, the eldest son, died young; David, master of Drummond, is not mentioned in the pedigrees, but is now believed to have been the chief actor in the outrage on the Murrays at Monivaird Church, for which he was executed after 21 Oct. 1490 (Exchequer Rolls of Scotland, ed. Burnett, vol. x. p. 1, with which cf. Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer, Scotland, ed. Dickson, vol. i. pp. cii–civ); William was living in March 1502–3; and John was ancestor of the Drummonds of Innerpeffray and of Riccarton. Of the daughters, Margaret [q. v.], mistress of James IV, was poisoned in 1501; Elizabeth married George, master of Angus, and was great-grandmother of Henry, lord Darnley; Beatrix married James, first earl of Arran; Annabella married William, first earl of Montrose; Eupheme, the wife of John, fourth lord Fleming, was poisoned in 1501; and Sibylla shared a like fate. Drummond was the common ancestor of the viscounts of Strathallan and of the earls of Perth and Melfort.

[Douglas's Peerage of Scotland (Wood), ii. 360–1; Malcolm's Memoir of the House of Drummond, pp. 67–86; Registrum Magni Sigilli Regum Scotorum (Paul), 1424–1513, (Paul and Thomson) 1513–46; Exchequer Rolls of Scotland (Burnett), vols. vii–x.; Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer, Scotland (Dickson), vol. i.; Cal. State Papers, Scottish Ser. (1509–89), p. 1; Letters and Papers of Hen. VIII (Brewer), 1509–16.] 

DRUMMOND, JOHN, first and titular  (1649–1714), was the second son of James, third earl of Perth. In 1673 he was captain of the Scotch foot guards. In 1677 his elder brother, James, fourth earl of Perth [q. v.], in a letter to Lauderdale offering to assist in dragooning the covenanters, complains of the family's decay, but honours soon fell thick upon them. In 1679 Drummond became deputy-governor of Edinburgh Castle, in 1680 lieutenant-general and master of the ordnance, in 1681 treasurer-depute of Scotland under Queensberry, and in 1684 secretary of state for Scotland. In 1685 he was created Viscount Melfort, with a grant from the crown of Melfort, Argyllshire, and other estates. In 1686 he was raised to an earldom, and exchanged Melfort for Riccarton, Cessnock, &c., Cessnock, worth 1,000l. a year, having by a shameless act of spoliation been taken from Sir Hugh Campbell. The reversion of these peerages was to the issue of his second marriage with Euphemia, daughter of Sir Thomas Wallace of Craigie, his sons by his first wife (a Fifeshire heiress, Sophia Lundey or Lundin, daughter of Margaret Lundey and Robert Maitland, Lauderdale's brother) being passed over as staunch protestants. Melfort and his brother, in order to supplant Queensberry, had declared themselves converted to catholicism by the controversial papers found in Charles II's strong box, and paraded by James II as a proof that Charles had always been a catholic. According to Burnet this double conversion was suggested by Perth and reluctantly adopted by Melfort; but the latter so far surpassed his brother in ability and unscrupulousness that the scheme was more likely his. Whereas, moreover, Perth's conversion appears to have acquired sincerity, Melfort's character never inspired confidence either in his political or his religious professions. It is, however, but fair to state that their mother, Lady Anne Gordon, was a catholic. For three years the two brothers ruled Scotland. Melfort, one of the first recipients of the revived order of the Thistle, was in London when William of Orange landed. He hastily provided for the worst by resigning his estates to the crown and having them regranted to his wife, with remainder to his son John. He advocated a wholesale seizure of influential whigs and their relegation to Portsmouth; but Sunderland's plan of rescinding all arbitrary measures prevailed. He was one of the witnesses to the will executed by James (17 Nov. 1688), and on the desertion of Churchill was meant to succeed him in the bedchamber. Quitting England before his master he landed at Ambleteuse 16 Dec. (N.S.), and countersigned James's letter to the privy council, which reached London 8 (18) Jan. 1689. His wife, with her son, speedily joined him, thus virtually abandoning her claim to the estates, and his Edinburgh house was pillaged by the mob, the charters and other papers being destroyed or dispersed. One of the handsomest men of his time, an accomplished dancer, of an ‘active, undertaking temper,’ as the ‘Stuart Papers’ euphemistically style his arrogant and monopolising disposition, Melfort acquired unbounded influence over James, and his adversaries never felt themselves secure except by keeping him at a distance from the king. Perth's suggestion that it was his wife who incited him to abuse that