Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 35.djvu/130

Mackay baron Mackay d'Ophemert, born 18 Jan. 1806, who succeeded to the barony of Reay as tenth lord in 1875, on the death of his cousin Eric, ninth baron, a descendant of George, the third lord Reay. The tenth lord was minister of state in the Netherlands, and vice-president of the privy council there. He died 6 March 1876. He married Mary Catherine Jacoba, daughter of Baron Fagel, privy councillor of the Netherlands, and was succeeded as eleventh lord Reay by his son Donald James, who resumed residence in England, and was governor of Bombay (1885-90).

 MACKAY, HUGH (1640?–1692), of Scourie, general, third son of Hugh Mackay of Scourie, Sutherlandshire—descended from Hugh Mackay, third of Strathnaver, chief of the clan Mackay—by Anne, daughter of John Corbet of Arkbole or Arbole, Ross-shire, was born at Scourie about 1640. After the Restoration, in 1660, he became ensign in Douglas's or Dumbarton's regiment, subsequently the royal Scots, and when the regiment was lent by Charles II to the French king, Mackay accompanied it to France. On his return to England in 1664 he was presented at court, and obtained from Charles an open letter, dated Whitehall, 20 Aug., recommending him to the favour of any to whom he might show it. By means of it he obtained an introduction to the Prince of Conde and the Viscount Turenne.

Although—through the deaths of his two elder brothers, who were murdered in Caithness—Mackay, on the death of his father in 1668, succeeded to the family estates, he continued to reside abroad. In 1669, along with other reduced officers, he volunteered into the service of the Venetian republic, to assist in driving the Turks from the island of Candia, and in acknowledgment of his valour received a medal. In 1672 he obtained a captaincy in Dumbarton's regiment, with which he served under Turenne in the expedition against the United Provinces, when John Churchill, afterwards Duke of Marlborough [q. v.], was a fellow-officer. While quartered in the town of Bonmel in Gueldres, in the house of a Dutch lady, the wife of the Chevalier de Bie, he fell in love with her eldest daughter Clara, whom in 1673 he married. The pious beliefs of the family made a deep impression on his character. 'He was,' says Burnet, 'the most pious man that I ever knew in a military way' (Own Time, ed. 1838, p. 540). That he had fought in an unjust cause now gave him serious concern, and his natural sympathies being also with the Dutch, he transferred his services to the States-General, obtaining a captaincy in the Scots Dutch brigade. He distinguished himself at the battle of Sineff in 1674, and also at the siege of Grave, which capitulated on 24 Oct. of the same year. Subsequently he was promoted to the rank of major-commandant. In 1677 he was appointed colonel of one of the Scots regiments, but whether this was, as his biographer states, in preference to his future adversary, John Graham of Claverhouse [q. v.], is doubtful. In 1680 he was made colonel of the regiment, and when, in 1685, the brigade was called over to England by James II to assist in subduing the Monmouth rising, he was appointed to its command, obtaining on 4 June the rank of major-general. The services of the brigade were not required, but Mackay, in recognition of the promptitude of its despatch, was made a privy councillor of Scotland. He went north to Edinburgh to take the oath and his seat, but returned to London without visiting his estates. After the brigade had been reviewed by James II on Hounslow Heath, he set sail with it for Holland. In 1687 James II proposed to transfer the brigade to the service of France, but the proposal was evaded by the Prince of Orange, and when, on 27 Jan. 1688, James demanded its recall, it was decided to retain the privates, the officers being permitted to follow their own inclinations. The majority of them, including Mackay, the commander, elected to remain. The decision of Mackay doubtless powerfully affected subsequent events. It necessarily also provoked the strong resentment of King James, and Mackay figured among those who were afterwards specially exempted from pardon.

In the expedition of the Prince of Orange to England Mackay had command of the English and Scots division, which was the first sent on shore after the Dutch fleet made the harbour of Torbay. On 4 Jan. 1689 he was appointed by William major-general and commander-in-chief of the forces in Scotland, and after his recovery from a severe illness sailed for Leith, which he reached on 25 March 1689. His forces consisted of the old Scots Dutch brigade, reduced to eleven hundred men by the omission of all the Dutch soldiers,