Page:The Complete Peerage Ed 1 Vol 2.djvu/413

 412 CKAWFOilD. shire ; on 17 July 1-173 bo was made Keeper (for 3 years) of Berwick, and in May 1476, High Admiral of Scotland. In 1474 he entailed the family estates on his heirs male {or ever. He was "for 20 years employed in almost every embassy that took place between England and his native country," for which "he was indeed well qualified, being princely in all his dealings," and his "magnificence" being "un- bounded."!**) Master of the Household, 1HQ ; Chamberlain, in or before US3 : Joint High Justiciary of the North, 14S7. On IS May 1-188 he was cr. BUKJS( b ) OF MON- TROSE [S.], the castle and borough of Montrose, &c, being erected into a Duchy and conveyed to him and his heirs. Soon afterwards he distinguished himself on the side of James III [S.] at the battle of Sauchieburn, 9 June 14SS, where that unhappy King was slain and himself taken prisoner and deprived of his public ollices. His Dukedom was forfeited by an act rescissory, Oct. 14SS, annulling all grants made by the late King during the S months preceding. In Nov. 14SS he was constrained to resign to Lord Gray [S.] his hereditary Sheriffdom of Angus. On 1 9 Sep. 1 1S11 he, under the name of " David, Earl of Crawford and Lord Lindsay," received a new patent(o) of the Dukedom of Montrose [S.] under the great Seal, in accordance with an Act of I'arl. In Feb. 1489/90 he was a member of the Secret Council. His first wife, having probably died (or posiibly, having been divorced) on or before 1484,( d ) Ue m. C) See "Lives of the Lindsays " where it is stated that "His heralds, the appendage of Sovereignty, are mentioned in the Exchequer Rolls, and as having exchanged their earlier name, ' Endure ' for ' Lynuesay,' the former having apparently been suggested from the motto of the family ' Endure fort.' He seems to have been the first of the Nobility upon whom the honour of having a herald was conferred in Scotland. [Eudure Pursuivant became Lyndesay Herald bj 1463 or 1464.] In England, however, Lindsay Herald is mentioned long previously, and in that Kingdom George Dunbar, the celebrated Earl of March, at the beginning of the 15th century, had a pursuivant under the title of Shrewsbury, evidently deriv ed from his so signally conducing to the victory [there, 1403] .which Used Henry IV upon the throne." ( b ) The first Dukedom conferred in Scotland, save those granted to the Royal family. (o) The analysis or abstract (all that is preserved) of the second patent commences thus — "Data est litera Comiti Craufurdie, creando ipsum Ducem db Montrose, pro toto tempore vite sue et concedendo silji cap. mess, ct locum castri de Montrose, afc." This has been generally considered as restraining the title to a life interest, but it is contended otherwise, and that " this new patent bus been misunderstood, from an abbreviated phrase in the abstract, as restrictive of the honour to the Duke's lifetime." There was also other arguments in favour of the Dukedom continuing to the heirs of the grantee, as that the Duke was not affected by the act rescissory, " the young King having already taken steps which rendered it, in his case, nugatory;" and again, that even it had been so affected, the act was itself rescinded in March 1503/4, when all things done by the then King were revoked, which were " either hurting his Soul, his Crown, or Holy Kirk." See " Lives of the Lindsay." The chief arguments in favour of the claim, set forth in a long letter, written by the then Lord Lindsay in Sep. 1865 to Sir Bernard Burke (printed in full iu Burke's Extinct Peerage, edit. 1866), appear to be that the patent of 18 May 14S8, " changing" tho grantee's Earldom into a Dukedom to him " et heredibus suis " could ouly be annulled (1) by resignation (2), by attainder or (3) by special annulment. Neither of the first took place. As to the last (1), the act recissory of 17 Oct. 1488, " being a general and penal act, could not per sc and without specification affect a dignity," as was " established by a leading case, that of the Dukedom of Norfolk [1425] in tho same century." (2) " If any ot tho grants of James HI survived the act recissory all survived " ergo, inasmuch as the Earldom of Glencairn was held " in 1640 by the only competent tribunal " to have so survived, the Dukedom of Montrose must be held to have likewise so survived. C) The fourth entry, in the index to testaments confirmed before the Commissary of Edinburgh, refers to Elizabeth Hamilton, Countess of Crawfurd, but the corresponding record to this part of the index has not been extant for many years. The exact date of each confirmation is given in the index in every case, excepting this, whore probably it had become obliterated or been torn away. The dates of the three preceding entries are 14 Jan. 1515, 20 Aug. 1514, and 10 Feb. 1514, while that of the succeeding one is 24 March 1516. In the index (made about 1815) are certain fragments with gaps which the compiler (a, most competent record (scholar) has endeavoured to put into