Page:The Complete Peerage Ed 2 Vol 4.djvu/772

 750 APPENDIX H That the Barony of Strabolgi upon the death of David de Strabolgi, third Lord Strabolgi, in i 369, fell into abeyance between his daughters and coheirs (i) Elizabeth, who married Sir Thomas Percy, and (2) Phillippa, who married Sir John Halsham; That by the extinction in the year 1496 of all the other coheirs the Barony of Strabolgi vested in Sir Edward Burgh, who was at that date the sole heir of Elizabeth, and accordingly the said Barony emerged from abeyance; That the Barony of Strabolgi, upon the death in or about the year 1600 of Robert Burgh, sixth Lord Burgh, who was the heir of Sir Edward Burgh, again fell into abeyance among the four sisters and coheirs of Robert Burgh, sixth Lord Burgh, viz.: (i) Elizabeth, who married George Brooke; (2) Frances, who married Francis Coppinger; (3) Anne, who married Sir Drue Drury; and (4) Katherine, who married Sir Thomas Knyvett; That the coheirs of the said Robert Burgh arc the following persons — The Petitioner Alexander Henry Leith; John Francis Byde Russel, who has presented no Petition and makes no claim; The Petitioner Reginald Gervase Alexander; The Petitioner Cuthbert Matthias Kenworthy; Emma Harriet Baroness Berners, who has presented no Petition and makes no claim; The heir or heirs (if any) of the said Frances Coppinger, who died in or before the year 161 9; The heir or heirs (if any) of Lucy Knyvett, who married Thomas Holt and John Field and died in the year 174O; That the Barony of Strabolgi is in abeyance and at His Majesty's disposal. As David de Strathbogie is not proved to have received a writ of summons to the Parliament of 13 18, in which he is held to have sat, the decision of the Committee, like the decisions in the Hastings and Vaux cases, amounts to the presumption of a writ. It should be noted also that the above resolution of the Committee in paragraph 6 by implication dates the Barony of Burgh 1487, though in the Burgh resolution their Lordships dated it 1529; for if Robert in 1600 was 6th Lord Burgh (he is called 4th Lord in the Burgh resolution), then Thomas, who was summoned in 1487, must have been ist Lord Burgh. See also ante, p. 747. It is only necessary to add that neither before 1369, when this " barony " is said to have fallen into abeyance, nor after that date was there ever any person called Lord Strabolgi, until the writ which was issued this year conferred that title on the very remote descendant of a Scottish earl, and placed him, at a bound, over the heads of nearly all the English barons on the Roll. That an individual who represents an un- known fraction of a barony which never existed, a barony which even on the most favourable representation has been unheard of for 547 years, should be given the precedence of 131 8, at the expense of most of the barons of the realm, is an outrage which the House of Lords may be expected to resent.