BHO

Supplement: January 1560

Pages 615-617

Calendar of State Papers Foreign: Elizabeth, Volume 5, 1562. Originally published by Her Majesty's Stationery Office, London, 1867.

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January 1560

[Jan.] 1420. The Earls of Arran and Lennox.
1. "Allegations and reasons of James Hamilton, pretended Earl of Arran, touching the title to that Earldom and to the Crown of Scotland, and the answers of Matthew, Earl of Lennox to the same."
2. Hamilton states that Lady Marrion Steward, sister to James III., married James, Lord Hamilton, and bare him a son and daughter, to wit, James, Earl of Arran, his father, and Margaret Hamilton, "your good dame," Countess of Lennox. As the brother succeeds before the sister, Lennox does him wrong to quarrel him.
3. Lennox replies, that if Hamilton had been lawfully begotten he should have had nothing to say against him. Hamilton's father was married to Elizabeth Hume, daughter to Lord Alexander Hume, about 1493, and she lived till 1543. Many years before her death Hamilton's father took to his company Dame Jenet Beton, by whom he had Hamilton, she not being his lawful wife.
4. Hamilton affirms that there was a divorce between his father and Elizabeth Hume, and that his father was married to Dame Jenet Beton. To this Lennox rejoins that yet there must be proved some lawful cause of divorce, or it is of no avail. Hamilton states that Elizabeth Hume was first married to Sir Thomas Hey, son and heir to Lord Yester, and that Sir Thomas and his father being near of consanguinity, that was then a lawful cause of divorce.
5. Lennox affirms that this is untrue, for there was never a marriage betwixt Sir Thomas Hey and Elizabeth Hume. Hamilton repeats his assertion, and adds that the divorce proves the same. He then asks Lennox how he is able to disprove it ? To this Lennox answers that he does so because Hamilton alleges the cause of the divorce to grow upon the marriage of Elizabeth Hume and Sir Thomas, who were never married. How then could there be (he asks) a divorcement between her and the Earl of Arran?
6. Hamilton admits that it is hard to prove this, for his father took a dispensation for his first marriage of the said Elizabeth and married her again, which proves that she was married to Hey, and that there was cause of divorce. Lennox rejoins that dispensations for things that never were, prove nothing.
7. Hamilton having remarked that this is no proof that Sir Thomas never married the said Elizabeth, Lennox proceeds to prove it thus. Alexander Hume, the first Hume, married the daughter of the Carrs, and his [?] name was Nicolas. She was inheritrix of Sariston [?] and Hutton Hall, and was married in Berwick 1478, and about two years after, in 1480, was the said Elizabeth Hume born. And Sir Thomas Hey married Dame Katherine Burdyke [Borthwick], sister to William Lord Burdyke, about 1489, and the same Sir Thomas was slain by the thieves of Eskdale 1491, and left a son a year old. The widow of this Sir Thomas married Sir Oliver Sinclair, Lord of Roslin, and her son by Sir Thomas lived till he was 18 years of age. He thus proves that Elizabeth Hume was not nine years old when Sir Thomas Hey married Katherine Burdyke, and therefore could not be Sir Thomas Hey's wife.
8. Admitting all this to be true, retorts Hamilton, he [Hamilton] was entered heir to his father without any contradiction by him, and continued so till the decease of King James, after whose death he was admitted to be Governor of Scotland without impeachment. To this it is replied by Lennox, that he was both under age and out of the realm. Also after the King's death the Cardinal wrote to the King of France for him to come home to Scotland to receive his right, and he [the King] raised a summons of bastardy against Hamilton. For when he [Hamilton] was declared Governor, he made proclamation that the Word of God should be in the vulgar tongue; but to stop the Cardinal's mouth, he made a new command to the contrary, barring all men from that benefit, and persecuting any that were forward thereto. And thereupon the Cardinal left off to prosecute the summons of bastardy. Lennox concludes that Hamilton has no right to the Earldom of Arran, much less to the Crown of Scotland, for whatsoever is set down here is to be proved by records.
Copy, in a Scottish hand. Endd. by Cecil. Pp. 4.
[Jan.] 1421. Another copy of the above.
Endd. Pp. 4.
[Jan.] 1422. Another copy of the above.
Endd. Pp. 4.
Jan. 23. 1423. Instructions for Montague and Chamberlain.
Duplicate of portions of the instructions contained in Nos. 629 and 630.
Endd. Pp. 4.