REFN: 4537AN
REFN: P4538
HAMILTON, JAMES, third marquis, and first duke of Hamilton, was bo rn in
the palace at Hamilton, on the 19th of June, 1606. His father, James,
marquis of Hamilton, was held in high favour by James I., who, amongst
other honours which he bestowed on him, created him earl of Cambridge, a
title whi ch was at an after period a fatal one to the unfortunate
nobleman who is the subject of this memoir.
Before the marquis had attained his fourteenth year, h is father, who was
then at St James’s court, sent for him for the purpose of betrothing him
to the lady Margaret Fielding, daughter to the earl of Denbigh , and niece
of the duke of Buckingham, and then only in the seventh year of h er age.
After this ceremony had taken place, the marquis was sent to Oxford, to
complete those studies which he had begun in Scotland, but which had been
seriously interrupted by his coming to court. He succeeded his father as
ma rquis of Hamilton, March 2, 1625, while as yet considerably under age.
An earl y and fond intimacy seems to have taken place between prince
Charles and the marquis. That it was sincere and abiding on the part of
the latter, the whole tenor of his life and his melancholy and tragical
death bear testimony. On C harles succeeding to the throne, one of his
first cares was to mark the estee m in which he held his young and noble
friend, by heaping upon him favours an d distinctions.
Soon after the coronation of the king, however, in which cerem ony he
carried the sword of state in the procession, he returned to Scotland for
the purpose of superintending in person his family affairs, which had
b een much deranged by the munificence of his father. The marquis, who
does not seem to have ever been much captivated by the life of a
courtier, soon becam e warmly attached to the quiet and retirement of the
country, and spent the g reater part of his time at Brodick castle, a
beautiful and romantic residence in the island of Arran.
The king, however, whose attachment to him seems to h ave gained strength
by his absence, wrote to him repeatedly, and with his own hand, in the
most pressing terms, to return. All these flattering invitation s he for
some time resisted, until his father-in-law, the earl of Denbigh, ca me
expressly to Scotland with another earnest request from the king that he
would come up to London, and at the same time, offering him the
appointment of master of the horse, then vacant by the death of the duke
of Buckingham.
The Most Noble James Hamilton, 1st Duke of Hamilton (June 19, 1606 - Mar
ch 9, 1649), Scottish nobleman, son of James Hamilton, 2nd Marquess of Ham
ilton, and of the Lady Anne Cunningham, daughter of the Earl of Glencair
n, was born on 19 June 1606. He was the Great-Grandson of Catherine, the i
llegitemite daughter of King James IV.
As the descendant and representative of James Hamilton, 1st earl of Arra
n, he was the heir to the throne of Scotland after the descendants of Jam
es VI. He married in his fourteenth year May Feilding, aged seven, daught
er of Sir William Feilding, later 1st Earl of Denbigh, and was educat
ed at Exeter College, Oxford, where he matriculated on 14 December 1621.
He succeeded to his father's titles on the latter's death in 1625. In 16
28 he became master of the horse and was also appointed gentleman of the b
edchamber and a privy councillor.
In 1631 Hamilton took over a force of 6,000 men to assist Gustavus Adolph
us in the Thirty Years' War in Germany. He guarded the fortresses on the O
der while Gustavus fought Tilly at the Battle of Breitenfeld, and afterwar
ds occupied Magdeburg, but his army was destroyed by disease and starvatio
n, and after the complete failure of the expedition Hamilton returned to E
ngland in September 1634.
He now became Charles I's chief adviser in Scottish affairs. In May 163
8, after the outbreak of the revolt against the English Prayer-Book, he w
as appointed commission