King James I and II (1406 – 1460)
Fall of the Douglas family (1455)
The Reformation
Scotland Reformed?
The “Rough Wooing”
The petted princess
Surrounded by enemies
Bothwell’s continuing influence
Alone and defenceless
“Nothing against her honour”
Elizabeth’s prisoner
The Stuarts
King James I and II (1406 – 1460)
At the age of 12, James I became king in 1406, while a prisoner in the Tower
of London. He returned to Scotland in 1424 as “an angry man in a hurry”
and was murdered in Perth at the age of 43. He was succeeded by James II (1437
– 1460).
James II was called “Fiery Face” because of a birthmark on his face.
He became king at six years of age. During his reign the Black Douglas family
was crushed. The fall of this well-known and respected family was both surprising
and spectacular.
Fall of the Douglas family (1455)
Scottish kings had rewarded the Douglas family for their loyalty, by helping
them to increase their power. Then in two spectacularly bloody incidents, they
cut the family down because it had become so powerful that it was a danger to
the crown.
In 1440 the sixteen-year-old sixth Earl of Douglas and his younger brother were
invited to dinner in Edinburgh Castle. At the end of the meal, a black bull’s
head was placed on the table which was the signal for the murder of the two
Douglas boys.
After the “Black Dinner” their territories were divided between
their uncle and sister. Unfortunately for the crown, the sister then married
her uncle’s son. This reunited all the Douglas lands and created, once
again, the problem of having one subject with too much land and power.
James II invited the Douglas Clan leader to meet him at Stirling where, after
an argument, the king stabbed him and then had him killed. The Douglas family
then started a civil war in which they were defeated and destroyed.
The Reformation
Scotland Reformed?
Religion was important to Scots in the 16th century and became inseparable from
politics. Socially, the church was crucial to everyday life. It was responsible
for education, health, welfare and discipline. On an individual level the church
was the vehicle for expressing inner spirituality. Changes to its forms of worship
could affect the believers’ chances for salvation.
The Reformation split the Church into Catholic and Protestant factions, creating
two roads to salvation. When Lutheran books started to appear in Scotland many
Scots accepted the message. After Henry VIII’s dissociation from the Pope
(1530s), the Scottish king James V also switched to Protestantism. He had a
Catholic daughter called Mary who, during her passionate and turbulent life,
would be in the focus of attention during the following years.
The “Rough Wooing”
Both France and England pursued the opportunity to commandeer the Scottish throne
by marrying the young queen. England was Protestant, France was Catholic. In
their bitter power struggle over Scotland the issue of Scotland’s faith
became not merely a question of religious denomination but one of international
power politics.
The “Rough” Wooing” as it came to be called, saw England attempt
to gain Mary’s hand through repeated invasions and the defeat of the Scots
Army at the battle of Pinkie. In return, France supplied the Scots with troops
and the firepower to resist Henry’s advances. Both sides spent a fortune
on this rough wooing of the Scots. It is thought that Henry VIII spent the fortune
he had gained from the dissolution of England’s monasteries on the campaigns,
all to no avail. In the end French triumphed.
The petted princess
Mary left Scotland when she was just five to be betrothed to the four-year-old
Dauphin, Francis. She was already Queen of Scotland because her father, James
V, had died when she was six days old, leaving her French Catholic mother, Mary
of Guise, acting as Regent. She eventually married Francis when she was 15 years
old. A year later, following his father’s death, Francis became King of
France and she his Queen. But a year after that, Francis died of a brain tumour
and his young widow had no option but to return to Scotland.
Her rule began in August 1561; she was just 18 and already widowed, a petted
princess of the French court who knew nothing of her native country. She spoke
mostly French and was fond of typical courtly pursuits like dancing, music and
embroidery. She was also an expert rider, courageous, spirited and headstron
used to getting her own way. But she knew little of the affairs of state and
had neither temperament nor training for rule.
Surrounded by enemies
Mary’s greatest handicap, however, was her religion: she was a Catholic
in a country that was officially Protestant. The leading Protestant lord was
Mary’s half-brother, the Earl of Moray who had deposed her mother in 1559.
Moray was the bastard son of James V and could never be King of Scotland. Instead
he became regent and Scotland became Protestant. So when Mary arrived, she was
surrounded by enemies, not least John Knox, the fiery Protestant preacher, who
made regular attacks on her from the pulpit, calling her a Jezebel and a heretic,
and denouncing her loose French ways. Yet, for the first two years of her personal
rule, things went rather well because Mary was young and inexperienced and followed
the advice of the Protestant Lords.
One of Mary’s closest advisors at this time was the Earl of Bothwell,
a tough, handsome border lord who was five years her senior. Bothwell was officially
Protestant in order to get ahead. On the other hand he had stayed loyal to Mary’s
mother during the Rebellion of 1559 and he now served Mary with the same devotion.
He was, first and foremost, a nationalist who wanted a strong and independent
Scotland. His chief aim was to prevent an alliance with England – Protestant
England – because he regarded it as the first step to political union.
Historians have tended to assume that Bothwell did not exert any significant
influence on Mary until 1565. But the recent discovery of secret reports from
Thomas Randolph indicates much earlier intimacy. Later he fled to France, at
which point Moray persuaded Mary to put down a supposed rebellion by Bothwell’s
friend, Earl of Huntly, in the Northwest of Scotland.
Bothwell’s continuing influence
Why did she do it? Because she was determined to succeed Elizabeth I as Queen
of England. She was a legitimate great-granddaughter of Henry VII, which Elizabeth,
as the daughter of Anne Boleyn, was not. Moray had promised her that if she
crushed the Huntly rebellion Elizabeth would look favourable on her claim –
and she believed him. But even with Huntly dead Elizabeth refused to see her.
Mary had trusted her older half-brother, but he had simply used her to destroy
a personal enemy and, in the process, further the Protestant cause. It was a
turning point; Mary no longer trusted Moray and the Protestant lords and now
turned, or returned, to the Catholic leaders.
Mary chose Henry, Lord Darnley, as her new husband. Like her he was a great-grandchild
of Henry VII with a Scottish father, Earl of Lennox, and an English mother who
was also a leading Catholic. By marrying Darnley, Mary hoped to strengthen the
Catholic cause and enhance her claim to the English throne.
The wedding took place at the Chapel Royal at Holyrood on 29 July 1565, Mary
wearing black, as befitted a widow. Moray and some of the Protestant lords rebelled
in protest, but were eventually driven into England by royal troops led by the
Earls of Lennox and Bothwell, the latter having been recalled from France for
the occasion. Bothwell was now at the height of his powers, a leading member
of Mary’s new – and largely Catholic – council. The only fly
in the ointment was Darnley. He spent little time with the Queen and even less
on the affairs of state, preferring to hunt, hawk, drink and keep low company.
Gradually the Queen fell out of love. But Darnley had done one thing right:
Mary was pregnant.
Alone and defenceless
The remaining Protestant lords saw Darnley as the weak link. They told him that
Mary’s Italian secretary, a former musician named David Rizzio, had too
much influence at court. And why? Because he was supposedly Mary’s lover.
The jealous and gullible Darnley believed them, and agreed to take part in Rizzio’s
murder. He also agreed to uphold the Protestant religion, and to support the
return from exile of the other Protestant lords. There has never been any evidence
that Mary was having an affair with Rizzio.
Nevertheless, on 9 March 1566, Mary was having a small supper party in her private
apartments, with Rizzio and five other friends, when Darnley and a group of
Protestant nobles burst in. They dragged Rizzio from the table and into the
next room – where they stabbed him 56 times. Bothwell had also been a
target, but he managed to climb out of the window and escaped to Dunbar. Alone
and defenceless, Mary decided that her only hope was Darnley. Two nights after
the murder she went to his room and convinced him that the Protestant lords
were using him. Soon he was begging her forgiveness and together they escaped
to Dunbar, where Bothwell was gathering an army. They returned to Edinburgh
with the army and forced the murderers to flee.
But Mary never really recovered. She spent days in her chamber weeping, close
to nervous collapse. “I could wish to be dead”, she repeated again
and again. She could never forgive Darnley. The only person she now trusted
was Bothwell. On 19 June 1566 Mary gave birth to Prince James (later King James
VI of Scotland and I of England). Darnley was now expendable and everybody wanted
to see the back of him: Mary hated him, the Protestant lords had been betrayed
by him and Bothwell wanted to replace him as king. To further his end, Bothwell
persuaded Mary to bring back Moray and the exiled Protestants.
“Nothing against her honour”
In November 1566, Bothwell met with nobles from all factions at Craigmillar
Castle to discuss the Darnley problem. They came up with two opinions: divorce
or assassination. But when Mary was consulted she ruled out divorce because
it would make her son illegitimate. As for “other means”, she said
that she wanted “nothing against her honour”. The nobles saw this
as carte blanche and, having left Mary’s room, signed a bond to murder
Darnley.
But was Mary in the plot as well? It seems likely because, in January 1567,
she joined Darnley in Glasgow and was, as she told his father, “using
herself as a most natural and loving wife”. And yet it was from Glasgow
that she sent her famous love letters – known as the Casket Letters –
to Bothwell while her husband was just yards away in the next room. “Cursed
be this proxy fellow that troubled me this much”, she wrote. “He
will come unless I promise to be with him at bed and board and forsake him no
more. And upon my word he will do whatsoever I will and he will come.”
Mary was as good as her words. On 1 February 1867 she brought Darnley from the
safety of Glasgow to the dangers of Edinburgh. He was taken to Kirk o’Field,
a house near the city wall, because he was sick and, Mary said, needed a quiet
place to convalesce. Mary promised to stay and look after him but on the night
of the murder, 9 February, she was at Holyrood attending the wedding masque
of a loyal servant. A coincidence? Possibly, but a convenient one. As it happened,
Darnley survived the explosion but was strangled and stabbed to death as he
tried to escape.
Virtually everyone was involved in the plot to murder Darnley but only Bothwell
and Mary were blamed. Within days, scurrilous placards appeared in Edinburgh,
depicting Mary as a whore and accusing her and Bothwell of the crime. They had
been set up by Moray and the Protestant lords. In desperation, Bothwell abducted
Mary and took her captive to Dunbar Castle where he raped her before forcing
her to agree to marry him. Later it came to light that Mary had been made pregnant
during the rape. Or could she have been complicit in the whole thing? Possibly.
Even her defenders find it hard to believe she knew nothing of the plan to abduct
her.
Elizabeth’s prisoner
On 15 May 1567, Mary and Bothwell were married at Holyrood according to the
Protestant rites. Mary was either so desperate – or so madly in love with
Bothwell – that she now appeared to give up even her Catholicism for him.
Exactly a month later, the showdown between Mary and the Protestant lords took
place at Carberry Hill near Edinburgh. But there was no actual fight because
Mary’s troops gradually melted away.
Mary agreed to give herself up on condition that Bothwell was given safe passage
into exile. In a final act of defiance they kissed in full view of both sides.
Then Bothwell galloped off and spent the next month trying to raise more troops;
so maybe he loved Mary after all.
But it was to no avail. Two days after Carberry, Mary was imprisoned on the
Isle of Lochleven where she later miscarried Bothwell’s twins. The young
Queen with the golden future was just 24, and her life was effectively over.
Her half-brother Moray became Regent. Bothwell fled, but was caught and imprisoned
in Protestant Denmark. He died there ten years later, some say insane. For Mary
there began 19 years of captivity, first in Scotland, then in England, ending
at the scaffold where she was beheaded in 1587, becoming a Scottish martyr.
Mary’s son James VI of Scotland refrained from taking revenge on Elizabeth
for his mother’s death. The reason was that there was no successor to
the throne in England and a forthcoming unification of the British and Scottish
crown after Elizabeth’s death was in the air. So James had a chance to
reign over both Scotland and England one day.