More Roberton Family History (7)

While looking for the author of The Robertons – A Noted Lanarkshire Family which appears in three previous posts (originally printed in the Hamilton Advertiser on August 7^th, 1943), a librarian at the South Lanarkshire Leisure and Culture Center also found another piece on Roberton history, again from the Hamilton Advertiser, but published in July 1874. Entitled Earnock and its Early Proprietors, it is another lengthy writing that I will present in a number of postings.

Earnock and its Early Proprietors (continued)

(from the Hamilton Advertiser, July 1874)

The Robertouns (cont.)

The amorial bearings of the Robertouns of Earnock were quarterly – 1^st and 4^th, gules, a close helmet, argent; 2^nd and 3^rd, a cross crosslet, fitchee, gules; crest, an anchor, proper. Motto – “For Security.”  These arms, quartered with the three cinquefoils of the Hamiltons of Neilsland, of which family Captain Gilchrist was the representative, are sculptured on a stone above the front door of the office-houses of Eddlewood, now occupied as a farmstead by Mr. James Marshall.  The coat is considerably defaced, and the motto illegible; but the name of the Captain’s lady, “ANNA ROBERTOUN,” above the arms, is distinct and legible.

We subjoin a few particulars regarding some of the minor branches of the family, and, first, of Archibald of Stainhall, third son of John Robertoun, ninth laird of Earnock, and his wife, Margaret, daughter of James Hamilton of Torrance. In 1595, a remission was granted “To Sir Jno. Hamilton of Letterick, knight, and to several of his servants, to Quintin Hamilton of Auchingraymount , Archibald Robertoun of Stainhall, and Jno. Dalzell, for burning part of the house of Jno. Hamilton, tailor in Hamilton, in the month of April last; and also for the slaughter of the late Patrick Hamilton, brother of laird of Preston, and the late Mr. Gavin Hamilton, Provost of Hamilton, at the same time.”

Patrick Hamilton, one of the individuals for whose slaughter this remission was granted, was the youngest son of Sir David Hamilton of Rossaven and Preston, and captain of the island of Arran.  “His career of violence and oppression,” says Anderson, “has been hardly equalled even in the fictions of romance.  Outlawed for the slaughter of James Inglis, tutor of Murdieston, and of David Stewart of Bute, he tooks refuge in the Isle of Arran in 1582.  He was again denounced for carrying off and retaining in captivity Thomas Inglis, the young laird of Murdieston, his brother’s ward (1594), and soon after met a tardy retribution of his crimes, being slain in an encounter by Sir Jno. Hamilton of Letterick, in the town of Hamilton, 2^nd April 1595.”

Archibald Robertoun married Elizabeth, daughter of Robert Ballie of Jervieston, by whom he had James, founder of the House of Bedlay, in the parish of Cadder. He had also several daughters, one of whom, Margaret, was married to John Rae, also a professor in Glasgow College, and had issue.