Three Generations of Douglases

Well, okay, it's really four generations, but probably not all linked in direct order, oldest to youngest.

There is a set of three armorial stained glass windows in the Glasgow Cathedral which memorializes three generations of a branch of the Douglas family.

The center of the three windows bears the legend:

This window replaces the Munich glass

presented by the Countess of Home and

incorporates the coat of arms from

that window

The coats of arms in the three windows, going from left to right, are:

Archibald James Edward Douglas, 1st Baron Douglas (1748-1827), was a Scottish politician. He was MP for Forfarshire from 1782 to 1790 and Lord Lieutenant of Forfarshire from 1794 to 1827. In parliament he was a loyal follower of Henry Dundas and William Pitt, and hoped to be rewarded with a peerage. Although he would have preferred an earldom, he was created Baron Douglas, of Douglas in the County of Lanark, in 1790.

Lord Douglas married first (1771) Lady Lucy Graham (1751-1780), daughter of the 2nd Duke of Montrose, and secondly (1783) Lady Frances Scott (1750-1817), sister of the 3rd Duke of Buccleuch. He had nine children (five sons and four daughters, most of whom reached old age). Douglas died on 26 December 1827 at Bothwell Castle, Lanarkshire. He was buried in Douglas parish church in the same county.

He was succeeded by his sons Archibald (1773-1844) as 2nd Baron Douglas of Douglas, Charles (1775-1848) as 3rd Baron and Rev. James (1787-1857) as 4th Baron, on whose death, the Barony of Douglas of Douglas became extinct.

The arms of Douglas of Douglas on the dexter (left) side of the shield are blazoned: Quarterly: 1, Azure a lion rampant argent crowned with an imperial crown or (Galloway); 2, Or a lion rampant gules surmounted by a ribbon in bend sable (Abernathy); 3, Argent three piles gules (Wishart); 4, Or a fess checky azure and argent surmounted of a bend sable charged with three buckles of (Stewart of Bonkill); overall on an escutcheon Argent a heart gules crowned or on a chief azure three mullets argent (Douglas of that Ilk).

The paternal arms of his wife, Lucy Graham, are blazoned: Quarterly: 1 and 4, Or on a chief sable three escallops or (Graham); 2 and 3, Argent three roses gules (Montrose).

Of his four daughters, who all married, only one left issue, the Hon. Jane Margaret. She married Henry, Lord Montagu, second son of Henry, third Duke of Buccleuch. Lady Montagu succeeded as heiress to the Douglas estates in 1837.

The arms of Lord Montagu (with Douglas in pretense), include in the second quarter the Royal Arms of Charles II debruised by a baton sinister argent (James Crofts, Duke of Monmouth, was an illegitimate son of Charles II), Campbell in the fourth quarter, and in the third quarter, Or on a bend azure a mullet of six points between two crescents or (Scott).

The eldest of Lady Montagu's four daughters succeeded on her death, and married Cospatrick Alexander Home, 11th Earl of Home, who in 1875 was created a baron of the United Kingdom by the title of Lord Douglas of Douglas. Their eldest son, Charles Alexander Douglas Home was the 12th Earl of Home and Lord Douglas in 1888 edition of the Dictionary of National Biography and had possession of the Douglas estates at that time.

The Earl of Home's arms are: Quarterly: 1 and 4, Vert a lion rampant argent (Home); 2, Or an orle azure; 3, Argent three popinjays vert beaked and membered gules (Pepdie of Dunglas); with, of course, an inescutcheon of pretence for Montagu.

Three generations of Douglases, with increasingly complex heraldry as heiresses transmitted the Douglas arms to their children.

There are a number of photographs of memorials and effigies of members of the family, including an effigy of and a stained glass window with the arms of Lucy Elizabeth Montagu Douglas of Douglas, Countess of Home (1805-1877), on a webpage of St. Bride’s Church, Douglas, Lanarkshire, at http://www.douglashistory.co.uk/history/photogallery/stbrides_douglas/real_p.htm

Finally, in a window in another part of the Cathedral presented in 1958 by The Cameronians Regiment, and listing all of the regiment's engagements in World War II, we have this display of arms:

The quarters are all those familiar to us from Douglas of Douglas above, with the addition of a label of three tags vert. The coronet atop the shield is that of a Marquess. The supporters are a wild man proper and a stag rampant or. The crest (the same as one of the two used by the Earl of Home) is On a cap of maintenance proper a salamander vert encircled with flames of fire also proper and the motto, Jamais arriére (Never behind). Both crest and motto are associated with (no surprise here!) Douglas.

I have not, at this point, been able to determine the owner of these arms. As a peer, you'd think he'd appear (pun intended. Sorry!) in my Burke's Peerage of 1938, but he's not there under Douglas, nor Home, nor Buccleuch (this last I knew would be a stretch, but I looked anyway). But without knowing his title, I'd have to thumb through the 3,000+ pages of that book looking for this coat of arms, and I'm not ready to devote that much time to this hunt right now.

In any case, it's a great display of heraldry and deserves its place here with the other, older Douglas memorial glass.

Another Stained Glass Armorial Window

I have been frustratingly unable to find much information about the person who is memorialized in this next stained glass armorial window in the Glasgow Cathedral.

The text at the bottom of the window states that:

This window replaces the Munich

glass presented 1861 in memory of

James Tennant, Esq. of St. Rollox

I have, however, found nothing about this particular individual. I have found a fair bit about Charles Tennant of St. Rollox (1768-1838, and whose monument in the Glasgow Necropolis across the street from the Cathedral bears a statue of him sitting in a chair), and some about (one of) his son(s), John Tennant (1706-1878). James Tennant of St. Rollox, presumably a relative of Charles and John, however, remains elusive. (I think that the dates are not quite right for him to be the person to whom Robert Burns was writing in his "Epistle to James Tennant." That James, son of John Tennant, was the younger brother of Charles Tennant of St. Rollox noted earlier in this paragraph, and would have been roughly contemporary with him, making that James a little early for the 1861 date of the original window.)

I have also been unable to determine if Scottish actor David Tennant (Dr. Who, Hamlet, Richard II, Gracepoint, Broadchurch, and a whole lot of others) is a descendant or relative of James Tennant, Esq. of St. Rollox or Charles Tennant of St. Rollox or his son John Tennant.

(It turns out that he is not; a link forwarded to me by friend, and blog follower, Margaret Sainte Claire, notes that David Tennant is a stage name. He was born David McDonald.)

Be all that as it may, it's a nice coat of arms to be found in that window.

The blazon of the arms of Tennant of St. Rollox (matriculated 1856) is: Argent two crescents in fess sable on a chief gules a boar's head couped of the first. The crest is A sail proper. Though not appearing in the window, Fairbairn's Crests gives the motto as Dabit Deus vela (God will fill the sails).

Thank Goodness for Genealogical Data

For this next armorial window in the Glasgow Cathedral, I had to do a bit of genealogical research.

The window is dedicated to Ninian Hill of Lambhill, but a brief search on-line came up with three (or four!) different individuals by that name: one 1621-1685; another 1623-ca.1682 (who may be the same as the first one, since the dates are so close); a third ca.1660-1738; and finally, a fourth 1690-1711.

Fortunately, the window also mentioned the name of his wife, and that helped to narrow down the identification of which particular "Ninian Hill of Lambhill" the window was dedicated to.

The full inscription on the window reads:

This window replaces and earlier window

presented in 1865 by Thomas Hill, Esq.

of Merrylee in memory of Ninian Hill

of Lambhill and Mary Craufurd of

Jordanhill, his spouse, and incorporates

the coat of arms from that window.

By searching for the combination of Ninian Hill of Lambhill and Mary Craufurd, I was able to determine that the man memorialized here is Ninian Hill of Lambhill and Gairbraid, who was born about 1660 and died in 1738. He was the son of Ninian Hill of Lambhill and Jean, daughter of John Caldwell of that Ilk. He married Mary Craufurd, daughter of Hew Craufurd of Jordanhill. (The elder Ninian Hill had married first Margaret, daughter of Hew Craufurd of Cloberhill, though they had no issue. It is these two marriages by a Ninian Hill of Lambhill to daughters of two different Hew Craufurds, one of Cloberhill and one of Jordanhill, which has led to some conflating of Ninian Hill elder and younger by researchers.) Ninian Hill the younger was, like his father, a Burgess of Glasgow.

He and his wife Mary sold part of their property in Glasgow, specifically the lands of Ramshorn and Meadowflat, to the Burgh for “three Houss or Hospitalls” ("the Merchants, Trades, and Hutchesones Hospitalls") there in 1694.

The arms of Hill of Lambhill were matriculated in 1676 by Ninian Hill of Lambhill (the elder) and are blazoned Azure a hill or with the sun rising and appearing over the top thereof in his splendour [proper, or also or].

The arms as shown in the window are the arms of Hill of Merrylee, matriculated in 1865 (and so about the same time as the original window was donated), and so must be the arms of the donor of the window, Thomas Hill of Merrylee, whose arms are blazoned Azure a hill or with the sun rising and appearing over the top thereof in his splendour [proper, or also or] within a bordure ermine. The crest is The Bible expanded proper, and the motto is Veritas superabit montes (Truth shall cross mountains).

Armorial Windows to Three Dennistouns

Not as closely related as the husband and wife in the last post, here we have armorial stained glass memorials to Robert Dennistoun, to James Dennistoun of Dennistoun, and to Alexander Dennistoun of Golfhill. I have not done the research to see how they are related, but they must be at least cousins to a greater or lesser degree. Based on the arms shown in the windows, I must believe that James is from the senior line, and that Robert and Alexander are cadets of that senior line.)

Though the arms are all differenced, they each bear the crest blazoned in Fairbairn's Crests as: In a hand an antique shield sable charged with a mullet argent (all three windows, however, show the mullet as or), and the first two have the same motto (the third has no motto in the window at all): Adversa virtute repello (I repel adversity with fortitude) (which sounds to me more than a bit like a spell that might be cast in Harry Potter. But maybe that's just me).

The first window, memorializing Robert Dennistoun, bears the legend:

This window replaces an earlier window

presented by Anne Penelope Dennistoun 

in memory of her husband Robert

Dennistoun, Esq., and their children,

and incorporates the coat of

arms from that window.

Robert Dennistoun, merchant, was the son of James Dennistoun (d. 1796) , one of the leading American merchants, and during the latter part of his life resided in Glasgow, and his second wife, Mary Lyon. Robert married Anne Penelope Campbell, a daughter of Archibald Campbell of Jura, and they were the parents of James Robert Dennistoun ('Ruffy'; he got this nickname from his wearing a fringe or “ruff” of beard under his chin), and grandparents of Admiral Peel Dennistoun.

Robert was a partner in George & Robert Dennistoun & Co. of Glasgow until his death c. 1815. The firm of G & R Dennistoun is known to have been the mortgagees-in-possession of Wingfield and Belle Vue estates on St. Kitts in 1825. He was one of the prime movers behind the formation of the Glasgow West India Association in 1807.

Robert Dennistoun's arms are blazoned: Argent and bend sable between a unicorn's head erased gules horned or and a cross crosslet fitchy gules, on a canton argent a demi-lion azure.

His wife's paternal arms are blazoned: Quarterly: 1 and 4, Gyronny of eight sable and or [should be or and sable]; 2, Azure a boar's head couped or; 3, Argent a lymphad oars in action sable.

The second window, memorializing James Dennistoun, bears the legend:

This window replaces and earlier window

presented by Isabella K. Murray in

memory of her husband

James Dennistoun, Esq., of Dennistoun

died 13th Feb 1885, and incorporates the

coat of arms from that window.

I believe the current window has Mr. Dennistoun's date of death incorrect; all the records that I found on-line for him give a death date of 1855. I suspect that the date was worn in the original, and that the 5 became an 8 in error.

James Dennistoun of Dennistoun (1803-1855) was the son of James Dennistoun and Mary Ramsay Oswald. He received  his education at the universities of Edinburgh and Glasgow, and became a member of the Faculty of Advocates in 1824. Having traveled abroad in 1825-26, in 1836 he again went abroad, and spent twelve years away from home, chiefly devoting himself to literary research and art. The winter generally found him at Rome, while the summers were given to journeys in Italy and Germany. He formed a collection of early Italian pictures, drawings, and medieval antiquities, with which he adorned his house in George Street, Edinburgh, his permanent home from 1847.

He was a magistrate and deputy-lieutenant for the county of Renfrew, and became a member of most of the societies formed for collecting materials for illustrating the history of Scotland.

His wife was Isabella Katherine Murray (1808-1864) was the daughter of James Wolfe Murray of Cringletie, Lord Cringletie, and Isabella Katherine Strange.

A bust of James Dennistoun of Dennistoun found in the frontispiece of the 1909 reprint of his three-volume work Memoirs of the Dukes of Urbino. (A tip of the hat and a hearty "thank you!" to my good friend and fellow heraldry enthusiast Margaret Sainte Claire of Glasgow for bringing this to my attention. All three volumes as well as another work by Mr. Dennistoun can be found at https://archive.org)

James Dennistoun of Dennistoun's arms are blazoned: Argent a bend sable.

His wife's paternal arms are blazoned, I believe: Or a fetterlock and on a chief azure three mullets argent.

The third window memorializing Alexander Dennistoun of Golfhill, bears the legend:

This window replaces the Munich glass

presented 1861 in memory of Alexander

Dennistoun, Esq. of Golfhill and

incorporates the coat of arms from that window.

Alexander Dennistoun of Golfhill (1790-1874) married 1822 Eleanor Jane, daughter of John Thomson of Liverpool. He was educated at the University of Glasgow, and with his brother John, Jr. for many years took a leading interest in the business of the well-known firm of J. & A. Dennistoun (founded by their father in 1780). He was elected MP for Dumbarton in 1835, but only served one Parliament owing to ill health. In 1851 he commissioned this portrait of himself and his family:

The arms of Dennistoun of Golfhill were matriculated in 1865 and are blazoned: Per fess argent and ermine a bend sable between a unicorn's head erased and a cross crosslet fitchy gules.

Heraldic Windows of Another Campbell Husband and Wife

Continuing our tour of the heraldic stained glass in the Glasgow Cathedral, I ran across another married couple, in this case, Alexander Campbell of Hallyards and his wife, Barbara.

The first window (the one on the right as you are looking at them), bears the inscription:

"This window replaces an earlier window presented by the children of Alexander Campbell, Esq. of Hallyards in his memory and incorporates the coat of arms from that window."

The second window (on the left as you are looking at them, bears a similar inscription:

"This window replaces an earlier window presented by the children of Mrs. Barbara Campbell in her memory and incorporates the coat of arms from that window."

The blazon of the arms of Campbell of Hallyards given in Balfour Paul's An Ordinary of Arms is:

Quarterly: 1, Gyronny of eight or and sable; 2, Argent a broadsword in bend gules hilted sable; Argent a castle triple-towered sable; 4, Argent a ship in full sail proper in a sea undy vert; all within a bordure argent, and in the centre of the shield on an escutcheon Sable a boar's head erased or.

The arms were granted in 1814. The crest is A lion's head affronty proper and the motto: I bear in mind.

There is a portrait of him by Henry Raeburn.

Alexander Campbell of Hallyards, the son of John and Mary Campbell, came from Doune, the cradle of the family, hence the nickname Sandy Doune. Born in 1768, he was a man of great energy; the head of a large family, a captain of the Highland Sharpshooters, an ardent supporter of the Celtic Society and his business acumen (he was a partner in the West Indies trading company "John Campbell Snr & Co") earned him the additional nickname of Business Sandy. He died in 1817.

His wife was Barbara Campbell, daughter of Archibald Campbell of Jura and his wife Sarah. Barbara was born about 1774 in Jura.

A Pair of Armorial Stained Glass Windows

There is a really nice pair of windows in the Glasgow Cathedral; not a matched set, exactly, but a complementary pair.

The upper parts of the windows are filled with depictions of two saints: St. Andrew and St. James. (They are named in the windows, but it's certainly easy enough to tell who they are from their attributes: St. Andrew is carrying a cross of St. Andrew, or saltire; and St. James' cloak and hat are strewn with escallop shells, and he is carrying a pilgrim's staff. So who else could they be, really?)

The two windows bear a single inscription across their bases:

"This window dedicated to the glory of God and the memory of  / & the gift of Sir Archibald Campbell of Succoth A.D. 1940
the original donor is the work of Herbert Hendrie. /  It replaces glass provided Sir Archibald Islay Campbell A.D. 1861."

Sir Archibald Spencer Lindsey Campbell (1852-1941) was the 5th Baronet. His grandfather, Sir Archibald Islay Campbell (1825-1866) was the 3rd Baronet. The baronetcy was created September 17, 1808.

The windows also bear two coats of arms: the dexter (left) bears the arms of Sir Archibald Islay Campbell (Quarterly: 1 and 4, Gyronny of eight engrailed or and sable [Campbell]; 2 and 3, Azure a lion rampant argent within a bordure counter-compony argent and azure [Wallace of Ellerslie]):

and the sinister (right) bears the arms of Sir Archibald Islay Campbell marshalling those of his wife, Lady Agnes Grosvenor, the daughter of the Marquess of Westminster (Quarterly: 1 and 4, Azure a portcullis with chains pendent on a chief or on a pallet azure between two Tudor roses proper a cross flory between five martlets or [the arms of the city of Westminster granted as an augmentation]; 2 and 3, Azure a garb or [Grosvenor]):

Note that the mantling on each of the helmets bears a depiction of the arms.

The motto is Labore et perseverantia (With labor and perseverence, according to Fairbairn's Crests).

I'm an enthusiast of the arms of Campbell of Succoth because they have as a crest A camel's head couped proper. I first ran across these arms when doing research for my book Camels In Heraldry. I am currently - far too slowly for my own liking, but there's only so much time in the day and many other projects crying out to be done - working on a second edition with even more examples of camels in heraldry.

What a beautifully done pair of armorial windows!

An Impressive Brass Memorial With Lots of Heraldry

For this final armorial memorial brass in Glasgow Cathedral, we have this one which has what I think would have to be termed an "exuberant display of heraldry." (And not just the heraldry, but the trees from which the shields are hung, with leaves and flowers in abundance.)

It is a memorial to John Hamilton Gray, Clerk of Carntyne and Deputy Lieutenant of the County of Lanark, who died April 22, 1867, at the age of 66, and his wife, Elizabeth Caroline Johnstone, who died February 20, 1887, at the age of 86.

The upper part of the memorial contains two armorial panels:

The first (above), from the dexter (left) side of the memorial, is for John Hamilton Gray of Carntyne, showing his arms impaled with his wife's in the center, and surrounded by eight shields of what I assume are the arms of his great-grandparents. On his arms and on the third shield down on the dexter (left side) are the differenced arms of Hamilton. The second crest above his shield is also the well-known crest of Hamilton (an oak tree being cut through the trunk by a frame saw).

The arms of Gray of Carntyne were granted in 1819 and are blazoned: Gules a lion rampant between three cinquefoils all within a bordure engrailed argent.

(Well, the blazon in Balfour Paul's An Ordinary of Arms says "... three cinquefoils argent all within a bordure engrailed of the last," but the rule I try to follow is: "In blazoning a Coat of Arms in which two or more Charges of the same Tincture immediately follow each other in the Blazon, it is not necessary to mention the tincture until all the Charges of such Tincture have been specified." John E. Cussans, Handbook of Heraldry, 1882, p. 161.)

John Hamilton Gray of Carntyne (1800-1867) was born in Glasgow, the son of Robert Gray of Carntyne, merchant, and educated at (but did not graduate from) the University of Glasgow.  He graduated BA from Oxford in 1844. He became an advocate in 1825 and then vicar of Bolsover and Scarcliffe in Derbyshire in 1836. He was a noted antiquary.

There is a portrait of him when he was a boy by Sir Henry Raeburn, a photograph of which can be found on-line at http://www.theglasgowstory.com/image/?inum=TGSA03587

The second panel (above), from the sinister (right) side of the memorial, is for Elizabeth Caroline Johnstone, and has her arms impaling her husband's in the center.

She was an antiquarian and scholar in her own right, having translated Karl Ottfried Müller's book The History of Etruria, with an account of the manners and customs, arts, and literature of the Etruscans into English which was published in 1868 and, as the memorial notes, was the author of "'Sepulchres of Etruria' and other works".

The husband's (without the quartering) and wife's arms also appear at the top (impaled) and bottom (side by side) of a window in the Cathedral, in brilliant colors.

The legend at the base of the window notes: "This window replaces an earlier window to the memory of John Hamilton Gray of Carntyne and Caroline his wife, 1869, and incorporates the coat of arms from that window."

All in all, some wonderful memorials to this husband and wife, chock full of heraldry, and a great segue from the armorial brasses to the armorial windows which can be found in Glasgow Cathedral.

Small Brass Memorial to a Campbell

Okay, this is the next-to-last brass that I am going to inflict upon you before getting to some of the armorial stained glass in Glasgow Cathedral, I promise!

This particular brass, not terribly large, is dedicated:

Here lie the remains of

James Campbell of Newton Lodge

Died 16 Dec. A.D. 1830 Aged 60

James Campbell of Newton Lodge was a West India merchant and a brother of Alexander Campbell of Hallyards, with whom he purchased an interest in a sugar refinery in Glasgow, where they traded under the name of the Newark Sugar Refining Co. in 1814.

His wife was Sarah Jean (Forbes) Campbell, 3rd daughter of Dugald Forbes Esq., of Stirling.

The arms (not hatched) shown here are different that those granted in 1814 to Campbell of Hallyards (his nephew, perhaps?), but assuming the same tinctures as that later grant, would be blazoned as: Quarterly: 1 and 4, Gyronny of eight or and sable; 2, Argent a broadsword in bend gules hilted sable; 3, Argent a castle triple-towered sable.

The 1814 grant to Campbell of Hallyards had a ship in the fourth quarter, placed all the quarters within a bordure argent, and added in the center of the shield on an escutcheon sable a boar's head erased or.

There is also a memorial window to James Campbell of Newton Lodge to be found in the Cathedral.

The window bears the legend: "This window replaces an earlier window to the memory of James Campbell of Newton Lodge who died 15th Dec. 1830 and incorporates the coat of arms from that window."

We'll see some more Campbell arms, including some near and dear to my heart because they have a camel's head crest, Campbell of Succoth, when we get to reviewing the armorial stained glass in the cathedral. Soon, I promise!