John Stewart, Commendator of Coldingham (1531–1563) was a Scottish landowner.
He was a son of Elizabeth Carmichael (1514–1550) and James V of Scotland.
His mother later married John Somerville of Cambusnethan.James Somerville, Memorie of the Somervilles, vol. 1 (Edinburgh, 1815), pp. 385–9, has 'Katherine' Carmichael.
Career As a child, John Stewart was given the estates and incomes of Coldingham Priory, and was usually called the Prior or Commendator of Coldingham, or "Lord John". His father, James V, wrote to Cardinal Rodolfo Pio da Carpi, in July 1541 that John should be Prior of Coldingham in place of Adam Blackadder, who became Abbot of Dundrennan, and his son would be able to prevent Protestant doctrine spreading from the nearby border with England. In his letter, James V explained that the danger of the "new doctrines" spreading was great because of the "community of language", the Scots language being similar in some respects to English. At this time, John Stewart was around nine years old, as an adult, he sometimes resided at Coldingham.Denys Hay, Letters of James V (Edinburgh, 1954), pp. 358, 426-7.
In August 1548 Lord John Stewart and his half-brother Lord Robert sailed for France from Dumbarton with Mary, Queen of Scots. According to an English observer, Henry Johnes, their elder half brothers, Lord James Prior of St Andrews and James Stewart, Commendator of Kelso and Melrose refused to go.David Hay Fleming, Mary Queen of Scots (London, 1897), p. 197: Joseph Bain, Hamilton Papers, vol. 2 (Edinburgh, 1892), p. 618.
Regency of Mary of Guise In 1550, after the conclusion of the war known the Rough Wooing, he accompanied his step-mother Mary of Guise on a visit to the French court.Pamela Ritchie, Mary of Guise: A Political Career (Tuckwell: East Linton, 2002), p. 270. Stewart was in Paris in February 1551 and wrote to Mary of Guise. His letter concerns a property in France, the Abbey of Flavigny en Auxois, a gift to him from Henry II of France.Annie I. Cameron, Scottish Correspondence of Mary of Lorraine (Edinburgh, 1927), pp. 342-3.Pamela Ritchie, Mary of Guise in Scotland (Tuckwell: East Linton, 2002), pp. 82–3. In July 1553, his sister Lady Jean Stewart was contracted to marry Archibald Campbell, 5th Earl of Argyll.Jane Dawson, "The Earl of Argyll and Divorce", Julian Goodare & Alasdair A. Macdonald, Sixteenth-Century Scotland (Brill, 2008), p. 154. Her cash dowry of 5,000 merks was to be paid by Mary of Guise and her brothers, the Commendators of Kelso, Holyrood, and Coldingham.HMC 11th Report Part VI Hamilton (London, 1887), p. 54.
In April 1558 he wrote to Mary of Guise from Coldingham about a dispute amongst his tenants in Glasgow who were now threatened with legal action by Robert, Lord Sempill, as Sheriff of Renfrew. Stewart wanted Guise, who was now Regent of Scotland, to intervene in favour of his tenants.Annie I. Cameron, Scottish Correspondence of Mary of Lorraine (Edinburgh, 1927), pp. 414-5.
During the Reformation Crisis the English government sent a fleet of warships to Scotland, and subsequently, by the Treaty of Berwick, an army to assist the Protestants at the siege of Leith. In January 1560 John Stewart sighted the English fleet commanded by William Wynter off Dunbar sailing towards the Isle of May and sent a boat to investigate.Joseph Bain, Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 1 (Edinburgh, 1898), pp. 273, 295.
Mary, Queen of Scots' personal rule
Mary, Queen of Scots made him keeper of Dunbar Castle when she returned to Scotland in August 1561. The English diplomat Thomas Randolph wrote that Lord John was in the queen's favour in October 1561, for his "leaping and dancing", and would marry the Earl of Bothwell's sister, Jean Hepburn.Joseph Bain, Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 1 (Edinburgh, 1898), p. 563. She had previously been "handfasted" to another man, Robert Lauder younger of the Bass, on 24 July 1556, but the marriage was not completed.Bannatyne Miscellany, vol. 3 (Edinburgh, 1855), p. 279.
Lord John, his half-brother Lord Robert, the Marquis of Elbeuf and others performed in a tournament in December 1561 on the sands of Leith. There was "running at the ring", with two teams of six men, one team dressed as women, the other as exotic foreigners in strange masque garments.Clare Hunter, Embroidering Her Truth: Mary, Queen of Scots and the Language of Power (London: Sceptre, 2022), p. 156. Mary, Randolph, the French ambassador Paul de Foix, and Monsieur de Moret, envoy from the Duke of Savoy attended this entertainment. There had been a similar tournament at Amboise involving Mary's uncle Francis, the Grand Prior, dressed as a gypsy with a baby, and the Duke of Nemours as a townsman's wife with a bunch of keys, and in 1594 another event involving cross-dressing was staged at the baptism of Prince Henry at Stirling Castle.Joseph Bain, Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 1 (Edinburgh, 1898), pp. 576, 579: Joseph Robertson, Inventaires de la Royne Descosse (Edinburgh, 1863), p. lxxvii citing Brantôme: Michael Bath, Emblems in Scotland: Motifs and Meanings (Brill, 2018), pp. 93-6.
Lord Robert married Jean Kennedy, sister of the Earl of Cassilis on 13 December 1561, and was subsequently given the title Lord Darnley.William Smith Mitchell, A History of Scottish Bookbinding (Edinburgh, 1955), p. 49. Soon after this Lord John was involved in a disturbance in Edinburgh that started as a kind of masque in the town.Sarah Carpenter, 'Masking and politics: the Alison Craik incident, Edinburgh 1561', Renaissance Studies, 21:5 (November, 2007), pp. 625-636: Lesley Mickel, 'From Bourgeois Wife to Renaissance Monarch: the Royal Entertainments and Imperial Ambition of Mary Stuart (1561–1566)', Review of Scottish Culture, 27 (2015). He and the Earl of Bothwell and the Marquis of Elbeuf went to the house of Cuthbert Ramsay where Alison Craik, a merchant's daughter and mistress of the Earl of Arran was lodged, wearing masks.David Hay Fleming, Mary Queen of Scots (London, 1897), pp. 270-1 fn. 65. When they were not admitted they broke down the doors. There were complaints to the queen and she issued a reprimand. Bothwell and Lord John ignored this and the next day there was a face-off between their followers and the Hamiltons in the market place.Joseph Bain, Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 1 (Edinburgh, 1898), pp. 582-3.
Mary sent him to arrest the Earl of Huntly at Huntly Castle in October 1562. On the day William Kirkcaldy of Grange and the Tutor of Pitcur arrived first and surrounded the house. While Kirkcaldy was talking to the porter, the castle watchman on the tower spotted Coldingham and the Master of Lindsay and their troops a mile off. He alerted the Earl, who hopped over a low wall at the back of the castle and found a horse before Pitcur could stop him. Elizabeth Keith, Countess of Huntly then welcomed the queen's men in and gave them a meal and showed them around the place.Joseph Bain, Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 1 (Edinburgh, 1898), pp. 657-8.William Forbes-Leith, Narratives of Scottish Catholics under Mary Stuart and James VI (London: Baker, 1889), pp. 87–88.
He entertained Mary at Dunbar Castle on 30 December 1562.Joseph Bain, Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 1 (Edinburgh, 1898), pp. 674. John Stewart and John Erskine of Dun advised Queen Mary not to bring charges against for speaking in public about her marriage plans after an audience at Holyrood Palace.Jane Dawson, John Knox (Yale, 2016), p. 237. On 4 June 1563, Mary gave some of John Gordon's properties near Banff to "John Stewart, Lord Darnley", at this time the Darnley title was used by John Stewart, Commendator of Coldingham.John Maitland Thomson, Register of the Great Seal of Scotland, 4 (Edinburgh, 1886), p. 333 no. 1468.
He died at Inverness in November 1563.Thomas Thomson, History of the Kirk of Scotland by David Calderwood, 2 (Edinburgh: Wodrow Society, 1842), p. 229.
John Knox told a story about his last words. Someone told Mary, Queen of Scots that Stewart's deathbed wish was that she would become a Protestant. Mary declared without hesitation that this version of Coldingham's speech was a lie invented by the treasurer John Wishart of Pitarrow and her brother Moray's secretary John Wood.David Laing, Works of John Knox, vol. 2 (Edinburgh, 1848), pp. 392–3.
Marriage and children He married Jean Hepburn, daughter of Patrick Hepburn, 3rd Earl of Bothwell. The wedding was celebrated at Crichton Castle on 3 January 1562. Mary, Queen of Scots and James Stewart, Earl of Moray (a half-brother to both Mary and John) attended. The English diplomat Thomas Randolph, who was not invited, heard there was 'much good sport and pastimes.'Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 1, (Edinburgh, 1898), p. 590. Robert Lindsay of Pitscottie said the entertainments lasted four days.Aeneas James George Mackay, Chroniclis of Scotland, vol. 2 (Edinburgh, 1899), p. 173. Their children included: Francis Stewart, who became Earl of Bothwell Christine Stewart, who was appointed to rock the cradle of Prince James in March 1568.HMC Mar & Kellie, vol. 1 (London, 1904), p. 18. Regent Moray and Regent Morton bought her clothes.Charles Thorpe McInnes, Accounts of the Treasurer of Scotland: 1566-1574, vol. 12 (Edinburgh, 1970), pp. 112, 357. Marjorie or Margaret Stewart, who was also in the king's household at Stirling before August 1570.Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 3 (Edinburgh, 1902), p. 314 no. 416. She married (1) William Sinclair of Underhoull, Unst, a son of Olave Sinclair, (2) William Bruce of Symbister, a relation of Laurence Bruce of Cultmalindie.Gilbert Goudie, 'Some Forgotten Incidents and Personages of Shetland', Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries, 25 (1890), pp. 50-52.
John Stewart also had a son Hercules Stewart by an unknown mother.
After the death of the Commendator, Jean Hepburn married John, Master of Caithness. In 1567, she was said to be in the favour of Mary, Queen of Scots, instead of Margaret, Lady Rires.P. F. Tytler, History of Scotland, 7 (Edinburgh, 1842), p. 375.
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