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The name Scott is first
definitely recorded in the Borders in 1116 when a member of the clan was
living at Kirkurd in Peeblesshire. It is probable that his forebears
originally came from Galloway, the first known base of the Scott clan.
At the end of the thirteenth century Richard le Scot, holding land near
Lanark and in Selkirkshire, signed the Ragman Roll along with other
land-owners. The family continued to hold land in both areas until about
1440 when Sir Walter Scott, who had already been granted Eckford Mains
(for capturing the reiver Gilbert of Rutherford) and who had acquired
part of Branxholm, near Hawick, exchanged his Lanarkshire property for
the rest of Branxholm with a laird who preferred to be further away from
England. With the extra land went added military strength, and Scott
then began raiding the English Borders.
His son and successor,
Sir David Scott of Buccleuch, was the first of the family to sit in the
Scots Parliament (1481 and 1487); he outlived his son and was succeeded
by his grandson, who only lived on to 1504. The next Laird of Buccleuch,
"Wicked Wat", was imprisoned twice in Edinburgh and fought at
Flodden, Ancrum Moor and Pinkie, but survived all these battles only to
die in Edinburgh High Street, slain by the Kers of Cessford in 1552. He
again was succeeded by his grandson, Sir Walter Scott, whose son (also
Sir Walter Scott) was the "Bold Buccleuch", the last of the
great Border reivers. Buccleuch led the rescue of Kinmoni Willie from
Carlisle Castle in 1598; he was later held by the English following on
two more raids, and was brought before Elizabeth Tudor. In reply to her
question "how he dared to undertake an enterprise so desperate and
presumptuous" he said "What is there that a man dare not
do?" This increased her respect for the Scottish nation and may
have confirmed her in her resolve to name James VI as her successor.
Buccleuch was created a peer as Lord Scott of Buccleuch in 1606, and
died five years later. His son was promoted to Earl of Buccleuch in
1619, served in Holland and died in London on his way home in 1633.
The second Earl was
succeeded by two daughters as Countesses in their own right: the elder,
Mary, was married to her kinsman Walter Scott of Highchesters when she
was eleven and he was only fourteen, he being created a peer for life
only, with the title of Earl of Tarras, to make him of equal rank with
his wife. Two years later, she died without producing a child. Her
sister Anne succeeded as the next Countess in her own right, and married
the Duke of Monmouth, son of Charles II by Lucy Walters, who had taken
the surname of Scott shortly before. She was then promoted to Duchess of
Buccleuch in her own right, an important step because it enabled the
Buccleuch dukedom to survive when Monmouth himself was attainted and
beheaded for rebellion in 1685. The present Duke of Buccleuch is
descended from them. He succeeded his father in 1973, having previously
been an MP for Edinburgh North (as Earl of Dalkeith) for 13 years, and
served in the RNVR and RNR from 1942 to 1971, rising from Ordinary
Seaman to Lieutenant Commander. He is also a Captain in the Royal
Company of Archers, Lord Lieutenant of Roxburgh, Ettrick &
Lauderdale, and President, past President or Chairman, Honorary
President of many benevolent organisations (e.g. the Malcolm Sargent
Cancer Fund for Children in Scotland, the Royal Blind Asylum and School,
the Animal Diseases Research Association and the Royal Association for
Disability and Rehabilitation. He has also been President of the Royal
Highland and Agricultural Society for Scotland; his other activities are
too numerous and varied to be mentioned here. He was created a Knight of
the Thistle in 1978.
Mary’s husband Walter
Scott later married Helen Hepburne of Humbie, and continued the line of
Scott of Harden. Historically they are descended from another grandson
of Richard le Scot, though of course there has been considerable
intermarriage between the Scotts of Buccleuch and all the leading Border
families. One of the best-known members of this branch was "Auld
Wat of Harden", thus known because he lived to be eighty, who
accompanied his kinsman Buccleuch in the rescue of Kinmont Willie. Sir
William Scott of Harden, his son, is remembered for his forced marriage
to "Muckle Mou’ Meg" (in reality Agnes, not Margaret),
daughter of the Laird of Elibank. This young lady was difficult to marry
off, due to her unprepossessing appearance; she was offered to William
as an alternative to the gallows, after he had been caught raiding her
father’s sheep. He accepted, after some hesitation. mainly (it is
said), because she was kind to him while he awaited execution in her
father’s dungeon or "pit". Sir Walter Scott was of the fifth
generation in descent from them; in addition to contributing some of
Scotland’s finest literature, he was responsible for maintaining our
national consciousness at a time when it could easily have gone under,
and for saving our distinctive banknotes from extinction.
The present head of the
Scotts of Harden is Lord Polwarth, who succeeded his grandfather in
1944. He is Vice Lord-Lieutenant of Roxburgh, Ettrick and Lauderdale and
a member of the Royal Company of Archers, served in World War II as a
Captain in the Lothians and Border Yeomanry, qualified as a Chartered
Accountant and was for some years Governor of the Bank of Scotland as
well as Chairman (and later President) of the Scottish Council for
Development and Industry. He was a Minister of State at the Scottish
Office in 1972-74 and Chairman of the Scottish National Orchestra
Society in 1975-79, and became Chancellor of Aberdeen University in
1966.
The family which bears
the country’s name, and which contributed one of its greatest writers,
also included one and possibly two remarkable medieval
philosopher-scientists, Michael Scot (1175-1234) and Duns Scotus
(1265-1308). Michael Scot was a noted mathematician and reputed
magician; he learnt Arabic and perhaps also Hebrew in Spain, and
translated some of Aristotle’s works into Latin. thus making them
accessible to Western Europe as a whole.
Duns Scotus has left his
name, and that of the small town whence he came, to all the
"dunces" in the world; but this is because he was too subtle
for most students and even professors to understand, so that another
school of thought prevailed. Any serious explanation of his philosophy
and writings would be far beyond the scope of this booklet.
The original homes of
nearly all the great Border families have long since been obliterated,
or have fallen into total disrepair. Caerlaverock is a ruin; Hume Tower
is a hollow shell; nothing remains of Buccleuch except part of a
doorway. But a descendant of the Maxwells lives at Traquair, Scotland’s
oldest inhabited house, where he brews Scotland’s strongest beer. Hume
Tower has been replaced by The Hirsel; looking at what remains of it one
wonders how so powerful a family could have operated from such a small
fortress. Buccleuch was replaced by Branxholm, razed by Sussex in or
about 1674, then rebuilt and later added to or restored; it is still
inhabited, but the Duke of Buccleuch now lives at Drumlanrig Castle in
Dumfriesshire and at Bowhill near Selkirk (which narrowly escaped the
fate of many old Border houses when a supersonic warplane, piloted by a
South American trainee, crashed and burst into flames in the grounds).
The present house of Harden, built in the early 17th century, to replace
Auld Wat’s peel tower, and incorporating part of it, is still the home
of the head of the Scotts of Harden, Lord Polwarth. |
