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DIRLETON, LORD,
a title of the earl of Kellie, first conferred in 1603, on Sir Thomas
Erskine, who gave James the Sixth important personal assistance in the
Gowrie conspiracy, and now possessed by the earl of Mar and Kellie; see
KELLIE, earl of.
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DIRLETON, EARL OF,
a title in the peerage of Scotland, which, with the secondary title of
Lord Elbottle, was conferred in 1646 on Sir James Maxwell, one of the
gentlemen of the bedchamber to King James the Sixth and Charles the First.
He was the son of John Maxwell of Kirkhouse by Jane Murray, sister of John
first earl of Annandale, and appears to have purchased the estate of
Dirleton from the earl of Kellie, obtaining a royal charter of the same in
June 1631. In 1633 he had parliamentary ratification of the barony of
Innerwick to himself and Elizabeth Boussoyne his wife, and along with John
Cunningham of Barns had a pension for keeping a light on the Isle of May.
He died before 1658, without male issue, when his titles became extinct.
He had two daughters, Elizabeth, duchess of Hamilton, afterwards the wife
of Thomas Dalmahoy, Esq., and Diana, Viscountess Cranburn, mother of the
third earl of Salisbury. |
