One of the earliest genealogical fairy tales was repeated by John Eaton Reid in 1864, who made the grandiose claim that ‘The Scotch Hamiltons are descended from the Hamiltons of Leicestershire, a branch from the stock of the illustrious Earls of Leicester’ (1).

Mr Reid at least spared the reader the more poetic fabrications of this period: ‘This illustrious family is said to be descended from Sir William de Hamilton, one of the sons of William de Bellomont, 3d Earl of Leicester. Sir William’s son, Sir Gilbert Hamilton, having spoken in admiration of Robert the Bruce, at the court of Edward I. received a blow from John de Spencer, who conceived the discourse was derogatory to his master. This led, on the following day, to an encounter in which Spencer fell, and Hamilton fled for safety to Scotland in 1323. Having been closely pursued in his flight, Hamilton and his servant changed clothes with two woodcutters, and, taking the saws of the workmen, they were in the act of cutting an oak-tree when his pursuers passed. Perceiving his servant to notice them, Sir Gilbert cried out to him ‘Through!’ which word, with the oak and saw through it, he took for his crest in remembrance and commemoration of his escape. He afterwards became a favourite with Robert Bruce, and from an old manuscript it appears that he was one of seven knights who ‘kept the king’s person’ in the field of Bannockburn, and afterwards continued with him till his death, and attended his burial at Dunfermline. Sir Walter de Hamilton, the son of Sir Gilbert, acquired the lands of Cadzow, in the sheriffdom of Lanark, and others; and from him was descended, in the fifth degree, Sir James Hamilton of Cadzow, who was the first peer of the family’ (2).

I only repeat such an account as to demonstrate the absolute depths of the historical fantasy attached to the Hamilton name. It is an Hans Anderson version of history, of a type that when nothing is known the gap is filled with grandiose stories attributed to such worthies as ‘Mr. It Is Said’.

The last account at least as one saving grace, as it does not attempt to plot a defined path of exact ancestry from a proposed ancestor; fictions that were commonly composed and unquestioningly copied. Another example of a more honest approach was given by John D’Alton in 1838: ‘In 1474 Sir James Hamilton, Lord Hamilton of Cadzow, (was) a lineal descendant of William de Hamilton who first assumed the name’. Such vague terms as ‘lineal descendant’ freed the writer from scrutiny by proof. Where such proof was lacking a more prestigious colleague of ‘Mr. It Is Said’ was wheeled out as a source of authority for what was claimed, who was usually called ‘Mr. Antiquary Of No Little Fame’, who had access to ‘writs in my hand’ (completely unknown to history).

A such acquainted ‘genealogical astrologist’ was Egerton Brydges, who shamelessly proclaimed about Gilbert (the real ancestor of the ducal Hamiltons): ‘My former author further informs me that he was matched with a lady of the family of the Randolphs, raised in that reign to the honour of Earl of Murray, by whom he had two sons, Sir Walter his successor, and Sir John Hamilton of Rossaven, Knight, of whom sprung the family of Prestoun and its branches’. Not content with this single piece of pedigree-making, Mr. Brydges informs us that the ancestry of many families named Hamilton can be traced to the patriarch Gilbert, naming as sons of John Hamilton, ‘James his successor, David, who first founded the family of Dalserf … of whom the Hamiltons of Blackburn, Allarshaw, Ladyland, Green, and others derive themselves. Thomas, of whom descended the house of Raploch, out of which issued the Hamiltons of Torrence, Stanhouse, Woodhall, Aikenhead, Dechmont, and Barns. It is as if being informed of a common ancestry of the Tribes of Israel; writ large in stone, and not to be disputed. (3).

Therein lay another example of creative thinking. The term ‘of whom sprung the family’ was used continuously by writers who vied with each other to compose an ancestry of the Hamiltons, which strung together a number of people of that name into a cohesive arrangement, designed to show a distinct lineal descent from Gilbert. It mattered little if the genealogical beads in these strings were only known to ‘Mr. It Is Said’ and his friends.

Striking examples of making a statement without proof were given by George Robinson in 1820, who repeated the compositions of ‘Douglas and Wood, in their respective Peerages’, who claimed that ‘Walter, the second son of David Hamilton of Cadzow’ was the ancestor of the Hamiltons of Camskeith and of the ‘Hamilton of Grange in Ayrshire’. Mr. Robinson bravely put such ‘historical’ claims into perspective: ‘The first notice that has come under my own observation of the Hamiltons of Camskeith is in the Scots Acts of Parliament, lately published, vol. II. p. 428,434, and 438, where John Hamilton of Camskeith appears as one of the curators of James Hamilton of Fynart. This was in 1542. From this personage the line of succession can be traced downwards with some degree of certainty. Let him therefore be stated as the first in this deduction, without tracing them individually farther back’ (4).

This last sentence should be the benchmark of Hamilton enquiry. It is certainly recorded that David, son of Walter bore three cinquefoils pierced; on the shield surrounded by tracery, ‘sigill. David Filii Walter’ — appended to Act of the Parliament of Scotland settling the Succession to the Crown, 1371, and that Walter FitzGilbert, in 1296, as a Lanarkshire proprietor, swore fealty to Edward I. Little else of these early times is as safe.

In creating direct lines of descent to ‘Hamilton Princes’, any number of present day Hamiltons claim descent from Gilbert, wherehas in the majority of cases it is just a case of ‘the name is the same’.

An article in the The Herald and Genealogist, 1867, expressed similar sentiments:

ORIGIN AND DESCENT OF THE HAMILTONS.

The Pedigree of the Hamilton Family. By Audi Alteram Partem. London, S. A. Mowels, 142, Sloane Street, S.W. 1867. Sm. 8to. pp. 32.

‘The writer of this brief but very pretentious essay has deemed it necessary to enlist in his support a subscription which includes the names of an Earl, two Viscounts, a Baron, a Right Honourable, and several Baronets and M.P.’s of the name of Hamilton; but it will be readily shown that he is quite unworthy of their confidence.

Though called in the Preface an “Examination” of the Hamilton Pedigree, the work is little more than a reproduction of the ancient and exploded legends handed down by Crawford and Douglas, with some other “authorities,” the value of which will be seen as we proceed. The author assigns as his reason for his self-imposed task the perusal by him of an article on the Hamilton-Douglases which appeared in the Spectator of October 1864.

At pp. 8 and 9 he proceeds to demolish the Spectator (itself not deeply versant with the subject) by remarking that Burton’s account (the Historian of Leicestershire) “is not one of mere conjecture but of certainty, and was no doubt the result of very careful investigation and research. It is most probable also that he possessed far greater opportunities of arriving at the truth than any modern genealogist (?) as it is well known that many valuable (?) pedigrees and documents were lost or destroyed during the civil war which soon after ensued.” A.A.P. shows his whole case, and begs the question, in these feeble observations. Because Burton, a country squire, who wrote about 1623, nearly four centuries after the alleged Hambledon emigration to Scotland, had probably access to some family pedigrees (a most trustworthy source!) which were afterwards lost, ergo, his account is one of certainty, not conjecture, and no one must presume to dispute it now, although we have access to original records, &c. of which worthy Burton probably never heard.

We think our readers may now form a tolerably correct estimate of this pamphlet, the ” summing-up” of which (pp. 31-2) is a marvellous specimen of reasoning in a circle. It may be added that it is full of errors in dates and names of places, and bears evidence of hasty and careless preparation … we should like to see a “little more” strictly legal evidence to show how some of these affiliate themselves to the ducal stem‘ (5).

This may seem harmless stuff, yet it takes a distinctly modern turn to the unsavoury.

Janet Douglas, daughter of Sir James Douglas of Dalkeith, the mother it is supposed of James Hamilton of Cadzow, is accused of having an extra-marital affair. On what certain grounds?, it may be asked, for such a charge at this time was of an serious nature in devoutly Catholic Scotland. On that genealogical rock of modern certainty, that the DNA of some living Hamiltons differs from that of others, ergo Janet Douglas was an adultress!

It is one thing to adhere to the ridiculous, but entirely another to propose the contemptuous.

copyright m stanhope 2016
References:

1. John Eaton Reid, History of the County of Bute: And Families Connected Therewith, p. 177, 1864.

2. The Topographical, Statistical, and Historical Gazetteer of Scotland, p. 739, 1853.

3. Egerton Brydges, Peerage of England, p. 515, 1812.

4. George Robertson, Topographical Description of Ayrshire, p. 169, 1820.

5. The Herald and Genealogist, p. 452, 1867.