I'm Bruce Fummey. People have been killing each other since time immemorial.
We could never pinpoint the first ever political assassination, but guns haven't been around that
long have they? When do you think was the first time a head of state was assassinated by gunshot?
Choose a year, and whatever comes into your head right now, tell me in the comment section below,
and no cheating! Who was it? Archduke Ferdinand of Austria-Hungary? Abraham Lincoln of the USA? Stop
it! You know it was Scots who invented everything, and we also invented assassinations by gunshot,
during the life of ... Mary, Queen of Scots. If you're interested in the people, places and events in
Scottish history, then click the subscribe button at the bottom right. In the meantime,
let me tell you a story. Today I'm in Linlithgow to update a story that I told a few years
ago, when production standards were lower, and it was peeing with rain as well. Now obviously
I don't want folk to think badly of Scotland, so I decided to redo the video on murdering
heads estate on a day that is not raining, so that people don't get the wrong impression.
This plaque commemorates an event that happened across the street, so where better to give the
context to the story. The date is the 23rd of January, 1570. Were you close? Just under two years
ago, Mary, Queen of Scots and her forces, had lost the battle of Langside, and she had fatefully
fled across the Solway Firth to England. The opposing side of the battle had been led by this
man; Mary's half brother the Earl of Moray. Now for details of the battle with maps and graphics,
you can watch my video 'Mary, Queen of Scots' Last Days in Scotland', I'll leave a link at the end,
but the Battle of Langside hadn't been the first time that James Stuart, Earl of Moray had
rebelled against his sister. I should probably point out that she was really his half-sister.
As will become clear, he was a bit of a bastard. Their dad, James the Fifth, had numerous
illegitimate children before Mary, and James wasn't her only illegitimate brother. In fact, he wasn't
even the only one called James. James the Fifth had actually petitioned the Pope to ask for permission
for his mistress, and this guy's mother, Lady Erskine, to divorce her husband and marry James,
thus legitimising their son, and making him the heir to the throne. Now the Pope refused, which is why
James Stuart, Earl of Moray wasn't the King, possibly why he wasn't a supporter of the Pope either.
He probably felt entitled to run the country himself, but after the King of France, his
half-sister Mary's husband died, it was James who went to France to persuade this young
Catholic Queen, that coming back to a Scotland that was embracing Protestantism with a Taliban-like
enthusiasm would be perfectly safe. You can just practise your Catholic faith in Holyrood Palace,
what could possibly go wrong? James was her key advisor. She made him the Earl of Moray.
He was as close to power as you might imagine possible, and he imagined he deserved.
When Mary decided to remarry, James, Earl of Moray decided that he should move his cat
into the royal doo'cot (dovecot). For those of you who aren't skilled at deconstructing metaphor, meow ... roo roo.
Pearls before swine! James doesn't like Mary's choice of husband. He stirs up trouble,
rebels against Mary, flees to England and starts begging Elizabeth of England for cash to support
pro-English intrigues. Now for the 'you're anti-English' brigade, remember that pro-English intrigues
are also generally pro-Protestant intrigues, pro-Tudor intrigues, but mainly it seems to me,
pro James, Earl of Moray intrigues. Now there are still some people in this country that get
exercised by the whole Catholic-Protestant thing. Personally if you are a Catholic,
I'm not interested. If you're a Protestant, I'm not interested. If you're a member of a sex
cult specialising in fat blokes, there's aspects of your faith that intrigue me I'll be honest.
I have to say though, if I was a Scottish Queen brought up Catholic in France,
and now surrounded by scheming Protestant Scottish nobility, I might be tempted to take
the logical, but probably ill-advised route of relying on lower status foreign Catholic advisors myself.
When one of these was brutally murdered in Mary's chamber,
it would later turn out that James, Earl of Moray, was one of the signatories to the contract
for the killing. Unaware of this, Mary forgave him that earlier rebellion remember,
and she brought him back into the fold, thinking that he would be a support. When a number of nobles
then agreed a contract to kill Mary's husband, James, Earl of Moray, looked through his fingers.
After a third ill-fated marriage to one of the nobles, who may have been involved in the
murder of that second husband, the Protestant Lords, some of whom were also involved in the
murder of that second husband, then ranged against Mary, and when she was imprisoned,
who was the key winner but James Earl of Moray.
When Mary escaped Loch Leven, and of course I've got a video about how that happened, in fact I'll
leave a whole playlist about Mary that you can come back to, by clicking the white tab up at the top
left. The point is, that when she escaped, it was James, Earl of Moray, who led the force against
her at the Battle of Langside. Now the thing about Mary is, that after the Battle of Langside,
it's so easy to get caught up in following her story to England and watch a tragic tale
play out, forgetting the maelstrom of civil war that continued here in Scotland. Now Moray was running
the country, as he knew was his right. He would obviously suppress anyone who'd supported the
Marian cause, and the main force that had fought for Mary at Langside had been the Hamiltons. Now
I'm not suggesting for a moment that the Hamiltons didn't have their own Machiavellian, or religious
reasons for taking the stance that they did, but if you were Catholic, you'd supported Mary politically
and militarily, and then her erstwhile confidant, now nemesis, had just burned down the Hamilton
family castle at Rutherglen, you might have a bit of the Lee Harvey Oswald about you.
Add to that, a murky tale about Moray's involvement in evicting you and your wife
from your own home in the middle of the night, leaving you freezing cold in your underwear,
standing on a grassy knoll and ... James Hamilton wanted revenge. He tracked the Earl of Moray, now
Head of State to Perth, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Stirling, through the borders to York and London,
but finally on the 23rd of January, 1570, the opportunity would present itself here
in Linlithgow. Now the Archbishop of St Andrews, was a Hamilton. He had a house just behind where you
are in the main street which is no longer there, but it had a balcony. How convenient! On the day
in question, washing was hung up to dry, and from behind the washing, James Hamilton waited
hidden, until Regent, Earl of Moray passed by. He fired a carbine and the ball went straight through
the Regent's belly, and out on the other side, killing a nearby horse in its path. The Hamiltons
had a fast horse waiting, and James ran out the back door and leapt on it. He hightailed it out of there,
with the Moray supporters in hot pursuit. As he approached a huge ditch, he was sure to be caught,
but he raced his horse towards the ditch, and as he reached it, he stuck his dagger in the horse's rear
giving an added incentive to make a frightened jump, and Hamilton escaped. I'd like to say that
no horses were injured in the making in this video, but James Hamilton escaped to France, and
you know what their eating habits are like. Back here, James, Earl of Moray was taken down from his
horse, but having been shot in the stomach died later that day. There were repercussions.
Several Hamiltons were imprisoned for involvement in the affair, a couple, including the Archbishop
of St Andrews were hung, and James Hamilton of Bothwellhaugh, the first man ever to shoot
dead a head of state, lived in penniless exile in France. Now everyone likes a story with goodies
and baddies don't they, but whenever I tell a story about Mary, Queen of Scots, there never seem to be
any goodies. If you'd like to understand Mary's final, fateful battle at Langside, then there's
a video coming up on screen now. In the meantime tha mi an dochas gum bith lath math leibh. Tiorridh an drasda.