Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Monro, Robert (d.1633)
MONRO or MUNRO, ROBERT (d. 1633), styled the 'Black Baron,' eighteenth chief of Foulis, was the eldest son of Hector Monro of Foulis, by Anne, daughter of Hugh, sixth lord Fraser of Lovat. His father died on 14 Nov. 1603, and while a minor he received a dispensation and special license from the king, dated 8 Jan. 1608, upon which by a precept from chancery he was infeft in all the lands possessed by his father on 26, 27, 28 and 29 April. On account of expensive living during his travels abroad he greatly embarrassed his estate; but having engaged his revenues for ten years to pay his creditors, he in 1626 joined as a volunteer the Scottish corps raised by Sir Donald Mackay, first lord Reay [q. v.]. for the German wars. At first he was captain of a company of Scots soldiers raised by himself. Subsequently he was advanced to be colonel of a Dutch regiment of horse and foot under Gustavus Adolphus, and specially distinguished himself in various actions. He died at Ulm in 1633, after six weeks' illness from a wound by a musket-ball in the foot. Although a spendthrift in his earlier years, he latterly became exemplarily pious, being, according to his relative. General Robert Monro [q.v.], 'a true Christian and a right traveller' (Monro his Expedition with the Worthy Scots Regiment, pt. ii. p. 49). By his first wife, Margaret, daughter of William Sutherland, seventh baron of Duffus, he had one daughter, Margaret, married to Kenneth Mackenzie of Scotwell,and by his second wife, Mary Haynes, an English lady, he had a daughter Elizabeth. As he left no male issue, he was succeeded in the barony of Foulis by his brother Hector, who also obtained the rank of colonel in the service of Oustavus Adolphus, and on his return to Scotland was on 7 June 1634 created by Charles I a baronet of Nova Scotia.
[Monro his Expedition with the Worthy Scots Regiment, called Mackay's, 1637; particulars concerning the Munros in Doddridge's Life of Colonel Gardiner; Douglas's Baronage of Scotland, pp. 83-4.]