Coigny), the “jeune captive” of André Chénier’s famous verses. He bought her freedom and his own with 100 louis. They married and crossed to London, but the union proved unhappy, and they were divorced on their return to Paris.
Turning to the fashionable world, Casimir de Montrond became famous for his successes. He was the confidant and political agent of Talleyrand, and his inside knowledge of politics enabled him to make a large fortune on the Bourse. In 1809 he was disgraced for some imprudent comments on the imperial system, and exiled from Paris. After spending some time at Antwerp he removed to Spa, where he was on intimate terms with Pauline Borghése, and in 1811 he returned to Antwerp; here he was arrested by Napoleon’s orders and sent to the fortress of Ham. After a month’s imprisonment he received permission to reside, under police supervision, at Châtillon-sur-Seine, whence he presently escaped to England. He returned to France at the first Bourbon restoration, and during the Hundred Days was entrusted with a mission to Vienna to convert Talleyrand to Napoleon’s interests, to see Metternich and Nesselrode, and to bring back if possible Marie Louise and the king of Rome. The second restoration restored him to his social triumphs, though he was always under police supervision, and on Talleyrand’s fall he accompanied him to Valençay and continued to help with his intrigues. He followed Talleyrand to London in 1832. Montrond returned to Paris some time before his death in 1843.
See H. Welschinger, “L’Ami de M. de Talleyrand,” in the Revue de Paris (Feb. 1895); Lanzac de Laborie, La Domination française en Belgique (1895); and Amédée Pichot, Souvenirs sur M. de Talleyrand (1870).
MONTROSE, MARQUESSES AND DUKES OF. David Lindsay,
5th earl of Crawford (c. 1440–1495), was created duke of
Montrose in 1488 (the first dukedom conferred in Scotland on a
person not of royal blood), as a reward for remaining loyal to
James III. during the rebellion of Angus and Prince James.
Montrose was deprived of his dukedom by James IV., but it was
restored in 1489 for life only. On his death in 1495 the title
therefore became extinct.
In 1505, William, 4th Lord Graham, whose wife Annabella Drummond was the duke’s niece, was created earl of Montrose; and this title was held by his descendants till 1644, when James Graham, 5th earl, was created marquess of Montrose and earl of Kincardine. This was the celebrated marquess of Montrose (q.v.) of the Civil War, whose son and successor, James (c. 1631–1669), was known as “the Good Marquess.” The latter refused to vote at the trial of his hereditary enemy the marquess of Argyll in 1661, admitting that he could not act impartially in such a matter; and the two noblemen afterwards became firm friends. The good marquess died in 1669, and was succeeded by his son James, 3rd marquess of Montrose (d. 1684). The 4th marquess, son of the last mentioned, who was also named James (d. 1742), was lord high admiral of Scotland in 1705, and lord president of the council in 1706. He was an ardent supporter of the Hanoverian succession; he also favoured the union of Scotland with England, for his services in regard to which he was created duke of Montrose and marquess of Graham in 1707, becoming in the same year one of the first representative peers of Scotland in the parliament of Great Britain. He was one of the regents of the kingdom on the death of Queen Anne, and was appointed a secretary of state by George I. He took an active part in suppressing the Jacobite rising in 1715, after which he was made keeper of the great seal in Scotland. He died in 1742. During his lifetime his son David was raised to the peerage of Great Britain with the title of Earl Graham; and on David’s death without issue in 1731 this earldom passed under a special remainder to his brother William (c. 1710–1790), who on his father’s death in 1742 succeeded to the dukedom also. William’s son James, 3rd duke of Montrose (1755–1836), held office in Pitt’s administrations in 1783 and 1804, and in that of the duke of Portland in 1807. He obtained the annulment of the law prohibiting Highlanders from wearing the kilt. He was succeeded by his son James (1799–1874), who held office under the earl of Derby in 1852, and again in 1858 and 1866, and was father of Douglas Beresford Malise Ronald, 5th duke (b. 1852). In 1853 James Lindsay, 24th earl of Crawford, claimed the title of duke of Montrose on the ground that the patent granted to his ancestor David Lindsay in 1488 (see above) had not been effectively rescinded, but his petition was dismissed by the House of Lords.
MONTROSE, JAMES GRAHAM, Marquess of (1612–1650), was born in 1612, and became 5th earl of Montrose (see above) by his father’s death in 1626. He was educated at St. Andrews, and at the age of seventeen married Magdalene Carnegie, daughter of Lord Carnegie (afterwards earl of Southesk). Not long after the outbreak of the Scottish troubles in 1637 he joined the party of resistance, and was for some time one of its most energetic champions. He had nothing puritanical in his nature, but he shared in the ill-feeling aroused in the Scottish nobility by the political authority given by Charles to the bishops, and by Hamilton’s influence with the king, and also in the general indignation at the scheme of imposing upon Scotland a liturgy which had been drawn up at the instigation of the English court and corrected by Archbishop Laud. He signed the Covenant, and was told off to suppress the opposition to the popular cause which arose around Aberdeen and in the country of the Gordons. Three times, in July 1638, and in March and June 1639, Montrose entered Aberdeen, where he succeeded in effecting his object, on the second occasion carrying off the head of the Gordons, the marquess of Huntly, as a prisoner to Edinburgh, though in so doing, for the first and last time in his life, he violated a safe-conduct.
In July 1639, after the signature of the treaty of Berwick, Montrose was one of the Covenanting leaders who visited Charles. This change of policy on his part, frequently ascribed to the fascination of the king’s conversation, arose in reality from the nature of his own convictions. He wished to get rid of the bishops without making presbyters masters of the state. His was essentially a layman’s view of the situation. Taking no account of the real forces of the time, he aimed at an ideal form of society in which the clergy should confine themselves to their spiritual duties, and the king, after being enlightened by open communication with the Scottish nation, should maintain law and order without respect of persons. In the Scottish parliament which met in September, Montrose found himself in opposition to Argyll, who had made himself the representative of the Presbyterian and national party, and of the middle classes. Montrose, on the other hand, wished to bring the king’s authority to bear upon parliament to defeat this object, and offered him the support of a great number of nobles. He failed, because Charles could not even then consent to abandon the bishops, and because no Scottish party of any weight could be formed unless Presbyterianism were established ecclesiastically.
Rather than give way, Charles prepared in 1640 to invade Scotland. Montrose was of necessity driven to play something of a double part. In August 1640 he signed the Bond of Cumbernauld as a protest against the “particular and direct practising of a few,” in other words, against the ambition of Argyll. But he took his place amongst the defenders of his country, and in the same month he displayed his gallantry in action at the forcing of the Tyne at Newburn. After the invasion had been crowned with success, Montrose still continued to cherish his now hopeless policy. On the 27th of May 1641 he was summoned before the Committee of Estates charged with intrigues against Argyll, and on the 11th of June he was imprisoned in Edinburgh Castle. When Charles visited Scotland to give his formal assent to the abolition of Episcopacy, Montrose communicated to him his belief that Hamilton was a traitor. It had indeed been alleged, on Clarendon’s authority, that he proposed to murder Hamilton and Argyll; but this is in all probability only one of Clarendon’s many blunders. (See S. R. Gardiner, Hist. of England, 1603–1642, x. 26). Upon the king’s return to England Montrose shared in the amnesty which was tacitly accorded to all Charles’s partisans.
For a time Montrose retired, perforce, from public life. After the Civil War began in England (see Great Rebellion) he
