Part 77

11. Lady Augusta, who married Sir William Murray of Auchtertyre, with issue.

The Earl died in 1766, and was succeeded as representative of the family by his eldest son,

IV. LORD MACLEOD, Major-General in the army, by whose noble and patriotic conduct the fortunes of the family were afterwards to some extent restored. Disdaining to live on the charity of his friends and as a burden on his father, he joined the Swedish army as a soldier of fortune worked his way there, was aide-de-camp to the King, who created him Count Cromarty, and, in 1775, returned to his native country, after twenty-seven years of distinguished foreign service, full of fame and honours, with the rank of Lieut.-General. In 1754 the re-grant of the Lovat estates by George III. to General Fraser emboldened Lord Macleod to petition the King for the restoration of the Cromarty ancestral possessions; but his application at that time failed, although he succeeded later on.

When Lord Macleod joined his father against the Government he was only eighteen years of age, and on account of his extreme youth he had already obtained an unconditional pardon on the 22nd of June, 1748. In 1777 he was presented at Court, on which occasion George III. received him very kindly. In return for this gracious treatment, first pardoning him, and now so generously receiving him, his Lordship offered to raise a Highland Regiment. The offer was accepted, and in a very short time, though without any property or political connections, he soon raised a fine body of 840 men among his Highland countrymen. To this number 236 Lowlanders and 34 English and Irish were added by some of his friends, making together a full regiment of 1100 men, embodied at Elgin, and inspected there by General Skene in April, 1778. Immediately after, Letters of Service were issued in his favour for raising a second battalion of the same size as the first. This he soon accomplished, not less than 1800 of the men having been raised from the possessions of his ancestors - a splendid set of men with excellent constitutions, and of most exemplary conduct. He was appointed Colonel of the first battalion, and his brother, the Hon. Lieut.-Colonel Mackenzie, received the command of the second battalion. The Regiment was named Macleod's Highlanders, numbered the 73rd, and is now well known as the 71st Highlanders. In 1779 Lord Macleod accompanied his Highlanders to India, and fought at their head in the Carnatic against Hyder Ah, under Major-General Sir Hector Munro, where they greatly distinguished themselves, though the regiment was nearly cut to pieces at the battle of Conjeveram. In 1782 his Lordship attained the rank of Major-General, and in the following year he returned home. In acknowledgment of his distinguished services, an Act of Parliament was passed, on the 18th of August, 1784, by which the forfeited estates of the Earldom were restored to him, on payment of L19,000 to relieve them of existing burdens.

Lord Macleod married in 1786 Marjory, eldest daughter of James, XVIth Lord Forbes, without issue. She afterwards married John, fourth Duke of Athole, with issue. The mansion, which had been almost entirely demolished after the 'Forty-five, was by him rebuilt and enlarged, and the policies put into good order and properly attended to. He died on the 2nd of April, 1789, and was succeeded in the estates by his cousin-german,

V. CAPTAIN KENNETH MACKENZIE of Cromarty, who died in 1796, without male issue. He was the last direct male heir, and on his death the representation of the family, carrying with it the dormant honours of Cromarty and Tarbat, went into the family of Ardloch. He was succeeded in the estates by Lord Macleod's eldest sister,

VI. LADY ISABELLA, who married the sixth Lord Elibank. She died on the 28th of December, 1801, without male issue, and was succeeded by her eldest daughter,

VII. THE HON. MARIA MURRAY, who in 1790 married the Hon. Edward Hay of Newhall, brother of George, VIIth Marquis of Tweeddale, who thereupon assumed the name of Mackenzie in addition to his own, with issue -

1. John Hay, her heir and successor.

2. Dorothea, who on the 2nd of July, 1813, married Sir David Hunter Blair, with issue.

3. Isabella, who on the 1st of November, 1817, married John Buckle, with issue.

4. Georgina Ann, who married James, fifth Earl of Glasgow, without issue.

Her only sister, the Hon. Isabella Murray, died unmarried in 1849.

The Hon. Maria Murray was succeeded by her only son,

VIII. JOHN HAY-MACKENZIE, who on the 23rd of April, 1828, married Anne, daughter of Sir Gibson-Craig, Baronet, with issue -

1. Anne his heir and successor.

He died at Cliefden on the 9th of July, 1849, and was succeeded by his only child,

IX. ANNE HAY-MACKENZIE of Cromarty, who, on the 27th of June, 1849, married His Grace the third Duke of Sutherland. On the 21st of October, 1861, her Grace was, by a new creation, made Countess of Cromarty, Viscountess Tarbat of Tarbat, Baroness Macleod of Castle Leod, and Baroness Castlehaven of Castlehaven, with remainder to her second son, Viscount Tarbat. Thus, should the old title ever be restored, there would be two Earls, with all the titles exactly similar, excepting that the holder of the original earldom would also inherit the Nova Scotia Baronetcy, as well as that of 1704.

On the death of the late Duchess of Sutherland, Countess of Cromartie, in 1888, she was succeeded by her second surviving son,

X. FRANCIS SUTHLRLAND LEVESON GOWER, as Earl of Cromartie, in all her other titles, and estates. He was born on the 3rd of August, 1852, and on the 2nd of August, 1876, married the Hon. Lilian Janet, second surviving daughter of Godfrey William Wentworth, 4th Lord Macdonald of Sleat, with issue -

1. Sibell Lilian, born on the 14th of August, 1878.

2. Constance, born in 1882.

The Earl died on the 24th of November, 1893. The limitation of this earldom being to his heirs male, and on the failure of such to his heirs, with other remainders over, a question arises as to whether or not the dignity is now in abeyance between his Lordship's two daughters and co-heirs.

As it is possible the old honours may yet be claimed, it may be interesting to note in a more concise manner the facts concerning them. The original patent of the Nova Scotia Baronetcy to Sir John Mackenzie of Tarbat, by Charles I., dated 21st May, 1628, was to him "suosque haredes masculos quoscunque de tempore in tempus in posterum per perpetuo," and the re-grant of 29th April, 1704, to his grandson, Kenneth, second son of George, first Earl of Cromarty, being confessedly to restore the old Baronetcy - now absorbed in the Earldom - intact, "as the samen was given to the umquhile Sir John Mackenzie of Tarbat," was to Kenneth and his heirs male "in perpetuum," and was therefore granted with the same succession, presumably to heirs male whomsoever.

Sir Kenneth Mackenzie of Grandvale and Cromarty, first Baronet of this re-grant, having died in 1729, the dignity was enjoyed by his eldest son, Sir George, second Baronet, who died without issue in 1748, and afterwards by his youngest son, Sir Kenneth, third Baronet, who died at Tam in 1763, also without issue. At this Sir Kenneth's death, it is clear that the succession would, under the patent of 1704, then devolve upon his heir male, George, the attainted third Earl of Cromarty, who survived all the male descendants of the patentee, but whose honours, having been attainted in 1746, had been restored by the pardon granted to him under the Great Seal on the 20th of October, 1749. Thus was this Baronetcy absorbed a second time in the Earldom of Cromarty. Nor does it appear that it was ever assumed by George, the third Earl (who died in Poland Street, London, on the 29th of September, 1766), nor by his son Lord Macleod, who obtained a pardon dated the 26th of January, 1748, and with whom, who died without issue, on the 2nd of April, 1789, ended the direct line both of the Earldom and of the Baronetcy.

The succession then opened to his cousin, Captain Mackenzie of Cromarty, who obtained the estates; but he also died without issue in 1796, without having assumed either title.

Taking the term "haredibus masculis," according to the opinion of John Riddell, the well-known Advocate and author "in the sense of our law, as an equivalent to heirs male whatsoever," the representation of the Tarbat Baronetcy would then revert to the brothers of George, first Earl of Cromarty, the next of whom was Roderick, Lord Prestonhall. But here again the fatality to heirs male which has dogged the steps of the Cromarty titles in so extraordinary a manner, ended the succession in the children of his son, Alexander of Fraserdale. Riddell, in his opinion upon the revival of 1826, says, "I certainly saw proof of the male extinction of the Prestonhall branch several years ago." That is, in one of the Lovat actions of Fraserdale, or Macleod of Macleod; and, after that family, the succession of the descendants of Alexander of Ardloch, fourth son of Sir John Mackenzie of Tarbat, was proved, in the Service at Tam, on the 30th of October, 1826, in the person of Lieutenant-Colonel Alexander Mackenzie, eldest son of Colonel Robert Mackenzie of Milnmount, who assumed the dormant Baronetcies of Tarbat and Royston, and who, dying without issue on the 28th of April, 1841, was succeeded by his only brother, Sir James Sutherland Mackenzie, who also died unmarried on the 24th of November, 1858. Since his death these Baronetcies have remained dormant, no effort to assume them having been made by the next heir male, although no doubt it was quite in his power to do so.

It is obvious from what has already been said that the representation of the Earldom of Cromarty, granted to George, Viscount Tarbat, on the 18th of September, 1703, the succession of which is "haredibus masculis et tallia" devolves upon the same head as the above-named Baronetcies. It is not, however, clear whether the pardon obtained by George, third Earl, is sufficient to remove the attainder, or whether an Act of Parliament would not be necessary for that purpose, although the attainted male-blood is long ago at an end. Since this question was debated, the restoration of the Airlie and other forfeited peerages have, in a great measure, cleared the ground, and in the new creation of 1861 the older title and honours according to the decisions in these cases could be in no way affected or disturbed.