Genealogical account of the family of Edmonstone of Duntreath

THE FA MIL Y OF EDMONSTONE. 3 1
have married very early, as her first husband, the Earl of Angus, was,
according to Hume of Godscroft's History of the Douglas, only seventeen
at the time. At all events, her fourth marriage was contracted twenty-
eight years after her first, and though scarcely, as Crauford in pedigree
gallantly calls her, 'still a young woman,' she nevertheless had by Sir
William Edmonstone a son and daughter. The date of her death is
unknown, but she was buried within the church of Strathblane. 1
The extensive connexions and numerous descendants of this Princess
make her a somewhat important person with genealogists. To these I
have referred in a note ; I cannot, however, but remark, that to be of the
same stock and kin with the illustrious James Kennedy, Bishop of St.
Andrews, son of the Countess of Angus by her second marriage, one of
the best and most distinguished men Scotland ever produced, is an honour
of which any family may be justly proud.
The acquisition of the lands of Duntreath follows, as has been stated
in the preliminary chapter, the alliance. They had come into the hands
of James I. by forfeiture of the Lennox family in 1425, and though there
is no exact notice of the grant, we find in the Chamberlain's Rolls, dated
1434, that the Crown Baillif took no charge of the farms of Duntreath,
because the King had infeft William Edmonstone with them ; who had at
that time been married nine years to the King's sister. After the death
of James I., the Duchess of Albany gained possession of her paternal
inheritance ; and accordingly, in 1445, she granted these lands to William
Edmonstone, the younger son of Sir William, on the occasion probably of
his marriage with her granddaughter Matilda Stewart.
The grant of James I., however, to the father seems to have been
maintained ; for both in this grant, and in a charter of confirmation of
James II., seven years later, in 1452, by which Duntreath is erected into a
barony, with full baronial powers, the conjoint infeftment of father and
son is specially notified.
On the rolls of the Baillies, both for 1445 and 1446, there are notices
of payments of money and meal from the revenues and domains of the
Crown in Bute and Arran to William Edmonstone of Culloden, Knight,
by the King's order.
Note 34, Appendix.