Series 1 > Miscellany of the Scottish History Society (Second volume)

INTRODUCTION
435
She was born in 1715, and died full of years in Little
Maddox Street, London, in November 1794,1 and like her
other sisters whose wills exist, made no testamentary mention
whatever of her sister Clementina.
Clementina was probably the youngest daughter, and was
of some beauty. The manuscript quoted by Dennistoun 2
states that Archibald Stuart, Provost of Edinburgh, and
John, fifth Duke of Argyll, both sought her in marriage ;
but except that we have no tradition of her early youth
beyond her statement that it was spent in London ‘ in great
plenty,’3 and that she was ‘ bred to business at Whitehall,’ a
phrase probably of political meaning. In the year 1746 she
met Prince Charles Edward Stuart, at the house, perhaps, of
her uncle Sir Hugh Paterson of Bannockburn, at which the
prince visited. They became enamoured, and she gave him
a promise to follow him in whatever circumstances ‘ whither
fortune might lead him.’
The Prince’s expedition failed, and Clementina, being a
Catholic, obtained a nomination as chanoinesse of a noble
chapter in the Netherlands from her uncle ‘ General Gram ’
[Graeme ?], for which her birth qualified her,4 but this did
not prevent her joining Prince Charles at Ghent in 1752.
She lived with him during his wanderings in France and in
the Low Countries, bearing his various names and being
always ‘ traitee comme son epouse,’5 and during their
residence at Liege the pair 4 ont ete connus publiquement et
d’un chacun pour mari et femme.’0 At Liege she gave birth
to her daughter, Lady Charlotte Stuart, who was baptized in
the parish church of Notre Dame aux Fonts, 29th October
1753, under the style of‘fille de Sr Guillaume Johnson et
1 Wills, Somerset House.
2 Dennistoun’s Memoirs of Sir Robert Strange, vol. II. App. vi. p. 323.
3 Life of Prince Charles Edward, Andrew Lang.
4 Memoir printed in CEuvres de St. Simon.
5 Ibid.
* Brit. Mus. Add. MSS. 30, 475.