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The Execution of Lady Jane Douglas
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This
page is an extract from Historical Tales of the Wars of Scotland and of
the Border Raids, Forays and Conflicts; Author: John Parker Lawson
THE EXECUTION OF LADY JANE DOUGLAS
Lady Jane Douglas was the daughter of George, Master of Angus; the granddaughter of the great Earl of Angus, commonly called Bell-the-Cat; the niece of Archibald Douglas, the well-known butt of James V.’s enmity; and the sister of the sixth Earl of Angus, Chancellor of Scotland, who suffered forfeiture under James V. and lived long in exile at the court of England. She married John, sixth Lord Glammis, who died on the 12th of December 1527, and bore to him a son, who became the seventh Lord Glammis; and soon after her first husband’s death, she married Archibald Campbell, the second son of the second Earl of Argyle.
When her brother, the Earl of Angus, and another brother, and her uncle Archibald Douglas fell under the wrath of James V., and were proclaimed by him as rebels and traitors whom no persons might sanction with their intercourse or assist with food, raiment, or shelter, she braved the King’s denunciation, and afforded them all the aid in her power, and in consequence became a sharer in the fiery hatred which he had sworn to cherish toward all the Douglas race. The King and his minions appear to have hunted up several pretexts for prosecuting her, and to have been constantly and keenly on the outlook for some feasible reason to imprison and kill her; but they did not succeed for years, till they became aided by one of the most profligate and atrocious outbursts of private revenge which anywhere disfigure the records of authentic history.
In December 1528, she was summoned along with others to answer before parliament for an alleged assisting of the Earl of Angus in an insurrectionary design against the King’s person; but seems not to have been prosecuted, in consequence of a total want of evidence. In July 1531, or perhaps earlier in that year, she suffered a forfeiture of goods for “intercommunying with our souerane lordis rebellis or for ony other crymes.” In January 1531–2, she was bound in surety to appear at the next assize of Forfar for the pretended crime of destroying her first husband’s wife per intoxicationem, which probably signified by means of drugs, philtres, charms, or enchanted potions.
“This shifting of the ground, in relation to the charge of crime against her,” remarks Mr. Pitcairn, “seems to have proceeded from the repeated refusal of the barons to come forward as assisors or jurors on her trial, and from the fear on the part of the public prosecutor, that the case would break down for want of legal and satisfactory proof of her being guilty of any treason. Such suspicious circumstances naturally lead us to infer that her real crime was the political offence of her being a true‑hearted Douglas…”
Various subsequent attempts were made to bring this ill-used lady under the anathema of the law; and failed either from the repugnance of gentlemen to act as jurors against her, or from the glaringly false and malicious nature of the allegations of her accusers. But at length, on the 17th of July 1537, she was brought to trial and condemned, upon the information and testimony of a seemingly disinterested party, for an alleged crime of a much more heinous nature than the majority which had hitherto been laid to her charge—*imagining and conspiring the destruction of the King by poison*.
The fabrication of this charge, and the circumstances which gave rise to it, together with the condemnation and execution of the lady on the ground of it, constitute one of the most remarkable chapters in the history of public prosecutions; and they are narrated with much clearness and piquancy in a rare extant Life of James V., written not long after the period.
The document describes Lady Jane Douglas as:
> “the most renowned beauty of Britain… her mien majestic… her courage above what could be expected from her sex… her judgment solid… her modesty admirable.”
Her second husband, Archibald Campbell, was devoted to her. But William Lion, a near relation of her first husband and a former suitor, became enraged at her rejection. His passion turned to hatred, and he devised a plot “that hell could suggest”: he accused Lady Jane, her husband, her son, and an aged priest of conspiring to poison the King.
These innocent persons were imprisoned in Edinburgh Castle, and their goods seized. Lion, who had the ear of the jealous King, inflamed James V.’s suspicions by invoking the old grievances against the Douglas name.
Lady Jane was brought before the judges. Her defence, as recorded, is one of the most remarkable speeches in Scottish judicial history. She argued her innocence with dignity, logic, and courage, concluding:
> “It is more easy to take away my life than to blast my reputation… I shall die cheerfully, having the testimony of a good conscience.”
The judges, moved by her words, sought to delay the case and appeal to the King’s mercy. But Lion prevailed upon James V. to insist on judgment. The court, bound by the strict letter of the law, condemned her to be burned alive.
She heard the sentence “without the least sign of concern.” When led to the stake, the people wept; she alone remained composed. Her beauty and courage shone even in the flames, and she died praying quietly.
The next day, her husband attempted escape from the Castle by a rope, which proved too short; he fell and was killed. The King, shocked, released the aged priest, but kept young Lord Glammis imprisoned until after his own death.
William Lion, tormented by guilt, confessed the plot to the King, who banished him and intended further punishment—but events intervened.
Mr. Pitcairn notes the extraordinary timing: Queen Magdalene had died only days before, plunging the nation into mourning. Yet in this moment of grief, the King pursued a savage act of vengeance against a noblewoman whose only true crime was her Douglas blood.
See also:
•
A Narrative on the Origins and Nature of Lawson’s Historical
Tales
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Sources for this article include:
Historical Tales of the Wars of Scotland and of the Border Raids, Forays and Conflicts;
Author: John Parker Lawson
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