George Seton, 5^th Earl of Winton 

GEORGE SETON, 5th and last Earl of Winton, was possessed of excellent abilities, but from his early years he displayed a marked eccentricity of character. He had travelled with his father in travels in France and the low countries, and benefitted from a good foundation in his education.  However, some family misunderstandings caused him to leave home while a mere youth, and he spent several years in France as bellows-blower and assistant to a blacksmith, without holding any intercourse with his family.

On the death of his father the 4th Earl of Winton, Viscount Kingston the next heir taking for granted that the young 5th Earl was dead was proceeding to take possession of the title and estates which were then also being shared by Seton of Garleton who was also involved in the discrediting claim against the absent Earl, when suddenly the 5th Earl appeared and vindicated his rights. It was afterwards ascertained that a confidential servant kept him apprised of what was taking place at home and in the family, and had sent him notice of his father’s death.

Subsequent to the fourth Earl of Winton’s death in 1704, it had been seen that the Kingston family were then considered, in the event of the failure of his two sons, his nearest heirs-male.  In the processes which ensued upon this account between George the attainted Earl and the Kingston family, Archibald Viscount Kingston, was the principal party against the latter:

Libelled Summons before the Court of Session, signeted 23rd May 1710, with execution thereon, dated 24^th May 1710, at the instance of Archibald Viscount of Kingston, nearest and lawful appearand heir to the deceased George Earl (fourth Earl) of Winton.

The Seton family, as we have seen previously, had always been noted for their loyalty and their attachment to the old Church, and the last Earl, though he had renounced the Romish faith, held firmly to the political creed of his ancestors.  In 1712 the Earl of Winton reprinted in a smaller form the Book of Common Prayer which had been prepared for Scotland in 1637. This book seems to have been actually used in places in the 18th century and it exercised a wide influence.

He was living peaceably in his own mansion at Seton when the rebellion of 1715 broke out. It is probable that he would, under any circumstances, have taken the field in behalf of the representative of the ancient Scottish sovereigns; but his doing so was hastened, if not caused, by the outrageous treatment which he received from a body of the Lothian militia, who forcibly entered and rifled his mansion at Seton, as he alleged on his trial, ‘through private pique and revenge.’  ‘The most sacred places,’ he adds, ‘did not escape their fury and resentment. They broke into his chapel, defaced the monuments of his ancestors, took up the stones of their sepulchres, thrust irons through their bodies, and treated them in a most barbarous, inhuman, and unchristian like manner.’ On this disgraceful outrage the Earl took up arms against the Government, assumed the command of a troop of horse mostly composed of gentlemen belonging to East Lothian, and joined the Northumbrian insurgents under Mr. Forster and the Earl of Derwentwater. Their numbers were subsequently augmented by a body of Highlanders under Brigadier Macintosh, who formed a junction with them at Kelso.

The English insurgents insisted on carrying the war into England, where they expected to be reinforced by the Jacobites and Roman Catholics in the northern and western counties. The Scotsmen proposed that they should take possession of Dumfries, Ayr, Glasgow, and other towns in the south and west of Scotland, and attack the Duke of Argyll, who lay at Stirling, in the flank and rear, while the Earl of Mar assailed his army in front. The English portion of the insurgent forces, however, persisted in carrying out their absurd scheme in spite of the strenuous opposition of the Scots, and especially of the Highlanders, who broke out in a mutiny against the English officers.

The Earl of Wintoun disapproved so strongly of this plan that he left the army with a considerable part of his troop, and was marching northward when he was overtaken by a messenger from the insurgent council, who entreated him to return. He stood for a time pensive and silent, but at length he broke out with an exclamation characteristic of his romantic and somewhat extravagant character. ‘It shall never be said to after generations that the Earl of Wintoun deserted King James’s interests or his country’s good.’ Then, laying hold of his own ears, he added, ‘You, or any man, shall have liberty to cut these out of my head if we do not all repent it.’

But though this unfortunate young nobleman (he was only twenty-five years of age) again joined the insurgent forces, he ceased henceforward to take any interest in their deliberations or debates. The Rev. Robert Patten, who officiated as chaplain to the insurgents, and afterwards wrote a history of the rebellion, indeed states that the Earl ‘was never afterwards called to any council of war, and was slighted in various ways, having often no quarters provided for him, and at other times very bad ones, not fit for a nobleman of his family; yet, being in for it, he resolved to go forward, and diverted himself with any company, telling many pleasant stories of his travels, and his living unknown and obscurely with a blacksmith in France, whom he served some years as a bellows-blower and under-servant, till he was acquainted with the death of his father, and that his tutor had given out that he was dead, upon which he resolved to return home, and when there met with a cold reception.’

The Earl fought with great gallantry at the barricades of Preston, but was at last obliged to surrender along with the other insurgents, and was carried a prisoner to London, and confined in the Tower. He was brought to trial before the House of Lords, 15th March, 1716, and defended himself with considerable ingenuity. Such was the sensation of the Earls Trial, the local Printer of the time, Daniel Bridge, was noted for his own trial for the printing of the Earls Trial proceedings, noted in the House of Lords Journal, Volume 20, 27th April, 1716.

The High Steward, Lord Cooper, having overruled his objections to the indictment with some harshness, ‘I hope,’ was the Earl’s rejoinder, ‘you will do me justice, and not make use of "Cowper-law," as we used to say in our country—hang a man first and then judge him.’ On the refusal of his entreaty to be heard by counsel, he replied— ‘Since your lordship will not allow me counsel, I don’t know nothing.’ He was of course found guilty, and condemned to be beheaded on Tower Hill. ‘When waiting his fate in the Tower,’ says Sir Walter Scott, ‘he made good use of his mechanical skill, sawing through with great ingenuity the bars of the windows of his prison, through which he made his escape.’

Although the Earls of Winton and Nithsdale found means to escape out of the Tower, and Messrs. Forster and M‘Intosh escaped from Newgate, it was supposed that motives of mercy and tenderness in the Prince of Wales, afterwards King George II, favoured the escape of all these gentlemen.

After his escape, he maintained an active presence in the Scots circles in France and Rome. Among the many interesting manuscripts preserved in the archives of the Grand Lodge of Scotland are the Minutes of a Lodge of Scottish Freemasons existing in Rome in the years 1735,1736 and 1737, from which we find that the Earl of Winton was himself admitted a Mason under the name (which he assumed on his attainder) of George Seaton Winton at a meeting held at Joseppe's, in the Corso, Rome, on l6th August 1735.  (See Hughan's The Jacobite Lodge at Rome.1735-7. published by the Lodge of Research. Leicester.1910.).

Despite his attainder, the Earl maintained active communications with various tenants on his Estates and directed various affairs regarding them while in exile.  He continued to work to have his Estates restored, and in 1736, in the Chronological Table of Private and Personals Acts of the Parliament of Great Britain, there is recorded under 10 GEO 2, c. 25, the Act of Restitution for George Seton, Earl of Winton, his Act submitted as follows: Restitution of George Seton: enabling him to sue or maintain any action despite his attainder and to take or inherit any estate.

During his exile, he can have had little money, but managed to carry on social life of a sort. In 1736 his name appears in
the Minute Book of the Masonic Lodge in Rome as having become a Mason, while the following year he was Grand
Master .

In 1740 he was in the Chevalier's Cabinet, vagrant Scots met him occasionally and, in 1736, Sir Alexander Dick speaks of having met him and others in a coffee house where they "fell a singing old Scots songs and were very merry".

In September 1743 Lord Lovat wrote to Lord Grange sending him a cypher in which Lord Winton is referred to as 'Mr. Hepburn'.

Among the legends that float round this interesting domain, there is one relative to George, fifth Earl of Wintoun. Prior to departing on his ill-fated expedition, he is said to have buried a large quantity of plate and other valuables, with the assistance of a blacksmith in the neighbourhood, in whose fidelity he placed reliance. The recollection of this buried treasure haunted him in his weary exile on the continent, and he contrived to return to Scotland, in the hope of recovering what he had so carefully deposited. The search was fruitless, and he fled in despair. It was afterwards observed that the family of the blacksmith became opulent farmers in East Lothian. w. c..

During this time Seton Palace had fallen into disrepair, but it had been occupied for some time by Elizabeth Stevenson or Pitcairn. Writing to Alexander Hay or Drumelzier in February 1757 from France, Sir George Seton Bt . of Garlston refers to the wrecking of the house and its contents and says "the auld wife Pitcairn" had pilfered many things and "furnisht an apartment in Winton of the debris and plunder of "Seton House". At the same time he asks Hay if nothing can be done to recover the family pictures from Lord Somerville, "which he alwaise said he would give up to the "family" .

The 5th Earl of winton then, ended his motley life at Rome in 1749, aged seventy, and with him terminated the main branch of the long and illustrious line of the Setons.  It is however, not without further controversy, for it will be noted in the claim of the Seton's of Bellingham, that the Earl married a lady Margaret M'KLear (McClear or McClure, daughter of a Physician) privately in a Catholic Church in Edinburgh and had an only child and heir, named Charles Seton who was raised by the Thompson family at Dunterly in Bellingham.  This claim was contested by the Earl of Eglinton in his Service to claim the Winton Honours.

Male cadets of this family, however, came by intermarriage to represent the great historic families of Huntly and Eglinton, besides the ducal house of Gordon, now extinct, and the Earls of Sutherland, whose heiress married the Marquis of Stafford, afterwards created Duke of Sutherland. The earldoms of Wintoun and Dunfermline, the viscounty of Kingston, and the other Seton titles were forfeited for the adherence of their possessors to the Stewart dynasty, and have never been restored; but the late Earl of Eglinton was, in 1840, served heir-male general of the family, and, in 1859, was created Earl of Wintoun in the peerage of the United Kingdom.

Extract Registered Sasine of the Earldom of Winton

Dated 9^th April, and recorded 5th June 1697, in the particular Register of Sasines at Edinburgh, in favour of George Lord Seaton, afterwards fifth Earl.  This sasine bears to proceed upon a disposition by George, the fourth Earl of Winton, dated 7^th April 1697, in favour (1^st) of the said George Lord Setoune, who is designed eldest lawful son of Earl George; and (2d) Christopher Seaton, second lawful son of the said noble Earle.  The sasine does not bear that the disposition was in favour of any other party nomination, although it recites a variety of general substitutions to heirs to be proreated of the Earl, and his above named two sons; and, at p. 24, there is recited a provision in favour of Dame Christian Hepburne, Countess of Wintoune, our spouse, in caise she shall happen to survive was (the fourth Earl).

This sasine proves the two sons of George the fourth Earl’s second marriage; and that of 7^th April 1697, when the youngest sone would be fourteen years of age, he had no other issue, male or female.

Extract Registered Disposition and Assignation by George fourth Earl of Winton, of his general estate, in favour of his eldest sone George Lord Seaton, dated 7^th April 1697, and recorded in the Books of Session, 27^th June 1710.

In this Disposition the said George Lord Seaton is designed, "our eldest lawful son, procreate betwixt us and Dame Christian Hepburn, Countess of Winton, our spouse".

Bond of provision by the said fourth Earl of Winton, in favour of Christopher Seaton, he second son dated 7^th April 1697.  This bond designs the above Christopher, our second lawful son, procreate betwixt us and Dame Christian Hepburn, Countess of Winton, our spouse.

Another Bond of Provision by the said fourth Earl of Winton in favour of Christopher Seaton, his second son, dated 29^th May 1703.  This bond also describes Christopher as our second lawful son.

Disposition and Assignation by the same to the same, dated 29^th May 1703, of an apprising of the lands of Carrieston, for 9000 merks.  In this deed, Christopher is like wise called the Earl’s second son.

Testament of the said George fourth Earl, dated 21^st February 1704.  This testament proceeds as follows:  We nominate, constitute and ordain our well-beloved sons, George Lord Seaton, our eldest son and apparent heir, and Mr. Christopher Seaton, his brother-german, procreate betwixt us and our well-beloved spouse Dame Christian Hepburn, to be our only executors, sold legatees, and universal intromitters with our haill goods, &c.

Neither this testament, nor any of the other deeds just described, make mention in any way of any other son or child of the fourth Earl, other than the two sons, George Lord Seaton and Christopher; and this, joined to the fact that the testament was executed twenty-one years after the birth of Christopher the second and youngest son, and as will immediately be seen, within a month of the Earl’s death, establishes that there were no other issue of the fourth Earl.

That the said George fourth Earl of Winton died 6^th March 1704, and was succeeded by the above mentioned George Lord Seaton, his eldest son, as fifth Earl of Winton.

In a printed condescendence in an action between the children of James Smith (factor for the fourth Earl) and the said George the fifth Earl, which bears date 24^th January 1715, it is stated, that George the fourth Earl had died upon the day of _________ 1704 years.

General Retour of the Service of George fifth Earl of Winton to his father, dated 4^th July 1710.  This retour designates the parties as follows:  Quondam Georgius Comes de Winton &c.  Pater Georgij nunc Comitis de Winton, Domini Seaton et Tranent, latoris præsentium, ejus unici legitimi filij nunc viventis procreat, inter illum et quondam Christianam Comitissam de Winton, ejus sponosam.  Obiit ad fidem et pacem S.D.N.Reginæ nune regnantis; Et quod Dictus Georgius nunc Comes de Winton, est legitimus et propinquior hæres masculus et lineæ dicti quondam Georgij Comitis de Winton, ejus patris.  This service proceeded at Edinburgh, in the Macers’ Court, under the commission issued from Chancery, and before the following jury:

1.   James, Duke of Montrose                                2.         William, Marquis of Annandale

3.   John, Earl of Laudredale                                  4.         James, Earl of Seafield

5.   William. Lord Saltoun                                        6.         _____, Lord Blantyre

7.   Lord President Dalrymple of North Berwick   8.         Adam Cockburn of Ormiston, Lord Justice-Clerk

9.   Sir Robert Dundas of Arniston                        10         Sir John Lauder of Fountainhall

11   Sir William Anstruther                                     12         Mr. James Erskine of Grange

13   Sir Gilbert Elliot of Minto                                 14         Mr. John Murray of Borohill

Sir Dougald Stewart of Blairhall

All Senators of the College of Justice.

In a Printed Information, dated 19^th July 1711, in an action between George the fifth Earl and Archibald Viscount Kingston, it is stated that the above Christopher who was the fourth Earl’s second son, lived nine months after the Earl, (fourth Earl).

It will be proved that Christopher himself died 5h January 1705, and therefore the fourth Earl must have died before April 1704.

Charter of Resignation by George fifth Earl of Winton, in favour of George Seaton of Barns, dated 31^st March, 1715.  In this charter the granter is designed Georgius Comes de Winton, Dominus Seaton et Tranent, unicus legitimus filius et hæres deservit, et retornat, quondam nobili et potenti Comiti Georgio Comiti de Winton, nostro patri, secundum Retornatum Nostrum o Cancellario extractum de data quarto die mensis Julij anno 1710.

This proves that the fifth Earl, alive in 1715, was the same Earl who was served by the retour of 1710.

The last described four documents prove the death of George the fourth Earl, and that he was succeeded by his eldest son George, as fifth Earl of Winton.

That George fifth Earl of Winton, having, as has been shown, succeeded his father in 1704, was, of date 16^th and 19^th March 1716, convicted of high treason; but afterwards, on the 4^th August 1716, escaped from the Tower, and died at Rom the 30^th September 1749; and that he had no issue, having died unmarried.

In Crawford’s Peerage of Scotland, which was published in 1716, there is no mention of the said George the fifth Earl having been previously married; and if such had been the case, the fact must have been stated as of more consequence than several particulars which Crawford does mention regarding his Lordship, and in conformity with the writer’s rule in other cases where marriage had taken place.

In Nisbet’s Heraldry, published in 1722, there is likewise the same silence as to any marriage of the said Earl.

In the Calendar of the House of Lords in 1716 – duplicate in the Advocates’ Library, published by authority – the proceedings on the impeachment of this Earl are stated, abridged from the Journal of the House.  In the whole proceedings, there is no mention made of any application by wife or child for admission to see the attainted Earl, or any reference whatever to the Earl having any such.  This is remarkable, because, during the impeachments of other Lords before the same tribunal, and at the same period, where the party had a wife or children, such applications and references were usual, and the circumstances related; and they were the more to be expected in the present instance, as the Earl sought delay, grounded upon the non-arrival of witnesses and friends from the North.

Factory, dated 21^st, and Recorded in the Books of Council and Session the 27^th January 1716, by George Earle of Wintoune, Lord Seton, Baron of Tranent, in favour of Elizabeth Stevenson, relict of Archibald Pitcairn of that ilk, Doctor of Medicine, which narrates that Forsameikle as our present circumstances does not allow us to be in Scotland for managing our affairs, &c, and contains no reference to family or marriage.  The testing clause is as follows:  In witness whereof, written by Charles Menzies of Kinmundie in Scotland, we have subscribed thir presents, at and within the Tower of London, ye 21^st day of January, 1716 years, &c.  This corroborates the other proof that the fifth Earl was not married.

In Patten’s History of the Rebellion, printed at London, 1717, (p. 130) it is stated that George Seaton, Earl of Winton, made his escape out of the Tower, August 4^th, 1716.

In the Caledonian Mercury, No. 4567, 16^th January 1750, the attainted Earl’s death is announced as follows:  Letters from Rome bring advice that the Earl of Winton, who was condemned to die in 1715, but escaped from the Tower, died there the 30^th of September last, N.S., aged upwards of 70, and was buried in the place set apart for the Protestants.

The fact of the attained Earl having gone to Rome after his escape from the Tower, is established by Lord Orford, who, in speaking of the Pretender, mentions Lord Winton when he (Lord Orford) was at Rome, as forming one of the Pretender’s slender Cabinet.

In Edinburgh Magazine for 1750, the attainted Earl’s death is likewise announced as follows:  December 19, 1749.  At Rome, aged above 70, George Earl of Winton.  His Lordship was engaged in the Rebellion 1715, and surrendered at Preston in Lancashire, on the 14^th November that year, with several Scots and English Lords, &c, to the Generals Carpenter and Wills.  He was brought to London, December 9^th and on the 10^th of January following, was impeached by the Commons of high treason.  On the 19^th, the date appointed for the trial, he pled no guilty, and his trial was put off from time to time, till the 15^th of March when he was brought, and received sentence of death on the 19^th; but he escaped from the Tower soon afterwards, and had lived in foreign parts ever since.

It is to be presumed, that in giving such accounts of the attainted Earl as the above, if he had left lawful issue, or had been married, the facts would naturally have been stated.  In the London Magazine, January 1750, the attainted Earl’s death is announced as follows:  The late Earl of Winton, at Rome, on December 30^th.  He was condemned to die for the Rebellion of 1715; but escaped out of the Tower.

In Sir Robert Douglas’s Peerage of Scotland, published in 1764, it is expressly stated, that the attainted Earl died at Rome, anno 1749, and having no issue, in his ended the male line of George Lord Seaton, eldest son of George second Earl of Winton, and that the male line of Alexander Viscount Kingston, his (George third Earl’s) second son having also failed, the representation of this noble family devolved upon the descendants of Sir John, his (third Earl’s) third son, (Sir John Seaton of Garleton).  N.B.  The second Earl in the above passage should be third; -- the slight numerical difference arising from the circumstances of the second Earl’s Resignation, as already detailed under Branch 1. p. 4.

This statement was made by Douglas only fifteen years subsequent to the attainted Earl’s death, when the facts must have been well known.  The Record by Sir Robert Douglas in all that relates to the Winton family, rests upon far higher and more direct authority than is usually the case with similar works, as is established by the evidence which he gave as a witness, and one of the inquest in the service to be immediately referred to, of Mrs. Mary Seaton or Arrat, youngest daughter of Sir George Seaton second of Garleton, to her eldest brother Sir George Seaton in 1769, being five years after he published his work.  In that service he not only deponed to the propinquity, and that the genealogy mentioned in the brieve and claim is true and authentic.  But Sir Robert gives as his cause scientia that he had in his hands the whole papers of the family of Winton when he wrote his book of the Peerage of Scotland, and examined these; which book he produces to the Jury.

It should be noted that in the Records of the Mason's Lodge in Rome, where George, 5th Earl was a member, it states that the records of the Lodge there were kept by George Seton Winton (his name in exile), Earl of Winton, and preserved and passed on by his widow (c.1799).  There is then, evidence to suggest that the 5th Earl of Winton was indeed married, and likely his second marriage.

Note also: In the in the Chronological Table of the Private and Personal Acts of the Parliament of Great Britain, Part 10 (1727-1736), Acts of the Parliaments of Great Britain, for the year 1736, C.25, Restitution of George Seton: enabling him to sue or maintain any action despite his attainder and to take or inherit any estate.  The 5th Earl of Winton had petitioned from Rome and was given a Restitution by Parliament.