Bothwell
NAME: Bothwell, James Hepburn, 4th earl of
ACHIEVEMENT(S): Arranged murder of Mary Queen of Scots’ husband Darnley.
NICKNAME/ALIAS: Duke of Orkney and Shetland
DATE/PLACE OF BIRTH: 1535 (?), in Scotland
DATE/PLACE/AGE AT DEATH: 4 April 1578, at Dragsholm, Sjaelland, Denmark. Aged around 43
DISCIPLINE: Aristocrat
FIELD: Politics
LANGUAGE: English
PARENTS: Patrick Hepburn, 3rd Earl of Bothwell (1512-56) and Agnes Sinclair
SIBLINGS: Lady Janet
SPOUSE: Lady Jean Gordon, married 1566-67; Mary, Queen of Scots, married
1567-70
CHILDREN: No legitimate issue
EDUCATION: At Spynie Castle
MAJOR WORK: None
LIFE AND TIMES: In June 1560 Mary of Guise, Regent of Scotland, sent Bothwell on a mission to France to raise troops and money for the Catholic cause. However, hearing she had died, Bothwell instead travelled to Denmark, where at Copenhagen he seduced a young Norwegian noblewoman, Anna Throndsend (whom he later abandoned in poverty in the Netherlands), and was well received by the King of Denmark.
Bothwell arrived in Paris in September 1560, where he was appointed by the French king, Charles IX, as a Gentleman of the Chamber and first met the newly-widowed 18-year-old Mary Queen of Scots*. He immediately won Mary's favor, and before his return to Edinburgh in February 1561 was appointed as commissioner for several of her Scottish estates.
Mary returned to Scotland the following August, and immediately took control of the government, selecting Bothwell as one of the members of her new Privy Council. Bothwell was constantly in trouble during this period because of a long-standing feud with another Privy Councillor, the powerful Protestant Lord James Hamilton, third Earl of Arran.
In March 1562 Bothwell asked the Protestant reformer Knox* to mediate between them. Arran then accused Bothwell of trying to persuade him to kidnap and forcibly marry the Queen, and for a short time both men were imprisoned as conspirators in Edinburgh Castle.
Some time in December 1562, Bothwell managed to escape for France, but the ship was forced by a storm to put in to Holy Island, and Bothwell ended up in the Tower of London until in September 1564, when a letter from Mary had him released. Mary recalled him to Scotland and became increasingly dependent on his support. On 24 February 1566, Bothwell married the sister of the Earl of Huntly.
A fortnight later both he and Huntly were present at Holyrood Palace, Edinburgh on the night of the brutal murder of the Queen's secretary David Riccio (9 March), but took no
part in it. Bothwell managed to evade Morton, Darnley and their co-conspirators, and then met Mary and Darnley (who had abandoned his allies) later that night at Dunbar Castle.
During the winter of 1566-67 it appears that Mary and Bothwell became lovers and it
seems fairly certain that by early 1567 the Queen knew she was pregnant by Bothwell, and probably also that it had been decided by him and a group of other prominent lords that Darnley had to be removed.
In February 1567, after a brief "reconciliation" with Mary, Darnley was taken by her to convalesce from a recent illness at a small mansion at Kirk o'Field, near Edinburgh, which was then, on the night of 9 February, blown up with gunpowder and Darnley murdered while trying to escape.
Public opinion immediately accused Bothwell of perpetrating the crime with Mary's complicity, but Bothwell was formally acquitted at an obviously rigged trial (12 April), and his position at court was then enhanced by the grant of more lands. About ten days later (23 April), Bothwell intercepted the Queen on her way from Stirling to Edinburgh and carried her off to Dunbar Castle, where they then lived as man and wife.
Early in May, Bothwell was granted a divorce from his wife by Archbishop John Hamilton*, on 14 May Mary made him Duke of Orkney and Shetland, and on 15 May they were married by Protestant rites in the chapel at Holyrood Palace.
This highly unpopular act provoked a fatal alliance between the Catholic and Protestant lords.
Mary and Bothwell were warned that an attempt would be made to arrest them, and
they fled first to Borthwick Castle and then on to Dunbar. On 15 June 1567 the Queen's forces met the rebels at Carberry Hill near Edinburgh. Mary surrendered on the condition that Bothwell be allowed to escape. While she was paraded as a prisoner through the streets of Edinburgh, he rode first to Dunbar, and then sought refuge at the home of his old friend, the Bishop of Moray, at Spynie.
After a few days, Bothwell decided to head north, first to the islands of Orkney and Shetland, then to the coast of Norway, where he had the misfortune to meet relatives of
Anna Throndsen, his abandoned former mistress.
They combined to have his two ships and 140 men captured and taken, first to Bergen in September 1567, and then to Copenhagen, where the Danish King Frederick II held him at Copenhagen Castle.
At Bergen, Bothwell was visited by French ambassador Charles de Dancay*, who undertook to pass news of Bothwell's situation to Charles IX of France. However, as his usefulness decreased, the Danes hardened towards Bothwell, and in January 1568 he was put in Malmoe Castle prison, in Sweden. In September 1570 his marriage to Queen Mary was annulled and, now Mary's cause was clearly completely lost, he was treated with less care and respect by the Danish king.
In June 1573 he was finally removed to Dragsholm Castle in Zeeland, Denmark, to a much harsher and more secure prison, where he was kept in solitary confinement. Here, he was apparently driven insane by the terrible conditions and the hopelessness of his situation, and died.
He was buried in Faareveile Church, where his disinterred remains are publicly displayed.
ASSESSMENT: Murderous lover, the husband of Mary Queen of Scots, he came to a bad end.
EXTRA CONNECTIONS:
ONELINER: James Bothwell, husband of Mary Queen of Scots
BIBLIOGRAPHY: DNB, EB
Gore-Brown, Robert, Lord Bothwell, London: Collins, 1937
Fraser, Antonia, Mary Queen of Scots, Weidenfeld & Nicolson: London, 1969