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Morgan, who usually bore the name of Hilton, to whom Lady Nithisdale dispatched a messenger, begging her to come immediately. "Their surprise and astonishment," remarks Lady Nithisdale, speaking of these, her two confidantes, "made them consent, without ever thinking of the consequences." The scheme was, that Mrs. Mills, who was tall and portly, should pass for Lord Nithisdale; Mrs.
He was served heir male, and of line male and entail of his father, on the twenty-sixth of May, 1696; and heir male of his grandfather, the Earl of Nithisdale, on the sixteenth of the same month. At his accession to his title, the Earl of Nithisdale possessed no common advantages of fortune and station.
This sudden announcement, which a less sagacious mind might have deemed injudicious, had the effect which Lady Nithisdale expected; the undertaking was one of such risk, that it could only be an enterprise of impulse, except to her whose affections were deeply interested in the result. The consent of Mrs. Mills was carried by storm, as well as that of another coadjutor, a Mrs.
Lord Kenmure, attended by the Jacobite chiefs, and Lord Nithisdale, soon quitted the town of Lochmaben; and proceeding to Ecclefechan, and thence marching to Langholme, reached Hawick on the fifteenth of September, and determined on proceeding from that place into Teviotdale.
The disorder spread fast. In Ayrshire, Clydesdale, Nithisdale, Annandale, every parish was visited by these turbulent zealots. About two hundred curates so the episcopal parish priests were called were expelled.
Trained bands were, however, soon raised by the well-affected gentry of the county for the protection of the neighbourhood; and Nithisdale was traversed by armed bands, Closeburn House, then the residence of Sir Thomas Kirkpatrick, being a frequent point of union for the friends of the Hanoverian interests to assemble.
These meetings had been continued for several years, and, during the reign of Queen Anne, without any molestation from Government. Lord Nithisdale took a decided part in all these measures, and was one of those who were considered as entirely to be trusted by the Earl of Mar, with regard to the projected arrival of the Pretender in Scotland.
The title of Nithisdale, except for the attainder, would have descended upon the next heir, Mr. Maxwell of Carruchan. Secret History of Colonel Hooke's Negotiations, by himself, p. 175. London, 1740. Patten's History of the Rebellion, of 1715, p. 234. Service of the Earl of Eglintoun, as heir male of the Earl of Wintoun. Printed for the family. Extract from "Peerage Law by Riddell," p. 201.
Amid the cries of a savage populace, and the screams of "No warming pan," "King George for ever!" an exclamation which proves how deeply the notion of spurious birth had sunk into the minds of the people, the Earl of Nithisdale was conducted, his arms tied with cords, and the reins of his horse taken from him, with his unfortunate companions, into the Tower.
In 1647, in consequence of failure of the direct line, the title and estates of the Nithisdale family devolved on a kinsman, John Lord Herries, whose grandson, William, the subject of this memoir, proved to be the last of the Maxwell family that has ever enjoyed the Earldom.
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