More research reading
Dec. 4th, 2021 02:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
luzulaPetticoat Patronage: elite Scotswomen’s roles, identity, and agency in Jacobite political affairs, 1688-1766 by Anita Randell Fairney (2015)
A Ph D thesis. It had a lot of interesting stuff about the roles of women: the political endogamy that led to new generations of Jacobites being brought up; women using the patronage system to save their menfolk who had been sentenced to death or exile, and also saving their estates; women managing estates; women passing information and being active in plotting; women taking roles as patronesses, raising troops, and doing political hosting.
But honestly the coolest thing I learned from it is the central roles played primarily by Anne Drummond, countess of Erroll, and Elizabeth Howard, duchess of Gordon, in the plotting leading up to the failed revolution of 1708.
Just to show how interrelated everyone was, Anne Erroll was:
- the sister of the Duke of Perth who was James III's governor (and was the grandfather of the Duke of Perth in the '45),
- the sister of the Duke of Melfort, close advisor to James II,
- aunt of the Countess Marischal (George and James Keith's mother)
Obviously her son, her parents and her husband (who died in 1704) were also important Jacobites.
Elizabeth Gordon was married to the 1st Duke of Gordon. She was tied to Anne Erroll through another active Jacobite, Mary Gordon, Duchess of Perth, who was sister-in-law to both women. Also Elizabeth's daughter married Anne's nephew.
Anyway, Anne Erroll seems to have been the main manager of the conspiracy on the Scottish end. Daniel Szechi in Britain's Lost Revolution? : Jacobite Scotland and French Grand Strategy, 1701-8 confirms this:
Elizabeth Gordon was, then, an important actor within the Scottish end of the conspiracy. But Anne Erroll was the most important of all. She was, Hooke told Torcy and Chamillart, ‘a lady of about fifty, with a sound, penetrating mind. All the [Jacobites] have confidence in her.’ 153 Because she was well known to be a strongly committed Protestant Anne Erroll enjoyed a deeper, broader level of trust than Elizabeth Gordon within the Jacobite community in Scotland and beyond and she seems to have assumed responsibility for the practical administration of the conspiracy from 1705 onwards. 154 This probably stemmed from her uniquely strong network within the Jacobite underground. For Anne Erroll not only enjoyed high status, as the wife and then widow of one earl of Erroll, High Constable of Scotland, and the mother of the next, but also directly connected with one of the most senior politicians at St Germain: Perth was her brother, and he, too, trusted her implicitly. 155 It was, in consequence, Anne Erroll to whom all the key correspondence was directed for distribution to the rest of the underground. 156
It seems that the important men were either in exile, or being closely watched, and this is one reason why her role became so large. Also she just seems super competent! The Hooke mentioned is a French agent sent to assess the readiness of Scotland to rise. Here's what Anne's brother wrote to her about Hooke: He will take what shape or figure you please, he will follow your direction absolutely, and so you have but to consult your own measures and give him his. Anne was referred to with more than six different code names in correspondence. She also arranged secret signals with a family connection in the Navy so that he would let ships through with messages and goods; she sounded out and negotiated with important men who might join the cause, and kept in contact with Elizabeth Gordon and other women who arranged meetings and hosted spies and agents in Edinburgh. Elizabeth Gordon, growing impatient, wrote directly to one of the French ministers, saying For God's sake! What are you thinking of? Is it possible that, having ventured all our zeal, we have neither assistance nor answer?
The repercussions of the plotting in 1708 ended with 20-30 Scottish noblement being arrested, but none of the women! Apparently they were not suspected at all.
Well, this may not be directly relevant to the story I'm writing, but it was very interesting nevertheless! Competent middle-aged women FTW. Would read a novel about Anne Erroll.
A Ph D thesis. It had a lot of interesting stuff about the roles of women: the political endogamy that led to new generations of Jacobites being brought up; women using the patronage system to save their menfolk who had been sentenced to death or exile, and also saving their estates; women managing estates; women passing information and being active in plotting; women taking roles as patronesses, raising troops, and doing political hosting.
But honestly the coolest thing I learned from it is the central roles played primarily by Anne Drummond, countess of Erroll, and Elizabeth Howard, duchess of Gordon, in the plotting leading up to the failed revolution of 1708.
Just to show how interrelated everyone was, Anne Erroll was:
- the sister of the Duke of Perth who was James III's governor (and was the grandfather of the Duke of Perth in the '45),
- the sister of the Duke of Melfort, close advisor to James II,
- aunt of the Countess Marischal (George and James Keith's mother)
Obviously her son, her parents and her husband (who died in 1704) were also important Jacobites.
Elizabeth Gordon was married to the 1st Duke of Gordon. She was tied to Anne Erroll through another active Jacobite, Mary Gordon, Duchess of Perth, who was sister-in-law to both women. Also Elizabeth's daughter married Anne's nephew.
Anyway, Anne Erroll seems to have been the main manager of the conspiracy on the Scottish end. Daniel Szechi in Britain's Lost Revolution? : Jacobite Scotland and French Grand Strategy, 1701-8 confirms this:
Elizabeth Gordon was, then, an important actor within the Scottish end of the conspiracy. But Anne Erroll was the most important of all. She was, Hooke told Torcy and Chamillart, ‘a lady of about fifty, with a sound, penetrating mind. All the [Jacobites] have confidence in her.’ 153 Because she was well known to be a strongly committed Protestant Anne Erroll enjoyed a deeper, broader level of trust than Elizabeth Gordon within the Jacobite community in Scotland and beyond and she seems to have assumed responsibility for the practical administration of the conspiracy from 1705 onwards. 154 This probably stemmed from her uniquely strong network within the Jacobite underground. For Anne Erroll not only enjoyed high status, as the wife and then widow of one earl of Erroll, High Constable of Scotland, and the mother of the next, but also directly connected with one of the most senior politicians at St Germain: Perth was her brother, and he, too, trusted her implicitly. 155 It was, in consequence, Anne Erroll to whom all the key correspondence was directed for distribution to the rest of the underground. 156
It seems that the important men were either in exile, or being closely watched, and this is one reason why her role became so large. Also she just seems super competent! The Hooke mentioned is a French agent sent to assess the readiness of Scotland to rise. Here's what Anne's brother wrote to her about Hooke: He will take what shape or figure you please, he will follow your direction absolutely, and so you have but to consult your own measures and give him his. Anne was referred to with more than six different code names in correspondence. She also arranged secret signals with a family connection in the Navy so that he would let ships through with messages and goods; she sounded out and negotiated with important men who might join the cause, and kept in contact with Elizabeth Gordon and other women who arranged meetings and hosted spies and agents in Edinburgh. Elizabeth Gordon, growing impatient, wrote directly to one of the French ministers, saying For God's sake! What are you thinking of? Is it possible that, having ventured all our zeal, we have neither assistance nor answer?
The repercussions of the plotting in 1708 ended with 20-30 Scottish noblement being arrested, but none of the women! Apparently they were not suspected at all.
Well, this may not be directly relevant to the story I'm writing, but it was very interesting nevertheless! Competent middle-aged women FTW. Would read a novel about Anne Erroll.
(no subject)
Date: 2021-12-04 07:43 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2021-12-05 06:05 pm (UTC)Yes, I seem to be on a roll with the research reading. : ) The more I read, the more my to-read list grows, because of the references I come across... Although I did skim a bit and not read this entire thesis in detail.
(no subject)
Date: 2021-12-05 08:02 pm (UTC)The more I read, the more my to-read list grows, because of the references I come across...
Argh, I know that feeling! May the research continue to go both well and at manageable scale. :)
(no subject)
Date: 2022-01-04 02:50 pm (UTC)The repercussions of the plotting in 1708 ended with 20-30 Scottish noblement being arrested, but none of the women! Apparently they were not suspected at all.
Hah! I have an Oz story in which the rulers and power-brokers of Oz (which if you know your Oz canon, runs heavily toward women), side-eye European history hard for its tendency to overlook women's contributions to revolutionary plotting. Seems like this is yet another case!
Thank you for the nutshell summary of Anne Erroll's doings -- she does sound fascinating!
(no subject)
Date: 2022-01-04 08:59 pm (UTC)My research reading is interrupted by Yuletide reading at the moment, but I have some books/articles lined up after that. All the reading about female Jacobites is for a longfic I'm currently working on where Ewen and Alison get married in Edinburgh and then Alison follows the army, with eventual Keith/Ewen/Alison.
(no subject)
Date: 2022-01-04 09:07 pm (UTC)