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![handle is hein.trials/abag0001 and id is 1 raw text is: HOUSE OF LORDS.
LAUDERDALE PEERAGE CLAIM.
Wednesday, lOth June 1885.
LORDS PRESENT:
THE LORD CHANCELLOR. EARL OF REDESDALE.
EARL OF MAR AND KELLIE. LORD SALTOUN.
EARL OF STRATHMORE AND LORD BORTHWICK.
KINGHORN. LORD BLACKBURN.
EARL OF MILLTOWN. LORD WATSON.
EARL OF PowIs. LORD BRAMWELL.
EARL OF BRADFORD. LORD FITZGERALD.
The EARL OF REDESDALE in the Chair. lothJune]885.
(The Solicitor- General.) My Lords, I appear on behalf of Major Maitland, the
claimant to the Lauderdale peerage ; and I will proceed to state to your Lordships the
facts upon which his claim is founded.
The first Peerage that was granted to the Maitland family, the ancestors of my client,
was granted to Sir James Maitland, who was Chancellor of Scotland, and who was
created, about the year 1590, Lord of' Thirlestane. No letters patent are to be found
creating the peerage, but it was probably created in connexion with the festivities at the
time of the coronation of Queen Anne of Denmark on the 17th of May 1590. The
name of the Chancellor appears at the head of the Commoners, and below the Peers in
1588 ; but in June 1590 it appears at the head of the Peers.
(The Lord Chancellor.) Can you tell us when letters patent appear first to have
come into use in Scotland ?
(The Solicitor- General.) Letters patent were certainly granted in 1616; that appears
in this very case. I cannot tell your Lordships how much earlier than that they were
in use.
(Lord Watson.) I think in the Mar Peerage the noble and learned Lords who advised
the House were of opinion that there must have been letters patent in 1567.
(The Lord Chancellor.) And that they had been lost.
(Lord Watson.) Yes.
(The Solicitor-General.) I need hardly remind your Lordships, because I think it
must be taken now as well settled, that, letters patent not appearing, the limitation must
be taken to have been to heirs male.
(The Lord Chancellor.) That is in the absence of any evidence leading to a contrary
conclusion.
(The Solicitor-General.) Yes, and in this case there is evidence, I think, plainly
showing that the limitation was to heirs male. My Lords, Sir John Maitland, first
Lord Thirlestane, died on the 3rd of October 1595, and he was succeeded by his only
son, who then became John, second Lord Thirlestane. By letters patent of the 2nd of
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