The laird of Luss's last visit to church

Picture credit: Clancolquhoun.com

He’d been known as The Black Cock of the West in his youth but in March 1676 Sir John Colquhoun of Luss (above) was in poor health and, though only in his mid-50s, seems to have sensed his end was nigh. 

As he signed various documents in connection with the sale of his wife’s estate while staying at the house of James Dean at the foot of the Canongate of Edinburgh, he was aware of the rule of Scots Law (since abolished) that documents signed on the grantor’s deathbed were vulnerable to challenge by his heirs. But he also knew the rule that he could not be said to be legally on his deathbed if he was able to go to church so, on the following Sunday, Sir John made a point, despite his exhaustion, of very ostentatiously going to church at the Abbey Kirk of Holyrood. He died about five weeks later without ever returning to church.

Within a year Lady Luss had remarried to Archibald Stirling of Carden and soon after that her and the late Sir John’s son and heir, Sir James Colquhoun, sued Carden to have set aside one of the documents his father had signed before his last visit to church, specifically a bond to Lady Luss for 20,000 merks (about £200,000 today). That money would have to come out of Sir James’ inheritance and he was damned if he was going to see it pocketed by his mother’s new husband.

Sir James’ challenge to the deed was based on the fact that his father’s last visit to church had been altogether too stage managed to prove that he’d not been on his deathbed: specifically, in that it was such a short distance from his host’s house to the Abbey Kirk (about 2-300 yards) and he’d gone in a coach rather than walking as the law required in this context. As his counsel argued:- 

he stumbled in the very short way to the coach, and his Lady and he were in each other's hands; yea, she held him. Though this was but suitable to his quality, to go in coach, and to lead his Lady; yet, at such a time as this, these compliments ought to be omitted and dispensed with.

The judges of the Court of Session agreed that, in these circumstances, Sir John’s last visit to church had not disproved that he was on his deathbed. That being so, his bond to Lady Luss was null and void. But their Lordships were at pains to point out that they were not to be taken as setting the precedent that going to church in a coach should always fail to elide deathbed for, as they put it: 

 one may have gout in the feet and no other distemper.

The Abbey Kirk of Holyrood as it appeared in the reign of James VII. Today it's the roofless ruin next to Holyrood Palace but in 1676 it was still in use as Canongate Parish Church. That year, Charles II appropriated it as his Chapel Royal. It was abandoned at the Revolution and the roof fell in in 1768.

Coming across them in the law reports got me looking into the Colquhouns a bit. One associates them with Luss and Loch Lomond but what I didn't know was that that was not where they originated. Nor did I know that Colquhoun (which in case anyone reading doesn't know is pronounced 'Kuh-HOON') was a place. It's not marked on any modern maps but the Roy Maps, surveyed around 1750, show Mains of Colquhun (sic - 'mains' is the Scottish word for a home farm) just east of Dumbarton Castle:-

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And the first edition of the Ordnance Survey 6 inch map, surveyed in 1860, shows 'The Old House of Colquhoun', which no longer exists, at the north end of the village of Milton about two miles east of Dumbarton:-

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In fact, the Barony of Colquhoun stretched from just east of Dumbarton along the north shore of the Firth of Clyde almost as far as Bowling and for about a mile and a half inland. Around 1240, it was granted by the 3rd Earl of Lennox to one Umfridus de Kilpatrick for the third part of the service of one knight. Umfridus soon started to style himself de Colquhoun. His great great grandson, Sir Robert of Colquhoun, married the heiress of Luss in about 1368 and from then on the family's territorial centre of gravity moved north. They sold Colquhoun in tranches in the 18th century but retain Luss on the west side of Loch Lomond to this day.

The approximate boundaries of the Barony of Colquhoun

The Colquhoun stronghold was Dunglass Castle built on a rock by the edge of the Clyde towards the east end of the barony, pictured below. The fragmentary remains of a late medieval enclosure contain a 17th century house much altered in the 19th century and which once contained interior features by Charles Rennie Mackintosh (since removed elsewhere, I believe). There's also a huge obelisk comemorating steamboat pioneer Henry Bell but since the 1920s the castle has been blighted by having been incorporated in an Esso oil storage depot. That has now been demolished and the site decontaminated and a masterplan has been published for its redevelopment as an industrial park with associated landscaping, walkways and cycle paths etc. amongst which Dunglass Castle will hopefully come back into its own as a focal point heritage feature.

Dunglass Castle with its prominent obelisk to Henry Bell. Picture credit: James Brown

You can read more about the Colquhouns here and their estates here; about Dunglass Castle here and here; and the redevelopment plans here.