Margaret Hartsyde

Margaret Hartsyde (fl. 1600–1640) was a Scottish servant, jewel thief, and landowner. A servant of the queen, Anne of Denmark, Hartsyde's duties included looking after the queen's jewels, dealing with the jeweller George Heriot, and handling large sums of money.[1]

Servant of a queen

Margaret Hartsyde was a daughter of Malcolm Hartsyde of Kirkwall, Orkney.[2] She is first recorded as one of the serving women in Anne of Denmark's chamber in 1601.[3] She came with the queen to England in 1603. When the court was at Winchester in September 1603 the queen ordered fabrics for new clothes for Hartsyde and other women who had made the journey from Scotland, including Anne Livingstone, Margaret Stewart, and Jean Drummond.[4] She subsequently married another royal servant called John Buchanan.

One of her letters to Sir William Livingstone of Kilsyth described how Anne of Denmark was surprised by his leaving the court, and had expected him to deliver a jewel to her which he ought to send to queen as soon as possible. She was hoping to buy a house in Libberton in Lanarkshire with her husband.[5]

Hartsyde handled large sums of money, and in 1606 paid the goldsmith George Heriot £500 towards the queen's bill for jewels. In 1607 Heriot gave Hartsyde a ring worth £30 for the queen, and wrote in his account that she had told him the purchase was "by her Majesty's direction", evidence that Hartsyde was trusted with the queen's business.[6]

Theft and trial

Margaret stole jewels from Anne in London and attempted to sell them back to George Heriot. She was sent for trial in Edinburgh and convicted of "unlawful subracting and detening" in June 1608, even though she had signed a confession. She was not sentenced to death but banishment to Orkney was proposed. John Buchanan was found not guilty. The king's advocate Thomas Hamilton wrote to James VI saying that Hartsyde had the best lawyers in Edinburgh on her side, and thought that in clearing her of a charge of "theft", the assize had "very far mistaken their duty." He recommended the king order her "to be declared infamous in all time coming" as "a restraint and terror to all other servants."[7]

Anne of Denmark had hoped she would be convicted and condemned by the laws of Scotland and wrote to Lord Balmerino expressing her disappointment.[8] The jewels, it was claimed, had been a gift from the queen. It was rumoured that Margaret had been indiscreet with the queen's secrets, revealing what a "wise chambermaid" would not have done.[9][10][11][12] King James wrote to lawyers in Edinburgh querying their judgement, calling them "pettyfoggeris", and ordered the Privy Council to interview anyone who had set their hands to the case. A second hearing in Linlithgow pronounced her guilty of an "infamous" crime against the royal persons, and she was imprisoned in Blackness Castle.[13]

Hartsyde and Buchanan went to Orkney and paid £400 sterling for the value of the jewels. In March 1618 the King, by Anne of Denmark's intercession, gave John Buchanan freedom to travel in Scotland, and freedom to travel anywhere in the kingdom was granted to Margaret and John on 15 March 1619.[14] Eventually in 1619, James declared Margaret Hartsyde innocent, saying she had been "by the sinisterous information of certain of her unfrendis for the tyme, pursued criminallie".[15] The legal process against her was held to deleted and the Justice Clerk would not issues extracts of it.[16]

Orkney and Fife

John Buchanan was made Chamberlain of Orkney and Shetland in May 1622, and was keeper of Birsay Palace, Newhouse on Orkney, Scalloway Castle, and the house at Sumburgh Ness in Shetland.[17] There were two competitors for this office, Robert Monteith and Sir Robert Maxwell.[18] Buchanan presided on the trials at Kirkwall of Marable Couper of the Northside of Birsay and Annie Taylor for witchcraft in 1624.[19]

By 1624, Buchanan became "Sir John Buchanan of Scotscraig". Scotscraig was near Tayport, Fife. John Lauder, Lord Fountainhall saw their initials "SJB" and "DMH" for Dame Margaret Hartsyde, carved on the windows of the house at Scotscraig in 1671.[20] In 1628 their daughter, Margaret Buchanan, married Arthur Erskine (d. 1651), a son of Marie Stewart, Countess of Mar.[21]

The date of Margaret Hartsyde's death is unknown.

Dorothy Silken, Piero Hugon, Danish Anna, and Jacob Kroger

Hartsyde's successor in the role of looking after the queen's silver in the bedchamber, was the Danish gentlewoman Dorothy Silken or Silking. She married Sir Edward Zouch of Woking in 1612. After an inventory of plate at Denmark House was made in 1621 they were asked to supply a shortfall worth £493, including a gold casting bottle with the queen's arms. Zouch successfully claimed that a warrant signed by his wife was forgery, because she could not write her name.[22]

After Anne of Denmark's funeral in May 1619, two of her servants were accused of theft, her French page Piero or Pierre Hugon and a Danish maiden of honour called Anna. Piero had been "her creature and favourite", and according to a letter describing the queen's last days, "Pira, and the Dutch woman that serves her" had been her closest attendants, excluding other courtiers.[23] Anna was probably "Anna Kaas" who served the queen since her first days in Scotland.[24] Hugon was a trusted courtier who travelled to the Danish court for Anne in 1618.[25]

Anne of Denmark had lost jewelry to thieves before. When she came to Scotland in 1590 she brought a German goldsmith called Jacob Kroger. In 1594 Kroger stole some of her jewels and fled to England with a French stable servant called Guillaume Martyn. They were captured by George Selby, imprisoned in Tynemouth Castle, returned to Edinburgh and executed.[26]

References
  1. Archibald Constable, Memoirs of George Heriot (Edinburgh, 1822), pp. 207-209.
  2. Walter Bell, 'Armorial Stone at Carrick House', PSAS (1908), p.239
  3. National Records of Scotland GD16/31/6.
  4. Jemma Field, Anna of Denmark: Material and Visual Culture of the Stuart Courts (Manchester, 2020), pp. 123, 146 fn. 21.
  5. Archibald Constable, Memoirs of George Heriot (Edinburgh, 1822), pp. 207-209.
  6. Archibald Constable, Memoirs of George Heriot (Edinburgh, 1822), pp. 205, 207-8.
  7. Melros Papers, vol. 1 (edinburgh, 1837), pp. 49-51.
  8. HMC 9th Report (Lord Elpinstone), part 2 (London, 1884), p. 105 (now National Records of Scotland).
  9. Robert Pitcairn, Ancient Criminal Trials in Scotland, vol. 2 (Edinburgh, 1833), pp. 544-557.
  10. William Fraser, Haddington vol. 1 (Edinburgh, 1889), pp. 101-2.
  11. Archibald Constable, Memoirs of George Heriot (Edinburgh, 1823), 208-9.
  12. James Balfour, Annals: The Historical Works of James Balfour, vol. 2 (Edinburgh, 1824), p. 26.
  13. David Masson, Register of the Privy Council, 1607 -1610, vol. 8 (Edinburgh, 1887), pp. 79-80, 516-7.
  14. Register of the Privy Council of Scotland, vol. 11 (Edinburgh, 1894), p. 350, 549 & fn.
  15. James Maidment, Letters and State Papers of the Reign of James VI (Edinburgh, 1838), pp. 147-8.
  16. State Papers and Miscellaneous Correspondence of Thomas, Earl of Melros vol. 1 (Edinburgh, 1837), p. 344.
  17. Register of the Privy Council of Scotland, vol. 12 (Edinburgh, 1895), p. 715: The Melros Papers, vol. 2 (Edinburgh, 1837), p. 553-4.
  18. HMC Mar & Kellie, vol. 1 (London, 1904), p. 109.
  19. P. Hume Brown, Register of the Privy Council of Scotland: 1554-1660, 2nd series vol. 8 (Edinburgh, 1908), p. 355-364: Miscellany of the Abbotsford Club, vol. (Edinburgh, 1837), pp. 135-142
  20. Donald Crawford, Journals of Lauder of Fountainhall (SHS: Edinburgh, 1900), p. 207.
  21. Francis Grant, Parish of Holyroodhouse of Canongate: Marriages 1564-1800 (Edinburgh, 1915), p. 603.
  22. A. J. Collins, Jewels and Plate of Queen Elizabeth (London, 1955), pp. 149, 306.
  23. Miscellany of the Abbotsford Club, vol. 1 (Edinburgh, 1837), p. 81
  24. Calendar State Papers Scotland: 1589-1593, vol. 10 (Edinburgh, 1936), p. 373.
  25. Acts of the Privy Council: 1618-1619 (London, 1929), p. 57.
  26. HMC 6th Report: Northumberland (London, 1877), p. 232.
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