Soldier and Commissioner
for Scotland
Unusually for a future earl Middleton's origins were obscure
and probably humble He first appears as a pikeman in the
regiment raised in 1632-3 by Sir John Hepburn for service
in France. Having presumably fought in Lorraine, he returned
t o Scotland (1639) in the Covenanting army under Alexander
and David Leslie. From colonel he rose to lieutenant general
and second in-command at Philiphaugh (1645) after which
he negotiated the surrender of Montrose. Under the Engagement
he at last found himself on the Royalist side and during
the 1648 invasion of England commanded the cavalry at the
Battle of Preston. After the further defeat of the Engagers
at Dunbar Middleton held out in the Highlands (1650) and
it was in an attempt to join him that Charles II briefly
eluded his Covenanting hosts and escaped up Glen Clova,
an incident known as 'The Start'. Under the 1650 Resolution
Middleton received an amnesty and fought at Worcester where
he was captured and sent to the Tower of London He escaped
to France and in 1653-4 briefly commanded a Royalist rising
in the Highlands under the Earl of Glencairn as Charles
II's commander-in-chief, it collapsed after a skirmish at
Dalnaspidal on the Drumochter Pass. He returned to the court-in-exile,
was created earl (1656) and, at the Restoration, Royal Commissioner
to the Scottish Parliament. 'an appointment which incurred
aristocratic jealousy' (G Donaldson). Middleton fanned this
jealousy by falling out with John Maitland, Earl of Lauderdale,
and by supporting the reimposition of episcopacy. Deprived
of office in 1663, he ended his days as Governor of Tangier.
- Encyclopaedia of Scotland',
edited by John & Julia Keay
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