Chapter XXI: The Commendator
The revenues were secularised, and were successively gifted, as we shall see, to more than one individual. [8] One moiety of the possessions of the Abbey was rescued from the. spoiler and applied to a noble purpose. The Altarages of St. Mirin, St. Columba, St. Ninian, St. Mary the Virgin, St. Nicholas, St. Peter, St. Catherine, St. Anne, the chapel of St. Rocques and the seven roods of land or thereby belonging and adjacent to the said chapel, with the pittances of money, obit silver, and commons formerly possessed and lifted by the monks of the Monastery of Paisley, were gifted by King James VI. to the Burgh for the erection and support of a Grammar School and its teacher. [9] The charter setting forth the benefaction thus expresses its worthy object—“that the youth may be instructed in good morals, and the knowledge of letters and virtue, and may be qualified not only for serving God in the ministry of the Word, but also for being able and useful members of the community.” This was the origin of the Grammar School of Paisley, which has been so serviceable to successive generations. Its endowment is the only feature which is in any way pleasant in the story of the spoliation and overthrow of the Monastery. Everything else connected with it is cruel and unjust.
When the last Abbot, on his promotion to a Bishopric, made over the Abbey to his nephew, Claud Hamilton, in commendam, it was probably his intention that the youth, when he came of age, should take orders, and become Abbot in reality. This had been the case with himself, and he intended it should be so with his nephew. The circumstances of the time prevented this, and Claud Hamilton probably lived and died a layman, or at least was only in some of the minor orders. But though he never wore the mitre of the Abbey, he was styled its Abbot, and had a very firm hold of its revenues, which he regarded as his own. [10] During the troublous times that preceded his uncle's death, “stern Claud” took a leading part on the side of Queen Mary ; and after the battle of Langsyde, his estates were forfeited, and he himself declared a traitor. [11] The Abbey and its possessions were then given to Lord Sempill, [12] who had fought on the side of the Regent, and whose great ambition seems to have been to become proprietor of the estates of which his family were hereditary bailies. After the execution of the Archbishop, Claud led a wandering life. He was one of the leaders in the surprise of Stirling. [13] He and his followers rushed through the streets of the town “crying this slogane, Ane Hamilton, God, and the Queen ! think on the Bishop of St. Androis.” [14] The object seems to have been instigated by a desire to revenge the death of the prelate, to whom Claud was much attached. This object was so far attained : the Regent, in the confusion, was foully murdered, being shot through the back by a Captain Calder, who afterwards confessed that he had received his orders from the Lord of Paisley. [15] Scotland was now divided into factions, and the name of Claud Hamilton appears among the leading spirits of the time. Vowing vengeance against Sempill, he came to the neighbourhood of Paisley [16] to dispossess, if possible, the usurper of his rights; and “as Lord Sempill was, upon the 10th July, 1572, passing forth to berreft some puir tenants, Lord Claud set upon him, chasit him back, slew forty-twa of his soldiers, tuik fyfteen of them prisoners, and than after layd men about the house sa lang till a greter power was come furth of another part to rescue Lord Sempill.”
[17]
[8] In 1567, Beatrice Livingstone complains to the Privy Council that her pension of 40 marks yerlie, out of the thirds of Paslay, had not been regularly paid her by Michael Chisholm, the collector.—Reg. Priv. Council Act, 1567.
[9] This charter is given at length by Mr. Brown, in his “History of the Paisley Grammar School,” a very interesting and accurate work. Mr. Brown supposes, I think with reason, that the town was indebted for this gift to the good offices of Mr. Adamson, the first Protestant minister in Paisley.
[10] He was infeft in the temporalities on 29th July, 1567.
[11] Acts of Par., 18th Aug., 1568.
[12] Privy Seal Reg., xxxvii., 84.
[13] 4th Sept., 1571.
[14] Bannatyne Memorials.
[15] Sir J. Melville's Memoirs, p. 242.
[16] Hist. of King James VI., p. 113, 1572.
[17] Ibid.