# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Stewart, Andrew (fl.1548-1593)

​STEWART, ANDREW, second Lord Ochiltree (fl. 1548–1593), son of Andrew, third lord Avandale and first lord Ochiltree [see under Stewart, Andrew, (first) Lord Avandale], by Margaret Hamilton, only child of James, first earl of Arran, succeeded his father in 1548. On 27 Oct. 1549 he received a grant of the lands of Pennymore, Ayrshire (Reg. Mag. Sig. Scot. 1546–80, No. 387), and on 31 Jan. 1556–7 the lands of Barloch-hill, &c. (ib. No. 1150). He was one of the lords who in May 1559 came to the relief of the protestants at Perth (Knox, i. 340), and on the last day of May subscribed the band in defence of the ‘Congregation’ (ib. p. 345). He was one of the commissioners sent in July 1559 by the lords of the congregation to arrange terms with the queen regent (ib. p. 367), and he also signed the letter of remonstrance sent to the queen regent in September against the fortification of Leith (ib. p. 414). When the lords of the congregation resolved at the close of 1559 to leave Edinburgh, Ochiltree joined the division which occupied Glasgow and the surrounding districts (ib. ii. 38). He subscribed the contract between Elizabeth and the lords of the congregation, 10 May 1560 (ib. p. 53), and shortly afterwards he, with his followers, joined at Prestonpans the English army sent to the assistance of the protestants (ib. p. 58). He signed the band for defending the ‘liberty of the Evangel’ and for the expulsion of the French from Scotland (ib. p. 63), and his name also appears among the subscribers to the book of discipline, 27 Jan. 1560–1 (ib. p. 129). Ochiltree accompanied Knox to Holyrood when in 1563 he went to answer to the queen for railing in his sermon against her proposed marriage to a papist (ib. p. 387), and alone bore him company in the outer chamber after the interview (ib. p. 389). He joined in the rebellion of Moray against the queen on her marriage to Darnley in 1565, and on 6 Sept. was cited to present himself before the king and queen within six days (Reg. P. C. Scot. i. 365). Failing to do so, he was on 1 Dec. declared guilty of lèse majesté (ib. p. 409). He supported the lords who conspired against Riccio, and also took an active part against the queen after the murder of Darnley. He subscribed the acts of the assembly in July 1567, in which the murder and popery met with the same condemnation (Knox, ii. 565), and attended the king's coronation on the 29th of the same month (Reg. P. C. Scotl. i. 537). At the battle of Langside, 13 May 1568, he fought against the queen and was wounded by Lord Herries (Calderwood, History, ii. 416). Consistent in his opposition to the queen, he voted against her divorce from Bothwell in 1569 (Reg. P. C. Scotl. ii. 8), and he was one of the nobles who carried the body of the Regent Moray from Holyrood to St. Giles's church (Randolph to Cecil, 22 Feb. 1569–70, in Knox's Works, vi. 571).
After the death of the Earl of Moray, Ochiltree ceased to take a prominent part in politics; but he was one of the new privy council chosen after Morton's return to power in July 1578 (Moysie, Memoirs, p. 12). It is probable, however, that he was no special friend of Morton's, for it was his son, Captain James Stewart (afterwards Earl of Arran) [q. v.], who in 1580 accused Morton of the murder of Darnley. On 18 March 1579–80 Ochiltree and his son James received a grant of the lands of Bothwellmuir and of Easter and Wester Moffat (Reg. Mag. Sig. Scot. 1546–80, No. 2983). On the slaughter of Ochiltree's son, Sir William, by the Earl of Bothwell in 1588, Ochiltree followed Bothwell persistently from place to place, but did not succeed in capturing him (Moysie, Memoirs, p. 69). In 1592 Ochiltree agreed to mediate between Huntly and Moray [see Stewart, James, second Earl of Moray], who was a partisan of Bothwell, and at his instance Moray came to Donibristle, ​Fifeshire, where he was treacherously slain by Huntly (ib. pp. 88). Ochiltree made strenuous efforts to be revenged on Huntly for his treachery (ib. passim); and in order to achieve his purpose entered into communication with Bothwell and shared in the plot for introducing him to the king in Holyrood (Melville, Memoirs, p. 407; Calderwood, v. 256). That the second Lord Ochiltree should have favoured the slayer of his son is improbable, and the most plausible supposition would be that the Lord Ochiltree who did so was the third lord, who was merely the nephew of the slain man, but the second lord was certainly alive until 26 Dec. 1593 (Reg. Mag. Sig. Scot. 1593–1608, No. 33). Probably, therefore, it was this same second lord who in the spring of 1594, with Bothwell and the laird of Spot, had a secret meeting, at which they agreed to convene with their forces on 2 April at Dalkeith, and thence proceed to the highlands to join Atholl and Montrose in an attack on Huntly (Moysie, p. 113). Their purpose having leaked out, it was frustrated by stopping the boats from sailing to transport the forces across the Firth of Forth, and after encountering and defeating a strong force under Lord Home, they passed south to Kelso and thence into England (ib. pp. 115–16). On 26 May Ochiltree was denounced for not appearing to answer for his treasonable attempts (Reg. P. C. Scotl. iv. 144); but in the beginning of 1595 the king, who, says Moysie, ‘had great favour and liking for the Lord Ochiltree,’ induced him to separate himself from Bothwell, and on coming to the king he received a full pardon for all past offences (Moysie, p. 122). Lord Ochiltree was in 1598 appointed lieutenant on the borders, and remained for four or five months at Dumfries, holding courts and pacifying the country (ib. p. 136). He died some time before 21 March 1601–2 (Reg. Mag. Sig. Scot. 1593–1608, No. 1159). By his wife Agnes, daughter of John Cunningham of Caprington, he had five sons and two daughters: Andrew, master of Ochiltree, who died in 1578; Captain James of Bothwellmuir, afterwards Earl of Arran [q. v.]; Sir William of Monkton (d. 1588) [q. v.]; Sir Henry of Nether Gogar; Robert of Wester Braco; Isabel, married to Thomas Kennedy of Bargeny; and Margaret, who was the second wife of John Knox the reformer, and afterwards married Sir Andrew Ker of Faldonside. He was succeeded in the peerage by his grandson Andrew, who was gentleman of the bedchamber to James VI, and governor of Edinburgh Castle, and who in 1615 resigned his title to Sir James Stewart of Killeith, eldest son of James, earl of Arran; Andrew Stewart was subsequently, on 7 Nov. 1619, created Baron Castle Stewart in the peerage of Ireland, and he died in 1632.
[Reg. P.C. Scotl. vols. i–v.; Reg. Mag. Sig. Scot. 1546–80, 1580–93, 1593–1608; Knox's Works; Histories by Calderwood and Spottiswoode; David Moysie's Memoirs and Sir James Melville's Memoirs in the Bannatyne Club; Douglas's Scottish Peerage, ed. Wood.]
T. F. H.