# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mackenzie, John (1727-1789)

1904 Errata appended.
​MACKENZIE, JOHN, Lord Macleod, Count Cromarty in the Swedish peerage (1727–1789), major-general in the British army, born in 1727, was eldest of the twelve children of George, third earl of Cromarty [q. v.], and his wife Isabella, daughter of Sir William Gordon, bart., of Invergordon, and great-grandson of George Mackenzie, viscount Tarbat and earl of Cromarty [q. v.] His education was superintended by his uncle, Robert Dundas of Arnistoun [q. v.], lord president of the court of session, and his three tutors became ministers of the church of Scotland. His father joined the Stuart cause in 1745, and Macleod, who was only eighteen, refused a government commission offered him by Forbes of Culloden and embraced with ardour the side of the rebels. Along with his father he joined the second army at Perth. On 1 Dec. he marched from Perth to Dumblane, after which he took possession of the bridge of Allan. During a visit to Glasgow he was, on 12 Jan. 1746, introduced to Prince Charles Edward, whom he accompanied from Glasgow to the army's headquarters at Stirling. He commanded a regiment of Mackenzies at the battle of Falkirk and in other affairs, and left an interesting narrative of the rising, which is now at Tarbat House, and has been printed in full by Sir William Fraser (Fraser, Earls of Cromartie, vol. ii.) The narrative abruptly ends with a raid into Caithness, on which Macleod was sent by his father early in April 1746. Macleod and his father were captured by some of Lord Sutherland's militia, at Dunrobin Castle, 16 April 1746, and sent first to Inverness and afterwards to the Tower of London. A true bill for high treason was ​found against Macleod 23 Aug. 1746. The brief for the crown against him is in the British Museum (Egerton MS. 2000, f. 67). At his trial, 20 Dec. 1746, Macleod pleaded guilty and threw himself on the king's mercy. He received a free pardon, dated 22 Jan. 1748, on condition that within six months of his attaining his majority he should convey to the crown all his rights and claims to the estates of the earls of Cromarty. This was duly done (Fraser, ii. cclxiii — Cromarty Writs, bundle 30, No. 16). Macleod's father, the Earl of Cromarty, had also been tried by his peers, found guilty of high treason, and sentenced to death and to a forfeiture of his estates, but the capital sentence was remitted on condition of his residing during the remainder of his life within the county of Devon.
Unwilling to be a burden on his family, Macleod left Devonshire privately in April 1749, and proceeded to Hamburg, and thence to Berlin, where he obtained letters of introduction from Marshal Keith [see Keith, James Francis Edward] to the court of Sweden. In a letter dated 16 June (old style), Macleod writes that in a few days he was to obtain a company in the Swedish regiment of Major-general Hamilton, in which he had apparently been serving as a volunteer; that Baron Hamilton, high chancellor of Sweden, his colonel's brother, was his firm friend [see Hamilton, Hugh, d. 1724] and that the king of Sweden had granted him a pension until better provided for (ib. i. cclxiii). On the recommendation of Lord George Murray, the Chevalier St. George, father of Prince Charles Edward, paid the cost of his equipment (ib.) In 1754 he appears to have been serving in Finland, as his Father describes him as frozen up there (ib. i. ccxliv). In April 1755 he was promoted to major in 'an old Swedish regiment' (Brit Mus. Addit. MS. 33055). He afterwards visited Denmark, to see the manoeuvres of the Danish troops. As a volunteer with the Prussian army and aide-de-camp to Marshal Keith, he made the campaign in Bohemia in 1757, and was present at the battle and siege of Prague (ib.) He left a narrative of this campaign, which is printed by Fraser.
When war broke out between Sweden and Prussia, Macleod, by the advice of Keith, went back to Sweden, and soon after obtained leave to visit England; application to enter the British service failed, it is said, through the misjudgment of his uncle, Sir John Gordon. Macleod went back to Sweden. In a letter of 30 Jan. 1762, his father states that Macleod had been made a knight of the Swedish order of the North Star, and expressed gratification at Macleod and his brother George having qualified as freeholders in Ross and Cromarty, and so obtained a footing again in the old country. Macleod rose to the rank of colonel (or by some accounts lieutenant-general) in the Swedish army, and received the title of Count Cromarty.
Returning to England in 1777, during the early part of the American war, Macleod was graciously received by George III, and, partly through the good offices of his cousin, Henry Dundas [see Dundas, Henry, first Viscount Melville], an offer made by him to raise a regiment of highlanders was accepted. His commission as colonel was dated 19 Dec. 1777. In a few weeks a fine body of 840 highlanders was got together, to which were added 236 lowlanders, raised by David (afterwards Sir David) Baird [q. v.] and other officers, and a few English and Irish. The regiment, 1,100 strong, marched to Elgin, and was passed for the service by General Skene in April 1778, and became the 73rd foot. Orders were at once issued for the formation of a second battalion. This was speedily completed, and from being an exile Macleod found himself at the head of a splendid corps of 2,200 of his countrymen, of whom 1,800 were from the neighbourhood in which his family once had its home. Stewart cites it as a remarkable example of the traditional influence of an old and respected name. Macleod embarked for India with the 1st battalion 73rd and other troops early in 1779. In accordance with instructions they occupied the island of Goree, which the French had abandoned for Senegal, and placed a garrison of the 75th and African corps there. They were delayed some months refitting at the Cape, and landed at Madras 20 Jan. 1780. Two days previously the 2nd battalion 73rd, under Macleod's brother George, landed at Gibraltar, as part of Admiral Rodney's relief, and bore a distinguished part in the subsequent defence. On 20 July 1780 tidings reached Madras of the irruption of Hyder Ali into the Carnatic. Three days later Macleod, as senior king's officer, urged on the president of the council the need of military reparations in the event of the rumours proving true. 'What can we do?' was the reply, 'we have no money,' 'but,' it was added, 'we mean to collect an army, and you are to command it.' Troops were then got together at Poonamallee, which Macleod was directed to march to Conjeveram. He remonstrated with the council as to the inadequacy of the force, saying, 'I have always observed that when you despise your enemy, he ends by giving you a d—d rap over the knuckles' (Hook, Life of Baird, i. 17). The ​troops were marched to St. Thomas's Mount, and there encamped. On 25 Aug. Sir Hector Munro [q. v.] arrived from Calcutta, where he had been in command, and took command of the troops, and a movement was made to effect a junction at Conjeveram with the detachment from Guntoor under Colonel William Baillie (d. 1782) [q. v.], which ended in the destruction of Baillie's detachment, and of a small reinforcement, including the flank companies of Macleod's regiment, which Munro sent to its aid. Munro's troops returned to Madras, and their safe return is said to have been due to the skill of Macieod. Soon after their return, Sir Eyre Coote (1726–1783) [q . v.] arrived and assumed the chief command. Macieod, on 12 Dec. 1780, was appointed president of a general court-martial for the trial of Brigadier Stuart. He appears to have had a dispute on some point of military etiquette with Coote, who wrote to him on 16 Aug. 1781, from camp Chaultrie, 'I cannot help expressing my regret that your lordship should have experienced a necessity for coming to the resolution of going home upon the principle your lordship has mentioned' (Fraser, i. cclv). Macieod went home, and in 1783 became a major-general on the British establishment.
After the 71st highlanders, raised in 1776 by Lieutenant-general Simon Fraser [see Faser, Simon, 1726-1782], had been disbanded at the close of the American war, the 73rd or Macleod's highlanders, which had greatly distinguished themselves under Eyre Coote, were renumbered as the 71st. They are now the 1st highland light infantry (late 71st foot), and are not to be confused with a battalion of the 42nd highlanders, which under Colonel (afterwards General) Norman Macieod performed distinguished service at Mangalore and elsewhere in the war with Hyder Ali, and succeeded Macleod's regiment in the position of 73rd foot.
In December 1780, when still in India, Macieod was returned to parliament, amid great local rejoicing, as member for Rossshire. The family estates were restored to him in 1784, on payment of a sum of 19,000l. to relieve the property of certain burdens. He commenced rebuilding Tarbat House, destroyed in 1746, and improving the policies. He died at Edinburgh 2 April 1789, aged 62. He was laid beside his mother in the old churchyard of the Canongate, where is a monument to mother and son. He married in 1786 Margery, eldest daughter of the sixteenth Lord Forbes, but had no issue. His widow married, secondly, John Murray, fourth duke of Atholl. She died in 1842. The Cromarty estates devolved on his cousin Kenneth Mackenzie of Cromartie, son of the Hon. Roderick Mackenzie, second son of the second earl. They now have passed through the female line to the Duke of Sutherland.
George Mackenzie (1741–1787), a younger brother of Lord Macleod, was long an officer of the 1st royal Scots, and commanded the 2nd battalion 73rd at the defence of Gibraltar. After the disbanding of that battalion at Stirling, in October 1783 he was appointed lieutenant-colonel of the surviving battalion, which became the 71st (late 73rd) highlanders. He died at Wallajaoad, 4 June 1787, aged 46. A monument was erected to him in the burying-ground of Fort St. George 'by the officers of his regiment and by his nephew and name-son, George Mackenzie, 75th regiment, who had fought and bled at his side.'
[Burke's Peerages under 'Cromartie,' 'Elibank,' and 'Sutherland;' Douglas's Scottish Peerage (Wood), i. 399 ; Sir William Fraser's Earls of Cromartie, Edinburgh, 1876, 2 vols.; Stewart's Scottish Highlanders, ii. 124–56; Cannon's Hist. Rec. 71st Highland Light Inf.; Mill's Hist, of India, vol. iv. ; Wilks's Sketches of South of India.]
H. M. C.
Dictionary of National Biography, Errata (1904), p.189 N.B.— f.e. stands for from end and l.l. for last line
| Page | Col. | Line | |
| 156 | ii | 3 | Mackenzie, John, Count Cromarty: omit now have |
| | | 4-5 | for the Duke of Sutherland, read Anne, daughter of John Hay Mackenzie and wife of George Granville William Leveson Gower, third Duke of Sutherland, whose second surviving son, Francis (d. 1893), inherited the Cromarty estates with the title of second Earl of Cromartie, being succeeded by the elder of his two daughters. |