page_title: James Stewart, 1st Earl of Moray
section_title: Assassination
hierarchical_section_title: James Stewart, 1st Earl of Moray / Assassination
caption_attribution_description: English: Stained-glass window depicting the assassination of the Regent Moray in Linlithgow High Street in 1570, believed to be the earliest recorded assassination involving a firearm. The window was financed by the 14th earl of Moray as part of a Victorian restoration in the 1880s
context_page_description: James Stewart, 1st Earl of Moray, a member of the House of Stewart as the illegitimate son of King James V, was the Regent of Scotland for his half-nephew, the infant King James VI. He was the first head of government to be assassinated by a firearm.
context_section_description: On Thursday 19 January 1570 Moray was at Stirling Castle where he had invited the English diplomat Sir Henry Gates and the soldier Sir William Drury, Marshal of Berwick, for dinner in the Great Hall. Later in his bedchamber he told the English visitors he would meet them and certain Scottish nobles at Edinburgh on Monday or Tuesday to discuss the rendition of English rebels. Moray was troubled by the problem of Dumbarton Castle, which was held against him by supporters of Mary, Queen of Scots. On 21 January, he sent letters to summon the Earl of Morton, Lindsay and Home to the meeting in Edinburgh.
  Moray was assassinated in Linlithgow on 23 January 1570 by James Hamilton of Bothwellhaugh, a supporter of Mary. As Moray was passing in a cavalcade in the main street below, Hamilton fatally wounded him with a carbine shot from a window of his uncle Archbishop Hamilton's house. He was the first head of government to be assassinated by a firearm.
  Moray's body was shipped to Leith, then taken to Holyrood Abbey. Moray was buried on 14 February 1570 in St Anthony's aisle at St Giles' Cathedral, Edinburgh. Seven earls and lords carried his body; William Kirkcaldy of Grange held his standard, and John Knox preached at the funeral. Knox's own prohibition of funeral sermons (on the grounds that they glorified the deceased and displayed distinctions between rich and poor) was waived for the occasion. Moray's tomb was carved by John Roytell and Murdoch Walker, with a brass engraved by James Gray. The contract for the tomb survives, and was written by the chaplain Robert Ewyn, the administrator of the craft of masons and wrights in Edinburgh.
  His wife, Agnes Keith, was buried inside his tomb when she died in 1588.
  Moray was succeeded by his eldest daughter and heir, Elizabeth Stewart, 2nd Countess of Moray, whose husband, James Stewart of Doune acquired the earldom on their marriage.
caption: Assassination of the Regent Moray. Victorian stained glass window in St Giles' Kirk, Edinburgh.
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