MARCH 16 – 1309 King Robert I the Bruce convened his first parliament, at St Andrews. The main task of the parliament was to affirm Bruce’s right to the throne and to make clear the loyalty and support of both nobility and clerics.

  • Brus or Bruce 1050 2Stewart2Kennedy 2Montgomery2Blair 2Cochrane2Miller 2Simmons2Choate Zoë ToaG

Robert I used two seals during his reign and the second, made in 1318, shows him in his military role on a caparisoned horse, bearing the Royal Arms of Scotland, with a broadsword, shield and crowned helmet. The obverse of the same impression bears the earliest example of the thistle used on seals.

Mounted knight with sword.

Isle of Man. Elizabeth 2nd is a descendant of Bruce through Stewart to Hanover to Saxe-Coburg to Mountbatten-Windsor.

  • Brus or Bruce 1050 2Stewart2Kennedy 2Montgomery2Blair 2Cochrane2Miller 2Simmons2 Choate Zoë ToaG

1322 Battle of Boroughbridge, First War of Scottish Independence

1410 John Beaufort, 1st Earl of Somerset 1st Marquess of Somerset and 1st Marquess of Dorset, later only 1st Earl of Somerset, KG (1373 – 16 March 1410) was the first of the four natural children of John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster, and his mistress Katherine Swynford, later his wife. Beaufort was born in about 1371 and his surname probably reflects his father’s lordship of Beaufort in Champagne, France.

Early arms of John Beaufort with a band dexter

1582 William Murray, Laird of Tullibardine; One of 24 Lords of the Congregation. Died. Sir William Murray of Tullibardine1

Sir William Murray of Tullibardine was the son of Sir William Murray of Tullibardine and Katherine Campbell. He married Lady Agnes Graham, daughter of William Graham, 2nd Earl of Montrose and Lady Janet Keith, on 15 April 1547.2 He died on 16 March 1582/83.3

Murray held the office of Governor and Keeper of Stirling Castle in 1572, jointly.2 He held the office of Comptroller [Scotland].2 He lived at Tullibardine, Perthshire, Scotland

Children of Sir William Murray of Tullibardine and Lady Agnes Graham

William Murray

Sir Mungo Murray

John Murray, 1st Earl of Tullibardine b. c 1550, d. between 29 Jul 1613 – 3 Aug 1613

Citations Charles Mosley, editor, Burke’s Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage, 107th edition, 3 volumes (Wilmington, Delaware, U.S.A.: Burke’s Peerage (Genealogical Books) Ltd, 2003), volume 1, page 175. Hereinafter cited as Burke’s Peerage and Baronetage, 107th edition.

Charles Mosley, editor, Burke’s Peerage and Baronetage, 106th edition, 2 volumes (Crans, Switzerland: Burke’s Peerage (Genealogical Books) Ltd, 1999), volume 1, page 134. Hereinafter cited as Burke’s Peerage and Baronetage, 106th edition.

G.E. Cokayne; with Vicary Gibbs, H.A. Doubleday, Geoffrey H. White, Duncan Warrand and Lord Howard de Walden, editors, The Complete Peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, Extant, Extinct or Dormant, new ed., 13 volumes in 14 (1910-1959; reprint in 6 volumes, Gloucester, U.K.: Alan Sutton Publishing, 2000), volume XII/2, page 62. Hereinafter cited as The Complete Peerage.

Cokayne, and others, The Complete Peerage, volume I, page 158

  • Keith of Dunnottarin Kincardine 1109 2Stewart2Campbell 2Montgomery2Blair 2Cochrane2Miller 2Simmons2Choate Zoë Blair5

1599 March 16th never happened in Scotland. The year 1599 began on March 25th and ended on December 31st. The next day January 1st was 1600.

1660 Long Parliament dissolves itself after 20 years (TG48-162)

1689 Convention of the Scottish Estates met to consider letters received on 16 March 1689 from the two contenders for the Crown. On 4 April they voted to remove James VII from office, drawing on George Buchanan’s argument on the contractual nature of monarchy.

James VII ordained the modern Order of the Thistle.

1689 William Blair of Blair, member of Convention of estates committee for settling the government. William raised a troop of horse in support of King William 3rd, and marched to Perthshire. William’s Information having reached Viscount Dundee, in arms for King James 2nd, Dundee proceeded with celerity during night towards Perth. Dundee caught the laird of Blair and laird of Pollock in their beds and carried them off prisoners to the Highlands, where laird of Blair died very soon after. Anderson v. 1/p.319.

Pollock Crest: A boar passant shot through with a dart Proper. Motto: AUDACTER ET STRENUE.
[from Latin: “Boldly and readily”].
[from Latin: “Boldly and strongly”].

1751 did not occur in England, Ireland, British North America, and British colonies, as 1751 only had 282 days due to the Calendar Act of 1750. But 1751 did occur in Scotland, as 1751 had 365 days. The world’s oldest lunar “calendar” is in an Aberdeenshire field.

1832 Joseph Smith the Prophet, at Hiram, Ohio, (clan Mack of Inverness, Malcolm King of Scots), Doctrine and Covenants 77. Sometime in the middle of March.  The sea of glass spoken of by John, 4th chapter, and 6th verse of the Revelation is the earth, in its sanctified, immortal, and eternal state. Eyes are a representation of light and knowledge,

1834 – James Hector, Scottish geologist (d. 1907).

1861 – Edward Clark became Governor of Texas, replacing Sam Houston, who has been evicted from the office for refusing to take an oath of loyalty to the Confederacy. Sam’s great-great grandfather Sir John Houston, built a family estate in Scotland in the late seventeenth century. An elected convention voted to secede from the United States on February 1, 1861, and Texas joined the Confederate States of America on March 2, 1861. Houston refused to recognize its legality, but the Texas legislature upheld the legitimacy of secession.

Houston was evicted from his office on March 16, 1861, for refusing to take an oath of loyalty to the Confederacy, writing, “Fellow-Citizens, in the name of your rights and liberties, which I believe have been trampled upon, I refuse to take this oath. In the name of the nationality of Texas, which has been betrayed by the Convention, I refuse to take this oath. In the name of the Constitution of Texas, I refuse to take this oath. In the name of my own conscience and manhood, which this Convention would degrade by dragging me before it, to pander to the malice of my enemies, I refuse to take this oath. I deny the power of this Convention to speak for Texas….I protest….against all the acts and doings of this convention and I declare them null and void.

1935 – John James Rickard Macleod, died, Scottish-born physician and physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 6 September 1876 Clunie, Perthshire, Scotland) a co-discoverer of insulin.

Macleod Crest: A bull’s head cabossed Sable, horned Or, between two flags Gules, staved at the First. Motto: HOLD Fast. Badge: juniper. Chief: Hugh Magnus MacLeod of Macleod. Seat: Dunvegan Castle, Isle of Skye

Dunvegan Castle, Inner Hebrides, is the oldest inhabited castle in all of Great Britain, and this is a source of great satisfaction to the Clan MacLeod. This Scottish clan has maintained control of the castle for almost 800 years. www.destination360.com/europe/uk/dunvegan-castle

1940 Scapa Flow. Home Fleet was bombed in Scapa Flow and heavy cruiser “Norfolk” damaged.

Merchant Shipping War – Since September 1939, 430,000 tons of shipping had been sent to the bottom by mines around the coasts of Britain – a loss rate only second to U-boats. Now the Royal Navy slowly countered magnetic mines with the introduction of ship-degaussing and ‘LL’ minesweeping gear. Although mines, contact, magnetic and later acoustic remained a threat throughout the war, they never again represented the danger of the first few months.

Monthly Loss Summary
- 43 British, Allied and neutral ships of 96,000 tons in UK waters. www.navel-history.net

1945 The House of Fear monochrome movie released, loosely based on 1891 The Five Orange Pips by Arthur Conan Doyle, and features the characters Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson. The plot is at a Scottish castle of Drearcliffe House, near the village of Inverneill. A hamlet of Mid-Argyll, Inverneill is located at the mouth of the Inverneill Burn, on the western shore of Loch Fyne, south of Lochgilphead. Inverneill was amongst lands granted to Colin Campbell, 1st Earl of Argyll (c.1433 – 1493), in 1480. Inverneill House wing was added by Lt. Col. Duncan Campbell in 1890. See http://www.scottish-places.info/features/featurefirst4057.html

The House of Fear poster, characters include MacGregor and Alistair, Watson remembers his ancestors are Scots.

 

1799 CLement Cruttwell Map of Scotland. Inverniel is in the south west quadrant, between Tarbet Island, Loch Funo, and Craignish Loch, south of Gareloch head, Killenner, Inveraray. Other locations Lung Island, Scarba Island, Kilinver, Tirvo, Mucaint, Connel, Glenorchy, Inverlachy, Clyde Irith, Bute. Argyle Shire.

1971 Gemini 8 launched. David Scott and Neil Armstrong (d. 25 Aug 2012), both Scots’ descents.

A Gemini-Titan launch vehicle lofts Gemini 8 into orbit, March 16, 1966.

1978 Sophie Irene Hunter born March 16 1978. Granddaughter of General Sir James Michael Gow GCB died (3 June 1924 – 26 March 2013) was a British Army officer, commissioned into the Scots Guards, Commanding Officer of 2nd Battalion Scots Guards in 1964, Commander of 4th Guards Brigade in 1967, General Officer Commanding Scotland and Governor of Edinburgh Castle in 1979. Sophie Irene Hunter’s husband Benedict Cumberbatch is the new Sherlock Holmes.

Burlesque Fairytale, Hunter as Annabel Blythe-Smith, Benedict Cumberbatch as Henry Clark. 7 June 2009. Hunter clan is Scots, but I can’t match Sophie’s Hunter name to her parents, based on minimal information in Wikipedia. But Her grandfather has Scots heritage, as noted. And her husband plays a fictional scot.

1991 Stansted Mountfitchet Airport London opened its terminal building designed by architect Norman Foster.  Construction was undertaken by John Laing and took place between 1988 and March 1991, costing £100 million. In 1990 it was awarded the European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture / Mies van der Rohe Award. Norman Robert Foster, Baron Foster of Thames Bank, OM, Hon FR Eng (born 1 June 1935) is a British architect whose company, Foster + Partners, maintains an international design practice famous for high-tech architecture.  In 1999, Foster was awarded the Pritzker Architecture Prize,  in 2009, the Prince of Asturias Award in the Arts category, and in 1994, the AIA Gold Medal. Foster completed a Masterplan for the Quartermile, Edinburgh Scotland in 2001, the Clyde Auditorium, part of the Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre complex, Glasgow (1997), and The SSE Hydro, Glasgow, Scotland (2004–2013 Wikipedia