General Notes

REFN: 2949AN
Beatrix Sinclair
The following is copied from The Genealogist, Volume 2, Numbe r 1 (Spring,
1981).
Thanks to Sewell Vincent Sample for this information.
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SOME CORRECTIONS TO THE SINCLAIR PEDIGREE
Andrew B. W. MacEwen
Beatrix Si nclair, Countess of Douglas.  She was married before 7
March 1425/6 to James Douglas of Balveny, called "the Gross", afterwards
7th Earl of Douglas,1 and is described on his monument as daughter of
Henry; Earl of Orkney.2 According to The Scots Peerage3 she was the only
daughter of Henry, 2nd Earl of Orkney of that name, by his wife Egidia,
daughter of Sir William Douglas of Nithsda le and granddaughter of King
Robert II.  The Complete Peerage is unsure which Earl Henry was her
father.4
This is not really a question, however, for the second Earl Henry
married a niece of James the Gross.  Had Beatrix been a da ughter of this
marriage, she would have been her husband’s grandniece (of the half
blood), since Sir William Douglas of Nithsdale was a natural son of
A rchibald "the Grim", 3rd Earl of Douglas.5  Such a relationship is
inherently unlikely, and two dispensations disprove it altogether.  The
sons of Beatrix , William and James, the 8th and 9th Earls of Douglas,
were successive husban ds of their cousin Margaret, only daughter of
Archibald, 5th Earl of Douglas. Her mother, Euphemia Graham, was a
descendant of Robert II, while her fathe r the 5th Earl was himself a
grandson of Robert III.
The dispensations6 are dated 24 July 1444 and 27 February 1452/3, and in
each the relationship dispe nsed is the 2nd and 3rd of consanguinity
(representing the common descent fro m Archibald the Grim).  Had the
Countess Beatrix also been descended both fro m Robert II and from
Archibald the Grim, her sons would have been related to Margaret in three
additional ways (4th and 3rd, 4th and 4th, and 4th and 4th of
consanguinity), but this is clearly not the case.  Beatrix was thus a
da ughter of the first Earl Henry, slain in 14O4,7 and she was probably
his youn gest, or even posthumous, child.
Although Countess Beatrix was not her husband ’s grandniece, it is perhaps
of interest to note that both her brother, the s econd Earl Henry, and his
son, Earl William (of Orkney, afterwards of Caithne ss), married
granddaughters of the same man, Archibald the Grim, Earl of Doug las.
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1    She may have been his second wife, unless he remained a bachelo r for
twenty to twenty-five years after attaining his majority.  If he did ha ve
an unknown first wife, she was not a daughter of Robert, Duke of Albany.
2    Inscription printed in Sir William Fraser, The Douglas Book, 2
(Edinburg h, 1885) p. 623.
3    6: 570-71.
4    4: 435, n.(c.)
5    The Scots Peerage 3: 163-64.
6    Callendar of Papal Letters 9: 467,  10: 130-31.  Communicated by Dr.
I Lorne Campbell of London, who had also noticed the problems of
Bea trix's parentage.
7    The Scots Peerage 6: 596.