Unlike the majority of Scottish counties, there was no hereditary sheriff in Aberdeenshire, the 1st Marquess of Huntly having resigned his grant under pressure from the crown in 1629. Thereafter appointment had been made either at pleasure or for life. In 1705 the Earl of Mar, a rising star of the Scottish Court party, obtained a grant of the sheriffdom during pleasure, but as reward for successfully managing the Union this was converted into tenure for life in April 1707.
Throughout this period these burghs were the scene of violent controversy. Haddington was influenced mainly by the Marquess of Tweeddale and the family of Wemyss; North Berwick by the Dalrymples; Lauder by the Earl of Lauderdale; Dunbar by the Falls, a wealthy merchant family; and Jedburgh by the Marquess of Lothian. Jedburgh was the most venal and turbulent, and from 1768 to 1774 was disfranchised and lost its turn as returning burgh. In the earlier part of the period Lord Milton, Argyll’s manager for Scotland, exercised considerable influence.
The property of the earls of Sutherland in this county was so extensive that the right of voting extended not only to the vassals of the Crown, as it did in all other Scottish counties, but to the vassals of the Earl as well.Alex. Wight, Inquiry into the Rise and Progress of Parlt. (1784), pp. 209-11. The main opposition to their interest came from the family of Mackay, Lords Reay. In 1754 George Mackay, the sitting Member, was returned, Lord Sutherland having agreed to Pelham’s request not to offer any opposition.
About 1754 the Stewarts, earls of Galloway, and the Dalrymples, earls of Stair, had the leading interests in Wigtownshire. At the general election Galloway’s brother, James Stewart of Auchleand, received the support of the Dalrymples in the county, in return for Galloway’s interest in Wigtown Burghs being given to John Hamilton (formerly Dalrymple) of Bargany.Letter to Ld. Loudoun from John Dalrymple, Allan Whitefoord, Andrew Hunter, and Wm. Duff, Loudoun mss.
The principal aristocratic interest in Selkirkshire was that of the Duke of Buccleuch, which during the minority of the 3rd Duke was managed, until 1761, by Archibald, Duke of Argyll, and then by Charles Townshend, Buccleuch’s step-father. The other leading interests belonged to: Walter Scott of Harden; the Murrays of Philiphaugh; and the Pringles of Haining. The Elliots of Minto had their principal estates in Roxburghshire but possessed considerable influence in Selkirkshire.
James Campbell of Ardkinglass owed his seat for Stirlingshire mainly to the influence of the Duke of Argyll. At the general election of 1754 two newcomers to Stirlingshire politics, Lawrence Dundas and Robert Haldane, joined forces to oppose Campbell: the numbers on the poll were even, and Campbell was elected by the casting vote of the praeses.Argyll to Pelham, 5 Nov. 1753, Newcastle (Clumber) mss; CJ, 28 Nov. 1754. From now on the Campbell interest began to decline.
The chief interest in Ross-shire belonged to the two branches of the clan Mackenzie, the earls of Seaforth (attainted after the ’15) and the earls of Cromarty (attainted after the ’45). At the general election of 1754 there was a contest between Kenneth Mackenzie, erroneously styled Lord Fortrose (son of the 5th Earl of Seaforth) and James Stuart Mackenzie, supported by his father-in-law the Duke of Argyll, and by Lord Ross.
The principal interests in Roxburghshire belonged to John Ker, 3rd Duke of Roxburghe, and Henry Scott, 3rd Duke of Buccleuch, both under age in 1755. During their minorities, Walter Scott of Harden, chief by male descent of ‘all the Scotts in the south of Scotland’, was virtually in control of the county. On leaving Parliament in 1765, Scott arranged the return of Gilbert Elliot of Minto, who held the seat unopposed until his death in 1777.
Perthshire was a centre of Jacobitism, and a high proportion of its freeholders, though entitled to enrolment, declined to qualify by taking the oaths of allegiance. The predominating interest in 1754 belonged to James Murray, 2nd Duke of Atholl, who had displaced his attainted brother in the dukedom. Another brother, Lord George Murray, also attainted, lived in exile; while Atholl’s half-brother, Lord John Murray, represented Perthshire 1734-61.
At the general election of 1754 William Mure, the sitting Member for Renfrewshire, was returned unopposed. An intimate friend of Bute, Mure early in 1759 took the lead in sponsoring the candidature of Patrick Craufurd in Ayr Burghs, in opposition to Lord Loudoun and the Duke of Argyll. This drew down upon him an opposition in Renfrewshire, where Lord Glencairn sponsored the candidature of William Cuninghame of Craigends.Caldwell Pprs. ii (1), p. 120; letters from Allan Whitefoord and Ld. Glencairn, Loudoun mss. Mure wrote to Bute on 16 Oct.
