Colonel George Hay, 16th Earl of Erroll (13 May 1767 – 14 June 1798) was a

Scottish peer The Peerage of Scotland ( gd, Moraireachd na h-Alba, sco, Peerage o Scotland) is one of the five divisions of peerages in the United Kingdom and for those peers created by the King of Scots before 1707. Following that year's Treaty of Union ...

and soldier.

Early life

Erroll was the eldest son of James Hay, 15th Earl of Erroll and his second wife, Isabella Carr, the eldest daughter and co-heiress of William Carr of Etal in Northumberland. His elder sister, Lady Augusta Hay (the first wife George Boyle, 4th Earl of Glasgow), succeeded to the Etal estate in 1806. From his father's first marriage to Rebecca Lockhart, he had one half-sibling, Lady Mary Hay, who married Gen.

John Scott John Scott may refer to: Academics * John Scott (1639–1695), English clergyman and devotional writer * John Witherspoon Scott (1800–1892), American minister, college president, and father of First Lady Caroline Harrison * John Work Scott (180 ...

of Balcomie. His younger brother was William Hay, who served as the Lord High Commissioner to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland from 1817 to 1819. His paternal grandparents were William Boyd, 4th Earl of Kilmarnock and Lady Anne Livingston (a daughter of James Livingston, 5th Earl of Linlithgow).

Career

In 1778, he succeeded to the earldom of Erroll following the death of his father. In 1780, he entered the British Army as

Cornet The cornet (, ) is a brass instrument similar to the trumpet but distinguished from it by its conical bore, more compact shape, and mellower tone quality. The most common cornet is a transposing instrument in B, though there is also a sopr ...

7th Dragoons The 7th Queen's Own Hussars was a cavalry regiment in the British Army, first formed in 1689. It saw service for three centuries, including the First World War and the Second World War. The regiment survived the immediate post-war reduction in ...

. He was made Captain of the 5th Dragoons in 1786 and of the

58th Regiment of Foot The 58th (Rutlandshire) Regiment of Foot was a British Army line infantry regiment, raised in 1755. Under the Childers Reforms it amalgamated with the 48th (Northamptonshire) Regiment of Foot to form the Northamptonshire Regiment in 1881. His ...

in 1792. In 1793, he became a

Major Major (commandant in certain jurisdictions) is a military rank of commissioned officer status, with corresponding ranks existing in many military forces throughout the world. When used unhyphenated and in conjunction with no other indicators ...

of the

78th Regiment of Foot The 78th (Highlanders) Regiment of Foot was a Highland Infantry Regiment of the Line, raised in 1793. Under the Childers Reforms it amalgamated with 72nd Regiment, Duke of Albany's Own Highlanders to form the Seaforth Highlanders in 1881. ...

and a Colonel of the

1st Regiment of Foot First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1). First or 1st may also refer to: *World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement Arts and media Music * 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and rec ...

in 1795. From 1796 until his death in 1798, he was a

Representative Peer In the United Kingdom, representative peers were those peers elected by the members of the Peerage of Scotland and the Peerage of Ireland to sit in the British House of Lords. Until 1999, all members of the Peerage of England held the right to ...

for Scotland.

Right to title

Upon the death of his father's aunt, Mary Hay, 14th Countess of Erroll (who died in 1758 without issue), his father

James James is a common English language surname and given name: *James (name), the typically masculine first name James * James (surname), various people with the last name James James or James City may also refer to: People * King James (disambiguat ...

became the 15th Earl of Arroll. Mary's sister Margaret had previously died at Rome in 1723, however she had married James Livingston, 5th Earl of Linlithgow, 4th Earl of Callendar. This regrant was questioned in the House of Lords in 1797. The then Earl of Lauderdale had questioned George, the 16th Earl of Erroll's right to vote at an election of the peers of Scotland. One of the objections made to the title was that the title of Earl of Erroll was claimed through a nomination. It was decided in 1748 in the case of the earldom of Stair that this power of nomination could not be validly exercised after the Union. The House of Lords, after a full inquiry, decided in favour of the 16th Earl of Erroll's right to the title. That the Earl of Erroll holds the honours of his house undoubtedly and without dispute, is clear from the decision of the House of Lords. Notes and Queries; p. 13; By Inc Chadwyck-Healey, William White; Published by Oxford University Press, 1852
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Personal life

On 25 January 1790, Lord Erroll was married to Elizabeth Jemima Blake (d. 1831), the sister of

Joseph Blake, 1st Baron Wallscourt Joseph Henry Blake, 1st Baron Wallscourt (5 October 1765 – 28 March 1803), was an Irish politician. Blake was the eldest son of Joseph Blake and Honoria Daly, daughter of Dermot Daly. He was returned to the Irish House of Commons for County G ...

and a daughter of Joseph Blake of Ardfry (

County Galway "Righteousness and Justice" , anthem = () , image_map = Island of Ireland location map Galway.svg , map_caption = Location in Ireland , area_footnotes = , area_total_km2 = ...

, Ireland) and Honoria Daly (a daughter of Dermot Daly). Her sister, Joanna Harriet Blake, was the mother of Sir Dominick Daly, the 15th Governor of Prince Edward Island and 7th

Governor of South Australia The governor of South Australia is the representative in South Australia of the Monarch of Australia, currently King Charles III. The governor performs the same constitutional and ceremonial functions at the state level as does the governor-gene ...

. Lord Erroll died on 14 June 1798 and was succeeded by his younger brother, William. His widow, the dowager Countess of Erroll, remarried to the Rt.-Hon.

John Hookham Frere John Hookham Frere (21 May 1769 – 7 January 1846) was an English diplomat and author. Early life Frere was born in London. His father, John Frere, a member of a Suffolk family, had been educated at Caius College, Cambridge, and became Sec ...

(a son of John Frere) on 12 September 1816, before her death in 1831.

Ancestors

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Erroll, George Hay, 16th Earl of 16 1767 births 1798 deaths Scottish representative peers