In 1808, George Lindsay Crawfurd, twenty-second Earl of Crawfurd and
sixth Earl of Lindsay, died without issue, and his vast estates
descended to his sister, Lady Mary Crawfurd. After the death of the
earl various claims were advanced to the peerage, one of them being
preferred by a person of the name of John Crawfurd, who came from
Dungannon, in the north of Ireland. When this claimant arrived at Ayr,
in January 1809, he gave himself out as a descendant of the Hon. James
Lindsay Crawfurd, a younger son of the family, who had taken refuge in
Ireland from the persecutions of 1666-1680. At first he took up his
abode at the inn of James Anderson, and from his host and a weaver
named Wood he received a considerable amount of information respecting
the family history. From Ayr he proceeded to visit Kilbirnie Castle,
once the residence of the great knightly family of Crawfurd. The house
had been destroyed by fire during the lifetime of Lady Mary's
grandfather, and had not been rebuilt--the family taking up their
residence on their Fifeshire estates. At the time of the fire,
however, many family papers and letters had been saved, and had been
stored away in an old cabinet, which was placed in an out-house. To
these Mr. Crawfurd obtained access, and found among them many letters
written by James Lindsay Crawfurd, whose descendant he pretended to
be. He appropriated them and produced them when the fitting time came.
At Kilbirnie he also introduced himself to John Montgomerie of
Ladeside, a man well acquainted with the family story and all the
vicissitudes of the Crawfurds, and one who was disposed to believe any
plausible tale. The farmer, crediting the pretender's story, spread it
abroad among the villagers, and they in turn fell into ecstacies over
the idea of a poor man like themselves arriving at an earldom,
rebuilding the ancient house of Kilbirnie, and restoring the old
glories of the place. Their enthusiasm was turned to good account. The
claimant was very poor, and stood in need of money to prosecute his
claim, and he made no secret of his poverty or his necessities, and
promised large returns to those who would help him in his time of
need. "Farms," we are told, "were to be given on long leases at
moderate rents; one was to be factor, another chamberlain, and many
were to be converted from being hewers of wood and drawers of water to
what they esteemed the less laborious, and therefore more honourable,
posts of butlers and bakers, and body servants of all descriptions."
These cheering prospects, of course, depended upon the immediate faith
which was displayed, and the amount of assistance which was at once
forthcoming. Therefore, each hopeful believer exerted himself to the
utmost, and "poor peasants and farmers, cottagers and their masters,
threw their stakes into the claimant's lucky-bag, from which they were
afterwards to draw 'all prizes and no blanks.'" Men of loftier
position, also, were not averse to speculate upon the chances of this
newly-discovered heir. Poor John Montgomerie gave him every penny he
had saved, and every penny he could borrow, and after mortgaging his
little property, was obliged to flee to America from his duns, where,
it is said, he died. His son Peter, who succeeded to Ladeside, also
listened to the seductive voice of the claimant, until ruin came upon
him, and he was compelled to compound with his creditors.
In due time the pretender to the Crawford peerage instituted judicial
proceedings. His advocates brought forward some very feasible parole
evidence; but they mainly rested their case upon the documents which
had been discovered in the old cabinet at Kilbirnie. These letters,
when they were originally discovered, had been written on the first
and third pages; but in the interim the second pages had been filled
up in an exact imitation of the old hand with matter skilfully
contrived to support the pretensions of the new-comer. In these
interpolations the dead Crawfurd was made to describe his position and
circumstances in Ireland, his marriage, the births of his children,
and his necessities, in a manner which could leave no doubt as to the
rightful claims of the pretender. Unfortunately for his cause, he
refused to pay his accomplices the exorbitant price which they
demanded, and they, without hesitation, made offers to Lady Mary, into
the hands of whose agents they confided the forged and vitiated
letters. The result was that a charge of forgery was brought against
the claimant, and he and his chief abettor, James Bradley, were both
brought to trial before the High Court of Justiciary, in February
1812, and were sentenced to fourteen years' transportation. This
result was obtained by the acceptance of the evidence of Fanning, one
of the forgers, as king's evidence. While under sentence the claimant
wrote a sketch of his life, which was printed at Dairy, in Ayrshire,
and was published before the sentence was carried into execution.
After some delay the sham earl was shipped off to Botany Bay, and
arrived in New South Wales in 1813. Many persons in Scotland continued
under the belief that he had been harshly treated, and had fallen a
victim to the perjured statements of witnesses who were suborned by
Lady Mary Crawfurd. It was not disputed that the documents which had
been put in evidence really were forged; but it was suggested that the
forgery had been accomplished without his knowledge, in order to
accomplish his ruin. Public feeling was aroused in his favour, and he
was regarded not only as an innocent and injured man, but as the
rightful heir of the great family whose honours and estates he sought.
During his servitude in Australia, John Lindsay Crawfurd contrived to
ingratiate himself with MacQuarrie, the governor of New South Wales,
and got part of his punishment remitted, returning to England in 1820.
He immediately recommenced proceedings for the recovery of the
Crawfurd honours; and, as his unexpected return seemed to imply that
he had been unjustly transported, his friends took encouragement from
this circumstance, and again came forward with subscriptions and
advances. Many noblemen and gentlemen, believing him to be injured,
contributed liberally to his support and to the cost of the
proceedings which he had begun. At last the case came,--and came under
the best guidance--before the Lords Committee of Privileges, to which
it had been referred by the king. Lord Brougham was counsel in the
cause, and he publicly expressed his opinion that it was extremely
well-founded. Many of the claimant's adherents, however, were deterred
from proceeding further in the matter by the unfavourable report of
two trustworthy commissioners who had been appointed to investigate
the affair in Scotland. On the other hand, Mr. Nugent Bell, Mr. William
Kaye, and Sir Frederick Pollock, with a host of eminent legal
authorities, predicted certain success. Thus supported, the pretender
assumed the _rôle_ of Earl of Crawfurd, and actually voted as earl at
an election of Scotch peers at Holyrood. Unfortunately for all
parties, the claimant died before a decision could be given either for
or against him. His son, however, inheriting the father's pretensions,
and also apparently his faculty for raising money, contrived to find
supporters, and carried on the case. Maintaining his father's
truthfulness, he declared that his ancestor, the Hon. James Lindsay
Crawfurd, had settled in Ireland, and that he had died there between
1765 and 1770, leaving a family, of which he was the chief
representative. On the other hand, Lord Glasgow, who had succeeded by
this time to the estates, insisted that the scion of the family who
was supposed to have gone to Ireland, and from whom the pretender
traced his descent, had in reality died in London in 1745, and had
been buried in the churchyard of St. Martin's-in-the-Fields. It was
finally proved that a record remained of the death of James Lindsay
Crawfurd in London, as stated, and 120 genuine letters were produced
in his handwriting bearing a later date than that year. The decision
of the House of Lords was--"That from the facts now before us we are
satisfied that any further inquiry is hopeless and unnecessary." This
opinion was given in 1839, and since that time no further steps have
been taken to advance the claim. Strange to say, Lord Glasgow allowed
the body of the original claimant to be interred in the family
mausoleum; and it has been more than suggested that if John Lindsay
Crawfurd was not the man that he represented himself to be, he was at
least an illegitimate offshoot of the same noble house, and that had
he been less pertinacious in advancing his claims to the earldom, he
might have ended his days more happily.