House of Dunbar: Part I - Rise of the Earls of Dunbar

By Lyle Dunbar

Do you know what your last name means? How did you get your last name? Where did your ancestors originate? Do you have any connections to royalty in your family history? Did your ancestors make any contributions to history? I thought about all of those questions, and went looking for the answers related to my Dunbar family name. I discovered that “Dunbar” meant “fort on a hill” in the old Gaelic language of Scotland. This name was given to Dunbar Castle, as well as the adjacent town of Dunbar, in southeast Scotland. The owners of Dunbar Castle in the 11th to 15th centuries were Scottish nobles known as the Earls of Dunbar because the name identified the location of their land holdings. By about 1300 in the Middle Ages, surnames were adopted to distinguish individuals within the growing population. The families of the Earls of Dunbar adopted the surname of Dunbar. Most of the Dunbars in the world got their name handed-down from these ancient Earls of Dunbar and the location of Dunbar Castle and Dunbar town.

Those with the Dunbar surname should read this story to explore where they fit in the House of Dunbar. Those interested in Scottish history will get an overview plus a description of the role of the Earls of Dunbar in that history. There were many noble families in Scotland, but the Dunbar story is unique due to the rise of the earls to the highest levels of power, and their fall from power, never to be regained. Those with other Scottish names and ancestry may be encouraged to explore their own family history to find their connections to famous people and places in Scottish history.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Feb 19, 2016
• ISBN: 9781483563527

Book preview

history.

CHAPTER 1

The Rise of the Earls of Dunbar and the House of Dunbar

The author of this book began the search for his Dunbar family roots in Scotland with a June, 1990, trip to visit the town of Dunbar and the nearby Dunbar Castle in southeast Scotland. This was an impromptu side trip after a business trip to England; so the author had done no research at that time to understand the Dunbar history in Scotland. He knew there was a Dunbar Castle, and he assumed the Dunbar’s must have been a noble family if they owned a castle. The author expected to find extensive information on the Dunbar’s noble past by visiting the castle and town. But he was very disappointed when he found the castle in ruins. There was also no evidence of any Dunbar’s living around the town of Dunbar. The author erroneously concluded that the Dunbar family name was not related to the Dunbar Castle and Dunbar town. The author certainly had no reason to connect the family name to Scottish nobles, and he found no evidence that the Dunbar family played any role in Scottish history. So the author assumed the Dunbar Scots must have been a minor clan, or perhaps a minor part of another major clan, or maybe vassals to some powerful Scottish noble in medieval times. Many Dunbar Scots, like many other Scotsmen, must have immigrated to the new world in the 17th and 18th centuries to find better economic opportunities. In the author’s initial short visit, he found no evidence of any significant role or contribution of the Dunbar family to Scottish history.

It was eighteen years later, in 2008, before the author revisited his Dunbar family history in Scotland. The author’s niece had acquired information on her Iowa Dunbar family genealogy going back to their beginnings in America near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the mid-18th century. She became familiar with the Clan Dunbar organization and the Dunbar DNA Project. She asked the author to be the male representative of her family to be DNA-tested to define the roots of her branch of the Dunbar family in order to complement the genealogy records. The author joined the Clan Dunbar (www.clandunbar.com) organization in 2008. He learned some basic facts about the ancient Dunbar family history, which contradicted his conclusions from his earlier 1990 trip to Scotland. The Clan Dunbar information showed the Dunbar family name originated with people in Scotland who were descended from Scottish and English kings. The early Dunbar family was descended from a long line of powerful Scottish nobles called the Earls of Dunbar. The author’s DNA test results confirmed his individual Dunbar lineage as Scotch-Irish, with ties to the Scottish family history, but also an Irish connection. The DNA of the author’s Dunbar family line shows similar genetics to many Irishmen in Northern Ireland. The author’s line may have descended from Niall of the Nine Hostages, an Irish king in about 400AD, who was the first of 125 generations of O’Neill family kings of Ireland. This initial information from Clan Dunbar and the Dunbar DNA project motivated the author to research the Dunbar family historical background in Scotland in more depth.

The focus of the author’s initial research was on the origins of the Dunbar name. There were no surnames like Dunbar until about 1300 in Scotland. When surnames became required, people often chose a name that described where they lived or a distinguishing local characteristic of their homeland. The word Dunbar meant fort on a hill in the old Gaelic language of Scotland. This is how Dunbar Castle got its name. It first appears in the historical records in the 600-800AD time period as a wood fort built on a large rock on a promontory point overlooking the North Sea in southeast Scotland. This wood fort evolved into an impregnable stone fort by the early-12th century. The town of Dunbar evolved from the home town of the local people, who served the owner of Dunbar Castle, from which it got its name. The owners of Dunbar Castle in the late-11th to mid-15th centuries were Scottish nobles with direct descent from Scottish and English kings, who were granted noble titles by the kings, and served as vassals to the king in those feudal times. They were initially called the Earls of Lothian, since Dunbar Castle and Dunbar town were in the old county of East Lothian in Scotland. These nobles changed their title to the Earls of Dunbar, since Dunbar was more descriptive of their location, and they owned Dunbar Castle, Dunbar town, and vast landholdings in that area of East Lothian and southeast Scotland. A few centuries later, in about the 1300’s, surnames were needed to distinguish individuals in the growing population. Many chose a last name that described where they lived. Dunbar nobles added of Dunbar, or de Dunbar, in the French language of the Scottish court and nobility in Scotland at the time.

In feudal times of the middle ages, the earls of Scotland were the top nobles subservient only to the king, somewhat like a Duke in the United Kingdom in more modern times. These earls were granted power and lands in return for their allegiance to the king. They in turn granted lands and privileges to their vassals down to the peasants who tilled the soil. The earls were noble warriors responsible for mobilizing an army when demanded by the king. The 1st Earl of Dunbar was Gospatric, which means servant of Patrick, and his name probably refers to the revered ancient Saint Patrick in the dominant Catholic religion of Scotland and Ireland at the time. Gospatric is considered the founder of the House of Dunbar. In some historical records, Gospatric’s name is spelled Cospatric and sometimes with a k added at the end of the name. In this book, the author has chosen to use the spelling Gospatric. He was first an English noble as the Earl of Northumbria in northeast England. Gospatric was related to the Anglo-Saxon English kings as well as the Scottish kings. Gospatric became a Scottish noble when he was granted the lands of East Lothian and Dunbar Castle, located in southeast Scotland, and the title Earl of Lothian, by his first cousin, King Malcolm III Canemore of Scotland, in 1072. Gospatric lost his English lands when he fought and lost battles against William the Conqueror, King William I of England, during his conquest of England and the Anglo-Saxon English kings in 1066. The eleven Earls of Dunbar spanned a time period from 1072 to 1435. Most were named Gospatric, Patrick, or George. In this book, each earl is designated with a Roman numeral, e.g., Gospatric I, to distinguish one from another. The need to do this clearly illustrates the reason surnames were adopted in the first place. The initial Earl of Lothian title evolved to the Earl of Dunbar title, which was more descriptive of the earls who owned Dunbar Castle and Dunbar town.

These Earls of Dunbar accumulated vast landholdings in the border regions of southern Scotland and northern England, as well as other areas of Scotland, through marriages and political alliances over several centuries. The Earls of Dunbar were nobles descended from kings. They also married well within their class into other noble families, as well as the royal families of England and Scotland. Gospatric I was a cousin of the Scottish King Malcolm III Canemore (b.1031, d.1093), as well as a distant cousin of the Scottish Queen, St. Margaret (b.1045, d.1093), who was the daughter of King Edmond Ironside (r.1016) of England. Note that the author uses the abbreviations b for born, d for died, m for married, and r for reigned" in this book. Gospatric I’s uncle was King Duncan I (b.1005, d.1040) of Scotland, who was killed in 1040 by Macbeth, both of whom were immortalized in Shakespeare’s play Macbeth. Gospatric I’s daughter, AEthelreda, was married to King Duncan II of Scotland (r.1094). Patrick I, 5th Earl of Dunbar, was married to Ada, who was the daughter of King William the Lion of Scotland (r.1165-1214). This royal connection later gave the Dunbar’s a claim to the throne of Scotland in the Competition for the Crown in 1291. George I, 10th Earl of Dunbar, had a brother named John Dunbar, who became the 5th Earl of Moray, and married the Scottish Princess Marjorie, daughter of King Robert II of Scotland (r.1370-1390), and the current main male line of the Dunbar family descends from this John Dunbar.

The Earls of Dunbar were descended from the warrior kings of Scotland and England, and were thus members of the warrior nobility during the Middle Ages. They were a product of the feudal system and the rivalry between Scotland and England. They were nobles who swore allegiances to kings in return for titles, vast landholdings, and wealth. They were knights who could raise great armies from among their vassals at the request of their king. Gospatric I chose to fight on the side of his relatives, the Wessex Anglo-Saxon English kings, and their allies, the Scottish kings, against William the Conqueror, who defeated the English kings in the Norman invasion of 1066. As a result, Gospatric I lost his English earldom of Northumbria, which had been in his family for centuries. But his allegiance to Scotland, and his family connections to the Scottish king, allowed him to gain his Scottish earldom, and thus he founded what would become the Earldom of Dunbar and the beginnings of the House of Dunbar in Scotland.

In spite of their warrior culture, and many battles of the earls, few were seriously injured or killed in battles. The key reason was that the nobles were more valuable if they were captured alive in battle and then ransomed by the winners to the losers. Gospatric II, 2nd Earl of Lothian and Dunbar, has the distinction of being the only Earl of Dunbar to actually die in battle, when he was struck by an arrow while fighting against the English at the Battle of the Standard in 1138. Patrick III, 7th Earl of Dunbar, commanded the left division of the Scottish army under King Alexander III of Scotland, and was severely wounded at the Battle of Largs in 1263, when the Norwegians were defeated and the western isles were added to Scotland.

The Earls of Dunbar had to be skilled politicians as well as warriors to stay in power. England and Scotland were continually engaged in wars during the earls’ reign of power in the 12th to 15th centuries. The earls’ landholdings were in the Scottish border regions between England and Scotland. Patrick IV, 8th Earl of Dunbar and Earl of March, was a leading Scottish noble, who competed for the crown of Scotland in 1291 against other Scottish nobles. The winner of that competition was John Balliol. Another major contender was Robert de Brus, 5th Lord of Annandale, who was the grandfather of the famous King Robert I the Bruce of Scotland. Patrick IV switched sides to support England and Scotland at various times as he maneuvered to survive the politics of his day. Patrick IV fought man-to-man at one time against the Scottish patriot, William Wallace, who was the subject of the movie Braveheart starring Mel Gibson. Patrick IV eventually sided with the Scots and supported King Robert I the Bruce of Scotland in 1308.

Patrick V, 9th Earl of Dunbar, commanded the right line of the Scottish army under King David II at the Battle of Neville’s Cross in 1346. His Countess Black Agnes Randolph Dunbar was famous for successfully defending Dunbar Castle against a six-month English siege in 1338, when Patrick V was fighting elsewhere. There are some differences in the historical records related to the Earls of Dunbar at the time of Patrick V. Some records state that there was another Patrick VI, who was a 10th Earl of Dunbar and married to Black Agnes. But the author has chosen to accept the historical accounts that Patrick V married Black Agnes as his second wife, and there are a total of 11 Earls of Dunbar. Patrick V and Black Agnes died without a surviving son to succeed, so the earldom transitioned to a cousin of Patrick V and nephew of Black Agnes. So George I became the 10th Earl of Dunbar and Earl of March, 12th Lord of Annandale, and Lord of the Isle of Man. He was one of the most powerful nobles in Scotland of his time, and a great general, who supported both England and Scotland at various times as he maneuvered to survive the politics of his day. His break with Scotland resulted from a great personal insult, the rejection of the betrothal of his daughter, Elizabeth, to the son of King Robert III of Scotland in 1399. This personal insult was a key factor that eventually led to the fall of the earldom of Dunbar. This personal insult was orchestrated by his major rival for wealth and power in the Scottish border regions, Archibald the Grim, who was the Earl of Douglas, and the head of the powerful Black Douglas family.

George II was the 11th and final Earl of Dunbar. It was said that he had more wealth than King James I of Scotland, which was probably a key contributing factor to the forfeiture of the earldom of Dunbar. Another key factor was the continuing family feud of the Earls of Dunbar with the Black Douglas family earls. The Earl of Douglas conspired with King James I of Scotland to convince the Scottish parliament to force George II to forfeit the earldom of Dunbar lands and titles in 1435. Although the forfeiture of the earldom of Dunbar was a disaster for the earls of Dunbar and the House of Dunbar; it also was the prelude to disaster for the perpetrators of the forfeiture, King James I and the Black Douglas family. In an ironic twist of fate, King James I fell victim to those very Scottish nobles who helped him plan and implement the forfeiture of the earldom of Dunbar. His successors, King James II and III, experienced similar bad fates with violent deaths. Within 20 years, the earls of the Black Douglas family reaped what they sowed, and received the same fate as the Earls of Dunbar with forfeitures of the Black Douglas’ earldoms in 1455. While the Earl of Dunbar family survived the forfeiture, many of the Black Douglas family earls lost their lives.

A forfeiture of lands and titles was not unique and occurred regularly among noble families in Scotland and England, who sometimes became adversaries of their kings. But the normal result was that the family eventually regained the lands and titles from the successor king. The distinguishing feature for the Earls of Dunbar was that they did not recover their high noble rank and titles. After the forfeiture in 1435, George II retired quietly to a small estate in England. George II retained the lands and barony of Kilconquhar in Fife in Scotland, as a result of those lands being held by the Archbishop of St. Andrews, and thus they were not part of the forfeiture. George II died in 1457, and his Kilconquhar lands and title were passed down in his family’s line for many generations.

There were other prominent Dunbar family branches, including Westfield, Cumnock, Kilconquhar, and Mochrum, who retained some significant land holdings and lesser titles through the 15th to 18th centuries. But they were apparently content to live in their baronies, isolated from politics, with no apparent attempt to regain the power and prestige of their predecessors as the Earls of Dunbar. These lesser titles and significant landholdings largely dissipated by the 19th to 20th centuries. There remain in the present day a number of Dunbar Scottish baronetcies and barons, and there also are several larger estates owned by branches of the Dunbar family in Moray in northeast Scotland. One of those Dunbar baronetcies is the Dunbar of Mochrum family branch and Baronetcy, and Sir James Michael Dunbar of North Carolina, 14th Baronet, is the chief of the House of Dunbar male line of descent from the Earls of Dunbar. His father, Sir Jean Ivor Dunbar, was confirmed as the chief of the main male line in a celebrated Scottish Peerage court case in 1990.

After the forfeiture in 1435, the House of Dunbar never again played a major role in Scottish history; although there are a number of famous, and infamous, House of Dunbar members contributing to Scottish history in later years. In addition, Dunbar Castle and Dunbar town continued to play key roles in Scottish history for the next 250 years. Dunbar Castle was owned by the kings of Scotland beginning with King James I in 1435. It was still an impregnable fortress. Dunbar Castle and Dunbar town were still on the main coastal invasion route between Scotland and England, and thus were always in contention between Scotland and England. English armies destroyed Dunbar town in 1544 and again in 1548. Mary Queen of Scots, as Queen of Scotland, was the owner of Dunbar Castle, and used it on several key occasions in 1566 and 1567 as she fought to retain her crown. This led to the final destruction of Dunbar Castle with the Scottish Parliament ordering its demolition in 1568. It had been an impenetrable fortress, and the Scottish Parliament did not want it to fall into the hands of the English, nor a powerful Scottish queen they opposed. Long after Dunbar Castle was dismantled, the Scots and English were still fighting in and around Dunbar town. On July 22, 1650, the leader of the English side, Oliver Cromwell, at the head of 16,000 men, entered Scotland, and on September 3, 1650, fought the Battle of Dunbar against a Scottish army and totally destroyed the town of Dunbar. A final insult to the proud history of the Dunbar Castle occurred in 1844 when inventor Robert William Thomson was permitted to use explosives to further destroy the Dunbar Castle ruins during the construction of the entrance to the new Victoria Harbor at Dunbar.

After several years of historical research, exposure to the Clan Dunbar organization, and completion of his DNA testing, the author was motivated to revisit his roots in Scotland in 2009, about 19 years after his first visit. The author joined the Clan Dunbar Scotland Tour of 2009, which was a Clan Dunbar sponsored tour of Scotland and northern England to visit places where members of the ancient House of Dunbar lived and contributed to Scottish and English history. The tour began with Glasgow Cathedral, in Glasgow, Scotland, where Gavin Dunbar was the archbishop during the religious wars between the catholic’s and protestant’s in the 1600’s, and later Chancellor of Scotland. The tour visited Stirling Castle, and the nearby sites of major battles, such as the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314, between the Scots and English during 300 years of the wars of independence in the 1300-1600 time period. The tour traveled south to Carlisle Castle in Cumberland, northeast England, which was built by King David I of Scotland, a relative of the House of Dunbar, who died there. Carlisle is in the area of ancient Cumbria, which was owned by Maldred, father of Gospatric I in the 11th century. The tour continued to the Isle of Man, in the middle of the Irish Sea, which is presently an independent country and part of the British Commonwealth, but which was once a landholding of Patrick V, 9th Earl of Dunbar, in the mid-1300’s. The tour visited Durham Cathedral in Durham, in northeast England, which was the burial place for Gospatric I, after he gave up his earldom and became a monk later in life, and where Scottish prisoners were held after the Battle of Neville’s Cross in 1346 and the Battle of Dunbar in 1650. The tour continued through the border regions to the ruins of the many splendid abbeys, such as Jedburgh and Melrose, which were built by King David I, a relative of the House of Dunbar, in the 11th century, and located in lands owned by the Earls of Dunbar. The tour visited the ruins of Dunbar Castle and the modern small town of Dunbar in southeast Scotland. Although it visually appeared similar as in the author’s first visit in 1990, the new-found knowledge of the ancient Dunbar family history provided a whole new perspective to the author on being a member of the House of Dunbar.

The House of Dunbar-Part I book covers the Rise of the House of Dunbar during the medieval times of the Earls of Dunbar and their ownership and occupancy of Dunbar Castle in the 11th to 15th centuries. The royal ancestors and lines of descent of the Earls of Dunbar will be described with extensive use of genealogy charts to show their ancestors and descendants, and their descent from royalty. Their rise to powerful positions and accumulation of vast landholdings will be described. Their mastery of politics will also be described, since these Earls of Dunbar had to balance the opposing English and Scottish political positions in order to retain their lands and titles in the border regions between Scotland and England. This Part I book concludes with the forfeiture of the Earldom of Dunbar in 1435. In a subsequent House of Dunbar-Part II book, the author will address After the Fall of the Earldom of Dunbar to tell the stories of many of the later House of Dunbar family branches and descendants of the Earls of Dunbar in the 15th to 18th centuries. Although these later Dunbar family branches were not as powerful or wealthy as their Earl of Dunbar predecessors, they had large landholdings and titles in southwest and northeast Scotland, and in the present day, there remain a number of Scottish Dunbar baronetcies and barons, as well as several larger estates in Moray in northeast Scotland. The author revisited his roots in Scotland for a third time in August, 2014, as a member of the Clan Dunbar Scotland Tour of 2014, which included a tour of the northern area of Scotland where many of these Dunbar baronetcies, barons, and their extensive landholdings were located. This trip provided the author with significant information to prepare the House of Dunbar-Part II book and tell the interesting stories of the House of Dunbar After the Fall of the Earldom of Dunbar.

CHAPTER 2

The Author Searches for His Dunbar Scottish Roots

The beginnings of the author’s research for this House of Dunbar book began in June, 1990, when he first attempted to find his Scottish roots. This story is told in the first person, since the author was traveling alone, and had much time to talk to himself to try to understand the House of Dunbar history in Scotland. I was on a business trip to England to attend the annual Farnborough Air Show in London, England. I had never been to Scotland. I had always heard that the Dunbar’s were Scottish and there was a Dunbar Castle near the town of Dunbar, Scotland. So I decided to take a side-trip to Scotland to find my Scottish roots. Being a type-A personality, my approach was to knock-out a tour of Scotland and Edinburgh, and learn everything about my Dunbar Scottish roots, in 3 days. I started my trip driving north to Scotland in my rental car on the M1 freeway passing Leicester, Nottingham, and the central Yorkshire counties of England.

My drive through the English countryside was getting monotonous and I started daydreaming. I began thinking about why I decided to take this side-trip to Scotland in search of my Dunbar family roots. I was 45 years old, and beginning to reflect on my life history. I was interested in knowing the origins of my Dunbar family name and my Scottish ancestors. In 1790, Edmund Burke wrote in his book Reflections on the Revolution in France that people will not look forward to posterity who never look backward to their ancestors. Alex Haley in his best-selling book Roots asked himself where did I come from? We are a collection of genes from our various ancestors. I wanted to know who were my ancestors?

Unfortunately, I had not done the research to know the history or genealogy of my Scottish ancestors. I had no idea of the origin of my Dunbar last name, my ancestors’ background, and their past contributions to history. I had always heard there was a Dunbar Castle in Scotland. So I fantasized that I descended from royalty and my Scottish family was rich and powerful. My objectives were to visit Dunbar Castle, find some evidence of the Dunbar family’s past and current presence in Scotland, and visit Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland, to get some understanding of Scottish history. The town of Dunbar and the adjacent Dunbar Castle is in southeast Scotland, on the coast of the North Sea, about 60 miles east of Edinburgh. Since there was a Dunbar Castle, I thought there might still be some of my distant Dunbar relatives living in the castle, or in the nearby town of Dunbar. If there was a castle, then I reasoned that these distant Dunbar relatives might be Scottish nobles. At a minimum, I expected to find some information on the past history of my Dunbar family in Scotland by visiting Dunbar Castle, Dunbar town, and Edinburgh.

I awoke from my daydreaming to reassess my driving route to Scotland. The M1 freeway was fast but boring. I stopped my rental car at a roadside rest-stop near Darlington to look at my map of northern England and southern Scotland (see Illustration 2-1 at the end of Chapter 2). I noted that I could continue on M1 and the coastal route A1 along the North Sea to Dunbar. I studied the map noting the county of Cumbria in northwest England along the Irish Sea, the county of Northumberland in northeast England along the North Sea, and the county of Durham in north-central England.

I decided to take the A68 route through the central highlands of northern England, through the county of Durham, then take the route B6318 through the county of Northumberland from A68 over to A1 on the coast at Alnwick, and follow A1 along the North Sea coast to Dunbar. The A68 route through the county of Durham passed through rolling hills with green pastures with sheep, and more sheep, and more sheep (see Illustration 2-2 at end of Chapter 2). At first, the countryside was pretty, then it was monotonous, and I must have been counting sheep because my mind started dreaming about the possibilities for my ancient Dunbar Scottish ancestors. I thought about what I knew of ancient Scottish-English history and the geography of Great Britain, Western Europe, England and Scotland. There were significant interactions between the inhabitants of what is now Scotland and Western Europe even in ancient times. The Romans conquered Western Europe and Great Britain occupying the island as far north as southern Scotland. When the Roman Empire collapsed after 400AD, and the Dark Ages began, there evolved many smaller kingdoms in Western Europe as well as in Scotland and England. These kingdoms were eventually combined into countries as we know them today in the medieval period, the later Renaissance period, and in modern times.

The close proximity of Scotland and northern England to Denmark and Norway across the North Sea meant invasions, occupations, and settlements of Scotland and England by Vikings during part of their history. The short distance across the English Channel from England to the Normandy area of northwest France meant continual warfare between England and France over the centuries. The Normans, a derivative of Nordmen, or men from the north, were of Viking descent. The Normans, under William the Conqueror, crossed the English Channel with a large army and defeated the Anglo-Saxon kings of England in 1066. The French language was the language of the royal court in England for centuries. Most English kings were descendants of these Normans after 1066. Scotland was able to take advantage of the England-France conflicts, and was a perpetual ally of France in the Auld Alliance for hundreds of years during the wars between Scotland and England.

The distance from London, the capital of England, to Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland is about 300 miles. This is not very great distance to travel in modern times. But even in medieval times, it was not a great distance to travel with large armies. This proximity of England and Scotland resulted in many wars and battles, as England tried to acquire Scotland and its lands in southern Scotland, while Scotland tried to annex lands in northern England. Scotland and England were first combined with the Union of the Crowns in 1603, and then united as a country in the United Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. Prior to that, they were separate countries continually at war fighting over territory, especially in the border areas of the countries. The current border between England and Scotland, from Carlisle near the Solway Firth in northwestern England, to Berwick-upon-Tweed in northeastern England, was always in dispute in ancient times. Scotland owned most of this area of northern England in ancient times before the 11th century.

Northern Ireland is also part of the United Kingdom. But Ireland is a separate country, as is the Isle of Man, which is located in the middle of the Irish Sea between Ireland and Scotland. The close proximity of Ireland to England meant that England conquered Ireland and controlled it for much of its history until the 20th century. Northern Ireland is only about 20 miles across the Irish Sea from Scotland. The close proximity of Northern Ireland, and the rest of Ireland, to Scotland meant that some of the earliest immigrants to Scotland, and perhaps some of my Scottish ancestors, came from Ireland. The Irish Gaelic language was the original language of the people who settled in Scotland, and who were the predecessors of the Scots.

My eyes were glazing over from the combination of the monotonous drive up route A68, and my thoughts on Scottish and English history, as happens to many people immersed in the details of history. I brought my mind back to concentrating on the local English countryside names and places. The county names on my map, such as Durham, Cumbria, and Northumberland, were not of much interest to me at the time. Since my ancestors were Scottish, I assumed there was no connection of my Dunbar family history with this English area. But many years later, I discovered that that this area of England was an important part of my ancient Dunbar family history. Gospatric I, the 1st Earl of Dunbar, and founder of the House of Dunbar, originally came from Northumberland (called Northumbria in ancient times). He was the Earl of Northumbria in England, as was his maternal grandfather, Uchtred the Bold, who ruled the area from the family stronghold of Bamburgh Castle on the North Sea coast. He was related to, and allied with, the Anglo-Saxon kings of England, who were defeated by William the Conqueror in 1066. He lost the fight with William the Conqueror and his earldom of Northumbria. He fled to Scotland where his first cousin, King Malcolm III Canemore of Scotland, gave him the lands of Lothian and Dunbar Castle, and the title Earl of Lothian in 1072. He became the first of eleven powerful Earls of Dunbar, who owned Dunbar Castle and much of the Scottish southern border regions over the 11th to 15th centuries.

Gospatric I’s father, Maldred, a younger brother of King Duncan I of Scotland, was King of Cumbria. King Duncan I was killed by Macbeth, and both were immortalized in Shakespeare’s play Macbeth. Macbeth was subsequently killed by Duncan I’s family, and his son, Malcolm III, a first cousin of Gospatric I, succeeded Macbeth as king. Thus, Gospatric I’s family owned most of what is now northern England in the 11th century. The English region of Durham County also had connections with my ancient family history. Gospatric I retired as Earl of Dunbar late in life, became a monk at Durham Cathedral, and there is some historical evidence that he may have been buried there in the late 11th century. Patrick V, 9th Earl of Dunbar, commanded the right line of the Scottish army under King David II at the Battle of Neville’s Cross near Durham in 1346 in one of many battles between Scotland and England.

I was driving on route A68 and just crossing route B6318 near Corbridge when I saw an unusual sight- the ruins of a massive stone wall crossing the green fields of the English countryside (see Illustration 2-3 at the end of Chapter 2). I stopped my car to look at my map to see if I could identify these ruins. My map showed route B6318 paralleling Hadrian’s Roman Wall from Carlisle, near the Firth of Solway in the Irish Sea, in the west of England, to Newcastle-upon-Tyne, in the east of England, on the North Sea. It should be noted that Scottish terminology uses the word firth for a large bay of water and upon-Tyne means on the river Tyne. So the ruins were the remnants of Hadrian’s Wall, which was built by the Roman Emperor Hadrian in 122AD to prevent military raids on Roman Britain by the Pictish ancient inhabitants of Scotland. The Romans considered them barbarian tribes from the north. The Romans could not defeat those tribes, so the wall was constructed to improve economic stability and provide peaceful conditions in Britain, and to mark physically the northern frontier of the Roman Empire.

Construction of the wall probably started in 122AD and was largely completed within six years. The wall was constructed primarily to prevent entrance by small bands of raiders or unwanted emigration from the north, not as a fighting line for a major invasion. The wall was thus part of a defensive system which, from north to south, included: a deep ditch, a berm with rows of pits holding entanglements, the curtain wall, a later military road (the Military Way), and a north mound and ditch to prevent or slow down any raids from a rebelling southern tribe. The total number of soldiers manning the early wall was probably greater than 10,000. In the years after Hadrian’s death in 138AD, the new Roman emperor, Antoninus Pius, abandoned the wall and began building a new wall 100 miles north in Scotland called the Antonine Wall. The Antonine Wall was not stone, like Hadrian’s Wall, but was a turf wall, a mound of earth with wood fences and forts along the top of the mound, which ran about 38 miles and had significantly more forts than Hadrian’s Wall. The author would visit Antonine’s Wall on his return visit to Scotland many years later in 2009.

This Antonine Wall allowed Antoninus Pius to conquer the northern barbarian tribes for a while. But his successor, Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius, had to abandon the Antonine Wall and reoccupy Hadrian’s Wall as the main defensive barrier in 164AD. In the late 4th century, barbarian invasions, economic decline, and military coups loosened the Roman Empire’s hold on Britain. By 410AD, the Roman administration and its legions were gone, and Britain was left to look after its own defenses and government. The Hadrian’s Wall garrisons, which were now mostly local Britons, probably lingered on in some form for generations and some parts of the wall remained occupied well into the 5th century. Hadrian’s Wall was declared a World Heritage Site in 1987, and in 2005 it became part of the larger Frontiers of the Roman Empire World Heritage Site.

I left the ruins of Hadrian’s Wall behind as I continued my drive up route A68 through north-central England. I decided it was time to cross over to the eastern coast on my continuing journey to Dunbar Castle. I took route B6341, passed by the small town of Otterburn, and continued to the town of Alnwick, where I transitioned onto route A1 going north toward Dunbar. The route A1 passed by the town of Bamburgh and the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed. I didn’t stop to explore these places because the names were not familiar and there was no obvious connection to my Dunbar roots. I later learned that these areas had some significant historical relevance to the House of Dunbar history.

There is one famous Dunbar family connection to the town of Otterburn. It was the site of a major battle in 1388, during the Scottish border wars between Scottish and English forces. George I, 10th Earl of Dunbar and Earl of March, and Henry Hotspur Percy, Earl of Northumbria, were, respectively, the English and Scottish wardens of the east marches, which were the lowland marsh regions east of Berwick-upon-Tyne in the border regions. They were essentially the local sheriffs charged with keeping the peace in the marches. In practice they were powerful warlords who were continually engaged in fights of their own making to protect their landholdings and interests. Percy is said to have entered Scotland with 10,000 Englishmen and ravaged the lands of George I for three days.

In retaliation, on the night of the feast of St. Andrew, the English castle of Berwick was attacked by seven men from the Scottish border area. Percy blamed George I. Meanwhile, George I convinced the Scottish King Robert II to assemble a Scottish army of 3,000 men, led by James Douglas, 2nd Earl of Douglas, George de Dunbar, 10th Earl of Dunbar and Earl of March, and his brother, John de Dunbar, 5th Earl of Moray, to invade Northumbria and Durham in the northeastern English border areas to retaliate for the Percy raids into Scotland. The Scottish army penetrated down to Newcastle-upon-Tyne and set up camp near where Percy had a garrison of Englishmen. Percy challenged James Douglas to single combat. Douglas unhorsed Percy, who was embarrassed and furious.

So Percy then raised a much larger English army to pursue James Douglas and the Scottish army. Percy attacked the Scottish camp at Otterburn in August, 1388, on a moonlit night. This unexpected English assault caught Douglas, as well as the Dunbar brothers, George I and John, sitting in their tent having supper. The Scottish army barely had time to put on their armor. A furious battle ensued with James Douglas, 2nd Earl of Douglas, falling mortally wounded in the fighting. His death-bed rallying cry to his followers, plus the skill and oratory of the new commander, George I, resulted in a rout of Percy’s English army. The command of the Scottish army then devolved to George I, 10th Earl of Dunbar and Earl of March, who was one of the outstanding generals of his time- for both Scotland and England at various times over the next 20 years.

There are several Dunbar Family connections to the town of Alnwick. It is infamous for two battles between the Scots and English. In the Battle of Alnwick of 1093, King Malcolm III Canemore of Scotland, and his eldest son, Edward, were killed. Gospatric I, 1st Earl of Dunbar and Lothian, was a first cousin of Malcolm III Canemore, who had given him Dunbar Castle and the lands of Lothian in 1072. In a second Battle of Alnwick in 1174, King William I the Lion of Scotland was captured by the English army. His daughter, Ada, married Patrick III, 7th Earl of Dunbar, which gave the Dunbars a royal connection and a claim to the Scottish throne in the Competition for the Crown in 1291.

Another Dunbar family connection in this area of England was to Bamburgh Castle. This was the coastal castle stronghold for the Earls of Northumbria. In addition to his Scottish royal roots, Gospatric I, 1st Earl of Dunbar, also descended from the Anglo-Saxon English kings, whose ancestors go back to Egbert King of Wessex in about 829AD. The Gospatric I relationship was through his mother, AEldgyth, an English princess, who married Gospatric I’s father, Maldred, Lord of Cumbria. AEldgyth was the daughter of AElfgifu, 3rd wife of Uchtred the Bold, Earl of Northumbria. AElfgifu was an English princess as the daughter of King Ethelred II the Unready of England (r. 978-1016). Thus, Gospatric I was the great-grandson of King Ethelred II of England and the grandson of Uchtred the Bold.

Uchtred the bold, Earl of Northumbria, was murdered in 1016 as a result of a plot by the Danish kings of England during their reign from 1016 to 1042. Uchtred was succeeded as Earl of Northumbria by various relatives, who were all killed in the notorious Northumbrian blood feuds that were common during those times up to the year 1067. Gospatric I, as a grandson of Uchtred the Bold and great-grandson of King Ethelred II of England, was well-positioned to become Earl of Northumbria. He was more an English noble than a Scottish noble in many respects. But in that borderland region between Scotland and England, a noble had to be able to work with both sides to survive and prosper.

In 1067, Gospatric I claimed the earldom of Northumbria by rights of his descent as a grandson of Uchtred the Bold. Even though seemingly entitled to his claim, Gospatric I still required the title to be confirmed by William the Conqueror, who had become King William I of England as a result of his Norman Conquest of England in 1066. He had defeated the Wessex Anglo-Saxon kings who were royal relatives of Gospatric I. Thus, Gospatric I had to pay a large sum of money to King William I to get the title and lands as Earl of Northumbria. This was a common practice in feudal times paying homage to the king for lands and titles.

There are also numerous Dunbar family connections to the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed. This is the town of Berwick on the Tweed River in the Scottish and English border areas, and the lowland marches (marshes). After Gospatric I settled in as Earl of Lothian, and the subsequent Earl of Dunbar, successive earls also held lands in Berwick shire including The Merse, or March west of the current town of Berwick-upon-Tweed. The Earls of Dunbar also later held the title of Earl of March as owners of these lowland marsh areas. The Earls of Dunbar also held titles from the English including Keeper of Berwick at various