Lord Oliphant - Extract From "Notes On Dignities in The Peerage of Scotland Which Are Dormant or Which Have Been For

Extract From "Notes On Dignities in The Peerage of Scotland Which Are Dormant or Which Have Been For

Sir Lawrence Oliphant was created a Lord of Parliament by King James the Second or King James the Third, but it is uncertain in what year the Honour was conferred. First mention of him as Lord Oliphant is in July 1455, a month after he reached his majority. Sir Lawrence, however, sat in Parliament as a Lord of Parliament on the 14th of October 1467. The Dignity descended in regular succession to Lawrence the fifth Lord Oliphant, who succeeded his grandfather, Lawrence the fourth Lord, in 1593, his father, the Master of Oliphant, perished at sea in 1584.

The principle of law, that a Peerage of Scotland of unknown origin shall be presumed to be limited to the heirs male of the body of the Grantee, had not been established by a decision or otherwise in the seventeenth Century; and Lawrence Lord Oliphant, having no son but having a daughter Anne who became the wife of Sir James I Douglas of Mordington, by a Procuratory of Resignation purported to resign his Peerage in favour of Patrick Oliphant his next heir male, desiring to ensure the continuance of his Dignity in the male line of his family; but his Resignation does not appear to have been accepted by the King, and certainly no regrant followed upon it. Lord Oliphant died before the year 1631.

There having been no regrant, his daughter claimed the Peerage of Oliphant as his heir at law. The Court of Session exercised jurisdiction on claims to Peerages before the Union, and Lady Douglas’s case came before that Court on the 11th of July 1633, when her claim was opposed by Patrick Oliphant. The Lords of Session found that as her father and his predecessors had held and enjoyed the Dignity, such enjoyment and use, there being no Writ to show an entail, were sufficient to transmit the Title to the heirs female; but that the Procuratory of Resignation, although the King not conferred the Honour in conformity with it, had denuded Lord Oliphant of the Peerage and had barred all claims to it. (Duries’ Decisions, p.685.)

Lord Mansfield, in the Cassillis case in 1762, and or the Sutherland case in 1771, declared the decision of the Court of Session contrary to law and justice, (Mr. Maidment’s Report of the Cassillis case, p.51, and of the Sutherland case, p. 9,) and it has been disregarded in all the cases which have come before the House of Lords in which similar questions were raised.

The King, according to the statement of Sir John Dalrymple of Stair, subsequently one of the Lords of Session, acted upon the views expressed by the Court of Session, and determined that the heir male should hold the Peerage of Oliphant. (Dalrymple’s Collections, p. 396.)

In 1641 the King created Sir James Douglas, the husband of Anne, the daughter and heir of Lawrence Lord Oliphant, Lord Mordington, and, granted him the precedency due to the former Lords Oliphant; and it appears from the records of Parliament that Lord Mordington sat above the Lord Oliphant. It is certain that the heir male did become Lord Oliphant, as on the 19th of October 1669, Lord Rosse protested that the calling of the Lords Elphinstone, Oliphant, Lovat and Borthwick before him should not prejudice him in his right to precedency before them, and on the 12th of June 1672, Lord Oliphant was present in Parliament as a Lord of Parliament, and sat in the precedency of the former Lords Oliphant. Patrick Oliphant of Newtyle, (afterwards Lord Oliphant), the heir male, was the son of John Oliphant of Newtyle, the second son of Lawrence the fourth Lord Oliphant. The male issue of Patrick Lord Oliphant failed in the person of Francis the tenth Lord Oliphant, who died without issue in 1748. The Title of Oliphant was after the death of Francis assumed by William Oliphant of Langton, descended from Peter Oliphant, the second son of Lawrence the third Lord Oliphant. William voted as Lord Oliphant at the election of a Representative Peer without protest on the 15th of March 1750.

He died without issue on the 3rd of June 1751, and the Title of Oliphant has been dormant since his decease.

Lawrence Oliphant of Gask, descended from William Oliphant, the younger son of the first Lord Oliphant, appears to have been the next heir male after William, and it is stated that William acknowledged him as his rightful successor, but having taken the part of Prince Charles Edward in the insurrection of 1745 he did net assume the Title.

His male heir, or in default of male issue from him, the nearest heir male of his ancestor William, the founder of the Gask branch of the family, would be entitled to the Dignity, and failing issue from William, the male representative descending from George the younger brother of William, if any, would be the next heir to the Oliphant Peerage."

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