After 1649
Moray helped to persuade the Prince of Wales, the future Charles II, to visit Scotland for his coronation as King of Scots at Scone on 1 January 1651. Charles then invaded England from Scotland, but was defeated at the Battle of Worcester in September 1651, and forced to escape to France.
In Scotland, Moray became Lord Justice Clerk, a Privy Councillor, and a Lord of Session in 1651. He married Sophia Lindsay, daughter of David Lindsay, 1st Lord Balcarres, but she died in childbirth on 2 January 1653 and the child was stillborn. Moray joined a Scottish uprising in 1653 which was suppressed by Cromwell, and Moray returned to the continent in 1654. Moray spent time in Bruges in 1656, then in Maastricht until 1659, when he joined Charles in Paris. Following the restoration of Charles II, Moray was one founders of the Royal Society at its first formal meeting on Wednesday 28 November 1660, at the premises of Gresham College on Bishopsgate, at which Christopher Wren, Gresham Professor of Astronomy, delivered a lecture. The twelve in attendance were an interesting mix of four Royalists (William Brouncker, 2nd Viscount Brouncker, Alexander Bruce, 2nd Earl of Kincardine, Sir Paul Neile, William Balle) and six Parliamentarians (John Wilkins, Robert Boyle, Jonathan Goddard, William Petty, Lawrence Rook, Christopher Wren) and two others with less fixed (or more flexible) views, Abraham Hill and Moray. Moray was influential in gaining the new society its Royal Charter and formulating its statutes and regulations.
Moray became a Privy Councillor again in February 1661, and was later a Lord of the Exchequer. His younger brother, Sir William Moray, was Master of the Works to Charles II. The King granted him an apartment at the Palace of Whitehall, where he engaged in chemical experiments. He became a recluse in later life, and, by the time of his death, he was virtually a pauper. He was buried in Westminster Abbey at the order of the King.
Moray had a range of notable friends: James Gregory, Samuel Pepys, Thomas Vaughan, Andrew Marvell, John Evelyn and Gilbert Burnet.
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