James Maitland, 9th Earl 1784 - 1860

James sat as Member of Parliament for Camelford from 1806 to 1807, for Richmond, Yorkshire, from 1818 to 1820 and for Appleby from 1828 to 1832. His House of Commons career ended with The Representation of the People Act 1832 which greatly widened the electoral franchise. This ended the system of rotten boroughs where the MP was nominated by a local landowner. It created a uniform franchise in the boroughs, giving the vote to all householders who paid a yearly rental of £10 or more and some lodgers.

In 1839 he succeeded his father in the earldom and entered the House of Lords. He also served as Lord Lieutenant of Berwickshire between 1841 and 1860 and died unmarried.

Anthony, Maitland 10th Earl of Lauderdale  GCB*  KCMG*,  1785 - 1863

He was a  naval officer by profession, reaching the rank of Admiral of the Red, (senior to Admirals of the White and the Blue) and inherited the Earldom at the age of 75, succeeding his brother.

As the younger son of the 8^th Earl, he was not expected to inherit the Earldom, and needed to make his own career He joined the navy in 1795 at the age of ten as Admiral’s Servant on HMS Victory – BUT – children of this age did not actually serve on board the ship. Early entry gave the young Anthony seniority which would be valuable throughout his career.

His first seagoing appointment was as Midshipman in 1798, aged 13 on the captured Ville de Paris, 100 guns. From 1801 he served under Captain Sir John Gore in the frigates HMS Medusa and HMS Triton. He was severely wounded during an attack on Boulogne byTriton in 1801. In 1803 he re-joined HMS Victory, and was appointed Acting Lt in 1804 on the sloop HMS Childers, and confirmed in his appointment in 1805. He was quickly given a command of HMS Arrogant, guard ship in Bombay in May1806, and achieved post rank – full Captain – in September that year, aged 21, remaining in the same ship.  This was very fast promotion. In 1811, he was given the frigate HMS Pique and served in the English Channel, Lisbon, Brazil and Caribbean stations. In 1816 he was appointed to HMS Glasgow 50 guns, and took part in the bombardment of Algiers. After the peace of 1815 his active service continued for several years in the Mediterranean until 1821, when his sea going career ended. He was  knighted in 1832, and reached flag rank in 1841.   

He was a Whig Member of Parliament for Haddington Burghs between 1813 and 1818 (how he carried out any political duties is a mystery, as he was at sea) and for Berwickshire between 1826 and 1832.  He was Naval Aide-de-Camp to King William IV between 1830 and 1837  and to  Queen Victoria between 1837 and 1841.

*Order of the Bath (G.C.B.) and the Order of St. Michael and St. George (K.C.M.G.)

Thomas Maitland 11th Earl of Lauderdale 1803 - 1878

He joined the Navy in 1816, aged 13, and was appointed Lt in 1823, in HMS Euryalus , frigate, in the Mediterranean, participating the Siege of Algiers.   In 1825 he was appointed to HMS Superb 78,  Guardship at Portsmouth, and in 1826 to HMS Ganges 84 for service off South America. In 1832 he took command of HMS Sparrowhawk, 18. In 1833 he brought home in Sparrowhawk 549,405 Mexican dollars, and 42 bales of cochineal.

He took  command of HMS Tweed 20, 1835 to 1837, on the Spanish coast, during the First Carlist War  and was awarded the Cross of Charles III.  In 1837 he was appointed Post Captain in HMS Wellesley, 72, Flagship of Sir Frederick Lewis Maitland and sent to the Bombay station. There he commanded a marine landing in Malabar, and after Sir Frederick’s death in 1839, served in the Persian Gulf and off Sindh. Mentioned in despatches for his actions during the capture of Chusan in 1840, and the siege of Tycocktow in 1841. Took part in capture of the Bogue Forts 1841,  commanded HMS Wellesley's boats on the advance to Canton, and then commanded the Naval Battalion which stormed the heights above Canton. His ship attacked Amoy, Chusan and Chinghae.

He was awarded the CB in 1841 for these endeavours, and knighted in 1843. In 1846 he was appointed to HMS America 50 for service off Portugal and in 1848 Flag Captain of HMS San Josef, then of HMS Victory, and commanding officer of the Gunnery School HMS Excellent at Portsmouth in January 1854. Promoted Rear Admiral in 1857, hoisted his flag in HMS Bacchante  -  a steamship. He was appointed Commander-in-Chief, Pacific Station in 1860.

He inherited the Earldom in March 1863, was promoted Vice Admiral  that year, full Admiral in 1868, and Admiral of the Fleet in 1877. He was appointed in 1866 First and Principal Naval Aide-de-Camp to the Queen.

He received the Order of the Bath (G.C.B.), was an Admiral of the Fleet, Royal Navy and principal naval A.D.C. to Queen Victoria. He was a representative Peer for Scotland and a Knight of King Charles III of Spain. He extended Thirlestane Castle by building the north and south wings which form the bar of the "T" formation of the castle.

Charles Barclay-Maitland, 12th Earl of Lauderdale. 1822 -1884

He died unmarried in August 1884 from a lightning strike whilst out shooting on the moors above Thirlestane. His death precipitated the Lauderdale Peerage Case of 1885

Frederick Henry Maitland 13th Earl of Lauderdale, 1840 - 1924

Frederick Henry Maitland was an army officer, Lt in the 4th Hussars, and then in 1874 entered the Bengal Staff Corps. From 1869 to 1886 he was employed by the Foreign Department of the Government of India. He was a Major in the Bengal Staff Corps in the Indian army when his cousin Charles died.

His grandfather Richard married Mary McAdam a few days before his death in New York in 1772.  Patrick, Richard's second son was brought up by the family in Scotland, but had to make his own career, and did so in India, becoming a prosperous banker, returning to Scotland to buy Kilmaron Castle, Fife. However, the bank failed in 1825 and the family fortune went with it. His eldest son Frederick made a successful career in the Indian army, as did the grandson, Frederick Henry.   

Frederick inherited the peerage only after fighting an expensive lawsuit against his cousin Sir James Maitland Gibson, Bt, who also claimed the Earldom.

The case went to the House of Lords in 1885. The Solicitor General of England and the Solicitor General of Scotland, supported by QCs represented each litigant. Frederick asserted  that he was the heir of Col Richard Maitland who died in New York in 1772, shortly after marrying Mary MacAdam.

Sir James Maitland Gibson’s lawyers argued that the marriage did not take place, that if it had been performed it was invalid due to Richard’s mental incapacity as he was dying, and that even if a valid marriage had taken place, the offspring were illegitimate, and therefore that under New York law Frederick Henry was not an heir male of Charles, the sixth Earl.

Frederick Henry’s lawyers contended that Richard was only posted on duty to New York, and that due to his Scots domicile, Scots law should apply. Under Scots law, subsequent marriage legitimises all previous offspring. [The parallel today would be to reject the assertion that Afghan Sharia law should apply to a marriage conducted in Afghanistan by a British Anglican military chaplain between a British couple].

The House of Lords unanimously supported Frederick Henry’s case. A big question is how Frederick Henry was able to finance his suit, with only army pay to support him. The assumption is that his lawyers were confident of winning the case, and so gave him credit.

Frederick became the 13th Earl of Lauderdale, and then a representative Peer for Scotland. He was Deputy Lieutenant of the Counties of Haddington and Berwick and then Lord Lieutenant of County of Berwick (1889-1901).

His first marriage was to Charlotte Sarah, daughter of Lt. Col. B.W.A. Sleigh of the 77th Regiment. His second wife was Ada Twyford, daughter of the Rev. H.T. Simpson, Rector of Adel, Yorkshire.

William Fuller Maitland 1813 - 1876

An outstanding Maitland art collection, formerly housed in an outstanding Maitland house in Essex, summarises the record of an eighteenth century banker's grand-daughter and her nineteenth century connoisseur son. 

Four Botticellis, two Fra Angelicos, a Cosimo Rosselli, a Filippo Lippi, a Giotto, a Rembrandt, a Rubens, a Holbein, a Ruisdale, a Van der Goch and a Matisse would be a creditable record for any private collector.

Such is the foreshortened record of William Fuller Maitland, born in 1813 who died in 1876,  The collection was housed in Stansted Hall, Mountfitchet,  Essex, a Jacobean mansion which William's father, Ebenezer, remodelled close to its original Norman foundation. It was rebuilt again by the collector's son who sold it in 1922. lt has since become the home of the Arthur Findlay College for the Advancement of Physical Science.

The Fuller-Maitlands descend from the Maitlands of Barcaple whose line (through Maitlands of Eccles) derives from James Maitland, third son of Sir Robert Maitland of Thirlestane & Lethington, predecessor of the Earls of Lauderdale.

Ebenezer Maitland (1780-1862) married in 1800 Bethia Ellis, grand daughter and heir of an immensely wealthy City of London banker William Fuller. In recognition of this windfall and good fortune Ebenezer added the name Fuller to his surname. Ebenezer and Bethia Fuller Maitland had eleven children of whom William was the second.

Professor Frederick William Maitland 1850 — 1906

FW was a legal scholar and historian. He was educated at Cambridge University, and is regarded as their most prominent historian. In 1884 he was a Reader and from 1895 Downing Professor of English Law at Downing College, Cambridge. His most important work is the History of English Law (1895). He published Domesday Book and Beyond in 1897 and the Constitutional History of England in 1908, plus many other legal works.

A century after being written, his books are still the standard works on their subject. There is a memorial to him in Westminster Abbey, London – the only member of our family to have one there. It was installed only because the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge jointly supported the proposal.

Agnes Catherine Maitland, 1850 - 1906

She was the second principal of Somerville College, Oxford, and parents came from Galloway. In 1889 she was appointed Principal of Somerville Hall, Oxford. Diuring her term as Principal, the number of students rose from 35 to 86 and the buildings were extended accordingly.

She developed the tutorial system, with a view to making Somerville a genuine college and no mere hall of residence, and urged the students to take the full degree course so as to prove their entitlement to degrees, which were still confined to men.

 

Paul Maitland 1883 - 1909

Paul Fordyce Maitland was an active impressionist painter in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He was an associate of Whistler and lived not far from his home in London’s bohemian district of Chelsea. In 1889 he was described as one of the ‘London Impressionists’ with Sickert and Steer. He painted largely from life in central London and his paintings are typically small – say 12x18 inches, though some are appreciably larger.

The Tate Gallery in London has a good collection of over twenty of his landscapes, but they are rarely shown and stay in the reserve collection. Southampton and City art Gallery and the Ashmolean in Oxford also have examples of his work.

For many years his works have been relatively unknown, though the playwright Terence Rattigan collected his paintings and bequeathed a collection to the Tate Gallery.

At the turn of the century, the landscapes changed hands for around £2,000, but from about 2005 interest in his work became more active, with typical prices at auction ranging from £4,500 to £9,000, with a sale at Sotheby’s in 2011 of The Row in August (25x30 inches – large for Paul Maitland) estimated at £12,000 to £18,000 and selling for £37,250.

Since then prices have declined to around £5,000 to £12,000.

Sir Herbert Lethington-Maitland 1868 – 1923

Sir Herbert began his career in Sydney Hospital in 1893, and established a private practice the next year. When the hospital became a medical school he was the first lecturer in clinical surgery. He was specialist of the head and neck and an early specialist in rhinoplasty. (cosmetic nose surgery)

John Alexander Fuller-Maitland 1856 - 1936

He was for many years music correspondent of the London Times and encouraged the rediscovery of English music of the 16th and 17th centuries, particularly Henry Purcell's music and English virginal music.