Elected Procurator of the Scottish Nation in Orleans University 3 Aug., 1513, resigned 21 Jan., 1514. Succeeded his deceased father as burgess of Edinburgh, admitted 28 March 1515. Took over his father’s business and supplied the Court with dress materials, including purple velvet for a coat for the king in Dec., 1526. Elected Provost of Edinburgh in 1523. Appears in the rolls of Parliament of 16 Nov., 1524 as Commissioner of the Burghs, a Lord Auditor of Causes, and also served as a Lord of the Articles on several occasions and also served as a commissoner for the tax granted to James V on his marriage.

Francis Bothwell also was a founding member of the Court of Sessions (paid £133, 6s, 8d Scots) for the first year; succeded Adam Hopper as Customer of Inverness on Hooper’s death in August, 1529. Francis became seriously ill in Dec. of 1535 and died sometime between Dec. 20 and Jan 14, 1536 when his widow was listed as Customer of Inverness.

Francis and his brother, Richard, are often referred to in 18th and 19th century articles as the sons of Richard Bothwell, described as being provost of Edinburgh in the reighn of King James III.
James III reigned from 1451 to 1488. From shortly before that time to 1491, the provosts of Edinburgh were (according to the roster posted in the Edinburgh City Chambers):
1445 Stephen Hunter
1446 Patrick Cockburn
1449 Thomas de Cranstoun
1451 George de Faia
1453 Sir Alexander Napier of Merchiston
1455 Thomas Oliphant
1456 Sir Alexander Napier of Merchiston
1462 Alexander Kerr
1466 George Bartraham
1467 Robert Mure of Polkelie
1469 Sir Alexander Napier of Merchiston
1477 James Creichton of Ruthven
1481 Walter or William Bartraham
1482 Sir John Murray of Tulchad
1482 Patrick Barron of Spittlefield
1484 John Napier of Merchiston
1485 John Murray
1486 Sir Patrick Barron of Spittlefield
1487 John Murray
1487 Patrick Hepburn, 1st Lord of Hailes
1488 Thomas Tod
1490 Alexander Hepburne of Quhitsum1491) Sir Thomas Tod.

The Richard Bothwell who is said to have been provost of Edinburgh is said to have been the same one who was Abbot of Dunfermline. It is claimed he was provost of Edinburgh in 1460.

She and Francis had a sasine 19 Feb. 1529-30.

Scots Peerage has Katherine giving birth to two daughters named Isobel, one to her first husband, Oliver Sinclair, and another to her second husband, Francis Bothwell.

Other sources say Sinclair was her third husband and Francis her second. No mention of who the first was.
Adam was served heir to her and Francis on Aug. 28, 1560.

Katherine Bellenden (1497-c.1568) was a courtier working in the wardrobe of James V of Scotland. Her niece of the same name was similarly employed.
Katherine was the daughter of Patrick Bellenden and Mariota Douglas. Her brother was Thomas Bellenden of Auchnoule. Katherine married Adam Hopper, then Francis Bothwell, who were both Provosts of Edinburgh. Her third husband was Oliver Sinclair, the King's favourite, who was reputed to have caused the Scottish defeat at the battle of Solway Moss.
While Katherine worked in the royal wardrobe she bought cambric cloth, Holland cloth, and other materials for making the King's shirts, which she and her colleague Janet Douglas, the King's seamstress, embroidered with gold and silver thread. She sold cloth to the King's tailor, Thomas Arthur, kept accounts of the King's purse, and also lent money to Margaret Tudor, (perhaps for debts incurred for sewing materials.) Janet Douglas also married a prominent courtier, David Lindsay of the Mount a diplomat and poet.[1] Amongst the many payments to Katherine Bellenden in the Scottish treasurer's accounts one entry notes Katherine as the spouse of Robert Craig, a servant of the tailor Thomas Arthur.[2] This was Katherine's namesake niece, married to Robert Craig, later an Edinburgh merchant, and their children included John Craig the physician and perhaps the lawyer Sir Thomas Craig. It seems that both Katherines were employed in the royal wardrobe and dealt in luxury fabrics.[3]
In 1541, Oliver and Katherine with their kinsfolk and their royal wardrobe colleagues, John Tennent and his wife the royal laundress, Mause Acheson, made a contract 'mortifyng' property, including the rents of a house on Edinburgh's Netherbow now called the John Knox House for priests to say Mass for their souls in St Giles, Edinburgh.[4]
In November 1543, Katherine wrote to the Queen Dowager of Scotland, Mary of Guise, regarding her and her husband's debts. A ship they had invested in had been impounded for sums of money they owed for lands in Orkney and Shetland. Mary of Guise was giving their Orkney lands to George Gordon, Earl of Huntly. In Orkney, Oliver Sinclair held the castle of Kirkwall as his ancestors had done, and Katherine wrote, 'we think great lack to go from our native rooms which my husband and his surname have held these three or four hundred years.'[5]
[edit]
Children
Francis Bothwell was the father of Adam Bothwell, Bishop of Orkney, though it is unclear if Katherine was his mother.
Katherine had two daughters with Oliver Sinclair. Isobel Sinclair married James Hamilton of Bothwellhaugh who assassinated Regent Moray in 1570. Alison Sinclair married David Hamilton of Monktonmains, brother of Bothwellhaugh. The persons of Isobel Sinclair and her supposed cousin Anne Bothwell are conflated in the Scottish ballad, Lady Anne Bothwell's Lament. Anne Bothwell was the daughter of Adam Bothwell the bishop, and perhaps grand-daughter of Katherine Bellenden. The ballad relates to her seduction and abandonment by Alexander Erskine (d.1640), a son of the Earl of Mar[6]
[edit]
External links
▪ As part of the restoration of the Palace at Stirling Castle, Historic Scotland has dramatised Katherine's role in the royal wardrobe; Historic Scotland - Katherine Bellenden
[edit]
References
1. ^ Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland, vol. 6, HM General Register House (1905), 298, 380-381, 390.
2. ^ Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland, vol. 7 (1907), p.463.
3. ^ Sanderson, Margaret H.B., A Kindly Place?, Tuckwell (2002), p.108.
4. ^ Laing, David, ed., Registrum cartarum Ecclesie Sancti Egidii de Edinburgh, Bannatyne Club, (1859) pp.246-253 no.141: Register of the Great Seal of Scotland, 1513-1546, HM General Register House (1883) p.597 no. 2600 (Latin).
5. ^ Cameron, Annie I., ed., The Scottish Correspondence of Mary of Lorraine, SHS, (1927), pp.46-7.
6. ^ Maidment, James, ed., Scottish ballads and songs, historical and traditionary, vol. 2, Edinburgh (1868), 39, 41-2, 327.

Took holy orders and was made parson of Ashkirk and Canon of Glastow, named by Pope Paul IV as Bishop of Orkney 2 Aug., 1559, admitted to the temporalities of the See 11 Oct. 1559.

This in itself is interesting since he was Catholic and yet by then he had been “married” for 7 years (wed to Margaret Murray abt. 1552 in Touchadam, Stirlingshire, Scotland) and sired the first two (John, 1556 and Francis, 1558) of at least eight children (John was made Lord Holyroodhouse in 1607).


The reformation came to Scotland in 1560 following the death of the regent and Elizabeth of England sent troops (artillery and naval forces) to help the "Lords of the Reformation" take control of the Parliament and outlaw the Mass before Mary of Scots returned to the Country.

The new Bishop was in his diocese when it became clear that the reforming party, the Lords of the Congregation, had succeeded and that Orkney had joined the world of the Reformation.

"When idolatry and superstitione were suppressed, he suppressed the same also in his bounds, preached the Word, administered the Sacraments, planted Ministers in Orkney and Zetland, and gave stipends out of his rents to ministers, exhorters and readers, and [subsequently] when he was a Commissioner, visited all the Kirks of Orkney and Zetland twice, to the hazard of his life, in dangerous storms on the seas, ..."

He survived at least one ambush/assassination attempt during his reign (the people of Orkney apparently preferring the more traditional church to the Scottish Reformed Church.)

According to "A CHRISTIAN HISTORY OF ORKNEY" (http://www.orknet.co.uk/fdb/reform.htm), "Adam Bothwell seems to have been a conscientious bishop of Orkney - though described by a descendent as 'boring', prone to writing sound spiritual advice in family letters to relatives. He had little political influence, however, and he controlled a bishopric with substantial lands and income. These he was forced to part with: by his patron, a lawyer powerful at court: Bellenden of Auchnoule, Justice-Clerk; and by his brother in law the adventurer Gilbert Balfour - who built Noltland Castle, on Westray, which still stands as a testimony to his need for protection and defence. In 1570, having alienated much of the income of the bishopric, Adam Bothwell was compelled to exchange his post with Lord Robert Stewart, abbot of Holyroodhouse and step-brother to Queen Mary. Bishop Bothwell does not appear to have been in Orkney after 1568. Lord Robert became Earl of Orkney, controlling the lands and revenues and patronage of both the Crown and the Bishopric, and coming to exercise his powers in person as a sort of Stewart throw-back to the days of the Norse warrior-Earls.

"To replace Bishop Bothwell, the General Assembly appointed as Commissioner in Orkney, Mr James Annand; and as Commissioner in Shetland, Gilbert Foulsie. …"

Adam had problems with Henry and Robert Sinclair in Orkney, who were married to sisters of Adam’s “cousin-german,” the Justice-Clerk Bellenden. In 1561, he went to France to lay his complaints before Queen Mary and returned to Scotland in her train.

Adam adopted the “reformed” faith.

On 14 Jan. 1563-64 he was made an extraordinary Lord of Session and an ordinary Lord on 13 Nov. 1565. Also served on the Privy Council and presided over the (third) marriage of Queen Mary, to James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell, at Holyroodhouse Abbey in 1567. As a result of that, and for other alleged offences, he was “delated” for a period of time by the General Assembly of the Kirk.

He crowned the infant king, James VI, in the parish church of Stirling on 29 July, 1567, following the old Roman ceremony, much to the distain of the minister who preached the sermon at the ceremony, John Knox.

Adam was part of the expedition headed by Murray of Tullibardine, the Comptroller and and Kirkcaldy of Grange, which, acting under the orders of the Privy Council, was dispatched to capture Hepburn.

Adam accompanied the Regent Murray to the Conference at York and Westminster in 1568 as one of the commissioners and was the one who gave in the written accusation denouncing Queen Mary as being implicated in the death of Darnley.

In Sept., 1568 he exchanged the major part of the “temporalities” of the See of Orkney with Robert Stewart, the Abbott of Holyroodhouse for that abbey, thus becomming Commendator of Holyroodhouse as well as Bishop of Orkney.

Briefly imprisoned at Stirling for joining the protests of the Earl of Montrose and Lord Lindsay on 16 July 1578 against the actions of the Earl of Morton.

Participated in the Ruthven Raid of 23 Aug., 1582 and was nominated on the following 26 Oct. to replace the Duke of Lennox on the reconstituted Privy Council.

He held sasine of Eistoun of Dunsyre on 2 Nov., 1560 as heir to his parents, had a charter of the barony of Alhammer or Whitekirk 11 March 1587-88 and another of Brighouse, in the sheriffdom of Linlithgow, 3 Aug., 1592.

At this time, bishops were elected by the chapter of the cathedral church (As personnel or staff, ecclesiastical law requires that a cathedral should have a chapter, taking the place of the ancient presbyterium and constituting, as it were, the senate of the church and the bishop's council. The chief obligation of the chapter is daily to celebrate the Divine Office and Holy Sacrifice of the Mass in the name of the entire Christian community. Its members, dignitaries, and canons escort and assist the bishop when he pontificates; even when he merely presides at the services they form an entourage of honor for him. In the United States there are no chapters, properly so called, these being replaced to a certain extent by "consultors" (III Conc. Balt., passim). )