Arthur (Forbes) Forbes Tenth Lord Forbes (1581 - bef. 1641)

Born 25 Apr 1581 in Keig, Aberdeenshire, Scotland

Ancestors

Husband of Jean (Elphinstone) Elphinstone Lady Forbes — married 5 Feb 1600 in Elphinstone Castle Scotland

Descendants

Died before Sep 1641 before age 60 in Scotland

Biography

Arthur (Forbes) Forbes Tenth Lord Forbes is a member of Clan Forbes.

Arthur Forbes was born on the 25th of April 1581 in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, the first-born son of John, 8th Lord Forbes and his 2nd wife, Janet Seton.

Arthur Forbes had a charter to the lordship and barony of Forbes on the 20th of December 1598: "to Arthur Forbes, eldest son of John, Lord Forbes, by Jonet Seytoun his wife". This was confirmed 28th of December 1598.(1) By this charter it was evidently intended to exclude John Forbes II, Arthur's older half-brother, from all succession to their father's estate. John Forbes II had followed his mother, Lady Margaret (Gordon) Forbes, a Roman Catholic, when his father divorced her in 1574, in part for religious reasons. In 1593 he had joined the Roman Catholic Capucin Religious Order as a celibate Friar (Monk). He lived in Tournai, Hainaut, Spanish Netherlands, not Scotland.^[1] John was nevertheless the 9th Lord being the eldest son by his father's first wife.^[2]

Apparently, the 2 brothers were not estranged, as in 1600 Arthur was found writing to his brother in a friendly manner.(2) Arthur only succeeded to the estates and the title on the 2nd of August 1606, after the closely-following deaths of their father (29 Jun 1606) and half-brother (2 Aug 1606). On the 8th of February 1610/1 a charter was granted to Jean Elphinstone, spouse of Arthur, Lord Forbes, and Alexander, Master of Forbes, their son, confirming his holding the lordship of Forbes.(3)

Even before his accession, Arthur Forbes, at 19 years old, married Lady Jean Elphinstone, daughter of Alexander Elphinstone, 4th Lord Elphinstone, on the 5th of February 1600. She was 20 years old and they married in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. The couple lived at Druminnor Castle, Rhynie Parish, Aberdeenshire, Scotland.
They had 6 children:

1. Alexander Forbes, 11th Lord Forbes; b: 1600 at Drumminor; d. 20 April 1672, Stockholm, as a Lt. General, Royal Swedish Army
2. Barbara Forbes, b. 17 Jan 1607 at Drumminor, Scotland
3. John Forbes, b. 2 Nov 1608
4. Anne Forbes, b: ca. 1612 in Scotland
5. William Forbes, b. 2 Feb 1614; d. 1654, @ 39 years old
6. Arthur Forbes, b. 29 Aug 1615 in Druminnor, Scotland

In 1628 when Sir Donald Mackay, Lord Reay, had been authorised to raise an army for foreign service, Arthur, Lord Forbes, agreed to furnish 800 men out of the 1,000 to be levied and committed a large sum to the cause.

Arthur Forbes, 10th Lord Forbes, died before 29th September 1641 in the midst of the Civil War that would cost King Charles I, Stuart monarch of England & Scotland, his head 8 years later. On his death, the title passed to his eldest son & heir, Alexander Forbes, 11th Lord Forbes, born in 1600 in Aberdeenshire, Scotland.

The Registrum de Forbes and other family papers give no suggestion that the disinherited John, who had for many years been a monk in a foreign land, could possibly be held to have succeeded to either title or estates, though it was quite well known that he had outlived his father for more than a month in the summer of 1606. It was also matter of common knowledge that the 8th Lord Forbes had intended (and had pledged himself to the king) 1 that this Roman Catholic son of his, who had lived since boyhood in a foreign country, should not inherit his name or his titles, and for three hundred years the matter was unquestioned, and every peerage and book of honours and titles or handbook of reference gave Arthur, who succeeded in I6o6, as 9th Lord Forbes;

Sources

1. ↑ See John Forbes II for more details.
2. ↑ "The Complete Peerage" by G.E.Cockayne, edited by the Hon. Vicary Gibbs and H. Arthur Doubleday, vol.v, London, 1926, p,546.

• (1) Penes- Lord Forbes
• (2) Second Rep. Hist. MSS. Com.- App. 195; P.C. Reg.- VI, 824
• (3) Reg. Mag. Sig.
• The Scottish Nation- William Anderson, A. Fullarton & Co., Edinburgh, 1880
• The Scots Peerage- Sir James Balfour Paul, Ed., Douglas & Co., Edinburgh, 1904-Vol. IV, p.60-2
• Memorials p.35
• Burkes Peerage
• Arthur Forbes, 9th Lord Forbes
• Lumsden, Matthew. Genealogy of the Family of Forbes (Journal Office, Inverness, 1819) Page 13
• Arthur Forbes, 10th Lord Forbes