WEMYSS, James Lord Burntisland, Sir ^{1 2}

   User ID: H442.

James married Margaret WEMYSS Countess of Wemyss, suo jure, daughter of David WEMYSS 2nd Earl of Wemyss and Margaret LESLIE, 25 December 1671(contract) 28 March 1672(marriage).^{1 2} (Margaret WEMYSS Countess of Wemyss, suo jure was born on 1 January 1659 ¹ and died on 11 March 1705 in Whitehall, London, England ².)

  Marriage Notes:

"Lady Margaret Wemyss was born on 1st January 1659. She had but reached her thirteenth year, when her father, whose hopes of male succession had been finally blasted by the death of the last of his ten sons, and whose estates had fallen into financial embarrassment, received an offer from a kinsman for her hand in marriage, on terms which promised at once the preservation of the line, and the extrication of the family possessions. It was accepted, and the terms of the marriage contract were arranged at Wemyss in December 1671 ....

.... Sir James Wemyss, the bridegroom-elect of Lady Margaret Wemyss, was the only son of General James Wemyss, Master of Ordnance to King Charles the Second. He was a scion of the house of Wemyss, being descended from the Caskieberran branch. David, second Earl of Wemyss, says that Sir James's 'gritte gritte grandfather and myne was full brothers.' "

from Family of Wemyss




"Margaret, Countess of Wemyss, inherited the title and estates of Wemyss under peculiar circumstances. She was born on 1 January 1659, and had almost reached the age of thirteen when her father, on the death of his eldest surviving son in September 1671, despairing of having male heirs of his body, made up his mind to accept an offer of marriage from a kinsman of his own name, and to settle his estates on his daughter and her husband, to the exclusion of his own kin who did not bear the family name, for he was determined that a Wemyss must have all before any other name, for he would never put his house out of that ancient name for any other in the world. The proposed suitor was Sir James Wemyss of Burntisland, and in the marriage-contract, dated 25 December 1671, the Earl became bound to resign his estates in favour of his daughter and her husband and the heirs-male of their marriage, whom failing, their daughters, successively without division. Failing these, the estates were to pass to the heirs-male of the marriage of James Wemyss, younger of Balfarg, a great-grandson of Sir James Wemyss of Bogie with Anne Aytoun, the Earl's niece."

from Scots Peerage (vol 8)



^{1 2}