Kings-Queens of Scotland. Robert II

Robert II (2 March 1316 – 19 April 1390) was King of Scots from 1371 to his death in 1390. He was the first monarch of the House of Stewart as the son of Walter Stewart, 6th High Steward of Scotland, and of Marjorie Bruce, daughter of the Scottish king Robert the Bruce by his first wife Isabella of Mar.

Edward Bruce, younger brother of Robert the Bruce, was named heir presumptive but died without heirs on 3 December 1318. Marjorie Bruce had died probably in 1317 in a riding accident and parliament decreed her infant son, Robert Stewart, as heir presumptive, but this lapsed on 5 March 1324 on the birth of a son, David, to King Robert and his second wife, Elizabeth de Burgh. Robert Stewart became High Steward of Scotland on his father’s death on 9 April 1326, and in the same year parliament confirmed the young Steward as heir should Prince David die without a successor. In 1329 King Robert I died and the six-year-old David succeeded to the throne under the guardianship of Thomas Randolph, Earl of Moray.

Edward Balliol, son of King John Balliol—assisted by the English and those Scottish nobles who had been disinherited by Robert I—invaded Scotland inflicting heavy defeats on the Bruce party on 11 August 1332 at Dupplin Moor and Halidon Hill on 19 July 1333. Robert, who had fought at Halidon joined his uncle, King David in refuge in Dumbarton Castle. David escaped to France in 1334 and parliament, still functioning, appointed Robert and John Randolph, 3rd Earl of Moray as joint Guardians of the kingdom. Randolph was captured by the English in July 1335 and in the same year Robert submitted to Balliol bringing about the removal of his guardianship. The office was reinstated in 1338 and Robert held it until David’s return from France in June 1341. Hostilities continued and Robert was with David at the Neville’s Cross on 17 October 1346 and either escaped or fled the field but David was captured and remained a prisoner until he was ransomed in October 1357.

Robert married Elizabeth Mure around 1348, legitimising his four sons and five daughters. His subsequent marriage to Euphemia de Ross in 1355 produced two sons and two surviving daughters. Robert rebelled against the King in 1363 but submitted to him following a threat to his right of succession. David died in 1371 and Robert succeeded him at the age of fifty-five. The border magnates continued to attack English-held zones in southern Scotland and by 1384, the Scots had re-taken most of the occupied lands. Robert ensured that Scotland was included in the Anglo-French truce of 1384 and that was a factor in the coup in November when he lost control of the country first to his eldest son, John, and then from 1388 to John’s younger brother, Robert. King Robert died in Dundonald Castle in 1390 and was buried at Scone Abbey.

Robert Stewart, born in 1316, was the only child of Walter Stewart, High Steward of Scotland and King Robert I’s daughter Marjorie Bruce. He died probably in 1317 following a riding accident. He had the upbringing of a Gaelic noble on the Stewart lands in Bute, Clydeside, and in Renfrew. In 1315 parliament revoked Marjorie Bruce’s right as heir to her father in favour of her uncle, Edward Bruce. Edward was killed at the Battle of Faughart, near Dundalk on 14 October 1318, resulting in a hastily arranged Parliament in December to enact a new entail naming Marjorie’s son, Robert, as heir should the king die without a successor. The birth of a son, afterwards David II, to King Robert on 5 March 1324 cancelled Robert Stewart’s position as heir presumptive, but a Parliament at Cambuskenneth in July 1326 restored him in the line of succession should David die without an heir. This reinstatement of his status was accompanied by the gift of lands in Argyll, Roxburghshire and the Lothians.

Dumbarton Castle on Dumbarton Rock where Robert Stewart and King David took refuge in 1333

The first war of independence began in the reign of King John Balliol. His short reign was bedeviled by Edward I’s insistence on his overlordship of Scotland. The Scottish leadership concluded that only war could release the country from the English king’s continued weakening of Balliol’s sovereignty and so finalised a treaty of reciprocal assistance with France in October 1295. The Scots forayed into England in March 1296—this incursion together with the French treaty angered the English king and provoked an invasion of Scotland taking Berwick on 30 March before defeating the Scots army at Dunbar on 27 April. John Balliol submitted to Edward and resigned the throne to him before being sent to London as a prisoner. Despite this, resistance to the English led by William Wallace and Andrew Moray had emerged in the name of King John Balliol. On their deaths, Robert the Bruce continued to resist the English and eventually succeeded in defeating the forces of Edward II of England and gained the Scottish throne for himself.

David Bruce, aged five, became king on 7 June 1329 on the death of his father Robert. Walter the Steward had died earlier on 9 April 1327, and the orphaned eleven-year-old Robert was placed under the guardianship of his uncle, Sir James Stewart of Durrisdeer, who along with Thomas Randolph, Earl of Moray, and William Lindsey, Archdeacon of St Andrews were appointed as joint Guardians of the kingdom. David’s accession kindled the second independence war which threatened Robert’s position as heir. In 1332 Edward Balliol, son of the deposed John Balliol, spearheaded an attack on the Bruce sovereignty with the tacit support of King Edward III of England and the explicit endorsement of ‘the disinherited’. Edward Balliol’s forces delivered heavy defeats on the Bruce supporters at Dupplin Moor on 11 August 1332 and again at Halidon Hill on 19 July 1333, at which the 17-year-old Robert participated. Robert’s estates were overrun by Balliol, who granted them to David Strathbogie, titular earl of Atholl, but Robert evaded capture and gained protection at Dumbarton Castle where King David was also taking refuge. Very few other strongholds remained in Scottish hands in the winter of 1333—only the castles of Kildrummy (held by Christina Bruce, elder sister of Robert I and wife of Andrew Murray of Bothwell), Loch Leven, Loch Doon, and Urquhart held out against Balliol forces.

Dairsie Castle where the 1335 Parliament was held.