Sir William Seton of Seton, First Lord Seton
He was the eldest son of the heiress of Seton, Margaret and her Seton-cousin Alan de Winton, Baron of Winton. His grandfather was Sir Alexander Seton, only surviving son of the Governor of Berwick of the same name and Margaret Murray. With the illustrious and influential family heritage behind him, it was no wonder that William was raised at Seton by his mother and under the close eye of the extended Seton family.
Lord Seton married Catherine St. Clair of Herdmanston, daughter of Sir William St. Clair, a great house at that time and connected with the Sinclairs of Rossyln, noted for the legendary Templar connection. By her he had two sons and six daughters. The eldest son, John, succeeded his father, while the second son, Alexander, married, in 1408, Elizabeth, daughter and heiress of Sir Adam Gordon, and founded a family of Seton blood which rose to fame and importance and the highest ranks of the peerage, in that of the Gordon’s of Strathbogie or Huntly. In fact, William Seton had arranged for his eldest son John to be wedded to the heiress of Gordon, but John had married Janet Dunbar, daughter of the Earl of March, much to his fathers displeasure.
William became a famous knight in the middle of the fourteenth century, and visited Jerusalem, and through both his own and his wife’s family connections, was also active in the Sinclair-Templar affairs at Rosslyn. On his return from his crusade to Jerusalem, he took part, in 1383, with the Borderers of Scotland, in that raid into England described so graphically by Froissart (who names him), “for they said there had been such damage done to their lands as was disagreeable to themselves and friends, which they would revenge the very first opportunity.” They came back with a rich booty in prisoners and cattle. The battle of Otterburn, which furnished material for the ballad of Chevy Chase, was fought on the 19th of August, 1388, and Sir William was there. Friossart’s calling him “le seigneur de Seton” confirms the testimony of Maitland that he was created a Lord of Parliament, as we shall presently see.
Johnes’s translation and edition of the Chronicles, which is now the most commonly used – that of Lord Berners, although a classical one, being too antiquated in the language and style- has a gross error in the account of this affair. He confuses the title of Seton with that of Saltoun which not only shows his ignorance of Scotch names, but which title was not created until some sixty years after that time.
Maitland informs us that Sir William Seton “was the first created and made lord in parliament, and he and his posterity to have a vote therein, and be called Lords.” Several of his ancestors sat in Parliament; and to understand Sir Richard one must remember that for two centuries after the introduction of Feudal Law into Scotland the only baronies known were incident to the tenure of land held immediately from the Crown, and every tenant in chief by knight’s service was an honorary or parliamentary baron by reason of his tenure, but yet did not always receive a Writ of Summons to attend. With the gradual decay of Feudalism and the concentration of power in the Crown, certain rules of procedure became established by legislative enactment with the royal assent; and the higher order of the Nobility was distinguished from the lower one, by having conferred upon its members an hereditary right to be summoned and to sit and vote irrespective of feudal tenure or even of the possession of any land at all. They then formed a separate chamber in Parliament, which constituted the Peerage, or House of Lords. Thus certain baronial families became by favour of the sovereign or other accidental circumstance peerage families, while many others of an origin equally good never attained to the peerage, although their ancestors sat in what were then, as now, called parliaments; and their descendants are only Commoners. Hence the absurdity of speaking of an ancient and feudal family as having been ennobled, when the proper expression would be “raised to the peerage.”
In a manuscript of the British Museum, Sir William Seton is styled “Wilhelmus primus Dns. Seton,” and several other documents confirm the title to him. His descendant, George 7th Lord Seton, refused an Earldom in the sixteenth century, because he preferred the distinction of being the Premier Baron of Scotland. The precise date of the creation is unknown, but it is reasonably presumed to have been some time before 1393.
As a Templar, Sir William Seton, 1st Lord Seton, belonged to the third Order of Saint Francis, and dying in February, 1409, was buried in the Church of the Franciscan Friars (The Grey Friars) in Haddington, to whom he left by will six loads of coal weekly, out of his coal-pit of Tranent, and forty shillings annually, to be charged on his estate of Barnes. His widow is described as a virtuous and energetic woman, who got husbands for four of her daughters, and built a chantry on the south side of the parish church of Seton, prepared a tomb for herself there, and made provision for a priest to say mass perpetually for the repose of her soul.
King David II., by charter dated 23 October 1369, confirmed that donation which William de Seton had made to Adam Forest of two carucates of land in the town of Nudreff (Niddry) in the constabulary of Linlithgow. William de Setoun granted a charter delecto armigero nostro Johanni de Fravayd, probono et fideli services miki impenso et impendento, of the whole lands of Wester Favayd (Falside), in the barony of Travernent (Tranent), confirmed by King Robert II., 20th June 1371. A charter was granted by Robert Duke of Albany, 27 March 1408, confirming that impignoration which our beloved William de Setoun, Knight, had made with consent of our beloved cousin, John de Setoun, Knight, his son and heir, to our beloved son, Walter de Haliburton of Dryltoun, of an annual rent of 50 marks out of his barony of Travernent, as well out if the lands as out of the coal works of the same, for 500 marks due to the said Walter, for the marriage of Elisabeth de Gordoun, daughter and heiress of the deceased Adam de Gordoun, to be held by the said Walter his heirs or assigns, till the said sum of 500 marks is paid by the said William de Setoun, or his heirs, in the parish church of Gulyne.