John Douglas

Who is John Douglas?

Sir John Douglas was a British officer of the Royal Marines who, with his wife Charlotte, Lady Douglas was involved in a scandal regarding an alleged illegitimate child born to the Princess of Wales, Caroline of Brunswick.

Sir John Douglas was born at Jean Fields, Dalkeith, near Edinburgh; he was the son of Louis Douglas, Esq.; his grandfather was a lord of Session.

John Douglas began his military service at age thirteen. He was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Royal Marines on 14 February 1776 and promoted to first lieutenant on 9 April 1778. While serving as on recruitment duties in Gloucester, he met Charlotte Hopkinson, daughter of Lieutenant-Colonel George Caesar Hopkinson, late of the 15th Dragoons. Her family were acquaintances of antiquarian Samuel Lysons. Colonel Hopkinson bought the estate of Wotton in 1790.

Captain, 29 April 1783; Major in the Army, 1 March 1794

Douglas married 17 June 1797, at Gloucester, Charoltte, daughter of a private soldier, named Hephinson or Hopkinson, who was soon made a Sergeant; later becoming an army agent and subsequently became a Colonel, wealthy with an estate near Gloucester.

Lieutenant-Colonel in the Army, 1 January 1798