Gilbert Kennedy, 3rd Earl of Cassilis

Who was Gilbert Kennedy, 3rd Earl of Cassilis?

Gilbert Kennedy, 3rd Earl of Cassilis was Scottish landowner, soldier, politician and judge. He served as Treasurer of Scotland.

The son of Gilbert Kennedy, 2nd Earl of Cassilis, he succeeded to the titles of 5th Lord Kennedy and 3rd Earl of Cassillis in August 1527. On 6 February 1540/41 he had a charter of the Fief of Cassilis.

Gilbert Kennedy was taken prisoner by Thomas Dacre and Sir William Musgrave in the Battle of Solway Moss in 1542, and being committed to the custody of Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, was, by the instructions of that venerable martyr, induced to embrace the reformed religion. He became a Protestant, and went over to the English Party. He was released in February 1545, and held the office of Treasurer of Scotland in 1554, of Extraordinary Lord of Session between 1546 and 1558. Gilbert Kennedy fought in the Battle of Pinkie Cleugh on 10 September 1547.

In 1558 he was present, as one of the eight Commissioners appointed by the Scottish Parliament, at the marriage of Mary, Queen of Scots, to the Dauphin of France, to whom the Scottish deputies unanimously refused the Crown matrimonial. The Court of France appeared deeply mortified by this disappointment, and the Earl of Cassilis, with two others of the Commissioners, dying in one night, on 28 November 1558, at Dieppe, a report was raised that they had been poisoned, which was further countenanced by the death of a fourth Commissioner, Lord Fleming, at Paris, on 16 December 1558.