Robert Pitcairn (commendator)

Born about 1520, he was the son of David Pitcairn, of Forthar-Ramsay in the barony of Airdrie, Fife, and his wife Elizabeth Dury or Durie. On 22 January 1552 his father sold to him the lands of Forthar. He was a cousin of George Durie, Abbot of Dunfermline.

He was educated for the church, and became Archdeacon of St Andrews Cathedral, and commendator of Dunfermline Abbey.^[1]

Pitcairn was summoned on 19 July 1565 to a meeting of the Privy Council as an extraordinary member, to consider a declaration of the Earl of Moray on a conspiracy against his life, at Perth. On 19 October of the same year he was appointed keeper of the havens of Limekilns and North Queensferry. After the surrender of Mary Queen of Scots at Carberry Hill on 15 June 1567, he was chosen a lord of the articles; and on 29 July he was present at the coronation of the young king James VI of Scotland, in the kirk of Stirling. On 2 June 1568 he was appointed an extraordinary lord of session; and in September of the same year was chosen one of the principal commissioners to accompany the Regent Moray to the conference with the English commissioners at York on the charges against Queen Mary. He was present in the same capacity at Westminster and Hampton Court.^[1]

At the Perth convention, in July 1569, Pitcairn voted against the queen's divorce from James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell; and in September he was sent to London to acquaint Elizabeth I of England with the various negotiations connected with Mary's proposed marriage to Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk. Some time after the assassination of the Regent Moray he was, in May 1570, again sent ambassador to Elizabeth, to ask for help in repressing of the internal Scottish troubles, but with little success.^[1]

On Pitcairn's return to Scotland Matthew Stewart, 4th Earl of Lennox was made regent: this choice caused William Maitland of Lethington finally to sever himself from the king's party, and Pitcairn was chosen to succeed him as Secretary of State. In November 1570 he was again sent on an embassy to England; and he was also chosen to accompany James Douglas, 4th Earl of Morton on an embassy, the following February, to oppose proposals that had been made for Mary's restoration to her throne. Along with Morton, he was also sent, in November 1571, to treat with Henry Carey, 1st Baron Hunsdon and other English commissioners at Berwick-on-Tweed for an offensive and defensive league with England, the chief purpose being to obtain aid from Elizabeth against the party of Queen Mary in Edinburgh Castle. These negotiations were successful.^[1]

Pitcairn now had the confidence of Morton, and he was entrusted by him with negotiations with the English ambassador Henry Killigrew, on the proposal for delivering Mary to the Scottish government for her execution. He was also busy on negotiations with the defenders of Edinburgh Castle, and was one of the commissioners for the pacification, with Huntly and the Hamiltons, at Perth in February 1573.^[1]