Name James 2nd | Died July 6, 1711 | |
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Children James Douglas, 3rd Marquess of Queensberry People also search for James Douglas, 3rd Marquess of Queensberry | ||
James Douglas, 2nd Duke of Queensberry and 1st Duke of Dover (18 December 1662 – 6 July 1711) was a Scottish nobleman.
Life
He was the eldest son of William Douglas, 1st Duke of Queensberry and his wife Isabel Douglas, daughter of William Douglas, 1st Marquess of Douglas.
Educated at the University of Glasgow, he was appointed a Scottish Privy Counsellor in 1684, and was lieutenant-colonel of Dundee's regiment of horse. He joined William III in 1688 and was appointed colonel of the 6th Horse Guards Regiment.
He was appointed Lord High Treasurer of Scotland from 1693 and Keeper of the Privy Seal of Scotland from 1695 to 1702. He was Lord High Commissioner to the Parliament of Scotland in 1700, 1702 and 1703, in which role he procured the abandonment of the Darien scheme.
He was appointed a Knight of the Garter in 1701, and was Secretary of State from 1702. He encouraged the Jacobites by his undecided attitude on the question of the settlement, and was deluded into unconsciously furthering the Jacobite designs of Simon Fraser, 11th Lord Lovat. He withdrew from government in 1704.
He was reinstated as Keeper of the Privy Seal of Scotland in 1705, was a commissioner of the estates in 1706, and procured the signing of the Treaty of Union.
He was created Duke of Dover, Marquess of Beverley and Earl of Ripon in 1708, and appointed to the British Privy Council in the same year. He was Secretary of State for Scotland from 1709 until his death. Queensberry died at his house in Albermarle Street, Piccadilly, in 1711, of an "iliack passion" (intestinal obstruction). Queensberry House in Edinburgh is today part of the Scottish Parliament Building.