Margaret Hartsyde


Margaret Hartsyde was a Scottish servant, jewel thief, and landowner. A servant of the queen, Anne of Denmark, Hartsyde's duties included looking after the queen's jewels, dealing with the jeweller George Heriot, and handling large sums of money.
Margaret Hartsyde was a daughter of Malcolm Hartsyde of Kirkwall, Orkney. She is first recorded as one of the serving women in the queen's chamber in 1601. She came with the queen to England in 1603, and later married another royal servant called John Buchanan.
One of her letters to Sir William Livingstone of Kilsyth described how Anne of Denmark was surprised by his leaving the court, and had expected him to deliver a jewel to her which he ought to send to queen as soon as possible. She was hoping to buy a house in Libberton in Lanarkshire with her husband.

Theft and trial

Margaret stole jewels from Anne in London and attempted to sell them back to the jeweller George Heriot. She was sent for trial in Edinburgh and convicted of "unlawful subracting and detening" in June 1608, even though she had signed a confession. She was not sentenced to death but banishment to Orkney was proposed. John Buchanan was found not guilty. The king's advocate Thomas Hamilton wrote to James VI saying that Hartsyde had the best lawyers in Edinburgh on her side, and thought that in clearing her of a charge of "theft", the assize had "very far mistaken their duty." He recommended the king order her "to be declared infamous in all time coming" as "a restraint and terror to all other servants."
Anne of Denmark had hoped she would be convicted and condemned by the laws of Scotland and wrote to Lord Balmerino expressing her disappointment. The jewels, it was claimed, had been a gift from the queen. It was rumoured that Margaret had been indiscreet with the queen's secrets, revealing what a "wise chambermaid" would not have done. King James wrote to lawyers in Edinburgh querying their judgement, calling them "pettyfoggeris", and ordered the Privy Council to interview anyone who had set their hands to the case. A second hearing in Linlithgow pronounced her guilty of an "infamous" crime against the royal persons, and she was imprisoned in Blackness Castle.
Hartsyde and Buchanan went to Orkney and paid £400 sterling for the value of the jewels. In March 1618 the King, by Anne of Denmark's intercession, gave John Buchanan freedom to travel in Scotland, and freedom to travel anywhere in the kingdom was granted to Margaret and John on 15 March 1619. Eventually in 1619, James declared Margaret Hartsyde innocent, saying she had been "by the sinisterous information of certain of her unfrendis for the tyme, pursued criminallie". The legal process against her was held to deleted and the Justice Clerk would not issues extracts of it.

Orkney and Fife

John Buchanan was made Chamberlain of Orkney and Shetland in May 1622, and was keeper of Birsay Palace, Newhouse on Orkney, Scalloway Castle, and the house at Sumburgh Ness in Shetland. There were two competitors for this office, Robert Monteith and Sir Robert Maxwell. Buchanan presided on the trials at Kirkwall of Marable Couper of the Northside of Birsay and Annie Taylor for witchcraft in 1624.
By 1624, Buchanan became "Sir John Buchanan of Scotscraig". Scotscraig was near Tayport, Fife. John Lauder, Lord Fountainhall saw their initials "SJB" and "DMH" for Dame Margaret Hartsyde, carved on the windows of the house at Scotscraig in 1671. In 1628 their daughter, Margaret Buchanan, married Arthur Erskine, a son of Marie Stewart, Countess of Mar.
The date of Margaret Hartsyde's death is unknown.

Dorothy Silken, Piero Hugon, and Danish Anna

Hartsyde's successor in the role of looking after the queen's silver in the bedchamber, was the Danish gentlewoman Dorothy Silken or Silking. She married Sir Edward Zouch of Woking in 1612. After an inventory of plate at Denmark House was made in 1621 they were asked to supply a shortfall worth £493, including a gold casting bottle with the queen's arms. Zouch successfully claimed that a warrant signed by his wife was forgery, because she could not write her name.
After Anne of Denmark's funeral in May 1619, two of her servants were accused of theft, her French page Piero or Pierre Hugon and a Danish maiden of honour called Anna. Piero had been "her creature and favourite", and according to a letter describing the queen's last days, "Pira, and the Dutch woman that serves her" had been her closest attendants, excluding other courtiers. Anna may have been "Anna Kaas" who served the queen since her first days in Scotland. Hugon was a trusted courtier who travelled to the Danish court for Anne in 1618.
The theft was discovered by the goldsmith who supplied some of the items, either William Herrick or George Heriot. Anna and Piero were taken to the Tower of London and charged with stealing jewels worth £30,000. James Howell heard rumours and wrote, "Q. Anne left a world of brave jewels behind, but one Piero, an outlandish man, who had the keeping of them, embezelled many, and is run away."
The French ambassador François de Bassompierre, Count of Tillières, tried to help Hugon. A draft letter answering Tillières gives more detail of the accusations. King James gave a chest in Paris taken from Hugon to Mr Herbert, a brother of Sir Edward Herbert his ambassador in France, compensating Hugon with £500. The missing jewels were worth £60,000. Hugon was also accused of sending the queen's money and some religious items after her death to a nunnery and to some Jesuits to pray for her soul. These accusations were not sent to Tillières, after Hugon was interrogated in the Tower and he made a deal or bargain.
Herbert discovered that the brother of Louis Richard, one of the queen's musicians, had carried packages to France for Hugon. Herbert made an inventory of two chests belonging to Hugon, and the contents were thought to include some of the queen's jewels. He was concerned by various Catholic items he saw. There were many items of jewelry and costume, two bezoar stones, and a string of pearls with Hugon's note that Anne of Denmark had given them to him on his wedding day with a large diamond, and the pearls should be sold and the proceeds used to say Masses for the queen. Marie de' Medici became involved, who declared via Pierre Brûlart, marquis de Sillery, Viscount Puisieux, that she had always been well-disposed to the service of the late queen. Puisieux believed that Hugon was detained in England by the Spanish-favouring faction at court.
Maureen Meikle and Helen Payne propose that Hugon had become a significant figure in the queen's household after the departure of Jean Drummond, Countess of Roxburghe. Assuming that many or most of the items in the inventory had belonged to the queen, including Catholic items, they suggest that Anne of Denmark had asked him to take them away to prevent their discovery, although the result was the exact opposite, and that Hugon 's confession that money was intended to found a monastery in France ought to be taken as evidence for the queen's Catholic faith.
Anne of Denmark had lost jewelry to thieves before. When she came to Scotland in 1590 she brought a German goldsmith called Jacob Kroger. In 1594 Kroger stole some of her jewels and fled to England with a French stable servant called Guillaume Martyn. They were captured by George Selby, imprisoned in Tynemouth Castle, returned to Edinburgh and executed.