Madness Monday - George Sinclair, 4th Earl of Caithness: One Bad Dude - Munro Line



Reconstruction of Girnigoe Castle by Andrew Spratt

Does power lead to cruelty, or does cruelty lead to power?  Did George Sinclair (1527-1582) have the same “bad gene” that turned his great-uncle William Sinclair into the person known in history as “William the Wastrel”?  Was it the same gene that turned his grandson, another George and the 5^th Earl of Caithness, into the person we know as “the Wicked Earl”?  Or were these fellows bad because they lived in cruel times?  It’s the age-old Nature v. Nurture debate, I suppose, but there were no niceties of the psychiatrist’s couch in the earl’s time.  There was just blunt force.

Girnigoe Castle Today

            George’s grandfather, William Sinclair, 2^nd Earl of Caithness, had added to the Sinclair castles by building Girnigoe Castle three miles north of Wick on the east coast of Scotland.  (The spelling Groën gho is found in some documents.)  It was a massive beast of a castle of the L-Plan towerhouse type with a massive square multi-storey tower typical in Scotland at the time.  Similar castles are known to have had walls 14 feet thick on the ground floor, and since Girnigoe was nearly impregnable until it was attacked in the seventeenth century by Cromwell’s cannons, we can probably assume that it was a pretty sturdy place.



Dungeon of Girnigoe Castle

            Of interest to us in the story of George Sinclair, however, would more likely be the dungeon of Girnigoe Castle.  George’s son and heir, John (called Master of Caithness as he was in line to be the next earl), fell (to put it mildly) from his father’s good graces.  In a dispute with the Sinclairs’ arch-enemy, the Earl of Sutherland, George sent his son John into the town of Dornoch to attack Hugh Murray of Aberscors, a Sutherland ally.  In this assault, John first burned down the Cathedral and destroyed the town, then besieged the castle.  The Sutherland allies “cried uncle” and surrendered the castle.  Agreeing to leave the county, the defeated group left three hostages as a pledge that they would follow through.  However, Earl George—was he paranoid?—took John’s decision not to kill the Sutherland allies as a sign that he (John) had turned against his father and was in league with the Sutherlands.  Therefore, when the three hostages were delivered, George immediately had them beheaded and threw his son John, aged 27, into the dungeon of Girnigoe castle, where he lived for seven years in darkness.  During the last months of his life, his two jailers (actually Sinclair kin) began feeding him salt-beef while depriving him of water.  The history books say that in 1577, John, Master of Caithness, “died insane from thirst.”



Sinclair Aisle in Wick, Caithness
Photo by Gordon Mackay

     In 1877, historian William Anderson aptly described the end of George Sinclair, thus: “The inhuman earl died at Edinburgh 9th September 1582, and his body was buried in St Giles [some say Rosslyn Chapel], where a monument was erected to his memory. His heart was cased in lead and placed in the Sinclair's aisle in the church of Wick, where his murdered son was interred. . . . In an incursion of the earl of Sutherland into Caithness in 1588, afterwards mentioned, one of his followers, having entered the church of Wick, found the leaden box which enclosed the heart of the cruel earl of Caithness and, disappointed in expectations of treasure, he broke the casket open and flung the corrupted heart to the winds.”  A leaden heart flung from a leaden case.  A fitting end to one bad dude. 

Sources

Anderson, William.  The Scottish Nation: Or. the Surnames, Families, Literature, Honours, and Biographical History of the People of Scotland.  London: Fullarton, 1877.  Available on Google Books.

Images

Girnigoe Castle Today.  “Sinclair Girnigoe Castle.”  Wikipedia. 11 Jun 2013.  Web.  22 Jun 2013.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Girnigoe_Castle

Inside the Dungeon.  “Sinclair and Girnigoe Castle.”  Caithness.org.  n.d. Web. 22 Jun 2013. http://www.caithness.org/caithness/castles/photogallery/index.php?gallery=14&start=24

Reconstruction of Girnigoe Castle.  Used with the kind permission of Andrew Spratt. Stravaiging around Scotland.  2013.  Web.  22 Jun 2013. http://www.stravaiging.com/history/castle/castle-girnigoe

Sinclair Aisle.  Used with the kind permission of Gordon Mackay. Gordonmac Dot Com. http://www.gordonmac.com

 

© Eileen Cunningham, 2013

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