New Blog 1: Lake Dunmore

Sunday 4 November 2012

Lake Dunmore

John Murray, 4th Earl of Dunmore (1732 – 25 February 1809) was a British peer and colonial governor. He was the son of William Murray, 3rd Earl of Dunmore, and his wife Catherine (née Murray). He is best remembered as the last royal governor of the Colony of Virginia.

John was the eldest son of William and Catherine Murray, and nephew of John Murray, second Earl of Dunmore. In 1745 William Murray and John (then only 15) joined the ill-fated campaign of "Bonnie Prince Charlie" (Charles Edward Stuart). Young John was appointed a page to Prince Charles. The second Earl remained with the Hanoverian regime. After the Jacobite army was defeated at Culloden (1746), the Murrays were put under house arrest, and William was imprisoned in the Tower. By 1750, William had received a conditional pardon. His son John, now 20, joined the British Army. In 1756, after the deaths of his uncle and father, John became the fourth Earl of Dunmore, and sat as a Scottish representative peer in the House of Lords from 1761 to 1774 and from 1776 to 1790. Born in Tymouth, Scotland.