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ROBERT BRUCE

Robert Bruce was the greatest of the Scottish Kings. He was born in 1274 and died in 1329. He was King of Scotland from 1306 to 1329. The son of Robert Bruce (Earl of Carrick) in 1296, as Earl of Carrick, he swore fealty to Edward I, and in 1297 fought on the English side against Wallace. He then joined the Scottish army, but in the same year returned to his allegiance to Edward until 1298, when he again joined the national party, and became in 1299 one of the four regents of the kingdom. In the three final campaigns, however, he resumed fidelity to Edward, and resided for some time at his court; but, learning that the king meditated putting him to death on information given by the traitor Comyn, he fled in February 1306, to Scotland, stabbed Comyn in a quarrel at Dumfries, assembled his vassals at Lochmaben Castle, and claimed the crown, which he received at Scone, on March the 27th.

Being twice defeated, he dismissed his troops, retired to Rathlin Island, and was supposed to be dead, when, in the spring of 1307, he landed on the Carrick coast, defeated the Earl of Pembroke at Loudon Hill, and in two years had wrested nearly the whole country from the English. He then in successive years advanced into England, laying waste the country; and on June the 24th, 1314, defeated at Bannockburn the English forces advancing under Edward II to the relief of the garrison at Stirling.

In 1316 he went to Ireland to the aid of his brother Edward, and on his return in 1318, in retaliation for inroads made during his absence, he took Berwick and harried Northumberland and Yorkshire. Hostilities continued until the defeat of Edward near Byland Abbey in 1323, and though in that year a truce was concluded for thirteen years, it was speedily broken. Not until March the 4th 1328, was the treaty concluded by which the independence of Scotland was fully recognized. Robert Bruce did not long survive the completion of his work, dying at Cardross Castle on June the 7th, 1329. He was twice married; first to a daughter of the Earl of Mar, Isabella, by whom he had a daughter, Marjory, mother of Robert II; and then to a daughter of Aymer de Burgh, Earl of Ulster, Elizabeth, by whom he had a son, David, who succeeded him.

Ronert Bruce (Robert De Brus) was the fifth lord of Annandale. He was born in 1210 and died in 1295. He was possessed of extensive estates in Cumberland, of which he was made sheriff in 1255. He was one of the fifteen regents of Scotland during the minority of Alexander III and was one of the competitors for the Scottish crown on the death of Margaret, the Maiden of Norway, in 1290; Bruce being the grandson of David, earl of Huntingdon, by his second daughter Isobel, while Baliol claimed as the great-grandson by the eldest daughter Margaret. On the decision of Edward being given in 1292 in favour of Baliol, Robert Bruce resigned the estate of Annandale to his eldest son to avoid doing homage to his rival.

Robert Bruce (Earl of Carrick), was the eldest son of Robert Bruce and father of Robert Bruce, the later king of Scotland. He accompanied Edward I to Palestine in 1269; married, in 1271, Martha Margaret, countess of Carrick. Like his father he resigned the lordship of Annandale to his eldest son to avoid acknowledging the supremacy of Baliol. On the revolt of the latter Robert Bruce fought on the English side, and after the battle of Dunbar made an unsuccessful application to Edward for the crown. He died in 1304.
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