Francis Scott, 2nd Duke of Buccleuch

Francis Scott, 2nd Duke of Buccleuch KT FRS (11 January 1694/95 - 22 April 1751) was a Scottish nobleman.

He was the son of Sir James Scott, Earl of Dalkeith (son of James Scott, 1st Duke of Monmouth and Anne Scott, 1st Duchess of Buccleuch) and Lady Henrietta Hyde, daughter of Laurence Hyde, 1st Earl of Rochester. He was baptised on 20 January 1694/95 in St. James' Church, Westminster.

He married, firstly, Lady Jane Douglas, daughter of James Douglas, 2nd Duke of Queensberry and Mary Boyle, on 5 April, 1720 in Earl of Rochester's House, Privy Gardens, Whitehall. They had one son, Francis Scott, Earl of Dalkeith (1720/21 - 1750). Lady Jane died in 1729 and is buried at Dalkeith Castle.

He married, secondly, Alice Powell, daughter of Joseph Powell, on 4 September, 1744 in St. George's Chapel, Mayfair, London, England.

He held the office of Grand Master of Freemasons in 1723/24 and was invested as a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) on 12 March 1723/24. He held the office of the Spalding Gentlemen’s Society.

He was invested as a Knight of the Thistle on 2 February 1725.

He succeeded to his grandmother's titles as 6th Lord Scott of Buccleuch, 5th Baron Scott of Quhitchester and Eskdaill, 2nd Earl of Dalkeith, 2nd Duke of Buccleuch, 5th Earl of Buccleuch and 2nd Lord Scott of Whitchester and Eskdale on 6 February 1731/32.

He was a Scottish representative peer from 1734 to 1741.

He also succeeded to the titles of 2nd Earl of Doncaster and 2nd Baron Scott of Tindall in the Peerage of England on 22 March 1742/43. These were subsidiary titles of James Scott, 1st Duke of Monmouth restored by an Act of Parliament.

He was awarded the honorary degree of Doctor of Civil Laws by Oxford University on 18 April 1745.

He was buried on 26 April 1751 in Eton College Chapel.

According to his will, he had six children by a Mrs. Sarah Atkinson. He also appears to have had a son and three daughters by an Elizabeth Jenkins. Lady Louisa Stuart called him "a man of mean understanding and meaner habits," and added that after his first wife's death "he plunged into such low amours, and lived so entirely with the lowest company, that his person was scarcely known to his equals, and his character fell into utter contempt."

References

* [http://www.thepeerage.com/p10359.htm#i103590 thepeerage.com] Accessed March 16, 2008
* Doyle, James William Edmund. "The Official Baronage of England, Showing the Succession, Dignities, and Offices of Every Peer from 1066 to 1885, with Sixteen Hundred Illustrations." (p. 602) London: Longmans, Green, 1886. [http://books.google.com/books?id=B-kIAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA602&dq=James+Scott,+Earl+of+Dalkeith&as_brr=1 googlebooks] Retrieved March 16, 2008

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