David Beaton

David Beaton (c. 1494 - May 29, 1546) was a Scottish cardinal and Archbishop of St Andrews.

He was a younger son of John Beaton of Balfour in the county of Fife, and is said to have been born in 1494. He was educated at the universities of St Andrews and Glasgow, and in his sixteenth year was sent to Paris, where he studied civil and canon law. He began his political career at the French court. He became Commendator of Abroath in 1524, bishop of Mirepoix in Languedoc in December 1537 on the recommendation of King Francis I, and a in 1538 he was appointed a cardinal by Pope Paul III, under the title of St Stephen in the Caelian Hill. He was the only Scotsman named to that office by an undisputed right, Cardinal Wardlaw, Bishop of Glasgow, having received his appointment from the anti-pope Clement VII. On the death of Archbishop James Beaton, his uncle and patron, in 1539, the cardinal became Archbishop of St. Andrews. In 1544, he was made Papal legate in Scotland.

Between 1533 and 1542 he acted several times as King James V of Scotland's ambassador to France. He took a leading part in the negotiations connected with the King's marriages, first with Madeleine of France, and afterwards with Mary of Guise. He was made a French citizen.

Politically, Beaton was preoccupied with the maintenance of the Franco-Scottish allience, and opposing Anglophile political attitudes, which were associated with the clamour for Protestant reform in Scotland ('the whole polution and plague of Anglican impiety' as he called it). He was afraid that James V might follow Henry VIII's policy of appropriating monastic revenues. On the death of James in December 1542 at the battle of Solway Moss, Beaton attempted to assume office as one of the regents for the infant sovereign Mary, founding his claim on an alleged will of the late king; but the will was generally regarded as forged, and the Earl of Arran, heir to the throne, was declared regent. The cardinal, blamed by many for the war policy that led to the defeat at Solway Moss, was, by order of the regent, committed to the custody of Lord Seaton. With Beaton out of power, the Anglophile party persuaded Arran to make a marriage treaty with England on behalf of the infant queen, and to appoint a numner of Protestant preachers. In 1543 Beaton regained power, cancelled the treaty and proceeded to prosecute a number of those whom he saw as heretics. Two English invasions, and a failed Scottish invasion of England in 1545 followed - and for these many blamed Beaton.

In March 1546, perhaps to divert attention from these criticisms, Beaton arranged for the arrest trial and execution by burning of George Wishart. Wishart, though, had many sympathisers, and this led to the assassianation of the Cardinal soon afterwards. The conspirators, led by Norman Leslie, master of Rothes, and William Kirkaldy of Grange, managed to obtain admission at daybreak of 29 May 1546, and murdered the cardinal in his own castle. At the time it was widely believed that his death was in the interests of Henry VII of England, who regared Beaton as the chief obstacle to his policy in Scotland.

The murder of Beaton was certainly a significant point in the eventual triumph of Prostestantism in Scotland, and yet even at the time it was not neccessarily condoned even among his opponents. His contemporary Sir David Lyndsay, statesman, poet and strong critic of Beaton's, wrote soon after The Tragedie of the Cardinal (sic), which concluded:

                               "As for the Cardinal-I grant
                            He was the man we weel could want,
                                 And we’ll forget him soon!
                            And yet I think, the sooth to say,
                             Although the loon is well away,
                                 The deed was foully done."   

Beaton was little interested in Church reform, living, like many pre-Reformation prelates, in open concubinage, providing lavishly for his children from eccessiastical property. Certainly, he was an able statesman, and some saw his stance against Henry VIII as patriotic, but others, recalling his assets and interests in France called him 'the best Frenchman' in Scotland.

Reference

• John Knox, Hist. of the Reformation in Scotland, ed. David Laing (1846-1864)
• John Spottiswoode, archbishop of St Andrews, Hist. of the Church of Scotland (Spottiswoode Soc., 1847-1851)
• Art. in Dict. of Nat. Biog. and works there quoted;
• Andrew Lang Hist. of Scotland, vols. i. and ii. (1900-1902)
• Cameron M et al (eds) Dictionary of Scottish Church History and Theology T&T Clark, Edinburgh 1993.
• de:David Beaton