400th anniversary of the Baronetcy of Nova Scotia

The gold and enamel badge is decorated with the St Andrew’s Cross, overlaid with the Royal Arms of Scotland featuring a red lion on a gold background, surrounded by a red double border, known as a tressure. This striking badge denotes that the bearer is a Baronet of Nova Scotia. 

This hereditary title was initiated by King James VI & I in 1624, who died in early 1625, leaving the founding of the Order to his son and heir King Charles I, who created the first Baronets of Nova Scotia on 25 May 1625. Each Baronet was required to pay Sir William Alexander of Menstrie, who started the colonising project, the sum of 1,000 merks for his past expenses and 2,000 merks for future costs, as a way of funding his attempt to create the colony in Nova Scotia. [1] The saltire and Royal Arms of Scotland are surrounded by a motto: Fax mentis honestae gloria, which translates as ‘Glory is the torch of an honourable mind’. 

Whilst the motto has lofty ambitions, the creation of the order was more pragmatic: the astute King James initiated the Order as a means of raising funds to support the colonisation of the land that had become known as Nova Scotia, or New Scotland – an area of North America including the modern Canadian provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and the Gaspé Peninsula. The new hereditary title could be bought for 3,000 merks, 2,000 of which was then used to support six colonists on the land for two years. Each Baronet was granted 16,000 acres in Nova Scotia in addition to the hereditary title of Baronet that entitles the Baronet to be called ‘Sir’, with Baronet or Bt added after their name.

One of the earliest recipients of the baronetcy was Thomas Burnett of Leys. On display at what was his home, Crathes Castle, is the charter of King Charles I, clearly dated 21 April 1626, granting Thomas 16,000 acres of land in Nova Scotia and the title.

Tied to it, with a plait of green and cream ribbons, is a large red wax seal. This is in fact the second seal used by King Charles’s father, James VI & I. James had died the previous year and his son’s coronation had taken place on 2 February 1626 – this charter is evidence that Charles I must have continued to use his father’s seal until his own was designed and cast in bronze. The charter awards to the now ‘Sir’ Thomas Burnett of Leys 16,000 acres of land in Nova Scotia, running west and north from the coast at ‘Levingstoun Donypace’, to ‘Le Argallis Bay’, place names that did not survive the test of time.

In this age of ever-expanding empires, these lands of the Mi’kmaq people would be occupied by settlers, with rights granted to the baronets to exploit all of the natural resources of the land and its potential for development. This planned displacement of the Mi’kmaq people is nowadays of course very controversial. The charter states that ownership would include all buildings, both existing and future (rather optimistically) on what is still a sparsely populated and largely undeveloped area.

Fishing and mineral rights are also detailed: ‘gold and silver … iron, steel, tin, copper, brass, lead, alloy and precious stones, gems, pearls, crystal and corals’. The baronet was also awarded the right to draw up armies for the defence of his land, and to appoint administrators. [2]

Four years later, a neighbour of Sir Thomas Burnett, William Forbes of Craigievar, was awarded his own baronetcy of Nova Scotia. William was a young man with political ambitions and became MP for Aberdeenshire in 1639. He later became disillusioned with royalty, and in 1647 raised and commanded a cavalry regiment in the English Civil War for the Parliamentary side. His title, being hereditary, was passed on to subsequent male heirs, and the family badge features in several Forbes family portraits of the 19th century.

In the second portrait above, the Order takes pride of place, suspended from the stiff upright collar of Lord Sempill’s full dress uniform: that of an officer in the Black Watch. Lord Sempill had seen active service in Sudan, British India and South Africa, and had recently been appointed Representative Peer of Scotland. He would see heroic service during the First World War and was later appointed an aide-de-camp to King George V. The portrait is the epitome of imperial prowess: painted at a time when the British Empire was at its most powerful, albeit having continuously to defend that position across the globe.

The British colony of Nova Scotia was short-lived, as in 1633 King Charles I ceded Nova Scotia to the French, by the Treaty of St Germaine. Although lands were no longer granted, Scots could still be granted the baronetcy, as happened to Archibald Kennedy of Culzean in 1682. 

Three years later, King Charles II decreed that a baronetcy should be granted to Thomas Dalyell of the Binns (known as General Tam) for services rendered to the monarchy during and after the Civil War. However, as both Charles II and General Tam died before it was finalised, it was King James II who signed the document confirming General Tam’s son Sir Thomas Dalyell as the first baronet. His only son, also Thomas, died unmarried on 4 May 1719 and the title fell into abeyance. However, a few years later James Menteith Dalyell (1691–1747), oldest son of Sir Thomas’s only daughter Magdalen, reclaimed the title. His portrait, on display at his home of House of the Binns, is the earliest example the Trust has of a sitter wearing the Order of Nova Scotia.

The age of the sitter and the style of his wig suggest that this portrait was painted long before James reestablished the title c1728, when he would have been in his late 30s. It would be interesting to see if conservation can reveal if the order was added to the portrait a decade or so after it was actually painted.

The inheritance issue arose again when Eleanor Dalyell (1895–1972) successfully claimed the baronetcy in her own right. Following their marriage in 1928, her husband Percy Gordon Loch (1887–1953) took on his wife’s surname. He did not, however, become the baronet. The Dalyell family was unusual in that in 1682 General Tam Dalyell drew up a disposition that stipulated that succession of lands and titles should pass through the female line if there were no male heir. This seems to have been decided successfully in law on three occasions: through Magdalen Menteith Dalyell in 1719; with Sir James Wilkie Dalyell, 9th Baronet, who succeeded through Harriet Dalyell in 1913 (confirmed by a legal decision in 1919); and most recently in 1935 when, following the death of her father, Eleanor Isabel (Nora) Dalyell (1895–1972) became the de jure 10th Baronetess of the Binns, one of only four baronetesses in British history. She is a very significant person in the history of the National Trust for Scotland, being one of the first landowners to give a large house and estate to the Trust in 1944. 

Eleanor Dalyell and her husband had their portraits painted the following year. She does not wear the Order of Nova Scotia, but instead a tasteful ensemble of a peach silk satin dress, white ostrich feather fan and kid gloves, setting off to perfection her imperial topaz jewels. These distinctive golden-orange stones are mined in Brazil, and had most probably come to the family through Maria Sampayo (1798–1871), the Portuguese wife of Eleanor’s ancestor Sir William Cunningham Dalyell of the Binns, 7th Bt (1784–1865).

In 1972 Labour politician Tam Dalyell became 11th Baronet, following Dame Eleanor Dalyell’s death. Today, the title is held by his son, Gordon Dalyell, who succeeded on Tam Dalyell’s death in 2017.

First awarded to the Gordons of Haddo in 1642, the Order of Nova Scotia features in several portraits at Haddo House. Perhaps the most striking is the most recent, that below of Archibald Victor Dudley Gordon, 5th Marquess of Aberdeen and Temair (1913–84). Upon the death of his brother in 1974, Archibald inherited all of his titles, including the baronetcy of Nova Scotia. He had previously worked for many years as a broadcaster, producing The Week in Westminster for BBC radio from 1946–66. 

The 5th Marquess’ choice of Maggi Hambling as his portraitist was typical of this creative and brave collector of contemporary art. Hambling’s vigorous depiction is in stark contrast to all the portraits that preceded it. Here, the Order of Nova Scotia is just a vivid dash of cobalt blue and its ribbon a flash of brilliant yellow at the centre of her intensely energetic composition.

A series of events celebrating the 400th anniversary of the Baronetcy of Nova Scotia, organised by Kirk of the Holy Rude, the Standing Council of the Baronetage and the University of Stirling, will take place on 30 June and 1 July 2025. For more information, please contact the Secretary of the Standing Council of the Baronetage by emailing secretary@baronetage.org

2025 also marks the 400th anniversary of the death of King James VI & I. A new exhibition at National Galleries of Scotland – The World of King James VI and I – running from 26 April to 14 September 2025, charts his remarkable reign through stories of friendship, family, feuds and ambition.

Find out more

With thanks to Sir Crispin Agnew of Lochnaw for suggesting and advising on this article, to James Burnett of Leys for allowing the illustration of his family charter, to Kathleen Dalyell OBE for her guidance on her family history, and Dr Stuart Allan for advising on military uniform, regiments and ranks.

[1] A total of £166 13d 4p has a sterling equivalent of roughly £39,530 today. 

[2] Spalding Burnett of Leys  Disposition of lands in Nova Scotia to Sir Thomas Burnett, 1625 Patent of Baronetcy, 1626, pp. 232–33, The family of Burnett of Leys, with collateral branches. From the MSS. of the late George Burnett.