In 1650, when Charles II landed in Scotland, a mounted regiment of Life Guards was formed, with the Earl of Eglinton as Colonel or Captain-General, and Viscount Newburgh as lieutenant-colonel and as captain of the bodyguard troop.
After the Restoration, Newburgh mustered a revived bodyguard troop in Edinburgh in March 1661, numbering four officers, five NCOs, and 120 troopers, plus a surgeon and clerk, three trumpeters and a drummer.
At the same time, a second troop of guards was raised, commanded directly by the Lord High Commissioner, effectively the Scottish viceroy for the absent king in London, who was also Captain-General of the army.
In 1688, during the Glorious Revolution, all but one of the officers remained loyal to King James, or at the very least, resigned their commissions; but William of Orange quickly appointed the Earl of Drumlanrig to command a reconstituted Scots Troop.
In 1709, due to the full merger of the separate English and Scottish armies, the unit was transferred to the British establishment, where it was designated as the 4th Troop of Horse Guards.