Argyll's Lodging

[2] In 1629 Sir William Alexander, whose family was related to the Campbells of Argyll, bought the house from the Erskines.

Sir William was born in 1577 in Menstrie, a village lying a few miles to the north east of Stirling.

He is chiefly remembered today for his settlement of the colony of Nova Scotia in North America under a royal charter granted in 1621.

Sir William had his Stirling home redecorated when he realised that Charles I was intending to come to Scotland for his Scottish coronation in 1633.

He died insolvent in 1640, leaving the house to his son Charles, but the town of Stirling claimed the property in lieu of his unpaid debts.

In 1666 he bought the house that would become known as Argyll's Lodging and built it outwards to the north and south, while enclosing the courtyard behind a screen wall with an elaborate entrance gate.

Due to the fact that her first husband, the Earl of Balcarres, had remained loyal to the King, the latter granted her a pension and allowed her to keep her personal property.

Argyll returned to Scotland intending to lead a rebellion against the King to coincide with the Duke of Monmouth's revolt in England.

During the Napoleonic wars the army was greatly expanded, from 40,000 to 225,000 men, and the small hospital in the castle proved inadequate.

The plan of the house was originally a "P", the upper part of the "P" consisting of three wings around a courtyard to the west screened from the street by a wall with an entrance gate.

The main entrance which is in the central east wing led directly into the Laigh Hall (ground-floor cellar).