Esmé Stewart, 3rd Duke of Lennox

Esmé Stewart, 3rd Duke of Lennox (1579 – 30 July 1624), KG, 7th Seigneur d'Aubigny, lord of the Manor of Cobham, Kent, was a Scottish nobleman and through their paternal lines was a second cousin of King James VI of Scotland and I of England.

He was the younger son of Esmé Stewart, 1st Duke of Lennox (1542–1583), a Frenchman of Scottish ancestry and a favourite of King James VI of Scotland (of whose father, Henry Stewart, Lord Darnley, he was a first cousin), by his wife Catherine de Balsac (died after 1630), a daughter of Guillaume de Balsac, Sieur d'Entragues, by his wife Louise d'Humières.

[3] He had become the 7th Seigneur d'Aubigny in France when his elder brother surrendered the title following their father's death.

[4][5] On 9 February 1608, he performed in the masque The Hue and Cry After Cupid at Whitehall Palace as a sign of the zodiac, to celebrate the wedding of John Ramsay, Viscount Haddington to Elizabeth Radclyffe.

In 1609, he married Katherine Clifton, 2nd Baroness Clifton, by whom he had eleven children, third cousins of King Charles I, for whom many of them fought and died in the English Civil War: He died on 30 July 1624 at Kirby Hall, Northamptonshire, of the "spotted ague".

Arms of Esmé Stewart, 3rd Duke of Lennox: Quarterly of 4, 1&4: Arms awarded in 1427 by King Charles VII of France to Sir John Stewart of Darnley , 1st Seigneur d'Aubigny, 1st Seigneur de Concressault and 1st Comte d'Évreux, Constable of the Scottish Army in France: [ 1 ] Royal arms of France within a bordure of Bonkyll, for the arms of the de Bonkyll family of Bonkyll Castle in Scotland (whose canting arms were three buckles ), [ 2 ] ancestors of Stewart of Darnley; 2&3: Stewart of Darnley: Arms of Stewart , Hereditary High Steward of Scotland , a bordure engrailed gules for difference ; overall an inescutcheon of Lennox, Earl of Lennox , the heiress of whom was the wife of Sir John Stewart of Darnley
Two of the younger sons of the 3rd Duke of Lennox, who together with their elder brother Lord George Stewart, died as young men during the Civil War supporting the Royalist cause, left : Lord John Stewart (1621–1644), died aged 23 and right : Lord Bernard Stewart (1623–1645), died aged 22. Lord John Stuart and his Brother, Lord Bernard Stuart , c. 1638, by Sir Anthony van Dyck , National Gallery, London