Ninian Cockburn
Ninian Cockburn (died 6 May 1579) was a Scottish soldier and officer of the Garde Écossaise, a company which guarded the French king.
The Cockburn family had strong Protestant leanings; John Knox was the tutor of his nephew, and George Wishart was arrested at Ormiston.
[4] Ninian was among those accused of the murder of Cardinal David Beaton in 1546, and he joined the Protestant garrison during the subsequent siege of St Andrews Castle.
According to the Earl of Glencairn, Ninian Cockburn was a double agent, a spy at St Andrews Castle for the Governor of Scotland, Regent Arran.
He had been to Mary of Guise with a message from Somerset but her answer was not satisfactory, and she had managed to make him the enemy of Regent Arran, his half-brother John Hamilton, Bishop of Dunkeld, and George Douglas of Pittendreich.
Arran was going to harvest Ormiston wood as a punishment, and was taking timber and stones from the house of Alexander Crichton of Brunstane for the new Spur blockhouse at Edinburgh Castle, (designed by Migliorino Ubaldini).
Ninian had asked Andrew Dudley, the commander of Broughty, to write to Mary of Guise that he was well able to defeat any attack from French galleys.
[10] In August, Ninian told Grey of Wilton the news that Mary, Queen of Scots, had sailed for France from Dumbarton Castle.
[12] At this time, Ninian was in favour with Mary of Guise, who was Regent Arran's rival for power in Scotland, and he told Andrew Dudley he hoped to bring her round to the English cause.
[13] The Scottish diplomat James Melville of Halhill recorded his meeting at St Germain en Laye with Ninian in 1553, now a Captain of Horse in the French king's guard.
Melville conveyed his reluctance to proceed to the Constable and he dismissed Ninian from his presence in his cabinet in the Château before the tale was told.
[16] During the crisis of the Scottish Reformation, Ninian's brother John, laird of Ormiston was involved in a major setback for the Protestant Lords of the Congregation.
[17] The English ambassador in Paris Nicholas Throckmorton considered sending Ninian to spy on the French at the siege of Leith in May 1560.
He told Gresham the French ambassador was planning on behalf of Francis II of France to write to James Hamilton, 3rd Earl of Arran, who had been commander of the Scot's Guard.
Arran would be offered the Crown of Scotland and the withdrawal of French troops if he abandoned the plan for him to marry Elizabeth I of England[20] Mary Queen of Scots made Ninian chamberlain and factor of the Priory of Sciennes.
[21] Ninian continued in France in the Scots Guard, and sent William Cecil inaccurate reports of French subsidies given to Scotland.
On the way he overtook her ambassador, William Chisholm, Bishop of Dunblane, who was ignorant of Mary's defeat, and upstaged him in front of Charles IX of France and Catherine de Medici.
After Mary Queen of Scots went into exile in England, Ninian's correspondence with her half-brother Regent Moray, the English ambassador, and others was discovered in July 1568.
[27] Ninian returned to Scotland, and in October 1568 he travelled to York with Regent Moray for the conference discussing Mary's alleged crimes and the Casket letters.
In May 1578, Mary, Queen of Scots, wrote a letter in cipher code to the French ambassador in London, mentioning her distrust of Cockburn.
[36] He had a son, Francis Cockburn, who was granted the office of chamberlain and factor of the Nunnery of Sciennes in June 1579, which his father had held.
