Isobel Colt was the nurse of Robert Stuart, Duke of Kintyre and Lorne, a son of James VI of Scotland and Anne of Denmark.[1]
She may have been a daughter of an Edinburgh lawyer Oliver Colt and his wife Isobel Henryson, who was a daughter of Edinburgh merchant Thomas Henryson.[2]
Isobel Colt was the wife of Patrick Smith, an Edinburgh lawyer and writer to the signet. Women in early modern Scotland did not change their surnames on marriage.[3][4]
For the baptism of Duke Robert at Dunfermline Abbey on 2 May 1601, Isobel Colt was given new clothes including, taffeta from Tours for her gown, black velvet for a skirt and to border the gown, and black velvet for a "mutch" to wear on her head.[5]
She was dismissed shortly before the death of Duke Robert, as it was thought a change of nurse would improve his health. Isobel was given £200 Scots as a reward for her service by the English courtier Roger Aston on 25 May 1602. The payment was witnessed by John Buchanan, who later married Margaret Hartsyde, a servant of Anne of Denmark.[6]
References
edit- ^ Agnes Strickland, Lives of the Queens of England, vol. 5, p. 74.
- ^ Charles Boog Watson, Roll of Edinburgh Burgesses (Edinburgh: SRS, 1929), p. 117.
- ^ Jenny Wormald, Court, Kirk, and Community (London, 1981), p. 30.
- ^ History Workshop, What's in a Surname? Rebecca Mason
- ^ Ethel Carleton Williams, Anne of Denmark (London: Longman, 1970), p. 66: Letters to King James the Sixth from the Queen, Prince Henry, Prince Charles etc (Edinburgh, 1835), p. lxxxi-lxxxii
- ^ Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 13 (Edinburgh, 1969), p. 988 no. 801: National Records of Scotland, NRS E23/11.