Robert Carr, 1st Earl of Ancram

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Robert Ker (c. 1578–1654), 1st Earl of Ancram, was a Scottish nobleman and writer.

He was descended from a third son of Sir Andrew Ker of Ferniehurst, and entered public life as laird of Ancrum in Roxburghshire. He was born about the year 1578, and succeeded to the family estate in 1590, on the death of his father, who was assassinated by his kinsman, Robert Key, younger of Cessford. He was cousin to the famous, or rather infamous Robert Carr, the favourite of James VI. Kerr appears to have also been honoured, at an early period of life, with court favour. Soon after the king’s accession to the English throne, he is observed to occupy a considerable station in the household of Prince Henry, which was, perhaps, more splendid, and consisted of more persons than the present royal household. He afterwards was employed about the person of Prince Charles, who became his patron through life. By the mediation of this prince, a match was effected between Sir Robert and the Lady Anne Stanley, daughter of the Earl of Derby.

In 1620, Sir Robert was involved in a fatal quarrel by a young man named Charles Maxwell, who insulted him, without the least provocation, as he was entering the palace at Newmarket. In a duel, which followed, Sir Robert killed his antagonist; and, although the friends of the deceased are said to have acquitted him of all blame, so strict were the rules established by the king for the prevention and punishment of duels, that he was obliged to fly to Holland, where he remained about a year. During his exile, he employed himself in the collection of pictures, for which, like his royal master, he had a good taste: those which he brought with him on his return, were eventually presented to the prince. He was also distinguished by his literary taste.

On the accession of Charles I to the throne, in 1625, Sir Robert Ker was one of the friends who experienced his favour. He was in that year constituted a gentleman of the bed-chamber, and on June 24, 1633, when the king was in Scotland at his coronation, he was elevated to the peerage, under the titles of Earl of Ancram and Lord Kerr of Nisbet, Langnewton, and Dolphinstoun. Previous to this period, his son William, by his first wife Elizabeth, daughter of Sir John Murray of Blackbarony, had married his relative, Anne, Countess of Lothian in her own right, and had been, by the king, endowed with a full participation of that title. It was therefore arranged, in the patent granted to the subject of this memoir, that his own title should descend to the children of his second marriage, he thus enjoyed the singular honour of being father of two peers.

Unlike many other persons who owed every thing to this prince, the Earl of Ancram continued his steady adherent during the whole of his troubles; though he was unable to prevent his eldest son, the Earl of Lothian, from acting one of the most conspicuous parts on the opposite side. On the death of Charles, his lordship took refuge in Holland, where he spent the remainder of his days in solitary afflictions and poverty, and died in 1654, in the seventy-sixth year of his age. Jan Lievens painted him marvously. His title was inherited by his son Charles, but ultimately merged in that of Lothian.

He had two sons by his first marriage to Elizabeth Murray: