Gustavus Hamilton, 1st Viscount Boyne

Gustavus was born in 1642, probably in Manorhamilton Castle, County Leitrim, Ireland, built by his father. He was the fourth child and third son of Frederick Hamilton and Sidney Vaughan. His father belonged to a cadet branch of the House of Abercorn, being the fifth and youngest son of Claud Hamilton, 1st Lord Paisley. Gustavus's mother was a daughter of Sir John Vaughan, who had been governor of Londonderry.[1]

He appears below at the bottom of the list of siblings as the youngest:

1. Christiana (married 1649), who married Sir George Munro;[3]
2. Frederick (died before 1646), who was killed in action in Ireland;[4]
3. James (died 1652), called James of Manorhamilton, who married Catherine, daughter of Claud, Lord Strabane;[5] and
4. Gustavus (1642–1723), our subject here.

His father named him for the Swedish king Gustavus Adolphus for whom he had fought during the Thirty Years' War in Germany.[6] Gustavus studied at Trinity College, Dublin[7] and was awarded the degree of a Doctor of Civil Law in 1677 by the University of Oxford.[8]

Hamilton was captain in the English Army and was sworn of the Privy Council of England on the accession of King James II of England in 1685.[9] Shortly after this he quit his service and therefore was attainted.[10] In the Glorious Revolution, he was appointed colonel of the 20th Foot by William of Orange in 1689 and fought with his regiment in the defence of Coleraine.[11] Driven from there by Richard Hamilton, he fell back on Enniskillen, of which he was appointed governor.[12] At the Battle of the Boyne in the following year, his horse was shot under him and he almost killed.[13] In 1691 he took part in the Storming of Athlone and became the town's governor.[14] He was promoted to brigadier-general in 1696[15] and major-general in 1704.[16] Gustavus served as Vice-Admiral of Ulster from 1691 until 1710 and again from 1716 until his death in 1723.[17][18] In 1710, he was invested to the Privy Council of Ireland.[19]

From 1692 to 1713, Gustavus sat in the Irish House of Commons for Donegal County.[20][21] Subsequently, he was returned for Strabane until 1715,[21] when he was elevated to the Peerage of Ireland as Baron Hamilton of Stackallan, in the County of Meath.[22] On 20 August 1717, Hamilton was further honoured, when he was created Viscount Boyne, in the Province of Leinster, also in the Irish Peerage.[23]

He married Elizabeth Brooke, second daughter of Sir Henry Brooke.[24]

They had three sons and a daughter:

1. Frederick (died 1715), who predeceased his father but whose son became the 2nd Viscount;[25][26]
2. Gustavus of Red Wood, King's County (died 1734), M.P. for Donegal;[27]
3. Elizabeth, married Charles Lambart;[28] and
4. Henry (1692–1743), M.P. for Donegal.[29]

Lord Boyne died on 16 September 1723 [30] and was buried at Stackallen in County Meath. His eldest son Frederick having predeceased him in 1715, Boyne was succeeded in his titles by his grandson Gustavus.[31]

• Burke, Bernard (1949), A Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Peerage and Baronetage of the British Empire (99th ed.), London: Burke's Peerage Ltd.
• Cokayne, George Edward (1910), Gibbs, Vicary (ed.), The complete peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, extant, extinct, or dormant, 1 (2nd ed.), London: St Catherine Press - AB-ADAM to BASING
• Debrett, John (1828), Peerage of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, 2 (17th ed.), London: F. C. and J. Rivington
• Haydn, Joseph (1851), The Book of Dignities; Rolls of the Official Personages of the British Empire, London: Longman, Brown, Green and Longman's
• Henderson, Thomas Finlayson (1890), "HAMILTON, GUSTAVUS, VISCOUNT BOYNE (1639–1723)", in Lee, Sidney (ed.), Dictionary of National Biography, 24, New York: MacMillan and Co., pp. 159–160
• Lodge, John (1789), The Peerage of Ireland, 5, Dublin: James Moore
• Macaulay, Thomas Babington (1855), The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, 3, London: Longman Brown Greens & Longmans
• Paul, James Balfour (1904), The Scots Peerage, 1, Edinburgh: David Douglas
• Webb, Alfred (1878), "Hamilton, Gustavus, Viscount Boyne", Compendium of Irish Biography, Dublin: M. H. Gill & Son, pp. 241–242
• Wills, Rev. James (1841), "Gustavus Hamilton, Viscount Boyne", Lives of Illustrious and Distinguished Irishmen, 3, Glasgow: MacGregor, Polson & Co, pp. 358–397

• Genealogy of Gustavus Hamilton on The Peerage website
• Leigh Rayment for M.P.