John Erskine of Cardross

Colonel The Honourable John Edmund Erskine (30 March 1662 – 13 January 1743), of Cardross, was a Scottish soldier and politician. His journal was printed in the nineteenth century. He was nicknamed The Black Colonel. Background Born in Cardross, Scotland on 30 March 1662, a younger son of David Erskine, 2nd Lord Cardross, by his second wife, Mary Bruce, daughter of Sir George Bruce of Carnock. His father was a member of a cadet branch of the Earls of Buchan. Career Erskine's strongly Presbyterian sympathies led him to choose the winning sides during the Glorious Revolution of 1688 and the deliberations prior to the Act of Union of 1707. He fled from Scotland to join the army of William of Orange, where he was given command of a Regiment of Foot. He landed in England with William's invading army in 1698, the beginning of the Glorious Revolution. In return for his service, he was given further commands in William's army, made governor of Stirling and Dumbarton castles. In 1695, he was appointed a director of the Company of Scotland, and, in the following year, was sent to Holland and other parts of the continent, to manage the affairs of the company. Erskine was dubbed The Black Colonel.