STEWART, John (d.1769), of Castle Stewart, Wigtown.

The great-grandson of the 2nd Earl of Galloway,1P.H. M’Kerlie, Lands and their Owners in Galloway, i. 314-17; ii. 315; iii. 151, 387; v. 360. Stewart gave up his customs post in 1747 to stand for his county as a government supporter on the interest of his kinsman, the 6th Earl of Galloway, who put him in the hands of Argyll and Pelham.2Argyll to Pelham, 6 Aug. 1747, Newcastle (Clumber) mss. Receiving a place in 1751, he was unopposed at the ensuing by-election, mentioning to Claudius Amyand the ‘favours I have received’ from Newcastle and Pelham.331 July 1751, Add. 32724, f. 502. He may have been the Mr Stuart who in 1754 was receiving a secret service pension of £200 a year, which was not continued.4Add. 33038, f. 415. With Argyll’s support he expected to be returned again in 1754, but Galloway was hostile to the Duke and, combining with the Dalrymples, put up his brother, Colonel James Stewart,5Corresp. of Ld. Loudoun, Apr. 1754, with John Dalrymple and others, Loudoun mss. thus forcing John Stewart to withdraw. Four days before the election John Dalrymple (afterwards 5th Earl of Stair) wrote to Lord Loudoun: ‘Castle Stewart could never have been able to carry the shire without Colonel Stewart for the burghs; he has no interest earthly, independent of Galloway’.628 Apr. 1754, ibid. He did not stand again and died shortly before 6 July 1769.