Freemasonry and the Jacobites

M. de Ramsay, by Pier Leone Ghezzi. The Morgan Library identifies the sitter as probably Andrew Michael Ramsay, who served as tutor to the Stuart princes in Rome.

Freemasonry and the Jacobites concerns the involvement of supporters of the exiled Stuart dynasty in Masonic lodges, particularly in Scotland and continental Europe. The Jacobites sought the restoration of James VII and II and, later, his son and grandson after the dynastic changes of 1688–1689.^[1]

Jacobite membership is documented in particular lodges. It does not establish that Freemasonry as a whole served the Stuart cause: other Masonic networks included supporters of the Hanoverian monarchy.^[2]^[3]

Scottish lodge connections

David Stevenson identifies Jacobite connections among the early members of Dunblane lodge. They included William Drummond, Lord Strathallan, Alexander Drummond of Balhaldie and members of the Cameron family. Family relationships and local patronage helped bring these men together.^[4]

Stevenson treats the possibility of wider Jacobite sympathies within the lodge cautiously. His account also follows changes in its practical activity: after 1700 it became more involved in regulating the mason trade. Political connections and occupational functions could coexist within the same lodge.^[4]

Exiles in France

Charles Radcliffe, the titular Earl of Derwentwater, was a Jacobite participant in the rising of 1715 and later a Masonic leader in France. The QC Correspondence Circle dates his involvement in founding a Paris lodge to about 1725. Its account distinguishes active insurgents from people whose Stuart allegiance was more intermittent or social.^[2]

At the same time, the Duke of Richmond promoted English lodges in Paris and Aubigny. These provided a different set of political and intellectual connections. The presence of both circles is a reason to examine individual lodges and members rather than assign one allegiance to all early French Freemasonry.^[3]

The lodge at Rome

A lodge associated with the Jacobite community in Rome left minutes from 1735–1737. William James Hughan published the records in 1910, together with an account of their preservation in the archives of the Grand Lodge of Scotland. John Cotton and the Earl of Wintoun appear as its presiding officers.^[5]

Hughan rejected the claim that Charles Edward Stuart had presided over this lodge: the surviving minutes did not support it. Evidence that a lodge included Jacobites should therefore be distinguished from claims that a Stuart prince personally led it.^[5]

Ramsay and the Stuart household

Andrew Michael Ramsay provides a documented personal connection. The Royal Society's biographical record identifies him as tutor to the sons of James Francis Edward Stuart in Rome in 1724–1725. This establishes his employment in the Stuart household; it does not by itself demonstrate that his later Masonic writings were instructions for political action.^[6]

The drawing reproduced here has a qualified identification: the Morgan Library describes the sitter as probably Ramsay.^[7]

References

↑ National Museums Scotland, Exile, rebellion, and vanquishment: The Jacobite challenge. Accessed 30 September 2026.
↑ ^2.0 ^2.1 QC Correspondence Circle, Stuart Masonic Influence in France, 1723 Constitutions research website. Accessed 30 September 2026.
↑ ^3.0 ^3.1 QC Correspondence Circle, English Masonic Influence in France. Accessed 30 September 2026.
↑ ^4.0 ^4.1 David Stevenson, The Origins of Freemasonry: Scotland's Century, 1590–1710 (Cambridge University Press, 1988), p. 205.
↑ ^5.0 ^5.1 William James Hughan, The Jacobite Lodge at Rome, 1735–7 (Torquay: printed for the Lodge of Research No. 2429, 1910), chapters I–III and reproduction of the minute book.
↑ Royal Society, Ramsay, Andrew Michael, biographical register NA460, reproduced by Epsilon.
↑ Morgan Library & Museum, Pier Leone Ghezzi: M. de Ramsay, accession 1980.11.