Qualla: Murder of Lord Darnley https://qualla.com/murder-of-lord-darnley en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:40:17 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/v/w/murder-of-lord-darnley-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Murder of Lord Darnley https://qualla.com/murder-of-lord-darnley Murder of Lord Darnley: Introduction https://qualla.com/murder-of-lord-darnley/ Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. Just after two in the morning on 10 February 1567, a witness called Barbara Mertine looked out her window in Friar's Wynd and watched thirteen men go past in the dark. Then she heard the explosion, what she called the craik, that levelled the Old Provost's House at the Kirk o' Field. Eleven more men went by in the other direction. She shouted after them that they were traitors who had done an evil turn. She was right. The blast destroyed the house. But the body of Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, husband of Mary Queen of Scots, was found unmarked in a nearby orchard, apparently strangled or smothered before the explosion ever happened. The murder cost Mary her crown and changed Scottish history. The man who almost certainly arranged it became her third husband three months later.

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]]> Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/v/w/murder-of-lord-darnley-wp/gcvw-murder-of-lord-darnley-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Murder of Lord Darnley: A Trapped Queen https://qualla.com/murder-of-lord-darnley/ Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. By February 1567 Mary Queen of Scots was 24 years old and in a position with no good exits. She had returned to Scotland from France in 1561 to find a country that had reformed itself Protestant in her absence. She had ruled it as a Catholic for six years. Her second husband, Dar...

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]]> Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/v/w/murder-of-lord-darnley-wp/gcvw-murder-of-lord-darnley-a-trapped-queen.mp3 0:06 2 full Murder of Lord Darnley: The Explosion and the Strangled Body https://qualla.com/murder-of-lord-darnley/ Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. Early in the morning of 10 February the Old Provost's House was destroyed by gunpowder. Sir William Drury later reported that Sir James Balfour, whose brother owned the lodging, had bought sixty pounds Scots worth of gunpowder shortly beforehand. Balfour could have moved it from ...

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]]> Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/v/w/murder-of-lord-darnley-wp/gcvw-murder-of-lord-darnley-the-explosion-and-the-strangled-body.mp3 0:06 3 full Murder of Lord Darnley: The Earl of Bothwell https://qualla.com/murder-of-lord-darnley/ Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. Suspicion fell immediately on James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell. He was tried for the murder in April 1567 and acquitted by a Privy Council stacked in his favour. He then forced his supporters to sign the Ainslie Tavern Bond pledging to back his marriage to the queen. He carrie...

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]]> Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/v/w/murder-of-lord-darnley-wp/gcvw-murder-of-lord-darnley-the-earl-of-bothwell.mp3 0:06 4 full Murder of Lord Darnley: Forced to Abdicate https://qualla.com/murder-of-lord-darnley/ Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. Mary was captured at Carberry Hill, paraded through Edinburgh, and imprisoned at Lochleven Castle. There she was persuaded to abdicate in favour of her infant son James, who became James VI. She escaped, raised an army, lost the Battle of Langside, and fled south into England, wh...

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]]> Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/v/w/murder-of-lord-darnley-wp/gcvw-murder-of-lord-darnley-forced-to-abdicate.mp3 0:06 5 full