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In their origins, the Bruces shared much in common with us Sinclairs. They came from the same hardy Norse pirate stock. As we did, they followed the bastard William to England and David to France. Brave and hardy men, paladins. Today we celebrate the anniversary 1314 685th anniversary when the great King Robert the Bruce supported by the Knights Templar led by Sir William Sinclair with an army of only 9,000 defeated 38,000 Englishmen, the Scots facing heavy calvary, archers and wave upon wave of staunch and brave Englishmen. On that day, it was the crushing charge of the Knights Templar across rocky and almost impassable ground that turned the tide of victory. That far off day, almost seven hundred years ago, they won for Scotland her independence.
The chiefs of the clan Bruce have served as Governors of Canada, Ambassadors to China and Viceroys of India and Kings of Scotland are from the same band of Norsemen who set. off for adventure on the high seas, plundering, pillaging, looting and raping the coasts of Europe in the 9th century. Vikings became settlers and their warlords were converted to Christian noblemen. One such warrior chief, who took his title from lands at Eruis (now Brix) near Cherbourg in lower Normandy, Duke William in his conquest of Saxon England. Adam de Bruis flourished and his son Robert became a comrade of the Scots Prince David who succeeded to his throne in 1124. Robert became Lord of Annandale with lands in that fertile area of south west Scotland where the River Annan flows into the Solway Firth. The family held great estates in England but by the 14th century they had risen so high in Scotland that the throne itself was within their grasp. Robert the Bruce, Earl of Carrick, probably born in 1274 at Turnberry in Avrshire. swore fealty to Edward I of England as his feudal overlord, but by 1306 he had been proclaimed King of Scots on the ancient Hill of Scone in Perthshire. The victory of Bannockburn under the shadow of Stirling Castle in 24th June 1314 made his crown a political reality. Bruces became Earls of Elgin in 1633 and of Kincardine in 1647, with the titles being united in the chiefly line in 1740. Great wealth eluded the later Bruces and throughout the 18th and 19th centuries they left Scotland in search of fame and fortune. The 7th Earl brought home the famous Elgin Marbles from Athens stolen fair and square from the Greeks. Both the 8th and 9th Earls served as Viceroy of India.
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