ARCHIBALD CAMPBELL, 1st marquis and 8th earl of Argyll (1607-61), eldest son of Archibald, 7th earl, by his first wife, Lady Anne Douglas, daughter of William, 1st earl of Morton, was born in 1607 (the date of 1J98, previously accepted, is shown by Willcock to be incorrect), and educated at St. Andrews University. When his father renounced Protestantism in 1619 he took over the management of the estates. According to Baillie, "by far the most powerful subject in the kingdom," he had been made a privy councillor in 1628, and in 1638 Charles I. summoned him to London; but he refused to be won over and openly warned Charles against his despotic ecclesiastical policy. In consequence a secret commission was given to the earl of Antrim to invade Argyllshire and stir up the Macdonalds against the Campbells, a wild and foolish project which completely mis carried. Argyll, who inherited the title by the death of his father in 1638, now definitely took the side of the Covenanters in de fence of the national religion and liberties. In 1639, in a state ment to Laud, he defended the abolition of episcopacy by the Assembly, which continued to sit after its dissolution by Hamil ton. After the pacification of Berwick he carried a motion, in opposition to Montrose, by which the estates secured to them selves the election of the lords of the articles, who had formerly been nominated by the king, and on the prorogation of the Parliament by Charles, in May 164o, Argyll moved that it should continue its sittings and that the Government and safety of the Kingdom should be secured by a committee of the estates. In June he carried out a commission against the royalists in Athol' and Angus with some cruelty. It was on this occasion that took place the burning of "the bonnie house of Airlie." By this time the personal rivalry and difference in opinion between Montrose and Argyll had led to an open breach. The former arranged that on the occasion of Charles's approaching visit to Scotland, Argyll should be accused of high treason in the Parliament. The plot, however, was disclosed, and Montrose with others was imprisoned. When the king arrived he was forced to make a series of concessions. He transferred the con trol over judicial and political appointments to the Parliament, created Argyll a marquis (1641) with a pension of f I,000 a year. Argyll was mainly instrumental at this crisis in keeping the national party faithful to what was to him evidently the common cause, and in accomplishing the alliance with the Long Parliament in 1643. In Jan. 1644 he accompanied the Scottish army into England as a member of the committee of both kingdoms and in command of a troop of horse, but was compelled to return in March to suppress royalist movements in the north and to defend his own territories. He compelled Huntly to retreat in April, and in July advanced to meet the Irish troops now landed in Argyllshire and acting in conjunction with Montrose, who was at the head of the royalist forces in Scotland. An indecisive cam paign followed in the north. Argyll then threw up his commission, and retired to Inveraray Castle. Thither Montrose unexpectedly followed him in December, compelled him to flee to Roseneath and devastated his territories. On Feb. 2 1645, when following Montrose northwards, Argyll was surprised and defeated by him at Inverlochy, and was present at Montrose's further great victory on Aug. 15 at Kilsyth. He was at last delivered from his formidable antagonist by Montrose's final defeat at Philiphaugh on Sept. 13. In 1646 he was sent to negotiate with the king at Newcastle after his surrender to the Scottish army, when he endeavoured to moderate the demands of the Parliament. On July 7 1646, he was appointed a member of the Assembly of Divines.
Up to this point the statesmanship of Argyll had been highly successful. The national liberties and religion of Scotland had been defended and still further secured by the alliance with the English opposition, and by the triumph of the Parliament and Presbyterianism in England. Charles himself was a prisoner. But Argyll's influence could not survive the rupture of the alli ance between the two nations on which his whole policy was constructed. He opposed in vain the secret treaty now concluded between the King and the Scots against the Parliament, and while Hamilton was defeated by Cromwell at Preston, Argyll joined the Whiggamores, a body of Covenanters at Edinburgh; and established a new Government, which welcomed Cromwell on Oct. 4. This alliance, however, was at once destroyed by the execution of Charles I., which excited universal horror in Scot land. In the series of tangled incidents which followed, Argyll lost control of the national policy. He supported the invitation from the Covenanters to Prince Charles to land in Scotland. When Charles came to Scotland, having signed the Covenant and repudiated Montrose, Argyll remained at the head of the ad ministration.
After the defeat of Dunbar, Charles retained his support by the promise of a dukedom and the Garter, and Argyll attempted to marry the King to his daughter. On Jan. I 1651, he placed the crown on Charles's head at Scone. But his power had now passed to the Hamilton party. He strongly opposed, but was unable to prevent, the expedition into England, and in the subsequent re duction of Scotland, after having held out in Inveraray Castle for nearly a year, was at last surprised in Aug. 1652, and sub mitted to the Commonwealth. His ruin was then complete. His policy had failed, his power had vanished, and he was hopelessly in debt. In Richard Cromwell's Parliament of 16J9 Argyll sat as member for Aberdeenshire. At the Restoration he presented himself at Whitehall, but was at once arrested by order of Charles and placed in the Tower (166o), being sent to Edinburgh to stand his trial for high treason. He was acquitted of complicity in the death of Charles I., and his escape from the whole charge seemed imminent, but the arrival of a packet of letters written by Argyll to Monk showed conclusively his collaboration with Cromwell's government, particularly in the suppression of Glen cairn's royalist rising in 1652. He was immediately sentenced to death and was beheaded May 27 1661.
While imprisoned in the Tower he wrote Instructions to ,a Son reprinted in and 1743). Some of his speeches, including the one delivered on the scaffold, were published and are printed in the Harleian Miscellany. He married Lady Mar garet Douglas, daughter of William, 2nd earl of Morton, and had two sons and four daughters.
See also the Life and Times of Archibald, Marquis of Argyll (i9o3), by John Willcock, who prints for the first time the six incriminating letters to Monk; Eng. Hist. Review, xviii. 369 and 624; Scottish History Society, vol. xvii. (1894) ; Charles II. and Scotland in 165o, ed. by S. R. Gardiner, and vol. xviii. (1895) ; History of Scotland, by A. Lang, vol. iii. (1904)•