GRAHAM, JOHN, VISCOUNT DUNDEE, commonly called CLAVEIt HOUSE, from the name of an estate belonging to his father Sir William Graham, of whom he was the second son, was probably born about the year 1649 or 1650. He is said to have studied at St. Andrews, and to have made some proficiency in the mathematics; but learning was not a sphere in which he shone; and Sir Walter Soott, who endeavoured to raise his character from that of the ordinary soldier of fortune, and to endow him with a higher tone of feeling, cannot help comparing his letters to those of a chambermaid. Many of the younger eons of the Scottish gentry—poor, intrepid, and accustomed to that superiority over their neighbours which suits a man at once for command in a half disciplined army—had by these qualities held commis ions during the Thirty Years' War, without being very fastidious about the side on which they fought. Graham was evidently brought up to this trade. He entered first the French and then the Dutch service, obtaining in the latter considerable distinction. Being however refused the com mand of a regiment, ho returned to Scotland in 1677. He obtained a captain's commission in one of the troops of horse employed in enforcing obedience to the penal laws against nonconformists in Scot land. Among many cruel instruments, he became conspicuous by he
barbarity, and obtained an unenviable renown in history, rotnauce, and local tradition. A considerable body of Covenanters having announced that they were to hold a solemn preaching on the let of June 1679, Graham, on his way to disperse them, was met by an advanced body of these enthusiasts, armed and well commanded, who, in a piece of ground called Drumclog, dispersed his troopers, and compelled him to fly for his life. At the subsequent battle of Both well Bridge his exterminating counsels were fortunately counteracted by the milder genius of Monmouth, the commander of the expedition. In 1683 he was raised to the peerage by the title of Viscount Dundee and Lord Graham of Claverhouse. While the Convention Parliament was sitting in Scotland arranging the Revolution settlement, he put himself at the bead of some Highland and Irish marauders, with whom, on the 17th of June 1689, he successfully defended the pass of Killicrankie against Mackay until he was killed by a random shot.