army officer courtier Jacobite Duke
Thomas purchased a commission in command of a foot guards company in 1714 and a year later married Marjorie Murray (d in or after 1765), daughter of David Murray, fifth Viscount Stormont, and sister of the Earl of Mansfield and the Jacobite James Murray, "Earl of Dunbar".
He was from the Clan Hay. John"s maternal grandfather William Drummond, first viscount of Strathallan, bequeathed Thomas an estate at Cromlix, Perthshire. On 5 October 1718 John Hay was created by James III & VIII (the "Old Pretender") Earl of Inverness, Viscount of Innerpaphrie and Lord Cromlix and Erne in the Jacobite Scottish peerage.
Thus John Hay and John Murray became known as the "King"s favourites".
These complaints may, however, have been influenced somewhat by the children"s former governess Mrs Sheldon, sister-in-law of John Erskine, 6th Earl of March March"s failed rebellion in 1715 and further intrigues had eventually led to his being replaced by John Hay as James Stuart"s intermediary between the exiled Jacobites and those still in Britain, and March had sworn revenge on Hay for this loss of royal favour.
However, other Jacobites" correspondence suggests that some ill-treatment of Clementina by the Hays did occur, though the suggestion that Lady Inverness and James Stuart were having an affair, with Lord Inverness turning a blind eye, is less likely to be a fact than merely a rumour begun by March and the English government. James nevertheless elevated Hay in April 1727 to the titular Duchy of Inverness and further created him Baron Hay in the Jacobite Peerage of England.
Hay moved out of active political involvement into retirement in the Jacobite colony in Avignon, France by 1738, to which James Murray also retired later.
