James Douglas, Lord of Douglas

James Douglas, Lord of Douglas ( * 1286, † August 25 1330 in Teba, Spain) was a Scottish military leader and nobleman, who came from the family of Douglas, and the military leader of Robert the Bruce in the Scottish- English wars of independence. He was called by the Scots "The Good Sir James" and the English "The Black Douglas ".

Sir James was descended from Scottish nobility and was the son of Sir William Douglas. The English king Edward I rejected it in 1306 as vassals from, so he hit himself on the side of King Robert I.. He quickly became his best military leader. From a total of 70 battles that should have fought Douglas, he has reportedly won 57. Yet he never went as a noble gentleman before, but rather as a Scottish barbarian that underpins the legend that a battle from 1307, at the Douglas attended, the name " House of Pleasure Douglas " won, because he then organized a real massacre.

His greatest coup was when he led the Scots to victory at the Battle of Bannockburn on 24 June 1314. Robert the Bruce is said to have Douglas allegedly beaten then knighted. However, after this battle, it went on, the Scots brought the war to England now. 1319 Douglas fell in Yorkshire and there defeated the troops of the Archbishop of York and the Bishop of Ely at Mitton. Until 1327 he fought regularly in England, to spread fear and pain. The friendship between Bruce and Douglas was getting bigger, so big that Bruce Douglas asked, before he died, to bring his heart to the Holy Land. When Robert the Bruce died in 1329, Sir James Douglas made ​​his way to fulfill his promise, but Douglas came only to Spain, where he fell at the Battle of Teba in the fight against the Muslim Nasrid.

His son Archibald was in 1388 the third Earl of Douglas.