the Tower of London, along with the Earls of Nithsdale and of Carnwath, and Lords Widdrington, Kenmure, and Nairne. He was examined before the Privy Council on 10 January 1716, and impeached with the other lords on 19 January. Derwentwater pleaded guilty, urging in extenuation his inexperience, and his advice to those who were about him to throw themselves upon the royal clemency. He was attainted and condemned to death. Efforts were made to procure his pardon. Petitions were brought before both Houses of Parliament, and an address was carried from the upper house to the throne on 22 February, praying that His Majesty George I of Great Britain would reprieve 'such of the condemned lords as might appear to him deserving of clemency.' Widdrington, Carnwath, and Nairn were reprieved. The countess, accompanied by her sister, their maternal aunt, Anne Brudenell, Duchess of Richmond, the Duchess of Cleveland, and other ladies, was introduced by the Duke of Richmond into the king's bedchamber, where the countess, in French, asked for his majesty's mercy. The king, however, prompted by Robert Walpole (who declared that he had been offered £60,000 to save Derwentwater, but that he was determined to make an example), was obdurate. Derwentwater was beheaded on Tower Hill on 24 February 1716. On the scaffold, he expressed regret at having pleaded guilty, and declared his devotion to his Roman Catholic religion and to James III. Lord Kenmure suffered at the same time. The Earl of Nithsdale escaped from the Tower the day before. Charles Radclyffe escaped to France but was captured in 1745 on his return to support the 1745 uprising and was executed in 1746. Nairne was still in the Tower of London in 1717, so was able to benefit from the Indemnity Act 1717 and was released. On the day of his beheading, the Northern Lights were said to be unusually bright, and became known as Lord Derwentwater's Lights. His heart was taken to a convent in Paris where the prioress Anne Throckmorton witnessed it being enclosed within the chapel's walls. Derwentwater was stripped of his honours and titles (but his successors continued to use the titles), and his estates were confiscated. In 1748 Dilston Castle and the rest of the Derwentwater estates were granted by Act of Parliament (Public Act 22 George II chapter 56) to the Greenwich Hospital. Family Radclyffe married Anna Maria Webb (d. 19 August