William Carstares

William Carstares
William Carstares c. 1700
Born	(1649-02-11)February 11, 1649 Cathcart, Scotland
Died	December 28, 1715(1715-12-28) (aged 66)
Occupation	Minister

William Carstares (also Carstaires) (11 February 1649 – 28 December 1715), was a minister of the Church of Scotland, active in Whig politics.

Carstares was born at Cathcart, near Glasgow, Scotland, the son of the Rev. John Carstares, a Covenanter. He was educated at the University of Edinburgh, and then at the University of Utrecht. In the Netherlands he had an introduction to Gaspar Fagel. Through Fagel he met the Prince of Orange, the future King William III of England, and began to take an active part in politics.

During the Third Anglo-Dutch War, Carstares acted as an intelligence agent for the Prince of Orange, making journeys to England as "William Williams". He corresponded with Pierre du Moulin (d. 1676), who ran the Prince's espionage. He was suspected by the English, and arrested by warrant in September 1674 on English soil.

Carstares was then committed to the Tower of London; the following year, 1675, he was transferred to Edinburgh Castle. He was believed to be concerned with Sir James Stewart in the authorship of a pamphlet An Account of Scotland's Grievances by reason of the D. of Lauderdale's Ministrie, humbly tendered to his Sacred Majesty (1674). John Maitland, 1st Duke of Lauderdale himself got Carstares to admit he had been involved in printing the pamphlet. Lauderdale used the threat of the torture of the boot, which could be employed legally in Scotland; but Carstares was not tortured. In August 1679 he was released, one of the government sops to Scottish opinion after the Battle of Bothwell Bridge. He cannot therefore have been the William Carstares who was the chief prosecution witness at the trial of William Staley (the first of the Popish Plot trials), in November 1678, although that Carstares was also a Scotsman, and like his namesake is said to have acted as an intelligence agent.