Hugh Campbell, 3rd Earl of Loudoun

Hugh Campbell, 3rd Earl of Loudoun, KT, PC ( – 20 November 1731) was a Scottish landowner, peer, and statesman.

With the Earl of Mar, Loudoun was the last Secretary of State of the Kingdom of Scotland. He supported the Union with England of 1707 and was Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland between 1708 and 1713.

Early life and family Campbell was the oldest son of James Campbell, 2nd Earl of Loudoun, by his marriage to Lady Margaret Montgomerie, a daughter of Hugh Montgomerie, 7th Earl of Eglinton.

In 1684, he succeeded his father as Earl of Loudoun, Lord Campbell of Loudoun, and Lord Tarrinzean and Mauchline, which gave him a seat in the unicameral Parliament of Scotland as soon as he came of age. While his year of birth is unknown, it can be estimated from the fact that he took his seat on 8 September 1696 and would normally have done so at the age of twenty-one. In recommending Loudoun for the Court of Session, the Earl of Argyll wrote to William Carstares

From 1703 to 1705 Loudoun was a Commissioner of the Treasury, then from 1705 to 1707 Secretary of State of the Kingdom of Scotland, holding the office jointly with John Erskine, Earl of Mar, the two men becoming the last holders of that office before the Acts of Union 1707 combined England and Scotland into a single Kingdom of Great Britain. In 1706, he was appointed a Knight of the Order of the Thistle. On 26 October of that year he wrote to Sidney Godolphin, Earl of Godolphin, that "manie of the common people are so much impos'd on us to be against the union in manie places of the Countrie," but he believed that the benefits it would bring would ultimately pacify the dissenting voices. From 1707 he was a Scottish representative peer, with a seat in the House of Lords at Westminster.

Lady Margaret Campbell, who on 4 August 1728 married John Campbell of Shawfield, son and heir of Daniel Campbell, but died childless on 7 October 1733.

Coat of arms