Alexander was born on September 4th, 1241 to Alexander II, King of Scotland and Marie, daughter of the French Baron of Coucy. His father died in 1249 on the islet of Kerrera while attempting to gain the Isles for Scotland and within five days, the eight year-old Alexander was crowned Alexander III at Scone. A bard sang Alexander's ancestry back to Fergus, son of Ferehard in the Celtic pre-Christian tradition while most of the remaining ceremony took place with standard European protocol.

Within two years, Alexander's mother Marie, who had taken less and less interest in the upbringing of her son after her husband's death, moved back to France. Soon afterwards, she married Jean de Brienne (John of Acre), the son of the King of Jerusalem. Thus, at the age of ten, Alexander was left in a very precarious position, one that left him with few choices. On Christmas Day of that year he was knighted by King Henry III of England and the following day he married King Henry's daughter Margaret, one year his senior.

Little happened of consequence over the next ten years, as Alexander and his wife settled down to learning the responsibilities that they faced. In 1261, Margaret gave Alexander his first child; a girl who was also named Margaret. Afterwards, Alexander began to make the moves necessary to continue his father's work of bringing the Kingdom of the Isles into the Scottish fold.

The people of the Isles were for Scottish rule, and when the gallowglass, which were the authority of King Haakon of Norway, left for Ireland, the people revolted against their Norwegian King. In response, Alexander attempted to settle the matter diplomatically and offered to buy the Kingdom outright. But, King Haakon IV would hear nothing of this and launched a fleet to subdue his kingdom and war with the Scots. The Norwegians were defeated at the Battle of Largs and the Kingdom of the Isles passed into complete Scottish control through the Treaty of Perth in 1266.

This victory proved Alexander's power to his opponents. Henry III of England had repeatedly attempted to get Alexander to pay homage for Scotland to England. After the Battle of Largs, Henry made no more attempts at this.

In the meantime, Alexander's wife Margaret gave him two sons, Alexander and David. The reign of Alexander III now not only seemed secure, but he had heirs for his throne. But in the 1270's, fortune would shift for Alexander, in a decided turn for the worse.

In 1272, Henry III of England died. His heir, Edward I, again attempted to get Alexander to pay homage to England in 1274. Alexander politely refused, but this became a turning point in his life. In 1275, Alexander's Queen died. This was followed by the death of Alexander's son David in 1281. The King then married off his daughter Margaret to King Erik II of Norway the same year. Margaret died in Norway in 1283 after giving birth to a granddaughter for Alexander, also named Margaret. In 1284, Alexander's remaining son and heir died at the age of twenty.

Alexander remarried in 1285 to Yolande de Dreux, a French woman, in the hopes of restoring some heirs besides his infant granddaughter. But the ceremony was marked by a strange instance in where many say death itself came as a harbinger of disaster. Within the year, Alexander III died when his horse fell off a cliff while returning home from a council meeting in the night of March 18/19th, 1286 near Kinghorn, Fife. His only heir was Margaret, his 3-year-old granddaughter.

Alexander's defeat of King Haakon and the bringing of the Kingdom of the Isles into Scottish territory marked his reign. They also made the English seriously doubt any attempt at invading Scotland. There is little more of significance to report about the reign of Alexander except perhaps his bringing of a new type of money to Scotland, as he introduced the halfpenny and farthing.

Brian Workman, May 2000