15th August 1548 Mary Stuart the five year old Scottish Queen arrives in France for the first time.

The Scots sought urgent help from the French, to defeat the English during a period known as `The Rough Wooing’ and on 16 June 1548 thousands of French troops arrived at the port of Leith in Edinburgh and attacked Haddington which was under siege with artillery.

The price of this French support was that on 7 July, the Scots and French signed the Treaty of Haddington. This promised that Mary Stuart would marry the Dauphin Francis - the heir to the French throne.

The Earl of Arran then persuaded the Scottish Parliament to favour a French marriage for the Queen. He was rewarded for this with a French Duchy (a piece of territory) - he became the Duke of Châtelherault.

The French fleet, which had carried the soldiers, sailed to Dumbarton. It subsequently departed to France with the young Mary and her four young attendants; Mary Seton, Mary Beaton, Mary Livingstone and Mary Fleming. These attendants were more commonly known as 'The Four Marys'.

With her marriage agreement in place, five-year-old Mary was sent to France to spend the next thirteen years at the French court. The French fleet sent by Henry II, commanded by Nicolas de Villegagnon, sailed with Mary from Dumbarton on 7 August 1548 and arrived a week or more later at Roscoff or Saint-Pol-de-Léon in Brittany.

Mary was accompanied by her own court including two illegitimate half-brothers, and the "four Marys" (four girls her own age, all named Mary), who were the daughters of some of the noblest families in Scotland: Beaton, Seton, Fleming, and Livingston. Janet, Lady Fleming, who was Mary Fleming's mother and James V's half-sister, was appointed governess.