The castle began to decline around the time of the 1715 Jacobite rising. The last Lindsay lord of Edzell, another David, was a Jacobite, a supporter of the exiled James Stuart, the "Old Pretender". Faced with mounting family debts, David sold the castle to the 4th Earl of Panmure, a fellow Jacobite, for £192,502 Scots, equivalent to £16,042 sterling. Lord Panmure, however, forfeited his lands and property for taking part in the failed rebellion. Edzell was sold, by the Crown, to the York Buildings Company, a London waterworks company which had branched into the buying and selling of forfeited property. They proceeded to "asset strip" the property.