Armstrang of Gilnockie was a brother of the laird of Mangertoun. He had
a kind of Robin Hood reputation on the Scottish Border, as one who only
robbed the English. Pitscottie’s account of his slaying by James V.
(1529) reads as if the ballad were his authority, and an air for the
subject is mentioned in the _Complaint of Scotland_. In Sir Herbert
Maxwell’s _History of Dumfries and Galloway_ is an excellent account of
the historical facts of the case.