=Old Mortality.=
DESERTED BURYING-GROUND.
There exists, in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh, a scene nearly
resembling that described in the beautiful preliminary to this Tale,
as the burying-ground of the Covenanters. It is commonly called St.
Catherine’s Kirkyard, and is all that remains of the chapel and
cemetery of the once celebrated _St. Catherine’s in the Hopes_.[21]
The situation is particularly pastoral, beautiful, and interesting. It
is placed where the narrow ravine, down which Glencorse burn descends,
opens up into an expanse considerably wider. Rullion Green, where
the Covenanters were defeated by the troops of Charles II. in 1665,
was in the immediate vicinity; and tradition still points out in St.
Catherine’s the graves of several of the insurgents, who were killed
either in the battle or near this spot in the pursuit. If the latter
be the most probable fact, no other circumstance would be required to
establish the identity of the two scenes.
St. Catherine’s Churchyard, lying among the wildest solitudes of the
Pentland Hills, is an object of beautiful and interesting desolation,
almost equal to the scene of Peter Pattieson’s meeting with Old
Mortality. There does not now remain the least trace of a place of
worship within its precincts; and it seems to have been long disused as
a place of interment. A slight mark of an inclosure, nearly level with
the sward, and one overgrown gravestone, itself almost in the grave,
are all that point out the spot.
The ground in which St. Catherine’s is situated agrees in certain
general circumstances with the author’s Vale of Gandercleugh. The
horrific “_dry-stane dike_” projected by “his honour the Laird of
Gusedub,” does not, it is true, appear to have ever substituted its
rectilinear deformity for the graceful winding of the natural boundary,
as the too-poetical Peter Pattieson apprehended. But a circumstance has
taken place by which the romantic has been sacrificed to the useful
as completely as if “his honour” had fulfilled his intention. The
ravine, at the head of which St. Catherine’s is situated, has lately
been embanked, and laid completely under water, as a compensation-pond
for the mills upon the Crawley Burn, of which the more legitimate
supplies were cut off, and turned towards a different direction and
very different purpose, by being carried to Edinburgh for the use of
the inhabitants.
Besides being _possibly_ the original scene of the Deserted
Burying-Ground, this spot is not otherwise destitute of the
qualification of _classic_. At no great distance stands Logan House,
the supposed mansion of _Sir William Worthy_ of the “Gentle Shepherd”;
and at the head of the glen lies what has generally been considered the
“_Habbie’s How_” of that drama.
In the leading article of the _Scotsman_, September 3, 1823, the writer
endeavours to trace a similarity between the Vale of Glencorse and the
description of Glendearg in the Monastery.
VALE OF GANDERCLEUGH.
The Vale of Gandercleugh may perhaps have been suggested by Lesmahagow,
a village and parish in the west country, not far from Drumclog. In the
churchyard are interred several of the Covenanters,—in particular,
David Steel, who was slain by Captain Crichton, the cavalier whose life
was written by Swift—in a note to which Sir Walter Scott mentions Old
Mortality as having for a long time preserved Steel’s grave-stone from
decay.
HISTORY OF THE PERIOD.[22]
* * * * *
“We have observed the early antipathy mutually entertained by the
Scottish Presbyterians and the House of Stuart. It seems to have
glowed in the breast even of the good-natured Charles II. He might
have remembered that, in 1651, the Presbyterians had fought, bled,
and ruined themselves in his cause. But he rather recollected their
early faults than their late repentance; and even their services
were combined with the recollection of the absurd and humiliating
circumstances of personal degradation,[23] to which their pride
had subjected him, while they professed to espouse his cause. As
a man of pleasure, he hated their stern inflexible rigour, which
stigmatized follies even more deeply than crimes; and he whispered to
his confidants, that, ‘therefore, it was not wonderful that, in the
first year of his restoration, he formally re-established prelacy in
Scotland.’ But it is surprising that, with his father’s example before
his eyes, he should not have been satisfied to leave at freedom the
consciences of those who could not reconcile themselves to the new
system. The religious opinions of sectaries have a tendency, like the
water of some springs, to become soft and mild when freely exposed to
open day. Who can recognise, in the decent and industrious Quakers and
Anabaptists, the wild and ferocious tenets which distinguished their
sects while yet they were honoured with the distinction of the scourge
and the pillory? Had the system of coercion against the Presbyterians
been continued until our day, Blair and Robertson would have preached
in the wilderness, and only discovered their powers of eloquence and
composition, by rolling along a deeper torrent of gloomy fanaticism.
“The western counties distinguished themselves by their opposition to
the prelatic system. Three hundred and fifty ministers, ejected from
their churches and livings, wandered through the mountains, sowing the
seeds of covenanted doctrine, while multitudes of fanatical followers
pursued them, to reap the forbidden crop. These Conventicles, as they
were called, were denounced by the law, and their frequenters dispersed
by military force. The genius of the persecuted became stubborn,
obstinate, and ferocious; and, although Indulgences were tardily
granted to some Presbyterian ministers, few of the true Covenanters,
or Whigs, as they were called, would condescend to compound with a
prelatic government, or to listen even to their own favourite doctrine
under the auspices of the King. From Richard Cameron, their apostle,
this rigid sect acquired the name of Cameronians. They preached and
prayed against the Indulgence, and against the Presbyterians who
availed themselves of it, because their accepting of this royal boon
was a tacit acknowledgment of the King’s supremacy in ecclesiastical
matters.
“Upon these bigoted and persecuted fanatics, and by no means upon
the Presbyterians at large, are to be charged the wild anarchical
principles of anti-monarchy and assassination which polluted the period
when they flourished.
“The Conventicles were now attended by armed crowds; and a formidable
insurrection took place in the west, and rolled on towards the capital.
It was terminated by a defeat at the Pentland Hills, where General
Dalziel routed the insurgents with great loss, 28th November, 1666.
“The Whigs, now become desperate, adopted the most desperate
principles; and retaliating, as far as they could, the intolerating
persecution which they endured, they openly disclaimed allegiance
to any monarch who should not profess presbytery and subscribe the
covenant. These principles were not likely to conciliate the favour
of government, and, as we wade onward in the history of the times, the
scenes become yet darker. At length, one would imagine the parties
had agreed to divide the kingdom of vice between them,—the hunters
assuming to themselves open profligacy and legalized oppression,
and the hunted the opposite attributes of hypocrisy, fanaticism,
disloyalty, and midnight assassination. The troopers and cavaliers
became enthusiasts in the pursuit of the Covenanters. If Messrs. Kid,
King, Cameron, Peden, etc., boasted of prophetic powers, and were often
warned of the approach of the soldiers by supernatural impulse, Captain
John Crichton, on the other side, dreamed dreams and saw visions,
(chiefly, indeed, after having drunk hard,) in which the lurking-holes
of the rebels were discovered to his imagination.[24]
“Our ears are scarcely more shocked with the profane execration of the
persecutors[25] than with the strange and insolent familiarity used
towards the Deity by the persecuted fanatics. Their indecent modes of
prayer, their extravagant expectations of miraculous assistance, and
their supposed inspirations, might easily furnish out a tale, at which
the good would sigh and the gay would laugh.[26]
“The militia and standing army soon became unequal to the task of
enforcing conformity and suppressing Conventicles. In their aid, and
to force compliance with a test proposed by government, the Highland
clans were raised, and poured down into Ayrshire; and armed hosts
of undisciplined mountaineers, speaking a different language, and
professing, many of them, another religion, were let loose to ravage
and plunder this unfortunate country; and it is truly astonishing to
find how few acts of cruelty they perpetrated, and how seldom they
added murder to pillage. Additional levies of horse were also raised,
under the name of independent troops, and great part of them placed
under the command of James Grahame of Claverhouse, a man well known
to fame by his subsequent title of Viscount of Dundee, but better
remembered in the western shires under the designation of the bloody
Clavers.
“In truth, he appears to have combined the virtues and vices of a
savage chief. Fierce, unbending, and rigorous, no emotion of compassion
prevented his commanding and witnessing every detail of military
execution against the Nonconformists. Undoubtedly brave, and steadily
faithful to his prince, he sacrificed himself in the cause of James
when he was deserted by all the world. The Whigs whom he persecuted,
daunted by his ferocity and courage, conceived him to be impassive to
their bullets, and that he had sold himself, for temporal greatness,
to the seducer of mankind. It is still believed, that a cup of wine,
presented to him by his butler, changed into clotted blood; and that,
when he plunged his feet into cold water, their touch caused it to
boil. The steed which bore him was supposed to be the gift of Satan;
and precipices are shown where a fox could hardly keep his feet, down
which the infernal charger conveyed him safely in pursuit of the
wanderers. It is remembered with terror that Claverhouse was successful
in every engagement with the Whigs, except that at Drumclog, or Loudon
Hill. The history of Burly will bring us immediately to the causes and
circumstances of that event.
“JOHN BALFOUR of Kinloch, commonly called BURLY, was one of the
fiercest of the proscribed sect. A gentleman by birth, he was, says
his biographer, ‘zealous and honest-hearted, courageous in every
enterprise, and a brave soldier—seldom any escaping that came into his
hands.’
“Crichton says that he was once chamberlain to Archbishop Sharpe,
and, by negligence or dishonesty, had incurred a large arrear, which
occasioned his being active in his master’s assassination. But of
this I know no other evidence than Crichton’s assertion and a hint in
Wodrow. Burly, for that is his common designation, was brother-in-law
to Hackston of Rathillet, a wild, enthusiastic character, who joined
daring courage and skill in the sword to the fiery zeal of his sect.
Burly himself was less eminent for religious fervour than for the
active and violent share which he had in the most desperate enterprises
of his party. His name does not appear among the Covenanters who
were denounced for the affair at Pentland. But, in 1677, Robert
Hamilton, afterwards commander of the insurgents at Loudon Hill and
Bothwell Bridge, with several other Nonconformists, were assembled
at this Burly’s house, in Fife. There they were attacked by a party
of soldiers, commanded by Captain Carstairs, whom they beat off, and
wounded desperately one of his party. For this resistance to authority
they were declared rebels.
“The next exploit in which Burly was engaged was of a bloodier
complexion and more dreadful celebrity. It was well known that
James Sharpe, Archbishop of St. Andrew’s, was regarded by the rigid
Presbyterians not only as a renegade, who had turned back from the
spiritual plough, but as the principal author of the rigours exercised
against their sect. He employed, as an agent of his oppression,
one Carmichael, a decayed gentleman. The industry of this man in
procuring information, and in enforcing the severe penalties against
Conventiclers, having excited the resentment of the Cameronians, nine
of their number, of whom Burly and his brother-in-law, Hackston, were
the leaders, assembled, with the purpose of waylaying and murdering
Carmichael; but, while they searched for him in vain, they received
tidings that the Archbishop himself was at hand. The party resorted
to prayer, after which they agreed, unanimously, that the Lord had
delivered the wicked Haman into their hands. In the execution of the
supposed will of heaven, they agreed to put themselves under the
command of a leader, and they requested Hackston of Rathillet to accept
the office; which he declined, alleging, that, should he comply with
their request, the slaughter might be imputed to a private quarrel
which existed betwixt him and the Archbishop. The command was then
offered to Burly, who accepted it without scruple; and they galloped
off in pursuit of the Archbishop’s carriage, which contained himself
and his daughter. Being well mounted, they easily overtook and disarmed
the prelate’s attendants. Burly, crying out, ‘Judas, be taken!’ rode
up to the carriage, wounded the postilion, and hamstrung one of the
horses. He then fired into the coach a piece, charged with several
bullets, so near, that the Archbishop’s gown was set on fire. The rest,
coming up, dismounted, and dragged him out of the carriage, when,
frightened and wounded, he crawled towards Hackston, who still remained
on horseback, and begged for mercy. The stern enthusiast contented
himself with answering, that he would not himself lay a hand on him.
Burly and his men again fired a volley upon the kneeling old man, and
were in the act of riding off, when one, who remained to fasten the
girth of his horse, unfortunately heard the daughter of their victim
call to the servant for help, exclaiming that his master was still
alive. Burly then again dismounted, struck off the prelate’s hat with
his foot, and cleft his skull with his shable, (broadsword,) although
one of the party (probably Rathillet,) exclaimed, ‘Spare these grey
hairs!’ The rest pierced him with repeated wounds. They plundered
the carriage, and rode off, leaving, beside the mangled corpse, the
daughter, who was herself wounded in her pious endeavour to interpose
betwixt her father and his murderers. The murder is accurately
represented in bas-relief, upon a beautiful monument, erected to
the memory of Archbishop Sharpe, in the metropolitan church of St.
Andrew’s. This memorable example of fanatic revenge was acted upon
Magus Muir, near St. Andrew’s, 3rd May, 1679.
“Burly was of course obliged to leave Fife; and, upon the 25th of
the same month, he arrived in Evandale, in Lanarkshire, along with
Hackston, and a fellow called Dingwall, or Daniel, one of the same
bloody band. Here he joined his old friend Hamilton, already mentioned;
and, as they resolved to take up arms, they were soon at the head of
such a body of the ‘chased-and-tossed western men’ as they thought
equal to keep the field. They resolved to commence their exploits upon
29th May, 1674, being the anniversary of the Restoration, appointed
to be kept a holiday by Act of Parliament—an institution which
they esteemed a presumptuous and unholy solemnity. Accordingly, at
the head of eighty horse, tolerably appointed, Hamilton, Burly, and
Hackston entered the royal burgh of Rutherglen, extinguished the
bonfires made in honour of the day, burned at the cross the Acts of
Parliament in favour of prelacy and suppression of Conventicles, as
well as those acts of council which regulated the Indulgence granted
to Presbyterians. Against all these acts they entered their solemn
protest, or testimony, as they called it; and, having affixed it to the
cross, concluded with prayer and psalms. Being now joined by a large
body of foot, so that their strength seems to have amounted to five or
six hundred men, though very indifferently armed, they encamped upon
Loudon Hill. Claverhouse, who was in the garrison of Glasgow, instantly
marched against the insurgents, at the head of his own troop of cavalry
and others, amounting to about one hundred and fifty men. He arrived
at Hamilton, on the 1st of June, so unexpectedly, as to make prisoner
John King, a famous preacher among the wanderers, and rapidly continued
his march, carrying his captive along with him, till he came to the
village of Drumclog, about a mile east of Loudon Hill, and twelve miles
south-west of Hamilton. At the same distance from this place, the
insurgents were skilfully posted in a boggy strait, almost inaccessible
to cavalry, having a broad ditch in their front. Claverhouse’s dragoons
discharged their carbines, and made an attempt to charge. Burly, who
commanded the handful of horse belonging to the Whigs, instantly led
them down on the disordered squadrons of Claverhouse, who were, at the
same time, vigorously assaulted by the foot, headed by the gallant
Cleland and the enthusiastic Hackston. Claverhouse himself was forced
to fly, and was in the utmost danger of being taken, his horse’s belly
being cut open by the stroke of a scythe, so that the poor animal
trailed his bowels for more than a mile. In this flight he passed King,
the minister, lately his prisoner, but now deserted by his guard in
the general confusion. The preacher hallooed to the flying commander
‘to halt and take his prisoner with him;’ or, as others say, ‘to stay
and take the afternoon’s preaching.’ Claverhouse, at length remounted,
continued his retreat to Glasgow. He lost in the skirmish about twenty
of his troopers, and his own cornet and kinsman, Robert Grahame. Only
four of the other side were killed, among whom was Dingwall, or Daniel,
an associate of Burly in Sharpe’s murder. ‘The rebels,’ says Crichton,
‘finding the cornet’s body, and supposing it to be that of Clavers,
because the name of Grahame was wrought in the shirt-neck, treated
it with the utmost inhumanity—cutting off his nose, picking out his
eyes, and stabbing it through in a hundred places.’ The same charge is
brought by Guild, in his _Bellum Bothwellianum_, in which occurs the
following account of the skirmish at Drumclog:—
“‘Although Burly was among the most active leaders in the action,
he was not the commander-in-chief. That honour belonged to Robert
Hamilton, brother of Sir William Hamilton of Preston, a gentleman who,
like most of those at Drumclog, had imbibed the very wildest principles
of fanaticism. The Cameronian account of the insurrection states, that
“Mr. Hamilton discovered a great deal of bravery and valour, both
in the conflict with, and pursuit of, the enemy; but when he and some
others were pursuing the enemy, others flew too greedily upon the
spoil, small as it was, instead of pursuing the victory; and some,
without Mr. Hamilton’s knowledge, and against his strict command, gave
five of these bloody enemies quarter, and let them go. This greatly
grieved Mr. Hamilton, when he saw some of Babel’s brats spared, after
the Lord had delivered them into their hands, that they might dash them
against the stones (Psalm cxxxvii. 9). In his own account of this, he
reckons the sparing of these enemies, and letting them go, to be among
their first steppings aside, for which he feared that the Lord would
not honour them to do much more for them, and says that he was neither
for taking favours from, nor giving favours to, the Lord’s enemies.”
Burly was not a likely man to fall into this sort of backsliding. He
disarmed one of the Duke of Hamilton’s servants in the action, and
desired him to tell his master he would keep, till meeting, the pistols
he had taken from him. The man described Burly to the Duke as a little
stout man, squint-eyed, and of a most ferocious aspect; from which it
appears that Burly’s figure corresponded to his manners, and perhaps
gave rise to his nickname, _Burly_ signifying _strong_. He was with
the insurgents till the battle of Bothwell Bridge, and afterwards fled
to Holland. He joined the Prince of Orange, but died at sea during the
passage. The Cameronians still believe he had obtained liberty from the
Prince to be avenged of those who had persecuted the Lord’s people;
but, through his death, the laudable design of purging the land with
their blood is supposed to have fallen to the ground.’
“It has often been remarked, that the Scottish, notwithstanding
their national courage, were always unsuccessful when fighting for
their religion. The cause lay not in the principle, but in the mode
of its application. A leader, like Mahomet, who is, at the same time,
the prophet of his tribe, may avail himself of religious enthusiasm,
because it comes to the aid of discipline, and is a powerful means of
attaining the despotic command essential to the success of a general.
But among the insurgents in the reign of the last Stuarts, were mingled
preachers, who taught different shades of the Presbyterian doctrine;
and, minute as these shades sometimes were, neither the several
shepherds nor their flocks could unite in a common cause. This will
appear from the transactions leading to the battle of Bothwell Bridge.
“We have seen that the party which defeated Claverhouse at Loudon Hill
were Cameronians, whose principles consisted in disowning all temporal
authority which did not flow from and through the Solemn League and
Covenant. This doctrine, which is still retained by a scattered remnant
of the sect in Scotland, is in theory, and would be in practice,
inconsistent with the safety of any well-regulated government, because
the Covenanters deny to their governors that toleration which was
iniquitously refused to themselves.
“In many respects, therefore, we cannot be surprised at the anxiety
and vigour with which the Cameronians were persecuted, although we may
be of opinion that milder means would have induced a melioration of
their principles. These men, as already noticed, excepted against such
Presbyterians as were contented to exercise their worship under the
Indulgence granted by government, or, in other words, who would have
been satisfied with toleration for themselves, without insisting on a
revolution in the state, or even in the Church government.
“When, however, the success at Loudon Hill was spread abroad, a number
of preachers, gentlemen, and common people, who had embraced the more
moderate doctrine, joined the army of Hamilton, thinking that the
difference in their opinions ought not to prevent their acting in the
common cause. The insurgents were repulsed in an attack upon the town
of Glasgow, which, however, Claverhouse shortly afterwards thought it
necessary to evacuate. They were now nearly in full possession of the
west of Scotland, and pitched their camp at Hamilton, where, instead of
modelling and disciplining their army, the Cameronians and Erastians
(for so the violent insurgents chose to call the more moderate
Presbyterians) only debated, in council of war, the real cause of their
being in arms. Hamilton, their general, was the leader of the first
party; Mr. John Welsh, a minister, headed the Erastians. The latter so
far prevailed as to get a declaration drawn up, in which they owned the
King’s government; but the publication of it gave rise to new quarrels.
Each faction had its own set of leaders, all of whom aspired to be
officers; and there were actually two councils of war, issuing contrary
orders and declarations, at the same time—the one owning the King, and
the other designating him a malignant, bloody, and perjured tyrant.
“Meanwhile, their numbers and zeal were magnified at Edinburgh, and
great alarm excited lest they should march eastward. Not only was the
foot militia instantly called out, but proclamations were issued,
directing all the heritors in the eastern, southern, and northern
shires, to repair to the King’s host, with their best horses, arms,
and retainers. In Fife, and other counties, where the Presbyterian
doctrines prevailed, many gentlemen disobeyed this order, and were
afterwards severely fined. Most of them alleged, in excuse, the
apprehension of disquiet from their wives. A respectable force was
soon assembled, and James Duke of Buccleuch and Monmouth, was sent
down by Charles to take the command, furnished with instructions not
unfavourable to the Presbyterians. The royal army now moved slowly
forward towards Hamilton, and reached Bothwell Moor on the 22nd of
June, 1679. The insurgents were encamped, chiefly in the Duke of
Hamilton’s park, along the Clyde, which separated the two armies.
Bothwell Bridge, which is long and narrow, had then a portal in the
middle, with gates, which the Covenanters shut, and barricadoed with
stones and logs of timber. This important post was defended by three
hundred of their best men, under Hackston of Rathillet and Hall of
Haughhead. Early in the morning, this party crossed the bridge and
skirmished with the royal vanguard, now advanced as far as the village
of Bothwell; but Hackston speedily retired to his post at the west end
of Bothwell Bridge.
“While the dispositions made by the Duke of Monmouth announced his
purpose of assailing the pass, the more moderate of the insurgents
resolved to offer terms. Ferguson of Kaitlock, a gentleman of landed
fortune, and David Hume, a clergyman, carried to the Duke of Monmouth
a supplication, demanding free exercise of their religion, a free
Parliament, and a free general assembly of the Church. The Duke heard
their demands with his natural mildness, and assured them he would
interpose with his Majesty in their behalf, on condition of their
immediately dispersing themselves, and yielding up their arms. Had
the insurgents been all of the moderate opinion, the proposal would
have been accepted, much bloodshed saved, and perhaps some permanent
advantage derived to their party; or had they been all Cameronians,
their defence would have been fierce and desperate. But, while their
motley and misassorted officers were debating upon the Duke’s proposal,
his field-pieces were already planted on the eastern side of the
river, to cover the attack of the footguards, who were led on by Lord
Livingston to force the bridge. Here Hackston maintained his post with
zeal and courage; nor was it till his ammunition was expended, and
every support denied him by the general, that he reluctantly abandoned
the important pass. When his party were drawn back, the Duke’s army
slowly, and with their cannon in front, defiled along the bridge,
and formed in line of battle as they came over the river. The Duke
commanded the foot, and Claverhouse the cavalry. It would seem that
these movements could not have been performed without at least some
loss, had the enemy been serious in opposing them. But the insurgents
were otherwise employed. With the strangest delusion that ever fell
upon devoted beings, they chose these precious moments to cashier
their officers, and elect others in their room. In this important
operation they were at length disturbed by the Duke’s cannon, at the
first discharge of which the horse of the Covenanters wheeled and
rode off, breaking and trampling down the ranks of their infantry in
their flight. The Cameronian account blames Weir of Greenridge, a
commander of the horse, who is termed a sad Achan in the camp. The more
moderate party lay the whole blame on Hamilton, whose conduct, they
say, left the world to debate whether he was most traitor, coward,
or fool. The generous Monmouth was anxious to spare the blood of
his infatuated countrymen, by which he incurred much blame among the
high-flying Royalists. Lucky it was for the insurgents that the battle
did not happen a day later, when old General Dalziel, who divided with
Claverhouse the terror and hatred of the Whigs, arrived in the camp,
with a commission to supersede Monmouth as commander-in-chief. He is
said to have upbraided the Duke publicly with his lenity, and heartily
to have wished his own commission had come a day sooner, when, as he
expressed himself, ‘these rogues should never more have troubled the
King or country.’ But, notwithstanding the merciful orders of the Duke
of Monmouth, the cavalry made great slaughter among the fugitives, of
whom four hundred were slain.
“There were two Gordons of Earlston, father and son. They were
descended of an ancient family in the west of Scotland, and their
progenitors were believed to have been favourers of the reformed
doctrine, and possessed of a translation of the Bible as early as the
days of Wickliffe. William Gordon, the father, was in 1663 summoned
before the privy council, for keeping Conventicles in his house and
woods. By another act of council he was banished out of Scotland; but
the sentence was never put into execution. In 1667, Earlston was turned
out of his house, which was converted into a garrison for the King’s
soldiers. He was not in the battle of Bothwell Bridge, but he was met
hastening towards it by some English dragoons engaged in the pursuit,
already commenced. As he refused to surrender, he was instantly slain.
“His son, Alexander Gordon of Earlston, was not a Cameronian, but one
of the more moderate class of Presbyterians, whose sole object was
freedom of conscience and relief from the oppressive laws against
Nonconformists. He joined the insurgents shortly after the skirmish
at Loudon Hill. He appears to have been active in forwarding the
supplication sent to the Duke of Monmouth. After the battle, he escaped
discovery, by flying into a house at Hamilton, belonging to one of
his tenants, and disguising himself in a female attire. His person
was proscribed, and his estate of Earlston was bestowed upon Colonel
Theophilus Ogilthorpe by the crown, first in security for £5000, and
afterwards in perpetuity.
“The same author mentions a person tried at the circuit-court,
July 10th, 1683, solely for holding intercourse with Earlston, an
intercommuned rebel. As he had been in Holland after the battle of
Bothwell, he was probably accessory to the scheme of invasion which the
unfortunate Earl of Argyll was then meditating. He was apprehended upon
his return to Scotland, tried, convicted of treason, and condemned to
die; but his fate was postponed by a letter from the King, appointing
him to be reprieved for a month, that he might, in the interim, be
tortured for the discovery of his accomplices. The council had the
unusual spirit to remonstrate against this illegal course of severity.
On November 3rd, 1683, he received a further respite, in hopes he would
make some discovery. When brought to the bar to be tortured, (for the
King had reiterated his command,) he, through fear or distraction,
roared like a bull, and laid so stoutly about him, that the hangman
and his assistant could hardly master him. At last he fell into a
swoon, and, on his recovery, charged General Dalziel and Drummond,
(violent tories,) together with the Duke of Hamilton, with being the
leaders of the fanatics. It was generally thought that he affected this
extravagant behaviour to invalidate all that agony might extort from
him concerning his real accomplices. He was sent first to Edinburgh
Castle, and afterwards to a prison upon the Bass island, although the
privy council more than once deliberated upon appointing his immediate
death. On the 22nd August, 1684, Earlston was sent for from the Bass,
and ordered for execution, 4th November, 1684. He endeavoured to
prevent his doom by escape; but was discovered and taken after he had
gained the roof of the prison. The council deliberated, whether, in
consideration of this attempt, he was not liable to instant execution.
Finally, however, they were satisfied to imprison him in Blackness
Castle, where he remained till the Revolution, when he was set at
liberty, and his doom of forfeiture reversed by Act of Parliament.”
ADDITIONAL NOTICES RELATIVE TO THE INSURRECTION OF 1679.
_From “A History of the Rencontre at Drumclog,” etc._
_By William Aiton, Esq._
“MR. DOUGLAS having agreed to preach at Hairlaw, or Glaisterlaw, about
a mile north-west of Loudon Hill, on Sabbath, June 1, 1679, the Fife
men and Mr. Hamilton, dreading the Conventicle might be attacked by the
military, collected a number of their friends on the Saturday evening,
in a house near Loudon Hill, where they lay under arms all night.
They also sent off an express to Lesmahagow, to bring forward their
friends from that quarter, and who were up just in time to join in the
skirmish. But very few of their friends from Kilmarnock came forward to
that Conventicle.
“A considerable number of people assembled at that field-meeting, and,
as usual in these times, the greater part of them came armed. Captain
Grahame of Claverhouse was, by Lord Ross, who commanded the military in
Glasgow, sent out with three troops of dragoons to attack and disperse
that Conventicle. He had seized, about two miles from Hamilton, John
King, a field-preacher, and, according to Mr. Wilson’s account,
seventeen other people, whom he bound in pairs, and drove before him
towards Loudon Hill.
“Captain Grahame and his officers eat their breakfast that day at the
principal inn, Strathaven, then kept by James Young, writer, innkeeper,
and baron-bailie of Avendale, known in that district by the name of
_Scribbie Young_. The house which he then occupied stood opposite the
entry into the churchyard, and, from its having an upper room or second
storey in the one end, with an outside stair of a curious construction,
was denominated ‘the tower.’[27] Having been informed at Strathaven
that the Conventicle was not to meet that day, Captain Grahame set out
towards Glasgow with his prisoners. But, upon obtaining more correct
information about a mile north of Strathaven, he turned round towards
Loudon Hill, by the way of Letham. On being told at Braeburn that the
Covenanters were in great force, he said that he had eleven score of
good guns under his command, and would soon disperse the Whigs.
“Soon after worship had commenced, the Covenanters were informed, by an
express from their friends at Hamilton, as well as by the watches they
had placed, that the military were approaching them; and they resolved
to fight the troops, in order, if possible, to relieve the prisoners,
or, to use the words of their historian, Dr. Wodrow, to ‘oppose the
hellish fury of their persecutors.’ Their whole force consisted of
about 50 horsemen, ill-provided with arms, 50 footmen with muskets, and
about 150 more with halberts and forks. Mr. Hamilton took the chief
command, and David Hackston, Henry Hall, John Balfour, Robert Fleming,
William Cleland, John Loudon, and John Brown, acted as subalterns under
Mr. Hamilton. Mr. Wilson says, ‘Hamilton gave out the word that no
quarter should be given to the enemy.’ The Covenanters did not wait
the arrival of the military, who could not have reached them but by a
circuitous route; neither did they take shelter in the mosses that lay
near, and into which the cavalry could not have followed them; but they
advanced eastward about two miles, singing psalms all the way.
“When Grahame reached the height at Drumclog, and saw the Whigs about
half a mile to the north of that place, near to where Stabbyside House
now stands, he placed his prisoners under a guard in the farmyard of
North Drumclog, and, having drawn up his three troops of cavalry, he
advanced to attack the Whigs. Mr. Russel says, Claverhouse gave orders
to his troops to give no quarter to the Covenanters; and that ‘there
was such a spirit given forth from the Lord, that both men and women
who had no arms faced the troops.’ The dragoons had to march down an
arable field of a very slight declivity, at the foot of which a small
piece of marshy ground (provincially termed misk or boggy land) lay
between the hostile parties. As many of the insurgents resided in that
immediate neighbourhood, they could not fail to know that this marshy
place, on the north side of which they had taken their stand, was in
some places too soft to support the feet of horses. But as this swamp
was covered with a sward of green herbage, and was but of a few yards
in breadth, and lying between two fields of arable land, the declivity
of which was on both sides towards the bog, it is evident that Grahame
did not perceive it to be a marsh; and to this, above all other
circumstances, is his defeat to be attributed.
“This ground, so favourable to the Covenanters, appears to have been
taken up more from accident than design. If it had been their wish to
have taken their station in or behind a bog, they could have found many
of them much nearer to where the congregation first met, and much more
impenetrable to cavalry than that where the rencounter happened. In
advancing from Hairlaw Hill to the place of action, they passed several
deep flow-mosses, some of them of great extent, and into which cavalry
could not have entered. Even when the hostile parties came in sight of
each other, the Covenanters were nearer to a flow-moss than they were
to the marshy ground behind which they placed themselves. Had Captain
Grahame known the ground, he could have easily avoided the marsh, and
passed the extremity of it by a public road, only about two or three
hundred yards to the westward.
“The troops fired first, and, according to tradition, the Covenanters,
at the suggestion of Balfour, evaded the fire of the military by
prostrating themselves on the ground, with the exception of John
Morton in Broomhall, who, believing in the doctrine of predestination,
refused to stoop, and was shot. The ball entered his mouth, and he
fell backward at the feet of the great-grandfather of the writer of
this account. Grahame ordered the troops to charge; but a number of
the horses having, in advancing to the Covenanters, been entangled in
the marsh, the ranks were broken, and the squadron was thrown into
disorder. The Covenanters, who had no doubt foreseen what was to
happen, seized the favourable opportunity of pouring their fire on
the disordered cavalry, and, following it up with a spirited attack,
soon completed the confusion and defeat of the troops. The commander
of the Whigs cried, ‘O’er the bog, and to them, lads!’ The order was
re-echoed, and obeyed with promptitude; and, from the involved state of
the military, the forks and halberts of the Covenanters were extremely
apt to the occasion. The rout of the cavalry was instantaneous and
complete, and achieved principally by the insurgents who were on foot,
though the horsemen soon passed the bog and joined in the pursuit. Mr.
Wilson says that Balfour and Cleland were the first persons who stepped
into the bog; but the traditionary accounts allege that it was one
Woodburn, from the Mains of Loudon, who set that example of bravery.
“Thus far the traditionary accounts and that of Mr. Wilson have been
followed. But Mr. Russel says that Claverhouse sent two of his men to
reconnoitre, and afterwards did so himself, before he made the attack.
If he did so, it is surprising that he did not perceive the marsh,
as well as the road by which it might have been evaded. Russel also
says that Captain Grahame sent forward twelve dragoons, who fired
at the Whigs, and that as many of them turned out and fired at the
cavalry. This, he says, was twice repeated, without a person being
hurt on either side. On their firing a third time, one dragoon fell
from his horse, and seemed to rise with difficulty. Claverhouse, he
says, then ordered thirty dragoons to dismount and fire, when William
Cleland, with twelve or sixteen armed footmen, supported by twenty
or twenty-four with halberts and forks, advanced and fired at the
military. But still no one was injured, till Cleland advanced alone,
fired his piece, and killed one dragoon; and when the Whigs were
wheeling, some of the military fired, and killed one man. Claverhouse
next advanced his whole force to the stanck, and fired desperately,
‘and the honest party, having but few guns, was not able to stand, and
being very confused at coming off, one of the last party cried out,
“For the Lord’s sake, go on”; and immediately they ran violently
forward, and Claverhouse was tooming the shot all the time on them;
but the honest party’s right hand of the foot being nearest Cleland,
went on Clavers’s left flank, and all the body went on together against
Clavers’s body, and Cleland stood until the honest party was joined
among them both with pikes and swords, and William Dingwell and Thomas
Weir being on the right hand of the honest party, all the forenamed
who fired thrice before being together, and, louping ower, they got
among the enemies. William Dingwell received his wound, his horse being
dung back by the strength of the enemy, fell over and dang over James
Russel’s horse. James presently rose and mounted and pursued, calling
to a woman to take care of his dear friend William Dingwell, (for
the women ran as fast as the men,) and she did so. Thomas Weir rode
in among them, and took a standard, and he was mortally wounded and
knocked on the head, but pursued as long as he was able, and then fell.
The honest party pursued as long as their horses could trot, being
upwards of two miles. There was of the enemy killed thirty-six dead on
the ground, and by the way in the pursuit, and only five or six of the
honest party.’
“Lieutenant Robert Grahame, Cornet John Arnold, and thirty-four
privates of the King’s forces were killed on the field, and several
more wounded. Five of the military were taken prisoners, and afterwards
allowed to escape. Of the Covenanters, John Morton, Thomas Weir in
Cumberhead, William Dingwell, one of the murderers of the Bishop, James
Thomson, Stonehouse, John Gabbie in Fioch, and James Dykes in Loudon,
were all mortally wounded, and died either on the field, or soon after
the skirmish.
“The Covenanters pursued the troops to Calder Water, about three
miles from the field of action. A person of the name of Finlay, from
Lesmahagow, armed with a pitchfork, came up with Captain Grahame,
at a place called Capernaum, near Coldwakening, and would probably
have killed that officer, had not another of the Covenanters called
to Finlay to strike at the horse, and thereby secure both it and the
rider. The blow intended for the Captain was spent upon his mare, and
the Captain escaped by mounting, with great agility, the horse of his
trumpeter, who was killed by the Whigs.
“The Covenanters came up with some of the dragoons near Hillhead. The
troopers offered to surrender, and asked quarter, which some of the
Covenanters were disposed to grant; but, when their leaders came up,
they actually killed these men, in spite of every remonstrance. The men
so killed were buried like felons, on the marsh between the farms of
Hillhead and Hookhead, and their graves remained visible till the year
1750, when they were sunk in a march dyke, drawn in that direction. The
late Mr. Dykes of Fieldhead declared to the writer of this narrative,
that his grandfather, Thomas Leiper, of Fieldhead, had often told him
that he was present when these soldiers were killed, and did what he
could to save their lives, but without effect.
* * * * *
“When the discomfited dragoons returned through Strathaven, they
were insulted and pursued by the inhabitants, down a lane called the
Hole-close, till one of the soldiers fired upon the crowd, and killed
a man, about 50 yards east from where the relief meeting-house at
Strathaven now stands.
“Captain Grahame retreated to Glasgow, and he is said to have met at
Cathkin some troops sent out to his aid; but he refused to return to
the charge, observing to his brother officer, that he had been at a
Whig meeting that day, but that he liked the lecture so ill that he
would not return to the afternoon’s service. Another account says,
that when Captain Grahame rode off the field, Mr. King, the preacher,
then a prisoner, called after him, by way of derision, to stop to the
afternoon’s preaching.[28]
“The relations of the two officers that were killed went to Drumclog
next day after the skirmish, to bury them; but the country people had
cut and mangled the bodies of the slain in such a manner that only one
of the officers could be recognised. The coffin intended for the other
was left at High Drumclog, where it remained many years in a cart-shed,
till it was used in burying a vagrant beggar that died at the Mount, in
that neighbourhood. This fact has been well attested to the writer of
this account from sources of information on which he can rely.”
FOOTNOTES:
[21] The chapel was built in the fourteenth century, by Sir William St.
Clair of Roslin, in consequence of a vow which he made in a curious
emergency. One day, hunting with King Robert I., he wagered his head
that his hounds, _Help_ and _Hold_, would kill a certain beautiful
white deer before it crossed the March burn. On approaching the
boundary, there seemed little chance of his hounds being successful;
but he went aside, and vowed a new chapel to St. Catherine if she would
intercede in his behalf; and she, graciously accepting of his offer,
inspired the hounds with supernatural vigour, so that they caught the
deer just as she was approaching the other side of the burn.
[22] This spirited article is copied (by express permission of the
Publishers,) from “The Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border.”
[23] Among other ridiculous occurrences, it is said that some of
Charles’s gallantries were discovered by a prying neighbour. A wily
old minister was deputed by his brethren to rebuke the King for his
heinous scandal. Being introduced into the royal presence, he limited
his commission to a serious admonition, that, upon such occasions,
his Majesty should always shut the windows. The King is said to have
recompensed this unexpected lenity after the Restoration. He probably
remembered the joke, though he might have forgotten the service.
[24] See the life of this booted apostle of prelacy, written by Swift,
who had collected all his anecdotes of persecution, and appears to have
enjoyed them accordingly.
[25] “They raved,” says Peden’s historian, “like fleshly devils, when
the mist shrouded from their pursuit the wandering Whigs. One gentleman
closed a declaration of vengeance against the conventicles with this
strange imprecation, ‘or may the devil make my ribs a gridiron to my
soul.’”—MS. Account of the Presbytery of Penpont. Our armies swore
terribly in Flanders, but nothing of this.
[26] Peden complained bitterly that, after a heavy struggle with the
devil, he had got above him, spur-galled him hard, and obtained a wind
to carry him from Ireland to Scotland—when, behold! another person had
set sail, and reaped the advantage of his prayer-wind, before he could
embark.
[27] That part of the novel which represents Claverhouse eating his
_disjeune_ in the hall of Tillietudlem and seat of “his most gracious
Majesty Charles the Second,” must therefore be considered as entirely
unfounded in truth. Could Scribbie Young’s “tower” be the Tillietudlem
of the Tale? Surely not. And, besides, we are given to understand
that a small eminence or knoll in the neighbourhood of Lanark Castle,
which has probably been at some former period surmounted by a ruin, is
popularly termed Tillietudlem.
[28] Crichton says, “King was a bra muckle carl, with a white hat and a
great bob of ribbons on the back o’t.”