ATTACK ON CRAWFORD CASTLE.--RETURN TO LANARK.--CONFLICT WITH THE
ENGLISH.--MURDER OF THE HEIRESS OF LAMINGTON.--HER DEATH REVENGED.--THE
ENGLISH DRIVEN OUT OF LANARK.
The Castle of Lochmaben is supposed to have been the first fortress in
which Wallace ventured to place a garrison; and it is probable he was
enabled to do so, in consequence of a great many in the neighbourhood
having joined his standard, encouraged no doubt by his late successes.
This supposition is confirmed by the circumstance of his leaving behind
him a few of those who had been in the engagement with Graystock.
While the insurrection was thus spreading in Scotland, Edward was
prosecuting his views against France. The accounts of the proceedings
of Wallace occasionally reached him, and arrested his attention in the
midst of his victories; and though he felt no immediate apprehension
from the attempts of the freebooter, as he was pleased to call the
patriotic leader of the Scots, yet he considered him such an enemy as
it was not altogether prudent to neglect.
The applications, therefore, which were made from time to time, by
Percy and others intrusted with the management of Scottish affairs,
were promptly attended to, and the requisite supplies forwarded to
the different garrisons. Part of these supplies, as has been already
hinted, had reached Lochmaben before the late rencounter; most of the
other fortified places had received their quota; and the garrison of
the Castle of Crawford were in daily expectation of their proportion.
This fortress, which had belonged to the maternal ancestors of
Wallace,[84] attracted his attention. Having learned, from a female
whom he stopped on the moor, that the garrison, which consisted of
about twenty men, were carousing in an hostelry in the neighbourhood
of the castle, he proposed to Sir John Graham to attempt a surprise.
For this purpose, he directed Graham to follow slowly with the others
under his command, while, with a companion, he went forward himself
to observe the condition of the revellers. On approaching the door,
the language within had become sufficiently audible; and he soon
ascertained that he and his exploits were the subject of discussion;
their captain, one Martindale, in the heat of his pot-valour, declaring
to his men the pleasure which the presence of Wallace would afford him.
Finding himself in request, the fearless Scot stepped forward. The
“Benedicities” on both sides were brief. Wallace plied his weapon with
his usual effect; and, aided by his companion, the maudlin braggadocio
and his fellows were soon overpowered. Meanwhile, Sir John Graham, who
had reached the door during the contest, was ordered off to secure
the castle;[85] which duty, from the small number of its defenders, he
easily performed.
Having burnt the castle, and divided the spoil among his followers,
Wallace retired to Lanark, on purpose, it is supposed, to concert
measures for withdrawing from that place the object of his affections,
and placing her in some retreat less exposed to the exactions of
Hazelrig.
On this occasion, our hero, for the more effectually disguising
himself,[86] had thrown a green mantle over his armour, which he
fastened with a belt, from which depended his sword. At the entrance
of the town, his dress, and particularly the uncommon length of his
sword, attracted the notice of some of the soldiers belonging to the
garrison; and one of them, more insolent than the others, made a snatch
at it. Wallace evaded the attempt to deprive him of his weapon; when
a sarcastic[87] dialogue ensued, which soon ended in blows; and the
English, seeing their companion no match for the Scot, rushed forward
to his assistance. Hemmed in on all sides, Wallace became roused into
fury, and dealt his blows around him with fearful and destructive
energy. His ponderous blade descended with rapid and crashing effect
among the bucklers and head-pieces of the enemy, who had begun to
retire in confusion, before his irresistible arm; when others arriving,
who were unacquainted with the foe they had to contend with, rushed
headlong to the fray. Experience, however, soon taught them to be more
cautious in their advance; and Wallace had set them completely at bay,
when young Hazelrig came on with a fresh party to their assistance.
Thus re-inforced, and eager to revenge their companions, they were now
fast gathering round our hero, when a door facing him suddenly opened,
and a fair hand beckoned him from the _melée_. Wallace quickly embraced
the means of escape thus afforded him; and the door being instantly
shut against his enemies, gave him an opportunity of saving himself by
an outlet behind the house.
Old Hazelrig,[88] or, as Wyntown calls him, the Sheriff, was not in
Lanark at the time of this affray; but, on hearing the account of it,
and learning the number of English who had been killed, he hastened to
town, and caused the fair orphan of Lamington to be brought before him.
On discovering her connection with Wallace, and the assistance she had
so opportunely afforded him, in a paroxysm of rage and disappointment,
he ordered her for instant execution.
In the account of this affair, we have adhered to the statement of
Wyntown,[89] who adds, that Wallace, from a place of concealment, had
the heart-rending misfortune to be a spectator of the execution of
his mistress, without having the power of attempting a rescue. This
would not have been the case, if he had, as the Minstrel says, been
attended by Sir John Graham, and twenty-four of his associates. Wyntown
represents it as a mere personal adventure of Wallace; and states,
that, _after_ the melancholy catastrophe, he went in search of his
friends, to assist him in revenging the atrocity. Having collected
thirty of his followers, he returned with them, for that purpose, to
Lanark. At the dead hour of night, the door of the sheriff’s apartment
was burst from its hinges, and the iron-grasp of Wallace awakened
Hazelrig from his sleep. On being dragged headlong to the street,
after a stern reproof for his cowardly conduct, the trembling victim
instantly received the reward due to his villany. The alarm now spread,
and the garrison soon engaged with Wallace and his party; but deeply
incensed at the late disgusting act of barbarity, the people of Lanark
rose _en masse_ against their oppressors, who, unable to stand their
ground, were soon overpowered, and driven with great slaughter from the
town.
The inhabitants of Lanark, having thus identified themselves with the
cause of Wallace, saw no alternative left them, but to join heart and
hand with the avenger of their country’s wrongs; and the number that
now flocked to his standard enabled him to take the field openly, and
bid defiance to the enemy. Indeed, so formidable was the force under
his command, that he met and defeated a considerable body of the
English in a regular engagement in the neighbourhood of Biggar. It has
been alleged, that, on this memorable occasion, Edward commanded in
person; but such could not have been the case, as the English monarch
was not in the country at the time. That a considerable battle was
fought in the neighbourhood, there is reason to believe, as well from
current tradition, as from the number of _tumuli_ which are still to be
seen. In the statistical account of Biggar, the subject is thus taken
notice of:--“At the west end of the town is a tumulus, which appears
never to have been opened; and there are vestiges of three camps, each
of a roundish figure, at different places in the neighbourhood. There
is a tradition of a battle having been fought at the east of the town,
between the Scots, under Sir William Wallace, and the English, who were
said to be sixty thousand strong, wherein a great slaughter was made on
both sides, especially among the latter.”
These accounts, however, are decidedly at variance with truth, both
in regard to the amount of the English, and the person who commanded.
It is more probable, that the enemy did not exceed eight, or at most
ten thousand men, part of which appears to have been under the command
of Roden, Lord de Whichenour. On the side of the Scots, Sir Walter
Newbigging,[90] already referred to, headed a body of cavalry. His son
David, a youth, at that time little more than fifteen years of age,
held a command under him, and the well-tried military talents of the
father were not disgraced by the efforts of the young patriot, whose
conduct on this occasion was afterwards rewarded by the honour of
knighthood, probably conferred by the hand of our hero himself. The
family of Newbigging, as has already been noticed, came originally from
England; and Sir Walter and his son, on this occasion, found themselves
opposed to their near kinsman, the Lord of Whichenour.
At the head of what might now be called an army, Wallace kept
the field; and the celerity of his movements confounded all the
calculations of the enemy. While the main body of his forces appeared
in their formidable intrenchments, occupying the attention of the
English, distant garrisons were surprised, and put to the sword by
foes, who seemed to spring up as it were within their walls, and of
whose approach they had not the slightest intimation.
About this time, one of those iniquitous acts, so often met with in
the cold-blooded and relentless policy of Edward, was perpetrated at
Ayr, against the barons and gentry of the west of Scotland. This part
of the country had been the nucleus, as it were, of the insurrection;
and the ill-disposed and well-affected had now become equally objects
of suspicion to the usurper’s government. Under the pretext of holding
a Justice-Aire, they were summoned to attend; and those who appeared
(among whom were Sir Raynald Crawford, Sir Bryce Blair,[91] and Sir
Hugh Montgomerie) were treacherously seized, and hung up without even
the formality of a trial.
Wallace heard of the infamous proceeding, and determined on severe
retaliation. Selecting fifty of his confederates, he hastened to the
spot, and being joined by a number of the retainers of the murdered
gentlemen, they surrounded the buildings where the English were
cantoned, and who, indulging in fancied security arising from the
terror which they imagined the late severity was likely to impress upon
the Scots, had, after a deep carousal, betaken themselves to rest,
little dreaming of the vengeance that awaited them.
Having procured the necessary combustibles, Wallace, after disposing of
his men, so as to prevent the escape of any of the English, set fire
to the thatch, which being covered with pitch, the flames soon spread
to every part of the buildings, and rose in one general conflagration;
while the screaming wretches within vainly attempting to escape, were
received on the points of the Scottish swords, and either killed, or
forced back, to perish in the devouring element. It is said, that five
hundred of the English suffered in this lamentable manner. The severity
of the retaliation can only be palliated by the nature of the war the
parties were engaged in, and the desperation to which the cruelty of
the invaders had goaded on the wretched inhabitants. If tradition may
be credited, Wallace did not remain till the flames were extinguished;
for, when about two miles on his return, at an elevated part of the
road, he is said to have made his men look back on the still blazing
scene of their vengeance, remarking, at the same time, that “The barns
of Ayr burn weel.” The ruins of a church are still to be seen on the
spot where the chief and his followers stood to take their last look,
and which is named from the circumstance, “_Burn weel Kirk_.”[92]