Religion or the Kirk without License, p. 215. Act anent Non-Covenanting
Patrons. _Ib._ Act for founding Schools in every Parish, p. 216. Act
discharging the Printing of Books, Chronicles, or Libels without
License. _Ib._
_February 3._ Act in favour of the University of St Andrew’s, and anent
the Creditors of Sir Robert Spottiswood, p. 228.
_February 11._ Act Discharging the Printing of anything concerning
Religion or the Kirk, without License of the General Assembly or
Commissioners, p. 215. Act anent Non-Covenanting Patrons. _Ib._ Act for
founding Schools in every Parish, p. 216. Act discharging the Printing
of Books, &c., applicable to all Publications “concerning the State
of the Kingdom for ages past, without Warrant or Allowance for that
effect,” from the Secretary of State or Supreme Judicatories, without
prejudice to the Act in favour of the Kirk, p. 217.
THE
GENERAL ASSEMBLY,
AT EDINBURGH, 1646.
The preceding pages embody, with sufficient fulness and authenticity,
the proceedings of the Scottish Parliament and Assembly in the
beginning of the year 1645; and it is now our task to revert to
contemporary occurrences during the period which intervened betwixt the
Assemblies of 1645 and 1646, and which gave a colour and character to
these proceedings, and ushered in the latter General Assembly.
Of the occurrences now referred to, by far the most striking and
interesting were the military achievements of Montrose, which more
immediately operated on the nerves and the policy of the Scottish
Conventions in January and February, 1645. In our last sketch, we
brought down the notices to the end of January, of that year when
Montrose, having devastated Argyleshire, and chased its lord into
the Lowlands, bent his steps towards the north, in order to muster
the Royalists, and renew his summer aggressions on the dominant
Covenanters. He had not, however, proceeded far on his route when he
learnt that Argyle had returned to his own country with some Lowland
forces, with whom he joined the remnant of his own clan, and had taken
up a position at Inverlochie Castle, near Fort William, at the western
extremity of the chain of lochs which have recently been connected by
the Caledonian Canal. Retracing his steps through the snow-wreathed
mountain passes with his wonted celerity, Montrose’s band was once more
suddenly and unexpectedly in face of his enemy on the 1st of February,
and the outposts partially engaged. Although greatly superior in
force to Montrose, and in a position of his own selection, the Lord
of Argyle prepared, at the dawn of day next morning, for the coming
battle, by securing his own person in a place of safety. The soldiers
on both sides had lain all night on their arms; and, when Montrose was
in the field, there was little parley to be looked for. Argyle surveyed
the contest from the boat in which he had rowed from the shore ere it
commenced; and once more the star of Montrose was in the ascendant. The
clan Campbell and their allies fought gallantly; but, deserted by their
chief, and paralized by the terror of Montrose’s name, fifteen hundred
of them were slaughtered before the eyes of their craven lord in the
battle and retreat which followed; while this victory was won with
the most trivial loss of men on the part of Montrose—among whom was
Sir Thomas Ogilvy, of the House of Airlie, one of the most chivalrous
adherents of the Royal cause.
Montrose, having thus annihilated Argyle’s power, and tarnished the
military and moral influence of that chieftain, proceeded towards the
north-east, where the fame of another victory gained him the support
of Lord Gordon, and a considerable body of cavalry under his banner.
The dismay of the Convention and Assembly, then sitting at Edinburgh,
may be gathered from their recorded councils; and although they
screwed their courage up while Montrose was traversing the Grampians
and the wilds of the Western Highlands, his uniform success, and the
increase of his strength, made them tremble for their safety even in
the metropolis, though all the castles were in their hands. Baillie,
the second in command of their troops in England, and Urry, (both
experienced soldiers,) were recalled. These generals for some time
manœuvred so as to prevent Montrose from crossing the Tay and Forth;
and, as was frequently the case with him, his force was diminished by
the retirement of numerous portions of it. With the remnant, however,
he attacked the town of Dundee; and, with the irrepressible ardour of
his Highland and Irish soldiery, (who had no pay or sustenance save
plunder,) it became a scene of devastation, even in the immediate
vicinity of Baillie’s army, which was within a mile of the town.
Montrose hurriedly recalled his soldiers from the havoc, and effected a
retreat northwards, which has been admired as one of the most brilliant
of his exploits. In the face of a much superior force and able
generals, he effected his retreat without disaster—marching above sixty
miles without intermission, and fighting or manœuvring for three days
and nights, without rest or refreshment.
The Gordons once more joined Montrose in the north; and Urry being
detached to lead the northern Covenanters, and attack him in that
quarter, the hostile parties came again into collision at Auldearn,
(4th May, 1645,) where Montrose disposed his small band in the most
skilful manner, and obtained another victory in that fierce and well
fought battle, in which 2,000 of Urry’s troops were cut to pieces.
Urry had lost in it about a third part of his soldiers; and being
completely disabled and baffled, he was compelled to retreat on
Baillie’s main army, and leave Montrose victor of the field. Baillie
and Urry still advancing in greater force, Montrose soon again came
into contact with them (on the 2d of July) at Alford, where, after a
fierce and sanguinary struggle, (in which Lord Gordon was mortally
wounded,) the genius of Montrose, and the resistless gallantry of his
followers, won the day. They burst through the army of the Covenanters
like a living torrent, sweeping everything before them; and thus the
most skilful leaders, and some of the best troops of the Covenant, were
utterly cut off, or scattered in the north.
The natural effect of this career of victory was a considerable
accession to his standard, both of Highlanders and of non-Covenanters
in the Lowlands, who had hitherto been borne down by the high-handed
power of the Church and Estates, combined against the Royalists of
that kingdom; and there was something too, it must be confessed, in
the daring, and the devotedness of Montrose to his Sovereign—in his
grappling with and surmounting all disadvantages—and in the fame of
his uninterrupted triumphs—which was calculated to awaken the martial
spirit of Scotland, that we have seen even in later times awakened from
the slumber of peace, and shining forth in brightest lustre on the
fields of Spain and Belgium.
Notwithstanding the successes which had attended the arms of the
Parliaments in England, these successes of Montrose excited the
greatest consternation in the councils of those who at that time
ruled Scotland. New levies of troops were ordered to the number of
10,000; and the Convention of Estates was driven from Edinburgh by
a pestilence, which added to the other horrors of the year 1645 in
Scotland. They removed their sittings, in the month of July, first to
Stirling, afterwards to Perth—assembled around them all the forces they
could muster under the command of Baillie—and sent all the western
Lords of the Covenant to their respective shires to quicken new
levies.[332]
Montrose, with ranks more crowded and better appointed than heretofore,
descended from the mountains, and passing by the Convention and the
troops at Perth, whom he treated with scorn, advanced southward
with rapidity. Approaching the northern shore of the Forth, through
Kinross-shire, he consigned Castle Campbell (belonging to Argyle) to
the flames. He thence proceeded westward, marking his progress by
similar acts of vengeance; and crossing the river Forth at a ford
some miles above Stirling—the castle of which he had no means of
assailing—he then bent his course in a westerly direction for the
purpose of dispersing the new levies in the south-western counties,
and of advancing to the aid of his royal master in England. When he
had advanced as far as Kilsyth, he learned, on the 15th of August,
that Baillie, who had decamped from Perth, and taken the shorter route
by Stirling Bridge, was advancing towards him. That able commander,
knowing full well the spirit of Montrose and of his troops, would
have avoided a general engagement, but was overruled by Argyle and
other nobles, forming a Committee of the Estates, who urged on the
attack. Montrose was advantageously posted, and eager for the fight;
his men stripped to their shirts; and thus prepared “to do or die.”
The Covenanters, ere yet they were fully formed, began the attack on
an outpost; upon which Montrose, seeing and snatching the favourable
moment, poured down his daring followers to the combat, to which
they rushed in close columns with a wild shout that appalled their
antagonists, whose ranks they pierced, and whom they dispersed and
slaughtered with scarcely a shew of resistance, for the space of more
than ten miles. Four or five thousand of the Covenanters were slain on
the field and in the flight; and the only semblance of an army which
the Covenanters had on foot in Scotland was thus utterly routed and
dissipated. On this, as on former occasions, Argyle sought personal
safety in a barque on the Frith of Forth, at the nearest point to the
scene of action.
The capital surrendered on his advance, and there, as well as
elsewhere, he liberated a number of the King’s friends who were in
captivity; and so many persons of rank and consideration joined his
standard, that he called a Parliament to be held in Glasgow in the
King’s name. For the time, he was the conqueror of Scotland, save only
its few castles; but even if he had possessed the means of reducing
them, that formed no part of his scheme, which was to reach and join
the Royal standard in England. Meanwhile, the leading men of the
Convention and others fled for concealment in all directions; and, for
a brief space, the power of the Covenanters was completely broken.
But, from the very nature of Montrose’s armaments all along, they were
liable to frequent mutations. Destitute of what have been emphatically
termed “the sinews of war”—the funds for regularly maintaining his
followers in the field—they ever and anon, as volunteers, retired to
their homes, to the harvesting, and other pursuits, without leave asked
or given; and even after the triumphant Battle of Kilsyth, when he
had thus become master of Scotland, and might then have trodden the
Covenanters under foot, his forces melted away, until it was diminished
nearly to the condition in which it had been when he traversed the
wilds of Atholl and Badenoch.
Having communicated with the King, whose fortunes were then at the
lowest ebb in England, and urged him to draw near the northern border,
so as to form a junction of their respective forces, Montrose received,
by the hands of Sir Robert Spottiswood, a commission, under the Great
Seal, appointing him Captain-General and Lieutenant-Governor of
Scotland. Thus fortified, and animated by the sanguine spirit which
had already achieved such wonders under the most disadvantageous
circumstances, Montrose began his March towards the Border, and,
early in the month of September, took up his cantonments at Selkirk;
one portion of his little army (the cavalry) being quartered in that
hamlet, and the other division of it being encamped at Philiphaugh,
on the opposite bank of the Yarrow. Meanwhile the tidings of the
disasters and despair of the Covenanters at home had reached the army
in England. The chief men of that party were skulking in Berwick and
other places near the Border, which were occupied by the Covenanting
forces—and David Leslie was detached with five or six thousand of the
Scottish auxiliary army, composed chiefly of cavalry, to check the
progress of Montrose in Scotland. He crossed the Border at Berwick, and
proceeded on the route towards Edinburgh, with the view apparently of
intercepting the return of Montrose’s adherents from the north and the
Highlands. But he was too good a general either to disclose his real
intention, or to overlook any advantage which offered itself in the
course of his operations.
When Leslie had advanced so far as Musselburgh, and was within two
hours’ march of Edinburgh, he suddenly changed his route, and started
across the country by Middleton to Melrose, within four miles of
Montrose’s cantonments. Leslie’s troops were quartered at Melrose on
the 12th of September, and reposed there and in its vicinity during
the night; and early next morning, covered by a thick mist, approached
Montrose’s encampment on Philiphaugh. All the chief gentry on the
Border being at the time in the interest of the Covenanters, and their
vassals and tenantry being, of course, like-minded according to the
feudal feelings which then prevailed; and Montrose being lulled to a
fatal security by past success, and a belief that Leslie was in or
near Edinburgh, had not his scouts on the outlook. Leslie, favoured by
these circumstances, suddenly and unexpectedly attacked the camp of
Montrose, when unprepared for the contest, on the morning of the 13th
of September. Dividing his force into two portions, they respectively
attacked Montrose’s infantry on either flank; and the first tidings
which their chief heard that an enemy was near, were the sounds of
battle from the opposite bank of the Yarrow. Mustering his cavalry
in all haste, he rushed to the battle field, but too late for his
presence being available. Although his gallant followers fought with
their wonted enthusiasm, many of them were already either slaughtered
or taken prisoners ere he reached the scene of conflict; and although
he and his companions did all that skill or valour could accomplish in
such circumstances, it was in vain. Montrose continued the desperate
combat until all that remained of his force was only thirty of his
cavalry, the greater number being either killed, taken prisoners, or
sheltered from the rout in an adjoining wood. With this wreck of his
band, he retreated up the Yarrow and crossed over to Peebles, where a
few of his followers who had escaped joined him. After this disastrous
affair, Montrose once more retreated to the Highlands, where for the
present we must leave him.
We cannot pass on from this narrative of the Battle of Philiphaugh,
without recording that the successful commander, David Leslie,
tarnished his laurels by a cold-blooded massacre of the prisoners he
had captured, at the instigation, it has been confidently affirmed,
of the Covenanting clergy. Many of the prisoners were taken to Newark
Castle; and, while several persons of rank and better condition
were reserved for future vengeance, those of an inferior class were
butchered in scores in the court-yard of the Castle, like cattle in
the shambles: one hundred persons, at least, were put to death on this
occasion. A more atrocious outrage against all the usages of civilized
warfare never was committed, save in the modern times of Spanish
barbarity; and these hapless men, it most be remembered, were taken
prisoners while bearing arms under the commission and in the cause of
their lawful Sovereign, whose title and authority the Covenanters at
that time did not impugn, but, on the contrary, affected to vindicate
and uphold. If in future turns of fortune, the Covenanters became the
victims of bloody persecution, let it not be forgotten, that this
system of wholesale murder originated in the massacre at Newark Castle.
It must be stated, however, in palliation of this act of revenge by the
Covenanters, that Montrose and his followers, during the progress of
their victories, had ravaged, with unsparing severity, every district
which they visited; plundering, burning, and desolating, and not
unfrequently sacrificing life without mercy or remorse at every stage
of their progress.[333]
The picture which Scotland exhibited at the time referred to, would be
incomplete were we to omit mention of the executions in form of Law
which soon after followed the massacre of Newark. Douglas, Crawford,
Erskine, Fleming, and Napier, escaped along with Montrose from the
field of Philiphaugh; but among the prisoners reserved for more
deliberate proceedings, were Hartfield, Drummond, Ogilvy, Sir Robert
Spottiswood, (a son of the Archbishop and President of the Session,)
Sir Alexander Leslie of Auchintool, Sir William Rollock, Sir Philip
Nisbet, William Murray, brother of Tullibardine, Alexander Ogilvy of
Innerquarity, Nathaniel Gordon, Andrew Guthrie, son of the Bishop
of Moray, Stewart the Adjutant, and two Irish Colonels, O’Kyan and
Leighton. David Leslie, after his victory at Philiphaugh, fell back
on Lothian, where the two Irish officers were tried by martial law
and executed. Soon after, at a meeting of the Estates in Glasgow, Sir
William Rollock, Sir Philip Nisbet, and Alexander Ogilvy, were found
guilty of “rebellion against the State”, and executed there on the
29th of October. On the 26th of November, the Parliament met at St
Andrew’s, when Sir Robert Spottiswood, (whose sole crime was carrying
the King’s commission to Montrose,) Mr William Murray, Colonel Gordon,
and Mr Andrew Guthrie, were tried, condemned, and executed. Lord Ogilvy
and Adjutant Stewart made their escape; and Hartfield alone, through
the intercession of Argyle, was pardoned. And thus commenced the bloody
war of party revenge, which for nearly forty years afterwards polluted
and dishonoured the annals of Scotland.
In our last introductory sketch, we had brought down the narrative
of events in England to the Treaty at Uxbridge, which commenced in
January, 1646. The discussions embraced three great points—religion,
the militia, and Irish affairs. On the first of these, the
Parliamentary and Scottish Commissioners strenuously insisted on
the uniformity of religion, in terms of the League and Covenant;
Presbyterianism to be the form of Church Government, and that form,
with all its formalities and doctrines, (still unsettled even in
the Ecclesiastical Assemblies of both kingdoms,) was sought to be
sanctioned and adopted by the King, and enforced coercively on all his
subjects of Scotland, England, and Ireland. The other two subjects
presented also debatable points; but these are foreign to our purpose;
and the King having been required to sanction a bill for the abolition
of Prelacy—to confirm the proceedings of the Westminster Assembly,
with all the particulars subordinate to such a requisition—the treaty
terminated on the 22d of February, without leading to any auspicious
results, by the King rejecting overtures so inconsistent with all his
principles. Nor although the insurgents were still in the ascendant
in the affairs of arms, had the Presbyterian party any good ground of
confidence in their ultimate triumph; for henceforward the Independent
party became more bold and energetic, and, ere long, acquired a decided
preponderance in the councils which ruled the land; and, finally,
abolished and tyrannized over both the Episcopalian and Presbyterian
establishments; these being completely overborne by a potent
combination of wild and mystic sects, whose tenets were too variegated
to admit of any adequate description in a sketch of this kind, but who
always inculcated the doctrine of unlimited toleration, although in
their conduct, as was the fashion of the age, they practically outraged
its principles.[334]
The Acts of the Assembly 1645, contain abundant evidence of the spirit
by which it was animated; and we forbear adverting to particulars.
We go on, therefore, to remark that the English Parliament, by
their self-denying ordinance and new modelling of the army, having
invested the leading Independents with the highest power on their
side, obtained, on the 14th of June, 1645, the victory at Naseby. The
fate of Charles was thereby irretrievably sealed, and his fortunes
hopelessly overcast. In this state of affairs, the conflicts betwixt
the Presbyterian and Independent parties waxed fiercer in consequence
of continued efforts, on the part of the former, to obtain uncontrolled
spiritual domination, which was, of course, resisted by the other
party; and the English Parliament and leaders having, with the
assistance of the Scottish armies, triumphed over the Royalists, in all
quarters, were now anxious to get quit of their allies, whose presence
in England operated as a check on the predominant English adventurers.
Imputations against the Scottish army for rapacity, inactivity,
and other real or imaginary backslidings, led to recrimination and
heartburning; and the Scotch had a plausible ground of complaint,
inasmuch as the pay and allowances which had been promised them by the
English Parliament were greatly in arrear. Besides all these causes
of discord, the Scottish party was disappointed by the qualified
adoption of Presbytery as the Church of England. The conclusions of
the Westminster Assembly, after being sanctioned by the Scottish
General Assembly and Estates, were adopted indeed as an experiment
by the English Parliament, but to be reversed or altered according
to circumstances; and during all the sittings of the Westminster
Assembly, the English Parliament sturdily refused to render the Church
independent of the State, and retained to itself the ultimate power of
control in all matters ecclesiastical as well as civil. This sort of
erastianism was very unpalatable to the Scotch, who had set the Church
above the State, and wished this dominancy to be extended to England as
well as Scotland.
While these misunderstandings were at a height, and the King’s
power almost annihilated, he endeavoured to avail himself of these
distractions by a diplomacy not, perhaps, altogether free of intrigue,
with both the parties concerned; and, towards the close of the year
1645, he made overtures for an agreement with the English Parliament;
but although quarrelling among themselves, the victorious parties
concurred in rejecting those overtures, which, had they been acceded
to, might eventually have frustrated the designs of Cromwell and his
associates. They resolutely resisted the King’s offers to disband all
his forces and go to London, attended only by a royal escort, to pass
an act of oblivion, and to do whatever the Parliament should advise for
the good and peace of the kingdom, on the single condition of obtaining
security for the personal safety of himself and his followers. The
absolute rejection of such propositions was a sufficient indication
to the unfortunate Charles that he had nothing to expect even from
the most humiliating concessions to the ruling party in England;
and in this sad extremity of his fortunes, he adopted, perhaps, the
only other alternative that remained to him—that of casting himself
unreservedly upon the loyalty, the generosity, the gratitude of his
Scottish subjects; for assuredly the ample concessions which he
had made to them in 1641, by which he had confirmed their favourite
ecclesiastical polity, given omnipotence to the Estates, and vested
the executive authority entirely in the hands of the ruling party in
Scotland—and which he had not, in a single instance, infringed during
the space of five years, (unless his commission to Montrose may be
so construed,)—gave him reasonable grounds to expect that they would
welcome and protect their native King, who had thus lavished his regal
prerogatives upon them, and extended their national liberties. We shall
soon see the result of this resolution.