NOTES ON CREICHTOUN'S MEMOIRS

(Kindly supplied by J. B. Dalzell, Esq.)

Creichtoun says:—

1. He commanded at Ayrsmoss. (Bruce of Earlshall did.) "The Royalists killed about sixty and took fourteen prisoners." (Nine only were killed and five taken prisoners.)

2. The "rebels" at Drumclog were "eight or nine thousand strong." (There were only 250 in all.)

3. Sir Robert Hamilton, who commanded at Drumclog was "a profligate who had spent all his patrimony." (The evidence of the historian, Bishop Barnet, and of other reputable authorities, is all the other way.)

4. The number of the "rebels" at Bothwell Bridge was 14,000, and the bridge was "guarded with three thousand of the rebels." (Three thousand is nearer the mark, with only two or three hundred guarding the bridge.)

5. The "rebels had set up a very large gallows in the middle of their camp, and prepared a cartful of new ropes at the foot of it in order to hang the king's soldiers." (This gallows was simply the usual permanent gallows of the Sheriff Court of Lanarkshire Netherward.)

6. David Steele was dispatched by swords in his absence. (Steele surrendered under promise of quarter and a fair trial. But Creichtoun conveyed him to Steele's house, nearly a mile, and there in the presence of the man's wife and her little babe, Mary Steele, ordered the dragoons to shoot him. To their credit, the dragoons absolutely refused and rode off, but the Highlanders, who probably knew Gaelic only, and were therefore ignorant of Creichtoun's gross breach of faith, fired.)

These six instances are but a sample of the exaggeration and mendacious inventions only too common throughout Creichtoun's memoirs, and the reader would therefore do well to hesitate before accepting what is not corroborated by independent evidence.

NOTE ON GENERAL DALYELL

Immediately after the death of General Dalyell, his eldest son Thomas was created a baronet of Nova Scotia. Considerably over one hundred varieties in spelling this curious ancient Scottish surname have been collected. The General and his father, the Sheriff of Linlithgowshire, uniformly spelt their surname Dalyell, as their descendants are in the habit of doing at the present day.

J. B. DALZELL.

[INDEX OF NAMES]

To save confusion in compiling this list, all military titles have been omitted. Owing to the great mass of names dealt with, it has not been practicable to follow the fortunes of each individual. All identical names, therefore, have been indexed under a single entry, and names that differ in any respect whatever, even when belonging to the same individual, have been dealt with separately.

[TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES]

Corrected Errata on p. [xi] in the text.

Corrected Addenda to List of Officers Past and Present on p. [261] in the text.

Missing words or unexplained blank sections on pp. [70], [233], [238], and [283] indicated by gaps in the text.

Changed 2th to 12th, 5th to 15th, and 6th to 16th on p. [86].

Silently corrected simple spelling, grammar, and typographical errors.

Retained anachronistic and non-standard spellings as printed.