The following letter [dated 2d January, 1651] was at first designed for Mr Dickson, but was enlarged and sent to Mr Spang.
Reverend and Dear Brother,
I sent the inclosed to you by Mr R. Ramsay, thinking you would have been at the meetings of Stirling and Perth, whither I was resolved not to go, notwithstanding of many earnest intreaties to the contrary; yet, after the dissolving of the meeting at Stirling, I followed to Perth, upon sundry letters from Stirling to me for that effect. Your absence was not well taken by many; though I verily think your presence would not have had more influence on the remonstrants than that of Mess. Douglas, Blair, Cant, Rutherford, Durham, Wood, and others, who could in nothing prevail with them. Of the whole matter, as it comes in my mind, I will give you a simple account, but to yourself alone, and after to the fire; for as in all the meetings I was silent, and a mere spectator, except one forenoon, wherein I in some things declared my mind, so I would desire to meddle as little as may be with this unfortunate strife.
After the woful rout at Dunbar, in the first meeting at Stirling, it was openly and vehemently pressed to have David Lesly laid aside, as long before was designed, but covertly, by the chief purgers of the times. The man himself did as much press as any to have liberty to demit his charge, being covered with shame and discouragement for his late unhappiness, and irritated with Mr James Guthrie’s publick invectives against him from the pulpit. The most of the committee of estates, and commission of the kirk, would have been content to let him go; but finding no man tolerably able to supply his place, and the greatest part of the remaining officers of horse and foot peremptory to lay down, if he continued not; and after all trials, finding no maladministration on him to count of, but the removal of the army from the hill the night before the rout, which yet was a consequence of the committee’s order, contrary to his mind, to stop the enemy’s retreat, and for that end to storm Broxmouth House as soon as possible. On these considerations, the state, unanimously, did with all earnestness intreat him to keep still his charge. Against this order, my Lord Wariston, and, as I suppose, Sir John Cheesly, did enter their dissent. I am sure Mr James Guthrie did his, at which, as a great impertinency, many were offended. Col. Strachan offered to lay down his charge, being unwilling more to be commanded by D. Lesly. Some more inclined to do so; but all were quieted by this expedient.
Mr Patrick Gillespie, by his diligence with some brethren of the west, had procured a meeting at Kilmarnock, of some chief gentlemen and ministers of the sheriffdoms of Ayr, Clydesdale, Renfrew, and Galloway, where he persuaded them, for the present necessity, to raise a strength of horse and dragoons, as they had designed in their association, but far above the proportion of any bygone levy. This conclusion obtained, he persuaded next to put all under the command of four Colonels, the likeliest men to act speedily against the enemy, Ker, Strachan, Robin Halket, and Sir Robert Adair. They made their account to make up the old broken regiments of these four to the number of 4000, beside volunteers. With this voluntary offer, Mr Pat. Gillespie, Sir George Maxwell, and Glanderston, rode to Stirling. However many did smell, and fear the design of a division, yet the offer was so fair, and promises of present acting so great, that easily, even by the Chancellor and Mr Robert Douglas’s procurement, they obtained an act of state for all their desires. By this they stopped all men’s mouths, and forced them of Renfrew and Carrick to join with them. The committee of Renfrew seeing the vast expences of the enterprise, (for the first rigging out would amount to 500,000 pounds, [£41,666:13:4], and the daily charge to 4000 or 5000 lib. upon the shires foresaid), were generally averse from the motion. My Lord Cassils kept off Carrick; Galloway also did disrelish the matter; but the committee of Clydesdale, consisting of a few mean persons, who were totally led by Mr Patrick and Sir John Cheesly, being very forward; the committee of Kyle and Cunningham being persuaded by Mess. J. Nevo, Gabriel Maxwell, and a few more ministers, the act of state supervening, quashed all farther opposition. All of us in our pulpits, myself as much as others, did promove the work. In a very short time 3500 horse are got together, with hopes, by volunteers, to make them above 5000. We were all in expectation of ready and happy acting, by infalls on the enemy’s quarters. But behold how all our hopes were soon most miserably blasted! Col. Strachan’s scruples were not only about David Lesly’s command; for in this his friends had procured him ample enough satisfaction, getting assurance, from the committee of state, that David Lesly should gladly permit the forces of the west to act apart, and never trouble them with any of his orders; but Strachan’s scruples went much higher. Since the amendment of his once very lewd life, he inclined much in opinion towards the sectaries; and having joined with Cromwell at Preston against the engagers, had continued with them to the King’s death. At that time, by Mr Blair, and our commissioners at London, he was somewhat altered; yet not so far as to join with us in covenant, till, by the great labours of Mr Ja. Guthrie and Mr P. Gillespie, his doubts were so far satisfied or smothered, that he was brought to content the commission of the church for that and divers other scandals against him: yet it seems that importunity has made him profess large as much compliance with us as his heart did yield to. His eminent service, first against Pluscardie, and then against Ja. Graham, got him the church’s extraordinary favour, to be helped with 100,000 merks out of their purses, for the mounting him a regiment; the greatest offering which ever our churchmen made at one time. This did not a little lift his spirit, and get him the far best regiment in the army. With the western recruit, it became stronger than any two regiments in the kingdom. At this time many of his old doubts revive upon him; which, by the knavery of his Captain-Lieutenant, Govan, and frequent messages of his late friends, Cromwell, and these about him, became so high, that though extraordinary pains were taken upon him, yet he would receive no satisfaction, so far as to act any thing against the enemy, except there might be a treaty. And it appeared therein, that Cromwell was not willing to retire, upon our assurance not to molest England on the King’s quarrel, whom he professed to be so far fallen from all his right to England, that, for his wrongs to Scotland, he ought at least to be banished the land, or made a perpetual prisoner.
Strachan’s axiom and debates put the whole army and committee of the west in such confusion and discouragement, that all acting against the enemy was impossible. But the matter stood not at this point. In our debates, at the time of the engagement, our publick professions were, of our clearness to fight against the English sectaries, for vindication of the covenant, and the King’s just rights, on the parliament’s grant to us of some few desires. Mess. J. Guthrie and Jo. Livingston their whisperings a little in the ear to the contrary, were not then audible. It was strange to me thereafter, when I heard Wariston and Mr Guthrie speak it out, that it would take a long debate to clear from the covenant, the lawfulness of an offensive war against Cromwell and his party; yet in a short time it appeared, that the quarrel of the King or covenant, or any quarrel tending to war with the English, became to divers more questionable than it wont to be. Whether a fear of the troubles of war, or a despair of conquering the King to the publick, or their own personal interests, or a desire to keep the government, not only in the form, but in the hands it was in, or truly judgement of mind, drew men to those changes of former professed principles, I cannot say; only a great deal of zeal was begun to be practised against all who did smell in any excess of favour towards the King. What strict acts of kirk and state were made against malignancy. What numbers were cast out of their charges in the church, state, and army. What bars were put to their re-admitting. You know too much pleading was for the justice of beheading the King, whatever fault was in the actors. Mr Guthrie and Mr Gillespie’s debates were passionate against the proclaiming of the King, till his qualifications for government had first been tried and allowed. You may remember the labour was taken to hinder the addresses to the King; and how like it was to have prevailed, had not the reason, authority, and diligence of Argyle, overswayed it; and, for all that could be said, the voting of Mess. Guthrie, Gillespie, Hutcheson, and Durham, that no commissioner should be sent till a change in the King should appear; and when it was carried to send commissioners, I will not forget the great study of some to make their instructions so rigid, that few had any hope the King would ever assent to them; and when, above hope, the King had yielded to all the commissioners had required, the industry of these same men to get new instructions posted away to Holland, which, had they come thither before the King’s imbarking, were expected by all should have ruined the treaty. Yet when, by the extraordinary favour of God, the King was brought into Scotland, to do what either kirk or state had required; and, upon this agreeance, the noise of Cromwell’s march towards us was grown loud, Sir John Cheesly, Hopeton, and Swinton, kept off, by their debates in parliament, the raising of our army so long, that we were near surprised; and when our army was got together at Leith, the same men helped, by their continual cross-debates, to keep all in confusion. Their strange affronting of the King at Leith; the putting of him to a new declaration; and, when he stuck but at some hard expressions, concerning the persons of his father and mother; their procuring from the kirk and state that terrible act of disclaiming his interest of the 13th of August; that same night, without the kirk’s knowledge, printed it, and sent it to Cromwell with a trumpet. All these things bred jealousies in the observers, what the intentions of some men might be; yet all was dissembled, till after the defeat at Dunbar these intentions broke out in their actions. So soon as they saw it probable that they were to have a force to be ruled by themselves alone, it became their work to have that army so great, and the other at Stirling so small, as they were able.
Then, in these meetings with Mr Gillespie, where Sir John Cheesly and some three or four burgesses did meet oft and long, propositions of a strange and high nature were in hand, as Robert Lockhart, who sometimes was present, did show to Argyle and others. The first vent of their motions was at the provincial synod in Glasgow, where Mr Patrick, Mr Hutcheson, Ker, Strachan and others, with much night-waking, brought forth that strange remonstrance of the synod, where Mr Patrick, obtaining a committee to consider the sins procuring the wrath of God on the land, did put such men on it as he liked best, and by them the framing of the draught was put upon himself, who quickly begat that pretty piece which I sent you. It doubtless had been the subject of more discourse, had it not been drowned in the subsequent more absurd one on the same head in the name of the army; for at the very first, it fell on the face of the general assembly and parliament, and condemns both for their first treating with the King, and for the renewing of it in a second address; but most for closing of it without evidence of his real change. Then these most bitter invectives against the state, for which Mr Patrick had used so high language with you and Mr Douglas, in face of the commission, at length are all brought in, with large additions, to any thing was then heard. I have oft of late regretted to see the judicatories of the church so easily led to whatever some few of our busy men designed, but never more than in the particular in hand. I am sure the most of that writ was without the knowledge of the most, and against the sense of many, of the brethren. Yet all was voted, nemine contradicente, except honest Mr W. Russel, Mr R. Ramsay, and Mr Jo. Bell, spoke a little to some words, but on the matter let all go. Fearing what was in hand, I could speak but little. The night before I expected nothing more should have been pressed but a keeping out engagers from the army. I loved not to appear in contradiction to some violent men; yet my heart being against their conclusion, I was, after much soliciting and prayer, brought to a necessity of contradicting, and had thought on some reasons for that point to have been mainly proponed for my dissent; although I doubt not but my impatience and canker had broken out, if I had heard, which I had never dreamed of, their invectives against the treaties; but the Lord, in a very sensible way to me, carried it so, that neither the synod was troubled with me, nor the peace of my mind by them. I once inclined to absent myself, and had indeed gone out, but behoved to return, not daring to take that course; but behold, when I was ready to go to the synod at that diet when the remonstrance came in, my Lord Cassils sent his man to call me to speak with him at his lodging. While we are a little serious about sundry of the publick affairs, I found that more time had gone than either of us had observed, and telling him that my absence from the synod might be mistaken, I took my leave, and with all haste I got up to the church; where I found, at my entry, that all the debates on that paper were closed, and after thrice reading, it was going to the vote. I adored divine providence, who truly beside my purpose, but much to my content, had given me a fair occasion to say nothing of a writ, whereof I never heard a line read. This, for the time, and since, was a satisfactory ground for my silence, to my own mind, in that remonstrance which brought to the consenters, let be the contrivers, but small credit; the commission of the church having so far disavowed it, as for no request they could be induced to countenance it towards the committee of estates; but Mr Patrick behoved to present it himself, without the company of any from that meeting, which would have made a noise, had not the second remonstrance filled the ears of the whole kingdom with a louder sound.
Mr R. Ramsay and others had pressed that for removing of jealousies from many who were then speaking their doubts of some mens intentions, that the officers of the army should put forth a declaration of their designs. To me the motion savoured not. Since the raising of these forces were allowed by the states, all declarations from particular officers seemed needless; yet, on the synod’s motion to Colonel Ker, a declaration by him and his fellows was promised, and presently gone about by Mr Patrick and the chief associates then present. But, as Mr Patrick told us, it was laid aside by the advice sent them by Wariston from Stirling, and Mr James Guthrie, betwixt whom and them the posts then and thereafter ran very thick night and day, not so much on that ground, he told us, that they thought it illegal for such private persons to make publick manifestoes, as for that, as I suspect, which he told us not.
About this time, the King’s head was filled by some unhappy men about him, especially Dr Fraser and Henry Seymour, with many extreme fears. After the affront at Leith, they had raised suspicions in his mind, which, upon the defeat at Dunbar, were increased, but, by the separate rising in the west, brought near to the head of a design to break the treaty with him, and agree upon his expenses with Cromwell. Upon these motions, the malignants in the north stept in, and, by the forenamed persons, began a correspondence for the raising of the north for his present service, under the conduct of Middleton. So many noblemen were on this unhappy enterprise. Crawford was given out for its head and contriver, albeit he professed to me his opposition to it. Lauderdale knew of it; but he has said so far to me, that I believe him he opposed it to his power. However, the thing was so foolishly laid, and the King, by the counsels of these about him, was so various in giving order for that rising, sometimes commanding and then countermanding to rise, that all the party was put in a confusion; yet, by the information of these foresaid fools, the King being put in fear, that Lorn, going timely to bury a soldier, was drawing together his regiment to lay hands on him, contrary to his former resolutions; he took horse with some two or three, as if it had been to go a kawking, but crossed Tay, and stayed not till he came to Clowe in Angus. By the way he repented of the journey, and meeting with Lauderdale at Diddup, and Balcarras coming from Dundee by accident, was almost persuaded by them to return; yet, by Diddup and Buchan he was kept in Clowe. But when he came to that miserably-accommodated house, and in place of the great promised forces, he saw nothing but a small company of highlanders, he presently sent for Robert Montgomery, who was near with his regiment, and without more ado, did willingly return, exceedingly confounded and dejected for that ill-advised start. When it was first blazed abroad, it filled all good men with great grief, and to my own heart it brought one of the most sensible sorrows that in all my life I had felt. Yet his quick return of his own accord, and his readiness to give all satisfaction for that failure, and his kind receiving by the committee of states, among whom he ever sat after his return, (though never before), turned our grief suddenly into joy, his absence not lasting above two full days. Yet all men were not so soon satisfied.
Sundry of them who had been on the plot, fearing a discovery and punishment, flew to arms; Lewis Gordon, Ogilvie, Athol, and others, under Middleton’s command, putting out a number of fair pretexts for their rising. This might have destroyed all; yet, by God’s mercy, all was quickly quieted. D. Leslie, with all his horse, marched towards them; the King wrote earnestly to them to lay down. The committee of estates sent a fair act of indemnity, and so without more ado they went home. Mr James Guthrie had well near marred this peace; he moved Middleton’s summar excommunication. Mr R. Douglas, and most number present, were against it; yet Mr James and Mr Patrick, by two or three votes of elders, obtained it. And though the committee of estates, by an earnest letter, intreated Mr James to delay a little the execution, yet on the next sabbath he executed the sentence to the regret of many.