Within a fortnight of his reappointment he received further proof of the value set on his services. About this time news had arrived of Argyle’s intended invasion of Scotland, and it would seem that Claverhouse had communicated some important information with regard to it, in a despatch to the Lord Commissioner. The document is not known to be extant; but its purport is indicated by the reply which it elicited from the Secret Committee of Council, and which was written on the 23rd of May. ‘If there be any danger by horse,’ he was told, ‘it must be from the Border’; and he was authorised to propose what he judged expedient with a view to meeting the emergency, and instructed to inform the Earl of Dumbarton, who had just received his commission as Commander-in-Chief, of the measures which he intended to adopt. He was also to keep in touch with Fielding the deputy-governor of Carlisle. This clearly shows that the danger which he apprehended and had pointed out threatened the disaffected western counties.
The discretionary powers with which the letter of the Council invested Claverhouse implied the recognition, not very willing, it may be assumed, on the part of all the ‘affectionate friends and servants’ who signed it, and at the head of whom Queensberry figured as Commissioner, of his special fitness to cope with it. But the most striking and interesting passage in the document consists of a couple of lines, thrown in almost casually, and curtly announcing his promotion. ‘The King has sent commissions to Colonel Douglas and you as Brigadiers, both of horse and foot. Douglas is prior in date.’ When it is remembered in what relation Claverhouse had stood to Queensberry and his brother, but a short time before, the ungracious tone of this communication becomes highly suggestive. The suspicions which it arouses are amply confirmed by a full statement of the case, as it is set forth by Secretary Murray in a confidential letter to Queensberry. There could be no more striking proof of the feelings of ill-will and of envy which Claverhouse had to contend against, on the part of the Government, or of the intrigues that were resorted to by his opponents:—
‘The King ordered two commissions to be drawn, for your brother and Claverhouse to be Brigadiers. We were ordered to see how such commissions had been here, and in Earl Middleton’s office we found the extract of one granted to Lord Churchill, another to Colonel Worden, the one for horse, the other for foot. So Lord Melfort told me the King had ordered him to draw one for your brother for the foot, and Claverhouse for the horse. I told him that could not be; for by that means Claverhouse would command your brother. To be short, we were very hot on the matter. He said he knew no reason why Colonel Douglas should have the precedency unless that he was your brother. I told him that was enough; but that there was a greater, and that was, that he was an officer of more experience and conduct, and that was the King’s design of appointing Brigadiers at this time. He said Claverhouse had served the King longer in Scotland. I told him that was yet wider from the purpose; for there were in the army that had served many years longer than Claverhouse, and of higher quality; and without disparagement to any, gallant in their personal courage. By this time I flung from him, and went straight to the King, and represented the case. He followed and came to us. But the King changed his mind, and ordered him to draw the commissions both for horse and foot, and your brother’s two days date before the other; by which his command is clear before the other. I saw the commissions signed this afternoon, and they are sent herewith by Lord Charles Murray. Now, I beseech your Grace, say nothing of this to any; nay, not even to your brother. For Lord Melfort said to Sir Andrew Forrester, that he was sure there would be a new storm on him. I could not, nor is it fit this should have been kept from you; but you will find it best for a while to know, or take little notice; for it gives him but ground of talking, and serves no other end.’
Even if Queensberry was as discreet as his correspondent advised him to be, there is no reason for supposing that Melfort considered himself bound to keep Claverhouse in ignorance of the stormy scene described by Murray. But although the newly-promoted Brigadier must have been well aware of the device by which his enemies had found means of coupling a slight with what was intended to be a mark of royal favour, he had the wisdom and the self-restraint to show no consciousness of it. A letter which he wrote to Queensberry on the 16th of June, bears testimony to his calm and self-respecting conduct, whilst, at the same time, it shows that the Lord Commissioner was as spitefully intent as ever on finding opportunities or excuses for annoying and humiliating him.
Documents for the reconstruction of the whole case are not available. All that can be ascertained is that, in carrying out the precautionary measures which his additional powers justified and which the emergency required, he had requisitioned the assistance of some of Queensberry’s tenants. This had been construed into an offence, and made the subject of a report to the commander-in-chief who had no course open to him but that of intimating the Duke’s displeasure to his subordinate. The reply, addressed to Queensberry himself was respectful but dignified. ‘I am sorry,’ he wrote, ‘that anything I have done should have given your Grace occasion to be dissatisfied with me, and to make complaints against me to the Earl of Dumbarton. I am convinced your Grace is ill informed; for after you have read what I wrote to you two days ago on that subject, I daresay I may refer myself to your own censure. That I had no design to make great search there anybody may judge. I came not from Ayr till after eleven in the forenoon, and went to Balagen, with forty heritors against night. The Sanquar is just in the road; and I used these men I met accidentally on the road better than ever I used any in these circumstances. And I may safely say, that, as I shall answer to God, if they had been living on my ground, I could not have forborne drawing my sword and knocking them down. However, I am glad I have received my Lord Dumbarton’s orders anent your Grace’s tenants, which I shall most punctually obey; though, I may say, they were safe as any in Scotland before.’
With this explanation, the matter appears to have been dismissed from Claverhouse’s mind; and the remainder of his letter is taken up with remarks concerning certain dispositions intended by the other commanders who, like himself, were watching the progress of the threatened invasion. His outspoken, but well-grounded criticism of them showed that the rebuke administered to him had not reduced him to a condition of cringing subserviency, and that the obedience which he was prepared to yield to those in authority above him did not include a readiness to bear responsibility for the result of measures which seemed to him ill-advised.
The extant correspondence between Claverhouse and Queensberry closes with a letter bearing date of the 3rd of July 1685. It is a report as to the manner in which an order from the Secret Committee with regard to the disposal of the moveables of rebels for the maintenance of the royal forces had been carried out. It is a straightforward and business-like statement, setting forth how the money already received had been laid out, and requesting instructions with respect to the sums still due.
Apart from the desire which every honourable man would feel, and with which Claverhouse may be credited, of placing himself above suspicion in all that concerned the management of the funds that came into his hands, he had special reason for exercising exceptional care in the matter in view of the humiliating treatment to which he had been subjected shortly before. In the preceding month of March, Queensberry, as High Treasurer had given orders to the cash-keeper to charge Claverhouse on a bond he had given to the Exchequer, for the fines of delinquents in Galloway. Claverhouse had replied that his brother, the Sheriff-depute, was gathering them in, and craved for delay, whereupon he was allowed five or six days’ grace. He objected that considering the distance, such a concession was as unreasonable as giving no time at all. To this the Treasurer had retorted, ‘Then you shall have none.’
Claverhouse had paid the money; but he was not content to remain under the imputation which Queensberry’s action towards him implied. He had repeatedly applied for leave to proceed to London, for the purpose of explaining his conduct to the King, both in this transaction and in other matters which had been made the grounds of complaints against him, and which had led to his temporary disgrace. He had been persistently refused, and it was not till the end of the year that he had an opportunity of pleading his cause before James. Then, however, he did it to good purpose. According to Fountainhall, ‘the King was so ill-satisfied with what the Treasurer had exacted of Claverhouse, that he ordered the Treasurer to repay it.’
On the 24th of December 1685, Claverhouse returned to Edinburgh in company with the Earl of Perth. The Chancellor had recently abjured Protestantism, and stood in high favour with the King. But if, as Halifax sarcastically remarked, his faith saved him at Court, it made him impossible in Scotland. Within a few weeks of his arrival, on Sunday, the 31st of January, there was a popular demonstration against the avowed and public meetings for the celebration of Mass and other acts of ‘Papish worship.’ The disorderly crowd, in which the apprentices of Edinburgh figured conspicuously, fell upon one of the priests, and compelled him, under threats of death, to renounce popery, and, on bended knees, to take the test oath. Others, as they came from church, were roughly treated and had mud thrown at them.