“Our ears are scarcely more shocked with the profane execration of the persecutors[25] than with the strange and insolent familiarity used towards the Deity by the persecuted fanatics. Their indecent modes of prayer, their extravagant expectations of miraculous assistance, and their supposed inspirations, might easily furnish out a tale, at which the good would sigh and the gay would laugh.[26]
“The militia and standing army soon became unequal to the task of enforcing conformity and suppressing Conventicles. In their aid, and to force compliance with a test proposed by government, the Highland clans were raised, and poured down into Ayrshire; and armed hosts of undisciplined mountaineers, speaking a different language, and professing, many of them, another religion, were let loose to ravage and plunder this unfortunate country; and it is truly astonishing to find how few acts of cruelty they perpetrated, and how seldom they added murder to pillage. Additional levies of horse were also raised, under the name of independent troops, and great part of them placed under the command of James Grahame of Claverhouse, a man well known to fame by his subsequent title of Viscount of Dundee, but better remembered in the western shires under the designation of the bloody Clavers.
“In truth, he appears to have combined the virtues and vices of a savage chief. Fierce, unbending, and rigorous, no emotion of compassion prevented his commanding and witnessing every detail of military execution against the Nonconformists. Undoubtedly brave, and steadily faithful to his prince, he sacrificed himself in the cause of James when he was deserted by all the world. The Whigs whom he persecuted, daunted by his ferocity and courage, conceived him to be impassive to their bullets, and that he had sold himself, for temporal greatness, to the seducer of mankind. It is still believed, that a cup of wine, presented to him by his butler, changed into clotted blood; and that, when he plunged his feet into cold water, their touch caused it to boil. The steed which bore him was supposed to be the gift of Satan; and precipices are shown where a fox could hardly keep his feet, down which the infernal charger conveyed him safely in pursuit of the wanderers. It is remembered with terror that Claverhouse was successful in every engagement with the Whigs, except that at Drumclog, or Loudon Hill. The history of Burly will bring us immediately to the causes and circumstances of that event.
“John Balfour of Kinloch, commonly called Burly, was one of the fiercest of the proscribed sect. A gentleman by birth, he was, says his biographer, ‘zealous and honest-hearted, courageous in every enterprise, and a brave soldier—seldom any escaping that came into his hands.’
“Crichton says that he was once chamberlain to Archbishop Sharpe, and, by negligence or dishonesty, had incurred a large arrear, which occasioned his being active in his master’s assassination. But of this I know no other evidence than Crichton’s assertion and a hint in Wodrow. Burly, for that is his common designation, was brother-in-law to Hackston of Rathillet, a wild, enthusiastic character, who joined daring courage and skill in the sword to the fiery zeal of his sect. Burly himself was less eminent for religious fervour than for the active and violent share which he had in the most desperate enterprises of his party. His name does not appear among the Covenanters who were denounced for the affair at Pentland. But, in 1677, Robert Hamilton, afterwards commander of the insurgents at Loudon Hill and Bothwell Bridge, with several other Nonconformists, were assembled at this Burly’s house, in Fife. There they were attacked by a party of soldiers, commanded by Captain Carstairs, whom they beat off, and wounded desperately one of his party. For this resistance to authority they were declared rebels.
“The next exploit in which Burly was engaged was of a bloodier complexion and more dreadful celebrity. It was well known that James Sharpe, Archbishop of St. Andrew’s, was regarded by the rigid Presbyterians not only as a renegade, who had turned back from the spiritual plough, but as the principal author of the rigours exercised against their sect. He employed, as an agent of his oppression, one Carmichael, a decayed gentleman. The industry of this man in procuring information, and in enforcing the severe penalties against Conventiclers, having excited the resentment of the Cameronians, nine of their number, of whom Burly and his brother-in-law, Hackston, were the leaders, assembled, with the purpose of waylaying and murdering Carmichael; but, while they searched for him in vain, they received tidings that the Archbishop himself was at hand. The party resorted to prayer, after which they agreed, unanimously, that the Lord had delivered the wicked Haman into their hands. In the execution of the supposed will of heaven, they agreed to put themselves under the command of a leader, and they requested Hackston of Rathillet to accept the office; which he declined, alleging, that, should he comply with their request, the slaughter might be imputed to a private quarrel which existed betwixt him and the Archbishop. The command was then offered to Burly, who accepted it without scruple; and they galloped off in pursuit of the Archbishop’s carriage, which contained himself and his daughter. Being well mounted, they easily overtook and disarmed the prelate’s attendants. Burly, crying out, ‘Judas, be taken!’ rode up to the carriage, wounded the postilion, and hamstrung one of the horses. He then fired into the coach a piece, charged with several bullets, so near, that the Archbishop’s gown was set on fire. The rest, coming up, dismounted, and dragged him out of the carriage, when, frightened and wounded, he crawled towards Hackston, who still remained on horseback, and begged for mercy. The stern enthusiast contented himself with answering, that he would not himself lay a hand on him. Burly and his men again fired a volley upon the kneeling old man, and were in the act of riding off, when one, who remained to fasten the girth of his horse, unfortunately heard the daughter of their victim call to the servant for help, exclaiming that his master was still alive. Burly then again dismounted, struck off the prelate’s hat with his foot, and cleft his skull with his shable, (broadsword,) although one of the party (probably Rathillet,) exclaimed, ‘Spare these grey hairs!’ The rest pierced him with repeated wounds. They plundered the carriage, and rode off, leaving, beside the mangled corpse, the daughter, who was herself wounded in her pious endeavour to interpose betwixt her father and his murderers. The murder is accurately represented in bas-relief, upon a beautiful monument, erected to the memory of Archbishop Sharpe, in the metropolitan church of St. Andrew’s. This memorable example of fanatic revenge was acted upon Magus Muir, near St. Andrew’s, 3rd May, 1679.
“Burly was of course obliged to leave Fife; and, upon the 25th of the same month, he arrived in Evandale, in Lanarkshire, along with Hackston, and a fellow called Dingwall, or Daniel, one of the same bloody band. Here he joined his old friend Hamilton, already mentioned; and, as they resolved to take up arms, they were soon at the head of such a body of the ‘chased-and-tossed western men’ as they thought equal to keep the field. They resolved to commence their exploits upon 29th May, 1674, being the anniversary of the Restoration, appointed to be kept a holiday by Act of Parliament—an institution which they esteemed a presumptuous and unholy solemnity. Accordingly, at the head of eighty horse, tolerably appointed, Hamilton, Burly, and Hackston entered the royal burgh of Rutherglen, extinguished the bonfires made in honour of the day, burned at the cross the Acts of Parliament in favour of prelacy and suppression of Conventicles, as well as those acts of council which regulated the Indulgence granted to Presbyterians. Against all these acts they entered their solemn protest, or testimony, as they called it; and, having affixed it to the cross, concluded with prayer and psalms. Being now joined by a large body of foot, so that their strength seems to have amounted to five or six hundred men, though very indifferently armed, they encamped upon Loudon Hill. Claverhouse, who was in the garrison of Glasgow, instantly marched against the insurgents, at the head of his own troop of cavalry and others, amounting to about one hundred and fifty men. He arrived at Hamilton, on the 1st of June, so unexpectedly, as to make prisoner John King, a famous preacher among the wanderers, and rapidly continued his march, carrying his captive along with him, till he came to the village of Drumclog, about a mile east of Loudon Hill, and twelve miles south-west of Hamilton. At the same distance from this place, the insurgents were skilfully posted in a boggy strait, almost inaccessible to cavalry, having a broad ditch in their front. Claverhouse’s dragoons discharged their carbines, and made an attempt to charge. Burly, who commanded the handful of horse belonging to the Whigs, instantly led them down on the disordered squadrons of Claverhouse, who were, at the same time, vigorously assaulted by the foot, headed by the gallant Cleland and the enthusiastic Hackston. Claverhouse himself was forced to fly, and was in the utmost danger of being taken, his horse’s belly being cut open by the stroke of a scythe, so that the poor animal trailed his bowels for more than a mile. In this flight he passed King, the minister, lately his prisoner, but now deserted by his guard in the general confusion. The preacher hallooed to the flying commander ‘to halt and take his prisoner with him;’ or, as others say, ‘to stay and take the afternoon’s preaching.’ Claverhouse, at length remounted, continued his retreat to Glasgow. He lost in the skirmish about twenty of his troopers, and his own cornet and kinsman, Robert Grahame. Only four of the other side were killed, among whom was Dingwall, or Daniel, an associate of Burly in Sharpe’s murder. ‘The rebels,’ says Crichton, ‘finding the cornet’s body, and supposing it to be that of Clavers, because the name of Grahame was wrought in the shirt-neck, treated it with the utmost inhumanity—cutting off his nose, picking out his eyes, and stabbing it through in a hundred places.’ The same charge is brought by Guild, in his Bellum Bothwellianum, in which occurs the following account of the skirmish at Drumclog:—
“‘Although Burly was among the most active leaders in the action, he was not the commander-in-chief. That honour belonged to Robert Hamilton, brother of Sir William Hamilton of Preston, a gentleman who, like most of those at Drumclog, had imbibed the very wildest principles of fanaticism. The Cameronian account of the insurrection states, that “Mr. Hamilton discovered a great deal of bravery and valour, both in the conflict with, and pursuit of, the enemy; but when he and some others were pursuing the enemy, others flew too greedily upon the spoil, small as it was, instead of pursuing the victory; and some, without Mr. Hamilton’s knowledge, and against his strict command, gave five of these bloody enemies quarter, and let them go. This greatly grieved Mr. Hamilton, when he saw some of Babel’s brats spared, after the Lord had delivered them into their hands, that they might dash them against the stones (Psalm cxxxvii. 9). In his own account of this, he reckons the sparing of these enemies, and letting them go, to be among their first steppings aside, for which he feared that the Lord would not honour them to do much more for them, and says that he was neither for taking favours from, nor giving favours to, the Lord’s enemies.” Burly was not a likely man to fall into this sort of backsliding. He disarmed one of the Duke of Hamilton’s servants in the action, and desired him to tell his master he would keep, till meeting, the pistols he had taken from him. The man described Burly to the Duke as a little stout man, squint-eyed, and of a most ferocious aspect; from which it appears that Burly’s figure corresponded to his manners, and perhaps gave rise to his nickname, Burly signifying strong. He was with the insurgents till the battle of Bothwell Bridge, and afterwards fled to Holland. He joined the Prince of Orange, but died at sea during the passage. The Cameronians still believe he had obtained liberty from the Prince to be avenged of those who had persecuted the Lord’s people; but, through his death, the laudable design of purging the land with their blood is supposed to have fallen to the ground.’
“It has often been remarked, that the Scottish, notwithstanding their national courage, were always unsuccessful when fighting for their religion. The cause lay not in the principle, but in the mode of its application. A leader, like Mahomet, who is, at the same time, the prophet of his tribe, may avail himself of religious enthusiasm, because it comes to the aid of discipline, and is a powerful means of attaining the despotic command essential to the success of a general. But among the insurgents in the reign of the last Stuarts, were mingled preachers, who taught different shades of the Presbyterian doctrine; and, minute as these shades sometimes were, neither the several shepherds nor their flocks could unite in a common cause. This will appear from the transactions leading to the battle of Bothwell Bridge.
“We have seen that the party which defeated Claverhouse at Loudon Hill were Cameronians, whose principles consisted in disowning all temporal authority which did not flow from and through the Solemn League and Covenant. This doctrine, which is still retained by a scattered remnant of the sect in Scotland, is in theory, and would be in practice, inconsistent with the safety of any well-regulated government, because the Covenanters deny to their governors that toleration which was iniquitously refused to themselves.