[IV.]
ORGANIZATION OF SCOTTISH LEVIES FOR SWEDEN, AND THEIR FORCED DISBANDMENT.
Having dealt with that part of the general plan of bringing foreign troops to the aid of Sweden which was so successfully carried out by Mönnichhofen, we approach the main subject of this little work—namely, the history of the Scottish levies, and of the disaster that befell the very small portion of them that succeeded in leaving Scotland and landing in Norway.
Our starting-point in this part of the inquiry must be the commission addressed by Gustavus Adolphus to Sir James Spens, Laird of Wormiston.[29]
It gives an authentic indication of the measures subsequently adopted for obtaining levies in Scotland as well as in Holland. The young warrior and statesman refers to promises made by Sir James Spens to Charles IX., and to the services which his father had required of him, urging him to hasten his return (evidently from Scotland) with the "promised three thousand soldiers of proved faithfulness and bravery." He wished them to be infantry, not cavalry. The main object was the arrival of Sir James Spens at Elfsborg, by the 1st of April 1612, "with the before-mentioned number of troops, properly equipped with the needful accoutrements." Spens was to be paid at Hamburg the sum of 20,000 imperials, and was assured that any further expense he might incur in the matter of the levies would be repaid to him punctually and with the greatest cheerfulness. Gustavus Adolphus added: "Furthermore, we have thought (right) that it should be notified to you that we have arranged with our general (duce), our truly-beloved Johannes Mœnichovius, that he is to transport his thousand infantry, fully furnished with necessary arms, from Holland to Elfsborg, in the beginning of spring. If, therefore, you combine your fleet and army with the ships of the aforesaid Mœnichovius, we shall be extremely glad."
The execution of this part of the plan was subsequently rendered impossible by the fall of Elfsborg and the command which the Danes obtained of the approaches to Sweden by sea.
The proceedings of Spens in this matter are not disclosed in the documents so far discovered,[30] which prove that Colonel Andrew Ramsay was the active organizer of the levies in Scotland. King James I. in one of his letters calls him "the chief of the business, whose brother all men know what place he hath with us." The influence Andrew Ramsay possessed at the Court of King James probably caused him to be engaged by Spens. One of his brothers was Sir John Ramsey, a favourite of King James, and who, while one of the royal pages, in the year 1600, was instrumental in rescuing the king from assassination at Gowrie House, near Perth. It was another brother of his—Alexander Ramsay—who was the leader of the small detachment of Scots destroyed at Kringelen, in Norway, and not George Sinclair, as hitherto assumed.
That the king's name was privately but unjustifiably used in the proceedings of Colonel Andrew Ramsay, was subsequently acknowledged by the latter, and hence the suspicion arose in Denmark that King James was cognizant of those proceedings. But the documents preserved in Edinburgh show that King James did not become aware of what Andrew Ramsay and the officers with him were doing in Scotland until about the 31st July 1612, the date on which the king wrote to his Scottish Privy Council as follows:—
"Whereas it is said there is a colonel and certain captains levying men to go to Sweden, we wonder that any subject of ours dare presume in that kind to serve any foreign prince, not only without our licence but directly against our meaning and special promise made to our dear brother the King of Denmark[31].... It is therefore our pleasure that ye certify as to what that levying of soldiers meaneth; by what authority it is done; and that ye make stay of all proceedings therein till ye shall be advertised of our further pleasure concerning that matter."
Nine days later, the king wrote to his envoy at Copenhagen[32] that he had heard, "by mere accident, of levies in Scotland ready to embark under Ramsay, Steward, and some other captains;" and "being displeased, gave order presently for the stay of the levy. And whereas good numbers of them were already embarked before His Majesty heard the news, or ready to embark, His Highness hath given order to discharge them, and doth utterly disavow any acts of theirs," etc.