[231] Spalding, vol. i. p. 50, et seq. Gordon’s Continuation, p. 476, et seq.
[CHAPTER XII.]
A.D. 1636—(September) 1644.
BRITISH SOVEREIGN:—Charles I., 1625–1649.
Charles I. attempts to introduce Episcopacy into Scotland—Meets with opposition—Preparations for war—Doings in the North—Earl of Montrose—Montrose at Aberdeen—Arrests the Marquis of Huntly—Covenanters of the North meet at Turriff—The “Trott of Turray”—Movements of the Gordons—Viscount Aboyne lands at Aberdeen—“Raid of Stonehaven”—Battle at the Bridge of Dee—Pacification of Berwick—War again—Earl of Argyle endeavours to secure the West Highlands—Harsh proceedings against the Earl of Airly—Montrose goes over to the king—Marquis of Huntly rises in the North—Montrose enters Scotland in disguise—Landing of Irish forces in the West Highlands—Meeting of Montrose and Alexander Macdonald—Athole-men join Montrose—Montrose advances into Strathearn—Battle of Tippermuir.
Hitherto the history of the Highlands has been confined chiefly to the feuds and conflicts of the clans, the details of which, though interesting to their descendants, cannot be supposed to afford the same gratification to readers at large. We now enter upon a more important era, when the Highlanders begin to play a much more prominent part in the theatre of our national history, and to give a foretaste of that military prowess for which they afterwards became so highly distinguished.
In entering upon the details of the military achievements of the Highlanders during the period of the civil wars, it is quite unnecessary and foreign to our purpose to trouble the reader with a history of the rash, unconstitutional, and ill-fated attempt of Charles I. to introduce Episcopacy into Scotland; nor, for the same reason, is it requisite to detail minutely the proceedings of the authors of the Covenant. Suffice it to say, that in consequence of the inflexible determination of Charles to force English Episcopacy upon the people of Scotland, the great majority of the nation declared their determination “by the great name of the Lord their God,” to defend their religion against what they considered to be errors and corruptions. Notwithstanding, however, the most positive demonstrations on the part of the people to resist, Charles, acting by the advice of a privy council of Scotsmen established in England, exclusively devoted to the affairs of Scotland, and instigated by Archbishop Laud, resolved to suppress the Covenant by open force. In order to gain time for the necessary preparations, he sent the Marquis of Hamilton, as his commissioner, to Scotland, who was instructed to promise “that the practice of the liturgy and the canons should never be pressed in any other than a fair and legal way, and that the high commission should be so rectified as never to impugn the laws, or to be a just grievance to loyal subjects,” and that the king would pardon those who had lately taken an illegal covenant, on their immediately renouncing it, and giving up the bond to the commissioners.
When the Covenanters heard of Hamilton’s approach, they appointed a national fast to be held, to beg the blessing of God upon the kirk, and on the 10th of June, 1638, the marquis was received at Leith, and proceeded to the capital through an assemblage of about 60,000 Covenanters, and 500 ministers. The spirit and temper of such a vast assemblage overawed the marquis, and he therefore concealed his instructions. After making two successive journeys to London to communicate the alarming state of affairs, and to receive fresh instructions, he, on his second return, issued a proclamation, discharging “the service book, the book of canons, and the high commission court, dispensing with the five articles of Perth, dispensing the entrants into the ministry from taking the oath of supremacy and of canonical obedience, commanding all persons to lay aside the new Covenant, and take that which had been published by the king’s father in 1589, and summoning a free assembly of the kirk to meet in the month of November, and a parliament in the month of May, the following year.” Matters had, however, proceeded too far for submission to the conditions of the proclamation, and the covenanting leaders answered it by a formal protest, in which they gave sixteen reasons, showing that to comply with the demands of the king would be to betray the cause of God, and to act against the dictates of conscience.
In consequence of the opposition made to the proclamation, it was generally expected that the king would have recalled the order for the meeting of the assembly at Glasgow; but no prohibition having been issued, that assembly, which consisted, besides the clergy, of one lay-elder and four lay-assessors from every presbytery, met at the time appointed, viz., in the month of November, 1638. After the assembly had spent a week in violent debates, the commissioner, in terms of his instructions, declared it dissolved; but, encouraged by the accession of the Earl of Argyle, who placed himself at the head of the Covenanters, the members declined to disperse at the mere mandate of the sovereign, and passed a resolution that, in spiritual matters, the kirk was independent of the civil power, and that the dissolution by the commissioner was illegal and void. After spending three weeks in revising the ecclesiastical regulations introduced into Scotland since the accession of James to the crown of England, the assembly condemned the liturgy, ordinal, book of canons, and court of high commission, and, assuming all the powers of legislation, abolished episcopacy, and excommunicated the bishops themselves, and the ministers who supported them. Charles declared their proceedings null; but the people received them with great joy, and testified their approbation by a national thanksgiving.