Edinburgh, at the period in question, and for many years afterwards, was confined within narrow limits. It had never been properly fortified; and its castle, which majestically overtops the city, and forms the western boundary of that division now called the “Old town,” could afford it little security. On the south and on the east, the ancient city was bounded by a wall varying from ten to twenty feet high. On the north side, a lake, easily fordable, called the North Loch, now drained and converted into beautiful gardens, was its only defence. In several places the old wall had been built upon, so that dwelling houses formed part of the wall, but these erections were overlooked by rows of higher houses without the city. There were no cannon mounted upon the wall, but in some places it was strengthened by bastions and embrasures. The standing force of the city consisted of two bodies, called the Town Guard and the Trained Bands, neither of which now exist. The first, which, at the time we are now treating of, amounted to 126 men, acted in lieu of a police; and though pretty well versed in the manual and platoon exercise, were, from their being generally old men, unfit for military duty. The Trained Bands, or Burgher Guard, which was composed of citizens, and in former times amounted to a considerable number of men, did not at the period in question exceed 1,000. Anciently, the tallest men were armed with pikes, and those of a lower stature with firelocks, and both were provided with defensive armour. The captain of each company, eight in number, instructed his men one day in every week in the exercise of arms;[874] but the pikes and armour were afterwards laid aside, and since the Revolution the Trained Bands had appeared in arms only once in the year, to celebrate the king’s birth-day, on which occasion they were furnished with arms for the service of the day from a magazine belonging to the city.

As it was obvious that, under these circumstances, no effectual resistance could be made to the entrance of an army into the city, the provost and magistrates held a meeting on the 27th of August, at which some of the principal citizens attended, to devise means of defence. At this meeting it was resolved to repair the walls and to raise a regiment of 1,000 men, to be paid by a voluntary contribution of the inhabitants. A standing committee was, at the same time, appointed to carry this resolution into effect, and to advise with the Lord-Justice-Clerk and other judges then in town, and the crown lawyers, as to such other steps as might be considered necessary in the present crisis. To obtain the requisite permission to embody the proposed regiment, an application was sent to London by the Lord Advocate; and leave to that effect was granted on the 4th of September.[875]

Up to the 31st of August, no certain intelligence had been received at Edinburgh of the movements of the Highlanders; but in the evening of that day the inhabitants were thrown into a state of great alarm by receiving intelligence of the march of the Highland army into Athole, and of the ominous departure of Cope for Inverness. Instantly the drum beat to arms, and the town-council having met, they ordained that the keys of the city should be lodged with the captain of the city guard, and ordered sentries to be placed at each of the gates, and the city guard to be augmented. As an additional security, Hamilton’s dragoons, then quartered in the vicinity of the city, were kept under arms that night. The repairs of the city walls were commenced; orders were issued to place cannon on them, and to throw up a ditch on the north side of the castle, and arms were sent from the city magazine to Leith to arm its inhabitants. These preparations, and the hurry and bustle with which it may be supposed they were attended, may appear ludicrous when contrasted with the result; but the public functionaries were bound to put the city in as defensible a state as their means would admit of, and without the least possible delay.

It would have been perhaps fortunate for the honour of the city, if on the present occasion the civic authorities had been allowed, in conjunction with the committee which had been named, to follow out such measures as they might have deemed necessary for defending the city; but, unluckily, there existed a party consisting of ex-magistrates and councillors, who, by the course they adopted, brought dissension among the citizens. This party, at the head of which was ex-provost Drummond, “a zealous loyalist, and one of the most valuable municipal chiefs whom Edinburgh has possessed,”[876] had been succeeded in the town-council by Stewart, the then provost, and his friends, who, for five years, had kept possession of the municipal government, to the entire exclusion of Drummond and his party. Desirous of regaining their lost power, they availed themselves of the present opportunity, the elections being at hand, to instil distrust of the existing magistracy into the minds of the electors, by representing the members of the town-council as Jacobitically inclined, and as indifferent to the preservation of the city from the rebels. And indeed it appears that Stewart showed himself incapable of performing effectually the responsible duties of his office at this important juncture.[877] The opposition party, partly, no doubt, to ingratiate themselves still farther with the electors, the majority of whom were whigs, and warmly attached to the government, really showed greater zeal in organising measures for the defence of the city. They presented, on the 6th of September, a petition to the provost, signed by about 100 citizens, praying that they, the subscribers, might be authorised to form themselves into an association for the defence of the city,—that they might be allowed to name their own officers,—and that an application should be made by the provost to General Guest, for a supply of arms from the castle for their use.[878]

This petition was laid before an extraordinary meeting of the council next day, and the law officers of the crown having given their opinion that the council could legally authorise an arming of the inhabitants for the contemplated purpose, they acceded to its prayer, with the exception of that part which craved that the volunteers should have the nomination of their own officers, a privilege which the provost reserved to himself, in virtue of his office of chief magistrate. To ascertain the names of the citizens who were willing to serve as volunteers, a paper was lodged, on the 9th of September, in the Old-church aisle, and all loyal persons were invited by handbills to subscribe: 418 persons joined this association, and were supplied with arms from the castle. Simultaneously with the formation of the association, the magistrates exerted themselves to raise the regiment they had petitioned for, the warrant for which was received by the provost on the 8th of September; but their efforts were ineffectual, not being able, after a week’s recruiting, to raise 200 men. This paltry force, however, was named the Edinburgh regiment, to distinguish it from the volunteer association.

Hitherto the repairs of the city walls had been steadily progressing, and, to the great scandal of the more religious part of the inhabitants, no cessation took place even upon the Sunday; but although the persons employed upon the walls might plead necessity in justification of their work on the day of rest, they seem to have overlooked that necessity on the 10th of September, the day when the city elections commenced. So great was the anxiety of all classes to ascertain the names of the craftsmen sent up by the different incorporations to the council to represent them, that a total suspension of every business took place, and the magistrates, who felt little difficulty in procuring men to work upon the Sunday, now saw the works almost entirely deserted by the artificers employed upon them.

A few days after receipt of the intelligence of the march of the Highlanders into the low country, Captain Rogers, an aide-de-camp of Sir John Cope, arrived at Edinburgh from Inverness, with instructions to General Guest to send down a number of transports to Aberdeen to carry his men to the southern shores of the Frith of Forth. These vessels sailed from Leith roads on the 10th, under convoy of a ship of war, and their return was expected with the greatest anxiety by the inhabitants of Edinburgh, who were continually looking up to the weather-cocks to ascertain the direction of the wind.

The volunteers being officered and organised, were regularly drilled twice every day. Cannon were brought up from Leith and mounted on the walls, and the defensive works were proceeded with under the superintendence of Maclaurin, the celebrated mathematician, who had furnished the designs.

FOOTNOTES:

[843] Cope’s Trial, p 105. Home, p. 51.