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The wars of succession and
independence — attitude of the Cumyns and the earl of Mar — Robert Bruce and
the Mar earldom — Macduff and the regents — Aberdeen and the French
alliance—Buchan's border raids—Edward I. in Aberdeenshire—Wallace
popular support of the national cause —Edward's second visit — coronation of
Bruce—his wanderings : in Aberdeen : illness—battle of Barra and devastation
of Buchan — disappearance of the Cumyns — the part taken by
Aberdeen—"bon-accord"—second partition of the counties —king Robert's
charter to Aberdeen : municipal government— civil war — Aberdeen sacked and
burned — battle of Culblean—Beaumont and Mowbray—the parliament of Aberdeen—
progress of the burgh—the wolf of Badenoch—lady Lindsay's defence of Fyvie —
Caterans — close of the fourteenth century.
We now approach a time when
Aberdeenshire men were foremost actors in more than one of the great crises
of Scottish history, and when scenes that were to be turning-points in that
history took place within the borders of the county. With the death of
Alexander III. the bright and prosperous epoch of the national life came to
an abrupt termination. First there was a brief pause; then came the
beginning of the contentions, tumults, and wars, and for centuries
Scotland's energies were to be wasted, its people impoverished, its
civilisation stunted, and its blood poured forth. In the regency that was
appointed on the death of Alexander the three northern " Guardians" were
Alexander, Earl of Buchan ; Duncan, Earl of Fife; and William Fraser, Bishop
of St Andrews, all connected with the north-east; while of the southern
three one was John Cumyn of Badenoch. An early act of the regents was to
appoint a commission to meet at Scone and to hear and terminate a dispute
between Aberdeen and Montrose concerning the fairs of the two towns. From a
petition by the aldermen (propositi) and burgesses of Banff it appears that
the Aberdeen fa^rs were attended every year by Montrose merchants, to the
prejudice and injury, as was alleged, of Aberdeen and the whole northern
province. The question at issue appears to have turned upon the construction
of King William's grant of a Free Hanse to Aberdeen and his trans - Grampian
burgesses ; but the troubles that came upon the country must have diminished
the importance of the fair, and the question of privilege ceased to be
agitated.
Of the northern regents, the
Earl of Fife was assassinated, and the aged Earl of Buchan did not long
survive. The son and successor of Buchan, Earl John, attended the Parliament
of Brigham in 1290, and was a party to the treaty or contract for the
marriage of the Maid of Norway, now Queen of Scotland, to the heir to the
English throne. The death of the queen on her voyage from Norway was a new
calamity for Scotland, followed as it was by the appearance of the ten
claimants for the crown and their unanimous acknowledgment of Edward's claim
of overlordship. Most of them were already his vassals in respect of estates
in the north of England, but their resolution was confirmed by the general
body of the nobility and higher clergy, who at the Norham conference agreed
to the formal surrender into Edward's hands of the kingdom and its
fortresses pending his decision on the question of who should be king. The
Castle of Aberdeen, with that of Kincardine, was accordingly committed to
the charge of John de Guildford, and held by him during the seventeen months
that elapsed before Baliol was declared to be rightful King of Scots. The
claims of John Cumyn of Badenoch, founded on descent from King Donald Ban,
having been set aside in favour of those of the descendants of Malcolm
Canmore, Cumyn exerted his influence on the side of Baliol, to whose sister
he was married. John, Earl of Buchan, who had fallen heir not only to the
national offices but also to much of the influence of his father and
grandfather in the country between the Dee and the Spey, identified himself
on the whole with Edward's policy, though he took up arms against it during
the brief interlude of Baliol's French alliance. Bishop Henry Cheyne, or le
Chen, another eminent member of the Cumyn family connection, likewise
supported the Baliol and English interests.
The Earls of Mar were now of
the party opposed to the Cumyns. Earl Donald, son of Earl William who had
acted with them in 1255-1257, was with King Edward at Perth and at Berwick,
and appealed to him from a decision of the regents on the old subject of the
territorial possessions of the earldom. Alan Durward was now dead, and
through his daughter the Earl of Fife, her husband, had obtained a portion
of the Aberdeenshire lands that had belonged to the Earls of Mar. Earl
Donald went back to the old question of more than a century before, and
complained that when William the Lion restored the earldom to Morgund, the
son of Gyloclery, there were withheld " more than three hundred pounds of
land," partly in demesne and partly in tenandry, and he asked, through Sir
Robert de Brus, Lord of Annandale, that justice should be done him. One of
Edward's first acts after the crown had been awarded to Baliol, now known as
King John, was in the character of overlord to address a letter to him
requiring that Earl Donald should have leave to collect the arrears due from
the bailiary of Aboyne and Glenmuick. Light is thrown on the intervention of
Bruce and the drift of West Aberdeenshire politics in this trying time by an
intimate connection that was springing up between the Bruces and the family
of Mar. Earl Donald's daughter became the wife of young Robert Bruce, whose
sister Christian married Gartney, Mars son and successor.
On the accession of Baliol
King Edward ordered his keeper of the castles of Aberdeen and Kincardine to
give seisin of them to the new King of Scots; but Edward was exacting in the
matter of the homage incidental to feftment, and the nobility and people of
Scotland were slow to render the required obeisance. Mar's appeal to Edward
was followed by one from Macduff, uncle of the assassinated regent,
respecting the guardianship of the earldom during the nonage of the heir,
the result of which was that the Scottish king was ordered to pay damages.
Edward now declared war against the King of France, who had refused to obey
a summons to appear as vassal before the English king. Baliol, as an English
landlord, attended an English Parliament on the subject of this war, and
consenced to yield up for it the revenues of his English estates for three
years. As Scottish king he was ordered by Edward to lay an embargo on all
Scottish ships and to furnish troops for an expedition into Gascony ; and
the presence and aid of the Cumyns, Bruce, the Earl of Mar, and other
Scottish magnates were demanded by special writs of summons. A Scottish
Parliament or Convention which met at Scone is of interest in relation to
this history as the first Parliament in which the burgh of Aberdeen is known
to have been represented; and one of its resolutions was that all Englishmen
holding office at the Scottish Court should be dismissed—a committee of four
bishops, four earls, and four barons being appointed to look after national
affairs, and to keep an eye on Baliol himself, whose Scottish patriotism was
compromised by his position as an English landlord. Thereupon followed the
offensive and defensive league with France (1295), to which the seals of
Aberdeen and five other Scottish burghs were affixed. The next step was a
futile expedition into Cumberland and an attack on Carlisle, led by the Earl
of Buchan, but participated in by most of the Scottish nobles, and it was
followed by a second raid into Northumberland with equally poor results. Not
only are the names of the Bruces absent from the list of those by whom
Buchan was accompanied, but Carlisle Castle was held for Edward by Robert
Bruce, son of the competitor and father of the king. Baliol, when he found
that Bruce would not take part with him against England, declared his
estates in Annandalc forfeited and conferred them on the Earl of Buchan.
Henceforth there was no goodwill between the Bruces and Cumyns, though a
dozen years were to elapse before their final conflict in Aberdeenshire.
These r;ads and the
independent spirit manifested in Scotland brought Edward north in the summer
of 1296 at the head of a large and well-disciplined army, and after his easy
victories at Berwick and Dunbar he had a triumphal march through the
country. At Montrose, where King John made his surrender, the Earls of
Buchan and Mar paid their homage to the English king; "Kincardine in the
Mearns," Glen-bervie, and Durris "among the mountains," were the next stages
of this royal progress; and Aberdeen, described by the chronicler of the
journey as "the city of Aberdeen, a fair castle and a good town Upon the
sea," was reached on the 14th of July. During his five days' stay in the
city Edward exacted the homage of the burghers and barons with abjuration of
the French alliance. He arrived on Saturday, and on Sunday he received the
homage of Sir Norman de Leslie, Sir Alexander de Lamberton, Sir Patrick de
Eggilvyne (or Ogilvie), Sir John de Garviagh, Sir William de Cluny, Sir
Thomas Durward, Gilbert de Mar, and William Cumyn, provost of the church of
St Andrews; on the two following days that of Sir Gilbert and Sir Hugh de la
Haye, Sir Duncan de Ferenderach, Sir Reginald le Chen, Sir Patrick de
Berkeley, Sir John de Mowat, Robert le Falconer, and Robert de Elmsley. On
the Tuesday also "the burgesses and community of Aberdeen" put their common
seal to the record of their allegiance. The bishop d d not present himself
till Thursday, on which day Walter Blackwatre, Dean of Aberdeen, and Sir
John Fleming also took the oath.
An incident of Edward's visit
was the capture by one of his knights of Sir Thomas de Norham and twelve
followers, possibly at Lumphanan. The Durward country was at this time in
possession of the widow of the murdered Earl of Fife, and by a deed of 1299
the countess conveyed to John de Hastings, Lord of Abergavenny, her lands of
Coull and Lumphanan, with other lands in Perthshire and in England, in
discharge of a debt which she was not able to meet because of the war in
Scotland and the violence of Sir Herbert de Norham, who had seized her goods
and chattels. From Aberdeen the English king proceeded to Kintore, and
thence by day's journeys to Fyvie, Banff, Cullen, the Enzie on the Spey
(where there were only tents for shelter), and Elgin, returning south by
Rothes, Cabrach, Kildrummy, Kincardine O'Neil, and the Cairn-a-Mounth. It is
probable that his cavalry scoured the country, and that supplies for his
army were brought in by foraging parties; and we find that compensation was
granted to the Earl of Buchan for ravages committed in his territories by
English foragers on their northward march.
The patriotic efforts of
Wallace were directed towards the north in 1297, when he made a successful
raid upon the English in Angus and Mearns, stormed Dunnottar Castle, and
surprised Edward's garrison in Aberdeen, though it succeeded in repelling
his attack upon the castle. He may have destroyed some shipping in the
harbour; but Henry the Minstrel must be exaggerating when he says that a
hundred ships were burnt, for so great a destruction could not have escaped
the attention of less imaginative chroniclers. The Earl of Buchan had lately
arrived in the north with a safe-conduct from Edward, and whether from
inability, with the resources at his disposal, to deal with the English
garrison in Aberdeen and the other opposition with which he was threatened,
01 from the urgency of affairs in the south, Wallace hastily withdrew from
this part of the country. We next find Buchan reporting to Edward the
outbreak of an insurrection against William Fitzwarine, the English
constable of the Castle of Urquhart, on Loch Ness, led by Andrew the son of
Sir Andrew de Moray, with other " enemies of the king's peace." Sir Andrew
was almost the only prominent man who thoroughly associated himself with the
efforts of Wallace. Letters from Edward enjoined Gartney, son of the Earl of
Mar, and Henry le Chen, Bishop of Aberdeen, his wardens of the sheriffdom,
to hasten to the relief of the castle and restore order. The insurrection
spread, and the Earl of Buchan took the field along with Gartney and the
bishop. They marched to Inverness, and, calling in the aid of the Countess
of Ross, put down the national resistance beyond the Spey, as they duly
reported to the English king in letters still extant.
Shortly after Wallace's
departure the proceedings of the commandant of Aberdeen Castle, Henry de
Lazom on Lathom, drew from the Earl de Warrenne, who was at the head of
Edward's affairs in Scotland, a complaint that he was consumed by
self-importance and not attending to his duties. From a letter from Edward
to Lazom we gather that armed bands were wandering about the country and
harassing the English, and orders, were given to repress this brigandage.
Apparently the citizens had received Wallace favourably, and while his
followers were not of sufficient note to engage the attention of the
chroniclers, there is probably truth in Blind Harry's assertion that the
common people rallied to his standard.
"Yett pur men com and prewyt
all their micht
To help Wallace in fens of Scotland's richt,"
says the Minstrel, and a
remark which he makes about Cumyn's hostility seems referable to the
assistance which. Wallace received from the north. Sir Adam Brown, the
knight of Madmar, was, however, a supporter of Wallace, and fell in the
battle of Falkirk.
Little is known of the
history of the counties during the period between Wallace's visit to
Aberdeen and the emergence of Bruce as head of the patriotic party. In his
last march through Scotland, in 1303, Edward reached Aberdeen on August 24,
and passed through the two counties on his way to Lochindorb, the Moray
stronghold of John Cumyn, now the principal warden of Scotland. At this time
the attitude of the people seems to have been that of sullen passiveness.
Kildrummy is again mentioned as one of the castles where Edward halted. It
was at this time closely connected with the family interest of Bruce, and
actually in his possession.
The cause of independence
must have seemed desperate indeed when, having dissolved, in 1304, the
commission of barons, with John Cumyn of Badenoch at its head, which had
still kept up the semblance of a separate government, Edward assumed direct
rule, assisted by a council of which the Bishop of Aberdeen, the Earl of
Buchan, and Sir Duncan de Ferenderach were members. Close upon this came the
betrayal and execution of Wallace, the flight of Bruce from the English
Court, his assassination of John Cumyn in the Greyfriars' Church at
Dumfries, his coronation at Scone, and the commencement of the long struggle
which was to end in his unchallenged possession of the Crown and the triumph
of Bannockburn. From the outset the two counties, with the exception of the
earldom of Buchan, had their sympathies actively enlisted in Brace's behalf,
and contributed not a little to the success of his efforts. After the
wanderings in Athole that followed his defeat at Methven, along with a few
of his followers he arrived in Aberdeen secretly, and in a state of
destitution. Here he was joined by the queen and her ladies, one of whom was
the Countess of Buchan, who, in spite of her husband's feud with Bruce, had
attended the coronation at Scone, and as representative of the Macduffs had,
according to ancient usage, placed the crown on his head. Bruce and his
party lived quietly in Aberdeen for some months, enjoying the hospitality,
it is believed, of one of the religious houses, perhaps the monastery of the
Trinity Friars on the bank-of the Dee. At last a change of scene became
necessary. The presence of the king began to be noised abroad, and an
English army was on its way to the north. His brother, Sir Nigel Bruce, was
to proceed to the Castle of Kildrummy with the ladies; but the approach of
the English, under the Earls of Gloucester and Hereford, compelled them to
seek an asylum farther north. The fiege of Kildrummy, its gallant defence by
Sir Nigel and the Earl of Athole, and its betrayal by an English sympathiser
named Osborn, are described in the vivid pages of Barbour, who states that
the garrison were hanged and drawn except Sir Nigel Bruce, who was taken at
the castle, and Athole, who was afterwards captured as he was attempting to
escape by sea. Sir Nigel Bruce was executed at Berwick and Athole in London,
where also Sir Herbert de Norham was put to death as a rebel against the
English king. The queen, with her party, was delivered over to the English
by William, Earl of Ross. She was treated with consideration and courtesy;
but the Countess of Buchan, by Edward's express orders, was confined for
four years in a cage of lattice-work attached to one of the towers of the
Castle of Berwick. Bruce's daughter Marjory was similarly imprisoned at
Roxburgh; the Countess of Mar is said to have been sent to a convent, and
her son, the young earl, was first sent to Bristol and other places, and
ultimately taken into the royal household to receive an English education
and imbibe English sentiments.
It was in the autumn of 1307
that Bruce, after his wanderings and adventures, recrossed the Mounth, where
he was joined by Sir Alexander Fraser and others of his northern friends. He
is,believed to have returned for a time to his old quarters in Aberdeen, and
those .cordial relations between him and the burghers were confirmed, of
which there were to be marked tokens on both sides in the "course of his
reign. The hardships of his lot during these anxious years had told upon his
health, and we next hear of him lying ill at Inverurie.
For safety he was carried to
Slevach or Sliach, an obscure place in the parish of Drumblade, where his
followers formed a camp and intrenched themselves. The Earl of Buchan, with
Sir John Mowbray, an English commander, and Sir David of Brechin, Bruce's
nephew, had been collecting an army at Slains to oppose him. The Cumyns
discovered the camp at Drumblade, and at Christmas-time for three days it
was harassed by their archers. Sir Edward Bruce, who commanded for his
brother, seeing that his men were badly provisioned, and being unwilling to
risk a battle until the king should be able to command in person, retired
with his force to Strathbogie, where Bruce had a powerful adherent in David,
Earl of Athole.
The king's convalescence was
now making progress, and after a time he moved down to Inverurie, where a
skirmish took place with a reconnoitring party under Sir David de Brechin
from the Cumyn camp, which had been established near the site of the modern
village of Old Meldrum. Bruce's outposts were driven in by Sir David de
Brechin, and the king at once determined to give battle to the Cumyn who in
Baliol's day had usurped the Annandale estates. The force under Buchan and
Mowbray, according to Barbour, was 1000 strong, while that of Bruce was only
about 700 — no very large array on either side. The conflict took place on
ground now forming part of the farm of North Mains of Barra. Bruce promptly
attacked, and Barbour tells us that the sight of the king, who was supposed
to be still on his sick-bed, made such an impression upon the enemy that
they wavered and broke. It is certain that they did not stand Bruce's
charge, and in spite of their superior numbers were speedily put to flight.
The battle in itself was on quite a minor scale, and Barbour gives no
warrant for the exaggerations of which it has been the subject; but its
consequences for Aberdeenshire were great, and it is historically important
as marking the turning point in the national cause.
Complete as the victory was,
it is not easy to understand why, in its consequences, it should have been
so overwhelming, except on the supposition that there had been a large
element in the Buchan population indifferently affected towards the Cumyn
interest, if not actually betraying it to its foes. Sir Edward Bruce
-pursued the vanquished band, which appears to have fled to Fyvie, where the
royal castle would afford a temporary refuge. With more deliberation the
king proceeded to wreak a terrible vengeance on the territory of the great
family which roused in him a spi-it of relentless fury. He put forth all his
energy to compass its destruction, and the means which he now adopted to
that end were long remembered as the " harrying of Buchan," a ruthless
exercise of fire and sword which even in an age of violence was regarded as
unprecedentedly savage. Barbour, who was a contemporary of Bruce's son, and
whose parish of Rayne is close by the scene of the battle, so that he must
have known many eyewitnesses of the scenes which he describes, tells how the
victor
"Gert his men burn all Buchan
Fra end till end, and sparit nane, And herryit thaim in sic maneir That
efter that weile fifty year Men menyt the herschip of Buchan."
Ruin and desolation
overspread the whole district. The house which had been supreme for more
than a century and a half, which in the persons of its successive heads and
chief collateral members had exercised a predominant sway iii national
affairs, and which for all but a hundred years had presided over the
destinies of the north-east, was irretrievably crushed in this single
conflict at Barra. The poets and historians of Scottish independence have
loaded the name of Cumyn with such obloquy as made it for ages a synonym for
falsehood and treason. But modern history can discover no just cause for
execrating the Cumyn Earls of Buchan beyond their too faithful adherence to
their alliance with Edward. We have a considerable number of their charters,
which are the record of numerous benefactions to the Church and the poor. It
was under their rule that the transition from the Celtic order in
population, customs, and language mainly took place. They were liberal and
considerate lords to their own people. They specially protected the native
race, their lordship over which was first established by peaceful means and
not by the sword; and Buchan at the time of the devastation was probably the
most Celtic part of Lowland Aberdeenshire.
With the downfall of the Earl
of Buchan the whole of the north-east of Scotland turned to Bruce's side.
The citizens of Aberdeen, who are believed to have contributed to the
victory of Barra, now rose against the English garrison and succeeded in
seizing the castle. Tradition says that the watchword- of the townsmen on
this occasion was "Bon-Accord," the motto subsequently adopted for the arms
of the city. Hector Boece states that Bruce's partisans stormed the castle,
which had been held for several years by the English ; that they put the
garrison to death, and that shortly after, in order to leave no place of
refuge for the English in Aberdeen, they removed the fittings and demolished
the castle itself. It is certain that on July 10, 1308, about seven weeks
after the battle of Barra, an order was signed by Edward II. directing
Captain William le Betour, as captain of the royal fleet from Hartlepool to
Aberdeen, to proceed with his ships to assist in raising the siege of the
castle. Kildrummy and the other fortresses in the counties were captured and
cleared of their English garrisons; but the Castle of Banff appears to have
remained in the hands of the English, for we find Edward issuing victualling
orders for its garrison in 1309. During the rest of King Robert's reign the
counties suffered little from the war, though they were constantly menaced
with a descent by sea.
With the establishment of
Bruce's power came the second great partition of Aberdeenshire and
Banffshire. The forfeiture of Buchan, Bruce's own domains of Kildrummy and
the Garioch, and the Crown lands still classed as thanages and disposable at
the will of the king, provided ample means of rewarding the followers who
had stood by him throughout his vicissitudes of fortune. New families appear
upon the scene — the Hays, who had been Bruce's fastest friends from the
time of his coronation; the Erasers, one of whom was his brother-in-law; and
the Gordons, who as Border lords were somewhat later in finally declaring
themselves. William of Irwyn, son of Irwyn of Bonshaw, a Dumfriesshire
neighbour of the Bruces, had cast in his lot with the king in the days of
struggle and strife, and received his reward in charters of 1323 and 1324 of
the whole of the royal forest of Drum beyond the Park, with the exception of
the lands granted by the king to Alexander Burnard. Burnard, the ancestor of
the old Aberdeenshire family of Burnett, baronets of Leys, with its numerous
branches, had by one of the missing charters of King Robert the western part
of the forest, with the lands of Leys and Crathes. The Irvines and Burnetts
have now for nearly six hundred years remained' in unbroken possession of
the adjacent Deeside estates conferred upon them by Robert Bruce for
services rendered to his cause. The new lords brought with them a new stream
of followers sufficient to obliterate what remained of the decaying Celtic
population in all the Lowland districts. The resettlement of Buchan was
wholly from non-Celtic sources, and Strathbogie, which had been mainly
Celtic under the native family, was soon to be flooded with vassals and
followers of the Gordons from their former seats on the English border.
The rise of the Keiths,
another family that played a great part for centuries in the affairs of
Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire, likewise dates from this period. Before 1318
Bruce conferred upon Gilbert de la Keith the office of Constable of
Scotland, which since the Cumyn forfeiture had been held for a time by the
versatile David de Strathbolgin; and in 1320 Parliament awarded to Sir
Robert Keith a large portion of the Cumyn heritage in Buchan, where he had
for neighbours in one direction the Hays, now lords of Slains, and in
another Sir John de Ross, who through' his wife, a Cumyn, had also become
possessed of part of the earldom lands. The Fraser interest became important
on Deeside about the same time, and included besides Durris and Strachan,
Aboyne, Glentanar, Tullich, Glenmuick, and Cluny. These possessions passed
with an heiress to the Keiths about the middle of the fourteenth century,
and by her daughter to the Gordons shortly after the close of that century.
The Cheyne lands of Inver-ugie were inherited by Mariot Cheyne, wife of John
de Keith, from her father, the third Sir Reginald Cheyne, who had been made
a prisoner at Halidon Hill, and was more a rudest barbarian of a rude age
than a polished Norman knight. The Forbeses were established on Donside in
the fourteenth century, but no remarkable events are associated with their
early career in these parts.
After Bannockburn and the
final establishment of King Robert's power the two counties had repose
during the remainder of his reign and recovered a portion of their former
prosperity. The king visited Aberdeen in September 1319, and three months
afterwards he rewarded its loyalty by a grant of the burgh itself to the
burgesses and community, with the forest of Stocket and all their revenues,
subject to a feu-duty of £213, 6s. 8d. Scots and reservation of his right of
hunting in the forest. The revenues handed over included the lands, mills,
fishings, and petty customs of the burgh. This charter of 1319 laid the
foundation of the city revenues known as the Common Good. Henceforth no
person, " of whatsoever condition or rank he be," was in any way to
interfere with or take cognisance of the admin:stration of their revenues by
the burgesses and community. Aberdeen was the first burgh to be placed on
such a favourable footing. Similar privileges were conferred on Edinburgh
ten years and on Dundee forty years later, but the other burghs remained
under the old system of being farmed out by tacks.1 Prior to this time,
nideed, the community had a definitely organised civic life with an alderman
at its head. The first alderman of Aberdeen whose name has come down to us
is Richard Cementarius, who was in office in 1272, but there is no reason to
suppose that he was without predecessors. With the alderman were associated
four propositi, each with charge of a district of the town as steward of its
revenues, hence called bailiff, "bailie," or (in Aberdeen) "baillie/' and
also with judicial authority, all these being appointed by a common council
elected by the community assembled in its guild court. Hitherto the burgh
revenues had been accounted for to the king's chamberlain, but they were now
to be paid into the city treasury. The beginnings of municipal government
are discernible in the earliest glimpses we get of the history of the city,
but by this charter of King Robert it received an all-important extension.
In the course of King
Robert's reign the town was placed in a condition of defence, with walls and
six ports, but a serious fire in 1326 destroyed a large number of the wooden
houses of which it still for the most part consisted. Henry Cheyne, who had
been deprived of his see for adherence to the policy of his relative the
Earl of Buchan, was restored to the royal favour in 1318. The erection of
the picturesque single-arched bridge across the Don at Balgownie is credited
to him, but whether the expense was defrayed out of the sequestrated
revenues of the see or was a voluntary outlay is not quite apparent. It is
more certain that the king caused a portion of the episcopal revenues to be
applied to the completion of the choir of the new church which, before the
commencement of the war, the bishop had begun to build on the old site
associated with the name of St Machar. King Robert showed himself a liberal
benefactor to the Church in the counties, as in the case of the Earl of
Buchan's Abbey of Deer, to which he gave a charter confirming in free gift
all its former possessions, and that of the church of St Mary which he
founded at Cullen; but he kept up the practice of granting lands and
churches to outside foundations, as in his charter of the lands of Tarves in
favour of the Abbot of Arbroath.
The firm and steady rule of
Robert I. was hardly ended when the counties began to experience again the
miseries of invasion and domestic strife. During the minority of David II.
the country was under the regency first of Randolph, Earl of Moray, and then
of Donald, Earl of Mar—the English-trained nephew of the late king. Donald
was a weak ruler, and the banished lords sought to regain their lost
possessions by putting forward the claims of Edward Baliol for the crown.
One of these lords, David de Strathbolgin, Earl of Athole, who had married
Joan Cumyn, daughter of Bruce's victim at Dumfries, was aiming at the
recovery of his Strathbogie lands. Two others, Alexander de Mowbray and
Henry de Beaumont, quarrelled about the lands of the earldom of Buchan,
Beaumont claiming to be earl in right of his wife, a daughter of the
dispossessed nobleman. A fourth, Sn Richard Talbot, another son-in-law of
John Cumyn, was made Lord of Mar by Edward Baliol. Talbot's descendant of
the third generation was first Earl of Shrewsbury, and the Earls of
Shrewsbury long numbered the lordship of Badenoch among their titles and
still carry the Cumyn arms. The defeat of Mar at Dupplin by Edward Baliol in
1332 was followed by the coronation of the victor, by his doing homage to
England, and by the march of Edward III. against the Scots in 1333 at the
head of a large army to establish hrS vassal on the throne. After the
disastrous reverse at Halidon Hill it seemed for a time as if the
independence won by Bruce were about to be lost. Edward overran the country
as far as Inverness, but Aberdeen appears to have held out until 1336, when
a force under Sir Thomas Roscelyn, who had landed at Stonehaven, marched
north to reduce the town. The burghers gave him battle outside the walls,
but were driven back with great loss and in disorder, leaving the town an
easy conquest to the English, whose leader, however, was slain in the
engagement. Aberdeen was sacked and set on fire, burning for six days,—" a
doleful sight to the spectators," says Boece. Many of the inhabitants were
put to the sword, and in Old Aberdeen the residences of the bishop and
canons were given to the flames.
David, Earl of Athole, had
already laid siege to the Castle of Kildrummy, which was held for the young
king by hi s aunt, Lady Christian Bruce, who since the death of her first
husband, Gartney, Earl of Mar, had been married to Alexander Seton, and was
now the wife of Sir Andrew Moray, who had succeeded her son. Earl Donald, in
the regency. Moray hastened towards Kildrummy, and Athole, anticipating his
arrival, crossed over to Cromar, taking up a position on the eastern skirts
of the hill of Culblean. If Wyntoun the chronicler may be trusted, Athole
bore himself like a hero, and when he saw his men yielding to Moray's
forces, apostrophising the rock by which he stood, in words modernised in
"The Lady of the Lake"—
"He sayd, ' Be Goddes grace we
twa
The flight on us shall samen ta'.' "
His wife, a daughter of Henry
de Beaumont, was blockaded by Moray for several months in the Castle of
Lochindorb, until relieved in August 1336 by King Edward. By the death of
Earl David, who combined in himself the representation of the houses of
Macduff, Strathbogie, Badenoch, and Athole, and who was also lord of estates
in England, a pillar of the English cause was broken, and a possible
claimant of the Scottish crown removed.
The contest in Buchan between
the two ambitious English barons was still in progress. Beaumont was
besieged in the Castle of Dundarg by Mowbray, who, failing to oust his
rival, and receiving no assistance from Baliol, went over to the Scottish
side. After disposing of Athole at Culblean, Moray hastened to Dundarg, and
Beaumont soon afterwards capitulated on condition of being allowed to retire
to England on his parole that he would never enter Scotland again as an
enemy. The successes of Moray in the north, and Sir William Douglas and the
Stewart in the south of Scotland, compelled the withdrawal of the English
forces from Aberdeenshire, and by the time that David II. returned from
France and took the reins of government in his own hands, the country was
free of invaders. David resided for some time at Kildrummy and elsewhere in
the north-east before visiting the southern portion of his dominions. He
held his first Parliament in Aberdeen in February 1342, when he confirmed
the grants and privileges conferred by his predecessors on the city, and
re-established the mint, which had been started by William the Lion. David
was much in the city during the years preceding his capture at Neville's
Cross.
The Mar earldom, with its
estates, was forfeited on Earl Thomas's adherence to England, but restored
on his submission. Buchan, as we have seen, was partitioned among the
supporters of Bruce, and by the death of Athole the Gordons obtained
undisturbed possession of Strathbogie. David did much to encourage the
rebuilding of Aberdeen and the restoration of its commerce. The
establishment of a staple for the Scottish ports at Middelburgh and the
exclusion of Flemish merchants were of special advantage to Aberdeen and its
growing shipping. In the contribution levied for David's ransom from the
English in 1357 Aberdeen is rated third among the royal burghs.
The anarchy which spread
throughout Scotland during the reigns of the first two Stewart kings
extended to Aberdeen-shire. Bishop Adam de Tyninghame, who as Dean of
Aberdeen had been one of the ambassadors who negotiated a treaty with the
King of France at Vincennes in 1371, embroiled himself with the Court in the
controversy regarding the legitimacy of the sons of Robert II. by Elizabeth
Mure, and in consequence incurred the enmity of one of them, Alexander
Stewart, the notorious £;Wolf of Badenoch." The Wolf had been invested with
the Cumyn earldom of Buchan and the lordship of Badenoch, while in right of
his wife he held the earldom of Ross, and as king's lieutenant in the north
he wielded almost unlimited power both in law and lawlessness. In pursuit of
his quarrel with the bishop he let loose a host of his vassals, Shaws and
Macintoshes, and broken clans from Strathspey and the regions west of
Brae-mar, upon the diocese, and especially upon the bishop's lands and
forest of Birse. In 1382 the king issued an order to the Wolf to take steps
against Ferchard MacIntoshy, the leader of the outlaws J but the order does
not seem to have been attended to, and the Wolf's son, Alexander, whom Boece
confuses with the Wolf himself, continued to disturb the lands of the
bishopric for some years to come. Excommunication had no effect upon him,
and he advanced with his Highlanders into Aberdeen to slay the bishop. The
result of an interview between the bishop and his enemy was that the
Highlanders with their leader withdrew in peace; but they continued to
harass the western parts of Aberdeenshire, particularly the Church lands
formerly held by the king's thanes.1 The same anarchical spirit is seen in
connection with the feud between the Keiths and Crawford Lindsays. In 1395
Lady Lindsay was chatelaine of the Castle of Fyvie for her husband, Sir
James of Crawford, who held the thanage of Fermartyn; and a quarrel arose
between her and Robert Keith, her nephew, who thereupon besieged the castle.
Lady Lindsay melted all the lead in the castle and held the besiegers at bay
by means of it until her husband came from Angus to her relief. Keith went
to meet him, and in a fight at Bourtie was defeated with the loss of fifty
of his followers.
The close of the fourteenth
century saw the feudal system established in Aberdeenshire as fully as it
can be said ever to have been. But here it differed widely from the
feudalism of England, and even from that which prevailed in the south of
Scotland. The tendency of the Anglo-Norman lords in the north was to revert
to the clan system which had existed before them, and to substitute the idea
of the lord of the soil for that of the chief of kindred blood as the proper
and natural leader of the people, with moral claims to their obedience. In
the two great houses of Gordon and Forbes the adoption of the clan and
family system was so complete that their foreign origin was speedily lost
sight of. This compromise involved abatements in usage from the feudal
powers with which the great barons were clothed by royal charter. In lieu of
the rights allowed them by Norman feudal laws they accepted the equivalents
to which the people had been accustomed. The Celtic payment of "can" or "kain"
was an instance of this, and existed in the north down to the beginning of
the nineteenth century. Subinfeudation, on the greater baronies, among
families and kindred, resulted in what was practically a clan, whereas the
feudal system knows nothing of blood, but only of connections through the
land.
In the end of the fourteenth
century, too, we find the distinction between Highlandmen and Lowlanders
very sharply accentuated. The natives ousted from their lands when Earl
David settled the Garioch with strangers, had been pushed back to the hilly
regions of West Aberdeenshire and Upper Banffshire, or into Badenoch. They
kept their own language and their ancient customs, and became aliens to
those who, though of their blood, had accepted the rule and language of the
stranger. Hating those who had dispossessed them, and with predatory habits
developed by their scanty means of subsistence, they became in the hands of
their enterprising leaders formidable as a power of annoyance to their
Lowland neighbours. In the War of Independence they escaped notice, taking
part, doubtless, with one side or the other; but when the country was
restored to peace their depredations became a national question, and were
felt nowhere more keenly than in Aberdeenshire.
In 1384 was enacted the first
of a long series of penal laws against Highland depredators, or "caterans,"
who were described as going about eating up the country, consuming the
resources of the sheriffdom, and by force and \iolence taking property and
victual. All men svere authorised to bring these caterans before the
sheriff, by force if necessary, and should the cateran be killed in the
exercise of this force his slayer would not have to answer for the act. But
under such leaders as the Wolf of Badenoch and his son Alexander, who became
Earl of Alar, the Highlanders of Badenoch were becoming a serious danger to
the country and an object of detestation to the inhabitants, whether high or
low. The struggles and turmoils of the fourteenth century had weakened the
predominance of the Teutonic population in the upland districts. Freedom
from an external yoke had indeed been secured, but it was at the expense of
civilisation. On the other side of the account, however, has to be placed
the disappearance of "natives" or bondmen from the charters before the close
of the fourteenth century. |
