CROMWELL made his raid on Edinburgh and invested the Castle in 1650, two years after he had been the guest of the Marquis of Argyll, who had entertained him in the Banqueting Hall of the fortress. Charles II watched from the ramparts of the Castle the manoeuvres of the troops of the Protector in their endeavours to reach the city, on the occasion when they were beaten at St. Leonards, then a village on the outskirts of Edinburgh. The disastrous result of the defeat at Dunbar a few days later, however, turned the tables, and Edinburgh had to surrender to the Ironsides, with the exception of the fortress, in which most of the clergy had taken refuge. The prisoners who were taken at the battle of Dunbar suffered cruelty unknown to a Christian country. Dr. Taylor says, “ It was most dishonourable to Cromwell and the Parliament.” They were transported to the English settlements in America, and there sold for slaves. On their journey to England they were treated with the greatest barbarity, as will be seen from a letter of Haselrig (one of Cromwell’s commandants) to the Council of State (.Parliamentary I list., vol. xix.).

“When they came to Morpeth, the prisoners being put into a large walled garden, they ate up raw cabbages, leaves, and roots, so many, as the very seed and labour at 4d per day was valued at £9, which cabbage (they having fasted, as they themselves said, near eight days) poisoned their bodies , for as they were coming from thence to Newcastle, some died by the wayside. When they came to Newcastle, I put them into the greatest church in the town ; and the next morning when I sent them to Durham, about 140 were sick and not able to march; three died that night, and some fell down in their march from Newcastle to Durham, and died. I having sent my lieutenant-colonel and my major with a strong guard both of horse and foot, they being there told into the great cathedral church, were counted to no more than 3000, although Colonel Fenwick wrote to me that there were about 3500. But I believe they were not told at Berwick, and as to most of those that were lost, it was in Scotland; for I heard that the officers who marched with them to Berwick, were necessitated to kill about thirty, fearing the loss of them all, for they fell down in great numbers, and said they were not able to march, and they brought them far in the night, so that doubtless many ran away. Notwithstanding all this many of them died, and few of any other disease than the flux [dysentery] ; some were killed by themselves, for they were exceeding cruel one towards another. If any man were perceived to have any money, it was two to one lest he was killed before morning and robbed; and if any had good cloaths, he that wanted, if he was able, would e the other and put on his cloaths.

“You cannot but think strange of this long preamble, and wonder what the matter will be. In short, it is this : out of the 3000 prisoners that my officers told into the cathedral church at Durham, only 600 are in health, and who are in all probability Highlanders, they being hardier than the rest; but we have no means to distinguish them.”

Cromwell offered the ministers who were shut up in the Castle liberty to preach in the city churches; but this offer they declined, and a lengthy correspondence took place between them and the pious Protector respecting the violation of the Covenant and the abuse of unlicensed persons interfering with the work of the ministry, for not only lay preachers but even soldiers held forth to great congregations from the vacant pulpits.

For the Honourable the Governor of the Castle of Edinburgh

Edinburgh, September 9, 1650

Sir,

I received command from my lord general to desire you to let the ministers of Edinburgh, now in the Castle with you, know that they have free liberty granted them, if they please to take the pains, to preach in their several churches; and that my lord hath given special command both to officers and soldiers, that they shall not in the least be molested.

I am, Sir,

Your most humble servant,

Edward Whalley

To Commissary General Whalley

Edinburgh Castle, September 9, 1650

Sir,

I have communicated the desire of your letter to such of the ministers of Edinburgh as are with me, who have desired me to return this for answer.

That though they are ready to be spent in their Master’s service, and to refuse no suffering so they may fulfil their ministry with joy, yet, perceiving the persecution to be personal by the practice of your party upon the ministers of Christ in England and Ireland, and in the kingdom of Scotland since your unjust invasion thereof; and finding nothing expressed in yours whereupon to build any security for their persons while they are there, and for their return hither ; they are resolved to reserve themselves for better times, and to wait upon Him who hath hidden His face for a while from the sons of Jacob.

This is all I have to say, but that

I am, Sir,

Your most humble servant,

W. Dundas

For the Honourable the Governor of the Castle of Edinburgh, these

Edinburgh, September 9, 1650

Sir,

The kindness offered to the ministers with you was done with ingenuity, thinking it might have met with the like ; but I am satisfied to tell those with you, that, if their Master’s service (as they call it) were chiefly in their eye, imagination of suffering would not have caused such a return ; much less would the practice of our party, as they are pleased to say, upon the ministers of Christ in England have been an argument of personal persecution. The ministers of England are supported, and have liberty to preach the Gospel, though not to rail, nor, under the pretence thereof, to overtop the civil power, or debase it as they please.

No man hath been troubled in Ireland for preaching the Gospel; nor hath any minister been molested in Scotland since the coming of the army hither. The speaking of truth becomes the ministers of Christ.

When ministers pretend to a Glorious Reformation, and lay the foundation thereof in getting to themselves worldly power; and can make worldly mixtures to accomplish the same, such as their late agreement with their King ; and hope by him to carry on their design, they may know that the Sion promised will not be built by such untempered mortar.

As for the unjust invasion they mention, time was when an army of Scotland came into England, not called by the supreme authority. We have said in our papers with what hearts and upon what accounts we come; and the Lord has heard us, though you would not, upon as solemn an appeal as any experience can parallel.

And although they seem to comfort themselves with being sons of Jacob, from whom (they say) God hath hid His face for a time, yet it is no wonder when the Lord hath lifted up His hand so eminently against a family as He hath done so against this, and men will not see His hand—it is no wonder if the Lord will hide His face from such, putting them to shame both for it and their hatred of His people, as it is this day. When they purely trust to the sword of the Spirit which is the Word of God, which is powerful to bring down strongholds and every imagination that exalts itself—which

alone is able to square and fit the stones for the New Jerusalem—then, and not before, and by that means and no other, shall Jerusalem, the city of the Lord, which is to be the praise of the whole earth, be built; the Sion of the Holy One of Israel.

I have nothing to say, but that

I am, Sir,

Your humble servant,

Oliver Cromwell

To the Right Ho?ioiirable the Lord Cromwell, Commander-i?i-Chief of the English Army

Edinburgh Castle, Septe?nber 9, 1650

My Lord,

Yours I have communicated to those with me whom it concerned, who desire me to return this answer: That their ingenuity in prosecuting the ends of the Covenant, according to their vocation and place, and in adhering to their first principles, is well known; and one of their greatest regrets is that they have not been met with the like. That when ministers of the Gospel have been imprisoned, deprived of their benefices, sequestrated, forced to flee from their dwellings and bitterly threatened for their faithful declaring the will of God against the godless and wicked proceedings of men, it cannot be accounted an imaginary fear of suffering in such as are resolved to follow the like freedom and faithfulness in discharge of their Master’s message. That it savours not of ingenuity to promise liberty of preaching the Gospel, and to limit the preachers thereof, that they must not speak against the sins and enormities of civil powers ; since their commission carrieth them to speak the Word of the Lord unto, and to reprove the sins of persons of all ranks, from the highest to the lowest. That to impose the name of ‘ railing ’ upon such faithful freedom, was the old practice of malignants against the ministers of the Gospel, who laid open to the people the wickedness of their ways, lest men should be ensnared thereby. That their consciences bear them record, and all their hearers do know, that they meddle not with civil affairs farther than to hold forth the rule of the Word, by which the straightness and crookedness of men’s actions are made evident. But they are sorry they have such cause to regret that men of mere civil place and employment should usurp the calling and employment of the ministry to the scandal of the Reformed Kirks, and particularly in Scotland contrary to the government and discipline therein established—to the maintenance whereof you are bound by Solemn League and Covenant.

Thus far they have thought fit to vindicate their return to the offer in Colonel Whalley’s letter. The other part of yours which concerns the public as well as them, they conceive hath all been answered sufficiently in the public papers of the State and Kirk. Only to that of the success upon your 4 solemn appeal,’ they say again what was said to it before, That they have not so learned Christ as to hang the equity of their cause upon events, but desire to have their hearts established in the love of the truth in all the tribulations that befall them.

I do only add that

I am, my lord,

Your most humble servant,

W. Dundas

For the Governor of the Edinburgh Castle, these

Edinburgh, September 12, 1650

Sir,

Because I am at reasonable good leisure, I cannot let such gross mistakes and unconsequential reasonings pass without some notice taken of them. And first, their ingenuity in relation to the Covenant for which they commend themselves doth no more justify their want of ingenuity in answer to Colonel Whalley’s Christian offer, concerning which my letter charged them with guiltiness and deficiency, than their bearing witness to themselves of their adhering to their first principles, and ingenuity in persecuting the ends of the Covenant, justifies them so to have done merely because they say so. They must give more leave henceforwards, for Christ will have it so—nill they, will they—and they must have patience to have the truth of their doctrines and sayings tried by the sure touchstone of the Word of God.

But if these gentlemen do assume to themselves to be the infallible expositors of the Covenant, as they do too much to their auditories to be the infallible expositors of the Scriptures also, counting a different sense and judgment from theirs—breach of Covenant and heresy—no marvel they judge of others so authoritatively and severely. But we have not so learned Christ. We look at ministers as helpers of, not lords over, God’s people. I appeal to their consciences, whether any person trying their doctrines and dissenting shall not incur the censure of sectary ? And what is this but to deny Christians their liberty, and assume the Infallible Chair ? What doth he whom we would not be likened unto [the Pope] do more than this ? . . .

But it will be found that these reprovers do not only make themselves the judges and determiners of sin, that so they may reprove ; but they also took liberty to stir up the people to blood and arms, and would have brought a war upon England, as hath been upon Scotland, had not God prevented it. And if such severity as hath been expressed toward them be worthy of the name of c personal persecution,’ let all uninterested men judge; and whether the calling of the practice ‘ railing ’ be to be paralleled with the malignants’ imputation upon the ministers, for speaking against the Popish innovations in the Prelates’ times, and the other tyrannical and wicked practices then on foot, let your own consciences remind you. . . .

You say, you have just cause to regret that men of civil employments should usurp the calling and employment of the ministry, to the scandal of the Reformed Kirks.

Are you troubled that Christ is preached ? Is preaching so exclusively your function ? Doth it scandalise the Reformed Kirks, and Scotland in particular ? Away with the Covenant if this be so! I thought the Covenant and these professors of it could have been willing that any should speak good of the name of Christ; if not, it is no covenant of God’s approving; nor are these kirks you mention insomuch the spouse of Christ. Where do you find in the Scripture a ground to warrant such an assertion, that preaching is exclusively your function? . . .

And if you will call our speakings together since we came into Scotland, to provoke one another to love and good works, to faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, and repentance from dead works; and charity and love towards you to pray and mourn for you, and for your better returns to £ our love of you,’ and your incredulity of our professions of love to you, of the truth of which we have made our solemn and humble appeals to the Lord our God, which He hath heard and borne witness to ; if you will call things scandalous to the Kirk, and against the Covenant, because done by men of civil callings, we rejoice in them, notwithstanding what you say. . . .

The Lord pity you. Surely we, for our part, fear; because it hath been a merciful and gracious deliverance to us. I beseech you in the bowels of Christ, search after the mind of the Lord in it towards you, and we shall help you by our prayers, that you may find it out ; for yet (if we know our hearts at all) our bowels do, in Christ Jesus, yearn after the godly in Scotland. We know there are stumbling-blocks which hinder you : personal prejudices you have taken up against us and our ways, wherein we cannot but think some occasion has been given, and for which we mourn ; the apprehension you have that we have hindered the Glorious Reformation you think you were upon ; I am persuaded these and such like bind you up from an understanding and yielding to the mind of God in this great day of His power and visitation. And, if I be rightly informed, the late blow you received is attributed to profane counsels and conduct, and mixtures in your army, and such like. The natural man will not find out the course. Look up to the Lord, that He may tell it you; which that He would do, shall be the fervent prayer ot

Your loving friend and servant,

Oliver Cromwell

Finding negotiations useless, and his attempts at reducing the Castle by a blockade of three months being futile, besides an endeavour to capture it by mining, the Lord-General prepared batteries, which it is said he mounted on the tombstones of Greyfriars churchyard. The old fortress was, however, well provisioned for a siege, and Augustine, a German soldier of fortune, at the head of a hundred and twenty horse bravely broke through the lines of the Protector’s army, killing eighty men and taking several prisoners, and further strengthened the defending garrison with a reinforcement of thirty-six men.

Cromwell, however, continued the siege with the utmost vigour, working a mine on the side of the rock next the Castle road, traces of which can still, it is thought, be seen. This was wrought by coal-miners, who worked under terror of the enemies’ muskets.

But the governor, Walter Dundas, a traitor, and his officers, who belonged to the party of Protestors, from the beginning had shown no real fight, and after some interchange of letters, which occupied a few days, Dundas surrendered the Castle on condition that the garrison should march out with the honours of war, and that all public records should be safely conveyed to Stirling. Accordingly the garrison at midday marched out with colours flying, and the Castle was then occupied by the English.

Cromwell in his report to Parliament said that the fall of this fortress was a very great and seasonable mercy} there were sixty-seven guns of various sizes in the Castle, a greater amount of brass ordnance than all the rest of Scotland contained. “I need say little,” he adds, "the strength of this place, which, if it had not come in as it did, would have cost very much blood to have attained : and did tie up your army to that inconvenience that little or nothing could have been attained while this was in design, or little fruit had of anything brought into our power by your army hitherto without it.”

The records of the kingdom, which were removed to Stirling after the surrender, fell a second time into the hands of the enemy, and were sent by Monk to the Tower of London. A number were restored by Cromwell in 1657; the rest—contained in eighty-five hogsheads—were lost on their return journey by sea to Scotland.

When Dundas was ordered to appear before the Scottish Parliament to explain his capitulation of the Castle, he was called u a base, cowardly, traitorous villain ” by Sir James Balfour. Cromwell on entering Edinburgh’s stronghold, amongst other measures ordered the destruction of the royal arms over the gate, and the wonder is that there remain so many traces of the Stuart monarchs in the Castle to-day.

A few disturbances, principally through the English soldiers behaving in a bombastic manner, much resented by the Scottish people, took place subsequently in Edinburgh. One incident is especially recorded by Patrick Gordon. One of Cromwell’s officers, emerging from the Castle, cried aloud boast-whilst mounting his steed: “ With my own hands I killed the Scot to whom this horse and these pistols belonged ; who dare say I wronged him ? ” u I dare, and thus avenge him,” exclaimed an angry Scot at this insolence, as he drew his sword and slew the boaster. The next moment he had mounted the now riderless horse and was on his way to the nearest port, whence he vanished into the country.

The rule of Cromwell, although galling to the pride of the Scottish people, gave Scotland and its warworn Castle ten years of comparative repose and prosperity, when the death of the great General and Protector on September 3, 1658, terminated the peace that had benefited the city. The Royalists, who now seized the favourable opportunity for bringing about the restoration of the King, had been watching their opportunity from the shores of France. Strangely enough Edinburgh and the Scottish people went wild with enthusiasm at the idea of once more having a monarchy. At the Cross his Majesty’s health was drunk by hundreds of citizens; the Cross itself was decorated with flowers, and the guns at the Castle thundered forth salutes in honour of Charles II j even Mons Meg was loaded and fired by the commanding officer.

Soon after the death of Cromwell General Monk was suspected by the English councils of infidelity. They dispatched a messenger with an order to Colonel Newman, the governor of Edinburgh Castle, to remove him from the command of the forces in Scotland. The messenger met an old friend at the Canongate, who happened to be a servant to Monk, who accosted him with cordiality. “ How comes it,” he asked, “ that you go in this direction, and not as usual to the General at Dalkeith?” “Because my dispatches are for the Castle.” The servant of Monk suspected something was wrong, and proposed they should have a bottle together. The messenger drank freely ; the servant stole the dispatch, Monk received it, and at once commenced his march southward, with the Army of Scotland, to accomplish the Restoration.

There is an interesting story in connexion with the. firing of the salute from the Castle guns. An old adherent of Cromwell’s campaign refused to obey the command, saying, u May the devil blaw me into the air gif I lowse a cannon this day—if I do some man shall repent it,” whereupon he was made by force to discharge a cannon, which burst with terrible results, “shuites his bellie from him, and blew him quyte over the Castle wall, in the sichte of mony pepill.”

At the commencement of the year 1661 a garrison was enlisted in Scotland for the occupation of the fortress with the Earl of Middleton as governor, and now the first Marquis of Argyll was brought from the Tower of London and cast into a dungeon under the very hall in which he had entertained Cromwell and discussed the execution of Charles I. He had forces in Scotland, The messenger met an old fnend at the Canongate, who happened to be a servant to Monk, who accosted him with cordiality. “How comes it,” he asked, “that you go in this direction, and not as usual to the General at Dalkeith?”

He begged time in which he might pray to the King for forgiveness—“I placed the Crown on his head, and this is my reward,” he said—but this was refused, and so his wife planned an escape. He was lying in his dungeon pretending to be ill and his wife came to pay him one of her last visits \ it had been arranged that he was to change his dress for hers, but at the last moment his courage failed him, whereupon the Marchioness broke down and wept, saying, “The Lord will requite it.” "I pity my enemies,” he replied quietly, and a day or two after he was beheaded by the Maiden.

A great plot for the capture of the Castle by the Jacobites was discussed with Kerr of Kersland, a Cameronian, who was believed to be a staunch supporter of the party, but was in reality a Government spy. The possession of the Castle was desirable not only as a stronghold and arsenal, but also as the depository of the “Equivalent” that was to be paid to Scotland by the terms of the Treaty of Union. The money had just been put under the protection of a small garrison, and the idea was to appropriate it to the Pretender’s exchequer. A few conspirators were on a certain day to mix with the citizens who daily crowded the esplanade, and one of the band was to seek admission to the Castle on the pretext of visiting an officer. On the lowering of the drawbridge he was to shoot the sentry at the gate, and this was to be a signal not only to his companions in the crowd, but also to a hundred men concealed in a house at the head of the High Street, who were to rush forth and seize the Castle. The traitor Kerr hastened to London to inform the Duke of Queens-berry, the chief of the Government; and lest his journey south should be suspected by his Jacobite friends, he returned to Edinburgh with all speed and aided the Government in defeating the designs for the plot, which was never carried out.

In 1681 the new Marquis of Argyll was committed a third time to the Castle for refusing to take the oath required by the Test Act as Commissioner of the Scottish Treasury, and on December 12, being found guilty of “ treason and leasing telling,” he was sentenced to death.

Precautions were taken to prevent rioting; the guards of the Castle were strengthened, and extra patrols were mounted in the city. Argyll, like his father, had decided on a plan of escape with the assistance of his daughter-in-law, the Lady Sophia Lindsay, of Balcarres. The story goes that she with her page paid a visit to the State prison with the object of bidding him a last farewell. Exchanging his own costume for that of her attendant, he sallied forth from his cell bearing her train aloft from the dirty paving slabs, which were wet with the slush of a previous snowstorm. He successfully managed to evade his guards until the couple reached the outer gate, when he was challenged by the sentry on guard, which made him forget his duty of train-bearer, whereby the silken robes of the Lady Lindsay were allowed to drop in the mud \ with wonderful presence of mind his companion lifted her bedraggled train and threw it across the face of her seeming attendant with the exclamation, “Thou careless loon!” The sentry, highly amused at the punishment, and at the dirty face of Argyll, allowed them to pass. Lady Lindsay entered her coach, the Earl got on behind as flunkey, and they rapidly drove away out of sight of the Castle, and the Earl was able to make good his escape to Holland. As for Lady Lindsay, she was arrested when the authoiities discovered what had transpired, and was confined in the Tolbooth.

Four years later, the Earl returned to Scotland to take part in an insurrection against King James; but the rebel force was hopelessly routed, and he had to fly in the disguise of a bearded peasant. Near Paisley, however, his identity was discovered; he was bound hand and foot and conducted back to Edinburgh, where, preceded by the headsman, he was taken in procession through the streets to his old quarters at the Castle. He passed his last hours calmly, sleeping and dining without showing signs that he feared his coming execution. When one of the Privy Council called he found Argyll gently asleep despite his heavy manacles.

Argyll was led from the famous prison at the Castle on June 30, 1685, and was taken to the Market Cross, where he was confronted with the instrument of death, and, going up to it, he touched it with his lips, saying, “It is the sweetest maiden I have ever kissed.”

A clergyman in the crowd which awaited the execution called out, "My lord dies a Protestant?” “ es,” replied the Earl, “and not only a Protestant, but with a heart hatred of Popery, Prelacy, and all superstition.” The brave nobleman then placed his head under the knife, which had done duty at the execution of his father, and died with great courage, whilst his Countess and her family were kept prisoners in the Castle.

During the Jacobite insurrection of 1715 a desperate attempt was made for the capture of the steep, the iron-belted rock, Where trusted he the monarchy's last gems, The sceptre, sword, and crown that graced the brows Since Fergus, father of a hundred kings.

Lord Drummond, son of the Duke of Perth, was at the head of the plotters } but the carrying out of the deed was entrusted to a Highland laird named Drummond of Balhaldie, and a body of Highlanders from Lord Drummond’s estate, who were to make the attempt on September 8. They were joined by some Jacobites in Edinburgh, composed principally of students and young lawyers, assisted by a serjeant and some privates in the Castle garrison, who had been secured by a young ensign named Arthur.

The assailants were to attack that part of the Castle which rises from the steep rock on the south-west, near St. Cuthbert’s Church, close to the postern gate. The soldier who was to be on guard duty at the time had agreed to drop from the rampart a rope, to which a scaling ladder was to be fastened by the conspirators ; it was to be drawn up by the sentry and the ladder fixed to the Castle wall for the ascent of his accomplices. After the capture of the governor and his garrison three shots were to be fired from the Castle guns as a signal for the lighting of beacons throughout Fife and the northern counties, so as to convey the news to the Earl of Mar, who was then to hasten forward with his army and take possession of Edinburgh. The Jacobites did not fear the deputy-governor, Lieutenant-Colonel Stuart, for any prevention of their plot, for he was, according to general belief, of doubtful loyalty.

Ensign Arthur had told his brother, a c doctor ’ in Edinburgh, of the plot under a pledge of secrecy, but the doctor’s evident unrest excited the curiosity of his wife, who induced him to reveal the secret a few hours before the event was to take place. She, unfortunately for the Jacobites, was an adherent of the house of Hanover, and at once sent an anonymous letter to the Lord Justice Clerk, Sir Adam Cockburn, who quickly forwarded the intelligence to the deputy-governor of the Castle, just in time to be received before the gates were closed for the night. Stuart, however, either disbelieved the information or was secretly favourable toward the plot, for he took no precaution further than to double his guards, after which he retired for the night. Meantime the conspirators had been spending the evening drinking in a neighbouring tavern, and were nearly an hour beyond the time appointed for setting out on their enterprise. Meeting in St. Cuthbert’s churchyard with a part of their scaling ladder, they waited quietly in the darkness for a confederate with the remainder, but he did not put in an appearance. Angry and impatient, they scrambled up the rock to the foot of the wall and directed the sentry to pull up the rope to which they had fastened the portion of the scaling ladder; he did so, but, as they expected, it proved far too short. At this critical moment the relieving guard approached the spot under which the conspirators stood. The confederate sentry immediately threw down the ladder and called out to the conspirators that their plot was foiled, firing his musket with intent to hide his own treason. The Jacobites fled for their lives under cover of darkness along the banks of the north loch, but the City Guard, who were patrolling the outside of the Castle walls by order of the Lord Justice Clerk, arrested three of the '54 men, including a Captain McLean, an old Jacobite officer, who was crippled by a serious fall whilst descending the rock.

ST. MARGARET’S CHAPEL

Stuart, the deputy-governor of the Castle, was deprived of his office on suspicion of his implication in the plot, and the serjeant of the guard, who had betrayed his trust, was hanged on the Castle wall; the other conspirators seem to have escaped punishment.

Up to the time when James VII was made to forfeit all claim to the Crown the committal of victims to the dungeons and prisons of the Castle was a daily occurrence, and they were treated with more or less severity. Amongst the worst cases, perhaps, was the treatment of Mr. William Spence, ‘servitour’ to the lately executed Earl of Argyll. After undergoing the torture of the c boot,’ Spence was placed under the charge of Sir Thomas Dalyell, an old Colonel of the Scots Greys, by whom he was forced to wear a hair-shirt, being thus kept from sleeping for five nights. This torture was given him in the hope that he would reveal the secret of certain ciphers which were found amongst his master’s papers. This failing, the thumbscrew was applied again and again, without effect. Then he was thrust back to the dungeons, where, however, he eventually deciphered the messages, one result of which was that William Carstairs, Principal of the University and Moderator of the General Assembly, was arrested and tortured in the Castle.

With the news that William of Orange had landed in England, times were to change in the history of the venerable palace, prison, and fortress, and we shall find it gradually approaching an era of peace.