Simon Grunau also, a Dominican monk, who wrote a Prussian Chronicle about the year 1526 makes mention of Douglas, adding the words "It was he whose father allowed himself to be killed in order that his master the King might live." [The Chronicle has been published by Perlbach, i. 676 and 679.]

Of the various embellishments of this story we have also spoken previously. Curious it is that the fact of a gate at Danzig, the Hohe Thor, having once been called the Douglas Gate, and of its having been adorned with the Coat of Arms of this nobleman, should occur in the following three Scottish writers: the author of the Atlas Geographies, Hume of Godscroft, in his Douglas book, and John Scot in his Metrical History of the War in Flanders. The last of these has the lines —

To these must be added the testimony of an English merchant, who in his description of the city of Danzig writes "Upon account of a signal service which one of the Douglas family did to this city in relieving it in its utmost extremities against the Poles, the Scotch were allowed to be free burghers of the town, and had several other immunities granted them above other foreigners, but now excepting the successors of those who were so incorporated they have no distinction or privileges, but indeed a better half of the families are of Scotch extraction." He then mentions the Hohe Thor being called Douglas Gate even in his time (1734). [A Particular Description of Danzig by an English Merchant, lately resident there. London, 1734.]

In Danzig, where the beautiful Hohe Thor still stands, restored and freed from its former encumbrances, nothing is known of this story. But then Danzig is rather badly off for a good history, and at some future time a verification may be found of what, till now, must be considered tradition only.

Skipping over a period of nearly two centuries we arrive at a period where Danzig was sorely pressed by the enemy.

In 1575 a scion of the royal family of Batori had been called to the throne of Poland as Stephen IV. Danzig, though nominally belonging to Poland, refused to acknowledge him and declared for the German Emperor, Maximilian II., who promised the town important trading privileges. Even after the death of Maximilian in 1576, its opposition did not cease. Stephan, therefore, laid siege to it, but its defence was so obstinate and so skilful that he had to withdraw very soon, express his regret, and pay 200,000 gulden as an indemnity.

For this war Scotland, the great recruiting depot of Europe, furnished a force of six or seven hundred men. They were drawn not, however, from Scotland itself, but from the Scottish forces in Holland. The first indication of it we find in the Calendar of State Papers when, (August 3, 1577) Walsingham writes to the Regent: "It may please you, therefore, to stay such of that (the Scottish) nation as lately served in Holland, who, as I am informed, are otherwise minded to repair to the service of the town of Danske, for unless the matter be speedily compounded their cause requires speedy relief." To Danzig they went, anyhow, and, as it appears, by sea. [Some of them under Gourlay Trotter and Tomson, arrived at Danzig in the middle of June 1577; others on the 20^th of August.] They were commanded by Colonel William Stuart and the Captains Gourlay, W. Moncrief, John Crawford, John Tomson, John Dollachy (?), Alex. Morra and Will. Rentoun. Their engagement was to last till May 1578; good pay and plenty of ammunition and provision was promised. We also hear that their sergeant-major was called Ambsteroder (Anstruther), their surgeon (Feldscheer), John Orley, their Provost, Robert Schwall, and their preacher (Predikant), Patrick Griech (Greig), the latter drawing two hundred gulden as his pay.

Now powder and shot seems to have been forthcoming in abundant quantities—we are told in the treasury-accounts of Danzig that at one time fifty-four schock (i.e. three score) of slow-matches at an expense of eighty-one gulden were handed out to the forces—but it was somewhat different with the officers’ pay, and some little pressure was required on the part of the claimants. Captain Murray addresses the Magistrates on this matter, and scornfully states that he has wasted a whole week and got nothing, and William Moncrieff writes a long letter with respect to the same business.

WILHELM MONKRIEFF, Captain."

Matters, however, seem to have been settled amicably, for we soon read of the valiant deeds of the little Scotch garrison. They were the chief stay of Danzig in all her troubles, say the State Papers, "They have done so much noble service that they have got great fame for their country in these parts."

Poor Gourlay had to pay with his life. An old chronicler of Danzig tells us that he, being wounded under the arm, wanted to jump into a boat, but he jumped short, and in his heavy armour he was drowned. His funeral was a very solemn affair. "All the Scots, with their muskets under their arms, went first with their colours, and drums beating. After the coffin came the magistrates, the bailies and the burgesses."

Colonel Stuart himself had a narrow escape. "On this Saturday, December 7th, 1577," writes an old chronicler, "the Scottish colonel, a handsome and imposing warrior of royal blood, went for a ride with the horses he had lately bought, outside the town, and exercised them opposite the hills near the shooting range of the citizens. But when the enemy noticed this, he rushed out of his cover, wanting to attack him. He, however, with his men, quickly galloped towards the Heilige Leichnams Thor, where he was under the cover of the guns, and the enemy dared not follow him.

After the siege had been raised the services of Colonel Stuart were asked for by the Danish King, but Danzig would not let him go before all the Scots had been paid off for "fear of a rising" [Kgl. St. Archiv,Danzig. Missivbucher. Letter to the King of Denmark, dated February 21, 1578. Colonel Stuart is in Edinburgh in 1590 writing to the Danzig Magistrates on behalf of the Dutch Councillor Ramel, who had lent King Sigismund money to redeem the Crown Jewels which the latter had pawned.] (1578). As to the "Predikant" or military chaplain, as we would now say, he held services after the manner of. the Presbyterians, in the Church of St Nicholas, also called the Church of the Black Friars, whilst the Pastor of St Elisabeth also celebrated the Holy Communion in the same way for the benefit of the levied Dutch and Scottish troops.

Danzig seems to have retained some at any rate of the Scottish soldiers in her pay. We read now and then of Scottish names, the bearers of which "now served in this town’s soldatesca."

Hans Krafort, for instance, and Oliver Ketscber, both soldiers, testify before the Magistrates of the town that the late Hans Rehe (Ray), born in the Kingdom of Scotland, did serve as a sergeant under Colonel Fuchs in the Russian War, that he was killed during the siege of Smolensk, and buried with all martial honours (1634). Or when Major-General Gaudi explains that Jacob Black, born at Danzig, who had served in his company as a dragoon, had died on the march behind Casimirs four years ago (1662). Very numerous, of course, were the Scottish officers in the service of the King of Poland. To the names already mentioned we may here add those of Captain James Murray, who in 1627 commissions Jacob Rowan at Danzig to collect his pension; Captain Reay who figures in a rather curious case of wrongful imprisonment; and Major-General Count von Johnston, who was also Colonel of a Regiment of Cuirassiers.

In 1624 King Vladislaus IV. grants to the Scot, Thomas Fergusson—‘egregius’—who had served under Jacob Wilson and Captain Kirkpatrick as a sergeant against the Russians, permission to return to his own country, characterising his conduct during the campaign as brave and honourable (1624).

Very sad was the case of Alexander Ruthven, who lost his life in the service of Poland. It is on account of his widow that Edinburgh addresses the following letter to the Magistrates of Danzig in the year 1605: "We make it known to you that to-day appeared before us the noble Margaret Munro, the widow of the late Colonel Alexander Ruthven, and explained to us how her late husband had spent and lost all his property in various wars in Poland and Sweden, so that after he had sacrificed his life in the service of the King of Poland she had hardly enough to live with her orphan children. Her only hope was placed, next to God, in the liberality of His Majesty, King Sigismund III., whose Chancellor and Field-marshal, Johannes Zamoscius, had promised him, when he was about to meet his death at the siege of Volmer, to see that the King would provide for his wife and children liberally; and as she herself for the want of means and otherwise is prevented from accomplishing such a long journey to call upon His Majesty and General Zamosc, she by the terms of this letter solemnly appoints George Bruce to approach the said persons in her name, and to remind them of their promise, and to act in all matters relating to her deceased husband as her representative, with this only limitation, that he shall have no power to arrange about money matters and pensions unless George Smyth, a goldsmith, and George Hepburn, a merchant, both citizens of Danzig, consent and approve. She makes these two her trustees, and empowers them together with her representative, George Bruce, to administer all matters relating to the late Alexander Ruthven, to pay his debts, or to call in debts just as if she had been present herself; and she will consider everything that has legally been done by these her representatives as binding, pledging at the same time all movable and immovable possessions she owns at present or may own in the future. In testimony whereof we have ordered our first secretary, Alexander Guthrie, to append the seal of our city to this document. Given at Edinburgh, on the sixth of April, one thousand six hundred and five." [Kgl. St. Archiv, Danzig.]

Another well deserving officer in the Polish Army was Peter Leermonth, whose name occurs in the Minute Books of Marienburg in 1619. He is called "nobilis," and the King, in granting him the property of a late stranger, which according to the jus caducum fell to the Crown, says of him: "He showed himself a brave and active soldier, not only against the Duke of Sudermannia, but also during the whole of the Russian War when we were besieging Smolensk . . . and again in the reign of our son, Wladislaus Sigismund, he fought very bravely, and was an example to others (et aliis dux et auctor existens ad pugnam)." It is well known that the Russian Poet Lermontoff’s Scottish ancestor Learmonth came to Russia about this time. The poet’s father’s name was Petrowitsch, showing that Peter was a family name.

It would fill another volume to write exhaustively on the Scottish officers in the service of Poland. Their numbers were, as we have stated, very large, their services much appreciated. It is owing, no doubt, in great part to these services that so many Scottish families were ennobled and enrolled among the Polish nobility in the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. We find the following names who were granted titles of nobility by the Polish Crown: Bonar, Chambers (1673), Mackay, Macferlant, Ogilvie, Munson, Miller, Guthrie (1673), Forseit (Forsyth), Patterson, with the surname of Hayna, Gordons, Fraser, Halyburton, with the surname Stodart, Watson, and Karkettle, the last two at the end of the eighteenth century.

Prominent among the Scottish officers of Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden, was William Lewis, [To this day there are "Lowis of Menar" in Livonia. Baron K. von Lowis of Menar at Riga had the kindness of furnishing me with the above data.] who emigrated to Sweden at the beginning of the seventeenth century. His ancestral home was Castle Manor in Peeble-shire. He also saw a good deal of service in Germany. In the camp of Altbrandenburg he was made colonel on the 17th of August 1631. In 1640 he was garrisoned with his regiment in Stralsund, Pomerania. His grateful King acknowledged his faithful services by bestowing upon him the estates of Panton and Nurmis in Livonia. Colonel Lewis died in 1675.

A descendant of his was Lieutenant-General Friedrich von Löwis of Menar, who, in 1813, for several months commanded the Russian army during the siege of Danzig, Danzig then an important fortress. His portrait and a memorial tablet is to be seen in the Waisenhaus Kirche (Chapel of the Orphanage) at the last named place.

How this portrait got into the Orphanage is told in the records of the institution. According to them a letter of recommendation to the heads of all the villages in the territory of Danzig had been granted by the magistrates to the Master of the Orphanage, who intended to set out on an expedition with some of his pupils in order to collect contributions in money and in kind for the institution, and to relieve the great want and distress occasioned by the protracted siege of the town. It must be remembered that Danzig at that time was held by the French, and that it was besieged by Russians and Germans, under the chief command of Alexander, Duke of Wurtemberg, to whom General Frederick von Löwis of Menar acted as second in command. "On the 24th of August," our records continue, "at half-past nine in the morning, one hundred and thirty-four orphans, accompanied by their teacher, sergeant and some nurses, left the orphanage and moved in procession, and singing the old hymn, ‘When we are in the depth of woe,’ to the Church of St Mary’s in the town, where the senior clergyman and chaplain of the institution delivered an address and pronounced the benediction. Then the children went to the melody of the hymn, ‘Now God, be merciful,’ to the Langemarkt, the chief square of Danzig. Here one of them spoke a few touching words of farewell. Everybody crowded around them, and even the poorest showed their sympathy by some little gift. It is told that an old apple-woman divided her whole barrel of fruit and vegetable amongst them, a present not to be undervalued in those days of famine and distress. With their master Gebrt at the head, the procession then moved out of the High Gate, past the little village of Ohra. But here their difficulties commenced. Scarcely had they passed the French outposts, when to their dismay they beheld at no great distance the Russian outposts, who had advanced as far as the "Three Boars Heads." Now, as neither the French would allow them to return to the city nor the Russians to proceed on their errand of mercy, they had to encamp where they were under the sky, starvation staring them in the face.

"At last, General Frederick von Löwis, moved by compassion and himself deeply afflicted by the recent loss of a young and promising boy, succeeded in effecting their release. The Duke of Wurtemberg having written to him on the occasion of his sad loss, he replied that his grief would be greatly assuaged if the poor orphans of Danzig received a free pass. Upon this the Duke allowed them to proceed.

"They were first placed in the monastery of St Albrecht, where Löwis had his quarters, later they found an asylum in the little village of Ottomin, where they were well fed and clothed by good Samaritans, until, in January 1814, Danzig was restored to Germany, and they were allowed to return to their old home.

"In memory of this act of kindness on the part of the Russian General, the following tablet was placed in the Orphanage chapel: ‘During the siege of Danzig under Alexander, Duke of Wurtemberg, Friedrich von Löwis, Imperial Russian General and Knight, our deliverer in the fatal days between the outposts at Niederfelde, from the 24th of August to the 8th of September 1813.’" [Kindly communicated by the Directors of the Orphanage at Danzig. Frederick von Lowis was the son of Major-General Fred von Lowis and Eliz. Clapier of Cologne. He was born 16^th Sept. 1767, at Hopsal in Esthonia, and died as Livonian Marshal and a brilliant military career against the Swedes, the Poles and the French in 1824 on the 16^th of April.]

An additional glimpse of Scottish officers in Germany is afforded to us in the history of the City of Thorn, which was occupied by Sweden from the year 1655 until 1658, when it was retaken by Polish and Austrian forces. The garrison at that time consisted of two thousand five hundred men, amongst them the Scottish Body Guard numbering five hundred, whilst some of the other regiments were also commanded by Scottish officers such as Colonel Cranston, Hatton and Douglas.

In the chronicles of the time the excellent discipline of these troops is praised.

Once again, at the beginning of the eighteenth century, the city of Danzig entrusted the post of commander of its forces to a Scotsman. This was Major Sinclair, who was called out of Holland in 1698. He was an energetic, able man, and took an interest in the improvements of the city. In 1704 he was made Colonel, and he died as Major-General in 1731, when he was buried with great pomp in the Frauen or Marien Kirche, where there is still to be seen a monument erected in his memory. [There is a long Latin inscription on the tomb, but no biographical details. His coat-of-arms that used to hang up above the monument has disappeared.]

In the armies of Brandenburg and Hanover also Scottish officers were found in great numbers during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. In the Brandenburg Prussian service such names occur as Captain Trotter (1653), Captain Hamilton (1669), Lieut.-Colonel Black (1665), and Colonel Spang. Very likely the following letter of introduction also refers to an officer. It was written by one Robert Stewart from Danzig in 1611, and addressed to the Elector of Brandenburg, Johann Sigismund. The writer recommends "Joannem Drummond," his countryman, who is honest and of good birth, and possesses famous friends. "The very great friendliness and condescension with which Your Highness received me may excuse the boldness of interceding for another friend. I most urgently commend him to your favour and kindness." In more recent times we find no less than four Hamiltons mentioned in Konigsberg: General Hamilton (1810), Colonel Hamilton (1819), and two other Hamiltons, non-commissioned officers (1832). A Colonel Leslie also occurs in the town of Preussisch Holland (1821). In the Hanoverian army the most eminent Scottish names in the seventeenth century are: Graham, Crichton, Gordon, Ramsay and Stuart; in the eighteenth: Henderson, Macphail and Robertson, and in the nineteenth: Mackenzie, Murray, and General Sir H. Halkett. Of these the Robertsons or "von" Robertsons, as they are now called, are distinguished by a long and honourable service. The first of them, belonging to the Strowan branch of the family, came to Germany about the middle of the seventeenth century, and entered the army of the Prince of Celle as a Major. He returned to Scotland in 1687 and died on his estate of "Clerkensheede," a name which has not yet been identified. Another Robertson was Governor of Nienburg in Hanover; a third, Captain in the Hanoverian Guards; a fourth, Knight of the Bath and the Order of Guelph, fought at Waterloo, where he was dangerously wounded. He died in 1849. Grandsons of his are still living in the North of Germany.

A great many of the second generation of Scotsmen followed the calling of the Church. Among the preachers of the Presbyterian Church of St Peter and Paul at Danzig we find Sam. W. Thomson towards the end of the eighteenth century and his successor, Peter J. Buchan. Thomas Burnet was the first preacher of the Scottish congregation there about the year 1692, when Scotch services took place in his private dwelling in the Frauengasse. From the great number of entries in the Church books of St Peter and Paul and of St Elizabeth, however, we conclude that from an early date the bulk of the Scots attended divine worship in these German Presbyterian Churches; though they may have formed and did form an ecclesiola in ecclesia, having their own poor-funds and so forth. They also had their own "Umbitter," a sexton or low church official, who was sent round to the members of the congregation announcing deaths, and funerals and marriages. His name is given as David Grim (Graham), and he died in the hospital of St Elizabeth in 1667, at the age of seventy-eight. Not only did the Scots of Danzig attend the services of St Peter and Paul, but they had clergymen of their own nation or extraction at that church as well, though of course the sermons were delivered in the German language. Two Buchans, Jacob and Peter, and probably father and son, were preachers there from 1749-1776, and from 1804-1814 respectively. Besides these the name of S. W. Turner occurs in the list of clergymen (1781-1806).

Among the Lutheran clergy of Danzig, as far back as 1624, a Scot, Magister Adrian Stoddart, deserves mention. He was born in 1598, and filled other responsible positions in the government of the town besides being Dean of the Parish Church of St Mary’s. His portrait is still to be seen in the vestry. The most valuable Chronicle of Curicke is dedicated to him.

In the remaining Province of Western Prussia we find no less than five Lutheran clergymen of the name of Achinwall, the same family that has already furnished us with the name of the famous Professor of Jurisprudence and Political Economy at Göttingen. The eldest of these was Thomas Achenwall, born 1695, at Elbing. He afterwards became clergyman of the Heilige Drei Königskirche in his native town, and died in 1755. The next is another Thomas, a cousin, born at Elbing in 1702. He became preacher at St Mary’s Church there and died in 1764. The third is his son Gottlieb Thomas Achenwall, born in 1731. After having taught at Elbing for some years, he was called to the village of Furstenan as clergyman in 1759. His son Daniel Thomas Gottlieb, born in 1766, came as minister to Lenzen (1804) and died there in 1807. The last of the Achinwall theologians was Thomas Christlieb, born at Elbing in 1751; ordained in 1778, he officiated in various churches, latterly in St Mary’s. He died in 1810.

Another Scottish clergyman at Elbing was W. Rupsohn (Robinson) who was born in 1664. Having studied at the University of Rostock, he spent some time in travelling through Germany, Belgium and France, not so much for the sake of scenery, but in order to enjoy the intercourse with famous men. [This was the main object of travelling in those days. To travel for the sake of natural scenery is altogether a modern growth.] After his return in 1689, he was, chosen clergyman at the Heilige Leichnam Kirche [Corpus Christi Church.] in Elbing, an office which he held until 1718, the year of his death.

In Nassenhuben, a village not far from Danzig, and where there was a Presbyterian Church, no less than four clergymen of Scottish descent officiated. Gilbert Wachius was the first. He came there from Königsberg in 1694, and was called to Bremen five years later, where he died in 1720. Alexander Davidson from Danzig succeeded him in the ministry. He died in 1725. Of John R. Forster we shall have to speak later. Finally we have in this same village the name of S. W. Turner, whom we have just mentioned as having been called to St Peter’s at Danzig in 1781.

In other places of Western Prussia such as Thorn, [Th. Albert Young (1719-1745) and Ernest Wauch (1789-1791) Thiensdorf, [G. Kraffert (Crawfurd), (1721-1737)] Graudenz, [Dan Lamb (1703-1708)] Rosenberg, [Michael Scotius, 1738. He was first in Neidenburg.] and Preussisch Mark, [The Marschall from Elbing (1708-1710)] we find clergymen of Scottish extraction filling the ministry.

Turning to Eastern Prussia the names of four Andersons occur since 1775. We have two W. Crichtons, Chaplains and Doctors of Divinity at Konigsberg; the elder of these came from Insterburg, became preacher in the Royal Orphanage (1715-1718), and, since 1730, Court Preacher and Consistorialrath in Königsberg. He died sixty-six years old in 1749. His son William, born 1732, at Königsberg, was for a time Professor of Theology at Frankfurt. In 1772 he succeeded his father.

Another Court Preacher, there used to be three, was J. Thomson, born at Warsaw in 1675. After having occupied the post of headmaster of the reformed School at Königsberg he entered upon the chaplaincy in 1707. [He died in 1732.]

In the Polish Presbyterian Church at Königsberg, mention is made of a clergyman named Chr. Henry Karkettle, who died in 1751.

In Rastenburg, Ernest Fr. Hamrnilton officiated; [1755-1783] in Pillau, David Hervie, a native of Konigsberg, but of Scottish descent, [1707-1775] whilst in 1665 Jacob Glen was a minister at Stallupohnen.

In Tilsit we find besides A. Dennis, who died in 1699, a clergyman named von Irwing, a native of the place, where the Scottish Irvings were widespread. Another Wach, born at Goldap, occurs as clergyman in the village of Tollmingkehmen.

With regard to Jacob Brown who was appointed to Königsberg in 1685, [Scots in Germany.] there exists a remarkable letter addressed to Hofprediger Schlemüller, on the 3rd of April 1668, by the Churfurst, showing and completing our evidence of the desire of the numerous Scots to enjoy the worship of God in their own tongue many years before.

"Your Reverence will remember," it runs, "how about two or three years ago, some of the Scottish Nation here held private meetings in their houses and had sermons, about which people in the town spoke very harshly, under the name of false and forbidden doctrine, asking our government very earnestly and humbly to stop such suspicious conventicles. Now when we caused an enquiry to be made into the matter of these secret gatherings and found that a Scottish exile of pure doctrine and good morals and an adherent of the Reformed (i.e. Presbyterian) Form of Religion had come hither to visit his good friends, but was not able now to return to his native country on account of the naval war lately broken out between Holland and England, and further that he, not wishing to eat his bread in idleness, desired to preach the Word of God to his countrymen in their own tongue; we have in order to remove all grounds of suspicions and complaints and to assist them in this praiseworthy undertaking, graciously been pleased to allow them to continue their religious exercise publicly after the close of the service of the Reformed Church on Sundays, in the Hall at the Castle.

"But as we have now been informed, shortly before our departure, and not without very great surprise on our part, that the said Scots against our prohibition continue their private meetings, that there were some points in their doctrine not altogether sound and that all this would be brought forward as a great ‘gravamen’ at our next diet, we desire your Reverence (it being very necessary to prevent this) to let these people know in our name, that, because the diet is approaching now and we are in nowise anxious to see a matter allowed by us disallowed by them, [The meaning of this sentence is not quite clear.] they should discontinue both the public as well as the private exercise of religion in their own tongue. But if afterwards they desire to have their own preacher besides our two Court-Preachers, they may duly petition for it, when, we have no doubt, His Electoral Highness will graciously consider such a request." [Kgl. St. Archiv, Konigsberg.]

It is curious to observe not only the liberal and humane views of the Prince, but also his dread—so often the dread of a military hero who knows of no fear in battle— of having his previously and magnanimously given privilege denounced, torn to shreds by discussion, and perhaps cancelled by the diet. The Scottish predilection for private religious meetings as well as the extreme importance attached to points of doctrine and their "soundness" is again highly characteristic.

We know the further development: how Brown was found wanting in some minor doctrinal matters, how the Elector interceded for him, and how he, after having promised to teach or do nothing against the mode of worship in Konigsberg, was finally appointed preacher to the Scottish congregation. [See Scots in Germany.]

Going across the strict boundaries of the two Prussian Provinces we may add to this already long list of Scottish Presbyterian Clergymen the name of C. Musonius (1545-1612)] son of the Scot, Jacob Musonius, at Lobsens, in the Province of Posen, and that of his brother Simon who died in 1592. Some of their descendants were likewise ministers. We even hear of Scotsmen preaching to Polish congregations, for instance Andrew Malcolm, who was Presbyterian clergyman at Zullichau in Silesia, his congregation consisting of a colony of Polish immigrants.