The Case for the Crown in re the Wigtown Martyrs proved to be myths versus Wodrow and Lord Macaulay, Patrick the Pedler and Principal Tulloch

Front matter

THE THE CASE FOR THE CROWN IN ItE WIGTOWN MARTYRS PROVED TO BE MYTHS VERSUS WODROW AND LOED MACAULAY, PATRICK THE PEDLEE AND PRINCIPAL TULLOCH. BY MARK NAPIER, SHERIFF OF DUMFRIESSHIRE. EX UNO DISCE OMNES. EDINBURGH: EDMONSTON AND DOUGLAS; LONDON: HAMILTON, ADAMS & CO. 1863. PRINTED BY JOHN HUGHES, THISTLE STREET, EDINBURGH. CONTENTS. PART FIRST. THE ROMANCE OF THE WIGTOWN MARTYRS PROVED TO BE FALSE.

PAGE Section I. — Lord Maeaulay's version of the Wigtown Martyrdom incredible on the face of it, . . . . .3 Section II. — Wodrow's version of the Wigtown Martyrdom ignored by Lord Macaulay in its most essential circumstances, while professing to found upon it, . . . . . .8 Section III. — The Reprieve of the Wigtown Women, as recorded in the Register of the Privy Council, not fully or fairly given by Wodrow in his Extract therefrom, . . . .15 Section IV. — Origin and object of Colonel James Douglas's Special Commission of Justiciary for the South and West of Scotland, — enduring from the 27th of March to the 21st of April 1G85, under which the two women were condemned at Wigtown, . 19 Section V. — How the two Wigtown Women were dealt with under Colonel Douglas's Commission of Justiciary, . . .27 Section VI. — Principal Tulloch answered, . . . .31 Section VII. — The evidence derived from the Records of the Privy Council, that the Wigtown women were pardoned in Edinburgh, and not drowned at Wigtown, corroborated by the Record of that Royal Burgh, ....... 44 Section VIII. — The evidence of the Public Records against the truth of the drowning drama at Wigtown, corroborated by the contemporaneous and positive testimony of the Lord Advocate, Sir George Mackenzie, ...... 47 Section IX.— Sir George Mackenzie's Statement of the precise number of Female State Criminals executed during the Reigns of the Restoration corroborated by all the Diaries and Reports of his Whig opponent Kountainhall, . . • .66 PAGE Section X.— Sir George Mackenzie still further, and exactly, corroborated, by the calumnious Papers of Grievances and Sufferings, penned by Conventicle Preachers, and promoted by the rebellious Presbyterians in Scotland, to induce the Prince of Orange to invade the Kingdom, .....-• "2 Conclusion, . . . ■ • • . . . 69 PART SECOND.

CRITICAL EXAMINATION OF THE RISE AND PROGRESS OF THE FABULOUS ROMANCE OF THE WIGTOWN MARTYRS. Section I. — Detection of Alexander Shields' First Falsehood on the Subject of the Drowning of Women, at the close of the 17th Century, ........ 75 Section II. — The first specific allegation of the Drowning of Margaret Lauchlison and Margaret Wilson, traced to another falsehood published by Alexander Shields, . . . . .81 Section III. — How the falsehood of the drowning of the Women at Wigtown, first published in 1690, came to be revived in the 18th Century, by the Collectors of Sufferings for Wodrow's History, . 88 Section IV How the Romance of the drowning of the Women at Wigtown was first concocted in the Parish of Kirkinner, in Galloway, and recorded by its Kirk-Session, . . . .95 Section V. — How the Romance of the Drowning of the Women at Wigtown was expanded into its present dimensions for the first time in the Session-book of the Parish of Penninghame, . . 100 Section VI, — Principal Tulloeh's Theory of Embellishments, . 105 Section VII. — An Alibi proved for the Provost of Wigtown against the Evidence of the Ghost of old Margaret Lauchlison, . .112 Section VIII. — That all the various versions of the Wigtown Romance are manifestly based upon falsehood, contradictory of each other, and incredible in themselves, ..... 117 Section IX. — The Tomb-stones and Epitaphs, . .

Preface

. AVhether two obscure women were or were not executed for high treason in 1685, would be a trifling question to deal with elaborately and systematically, if the case of the AVig town Martyrs went no deeper. But it lies at the root of that cancerous growth upon the History of Scotland, the Mar tyrology of the Covenant. Close research has led me to the conviction, that not a single individual was unjustly put to death, for rebellion, or high treason, in Scotland, by the Governments of the Restoration. Unless fanatical assertion be equivalent to truth and justice, there are no sufficient materials for a Martyrology of Scotland during that period. That which we have from AVodrow is a calumnious tissue of monstrous fables. It has poisoned the History of Scotland to an extent that is now, perhaps, irremediable.

He has misled all our historians of mark, from David Hume to Lord Macaulay, who have blindly followed him, and lazily, or lovingly, submitted to his rubbish, without an attempt at investigation. And thus it is that the national character of Scotland has been defamed by a mock and mythical mar tyrology of the lowest stamp, and her soil desecrated by fanatical monuments, not to commemorate the martyrs, but to perpetuate the calumny. Fountainhall, the AVhig counsel for the gallows-martyrs of the Restoration, would have laughed Wodrow's Martyrology to scorn. That great law yer and judge ever stood in political opposition to Lauderdale VI and Queensberry. Like all political oppositionists, he was sometimes unfair in his record of their acts, and not always wrong in his judgment of their policy.

But had he been Lord Advocate, instead of Sir George Mackenzie, not a single martyr the less would there have been among the people of Scotland. This is abundantly proved by his private journals, which are both voluminous and minute. A kind-hearted man, an exemplary Christian, of unblemished life, and a consistent AA'hig withal, he has not a word to say about the persecutions or cruelties, of the Government he opposed, civil or military. On the contrary, he scorned the false prophets of the Conventicles, who furnished him with those miserable clients, and never speaks of them but with contempt. The excited victims themselves he never, in a single instance, records as unjustly executed, or entitled to the sacred name of martyrs. He has elaborate notes on that sub ject which might have saved the History of England from the puerile pathos of those virulent fables which Lord Macaulay culled, con amore, from Wodrow without further inquiry.

In reference to his own martyrological clients, Fountainhall, among other admirable observations on the subject, says, — " The cause must be very commendable, and justly and clearly founded on the word of God, e'er a man can be esteemed a martyr for suffering in it. Non peena sed causa facit martyrem. And a martyr ought to have a clear cause, and a humble frame and preparation of spirit, and a knowledge of what he dies for." But what would Fountainhall have said of Wodrow's grand Martyrology, which is made up not only of such mock martyrdoms, most falsely told, but of mythical martyrdoms, as fabulous in point of fact, as they are calumnious in spirit ? AVeeded of fable, calumny, and fanatical railing, AA7odrow's two folio volumes would vanish, or resolve into an appendix of public documents that contradict him.

His calumnious legend of the life and death of John Brown, whom he dubs " the Christian Carrier," no longer exists as truth in history. It may suit some still to pretend, that the legal execution, under martial law, of an obstinate outlawed rebel, who had deeply forfeited his life to the laws of his country, who was lurking in arms at the very time to join the foreign invader, and who was carrying treasonable papers, is all one with the unintelligible murder, and by Claverhouse with his own hand, of a peaceable and industrious peasant, walking blamelessly in the sight of God and man. But thanks to the crowning discovery of Claverhouse's own letter, that ridiculous calumny has been utterly extinguished, in the face of Lord Macaulay's vicious adoption of it. No future historian will ever repeat that story as it has been told over and over again for nearly a century and a half.

None can now point, with the finger of truth, to a single act in the whole career of the highhearted hero of Killiecrankie, that gainsays his own noble defence of himself, — " I am as sorry to see a man die, even a Whig, as any of themselves. But when one dies justly, for his own faults, and may save a hundred to fall in the like, I have no scruple." But another AArodrow blotch, corrupting the blood of Scottish history to its heart's core, had spread wider and deeper still. It seems that "Memorials of Dundee" have not quite succeeded in eradicating the Wigtown martyrdom. It may not be abso lutely disproved, pronounces a leading English journal of letters, but the proofs have been " rudely shaken." It has occurred to myself as a positive duty to the intelligent public, not to leave such a question imperfectly illustrated in a voluminous and ex pensive work such as "Memorials of Dundee," (out of which the materials were being already filched by feeble pamphleteers), but to produce the exposition of it in a shape more tangible and complete.

So I now sit down before this last stronghold of the Wodrow martyrology, and hope to leave it also in ruins. The proofs will here be found more thoroughly digested, and more systematically arranged, than could well be done in " Memorials of Dundee." In searching for more light, more has been discovered, and still to the effect of destroying the pet martyrdom of the Kirk. I have paused long enough, and searched deep enough, to justify some confidence that no deeper researches are likely to restore the credit of this calumnious romance. Keen and angry have been the struggles in some quarters to do so. But the result (itself an argument against the truth of the martyrdom) as yet may be stated in three words, — scribbling, nibbling, and quibbling. What sort of a martyrdom is that, which, during the lapse of nearly two centuries, has never been proved ; and, when challenged as a falsehood at the end of that period, is admitted, by its keenest supporters, not to be proved yet, and seemingly to be incapable of proof?

What sort of a tradition, or " general belief," is that, which arose not at the time, and was expressly and positively denied to be fact before 1722, when AVodrow published, and still " denied to be matter of fact," in 1727, when AValker wrote 1 Some may think it both unnecessary and rash to attempt to prove the negative, that these " AVigtown Martyrs " were not drowned. But such is the nature of covenanting calumny, that unless that negative be proved, the Wigtown monument, which, " like a tall bully, lifts its head and lies," will continue to lift its head and lie as loud as ever. With what success that usually difficult task of proving a negative has been accomplished in the following pages, I now leave to the judgment of the Public. MARK NAPIER. 6 Abstslie Place, 10th March 1863. PART FIRST. THE ROMANCE OF THE WIGTOWN MARTYRS PROVED TO BE FALSE. PART FIRST. THE ROMANCE OF THE AVIGTOAVN MARTYRS PROVED TO BE FALSE.

Section I

Lord Macaulay' s version of the Wigtown Martyrdom incredible on the face of it. By way of justifying a calumny he could not prove, and which he condescends to borrow from a sect he despised — that James II. was a monster of inhumanity, and his government of Scot land " Tophet on earth " — Lord Macaulay tells this story in his History of England : — " The eleventh of May (1685) was made remarkable by more than one great crime. On the same day two women, Margaret Maclachlan and Margaret AArilson — the former an aged widow, the latter a maiden of eighteen — suffered death for their religion in AA'igtownshire. They were offered their lives if they would consent to abjure the cause of the insur gent conventiclers, and to attend the Episcopal worship. They refused, and they were sentenced to be drowned.

They were carried to a spot which the Solway overflows twice a-day, and were fastened to stakes fixed in the sand between high and low water-mark. The elder sufferer was placed near to the advancing flood, in the hope that her last agonies might terrify the younger into submission. The sight was dreadful. But the courage of the survivor was sustained by an enthusiasm as lofty as any that is recorded in martyrology. She saw the sea draw nearer and nearer, but gave no sign of alarm. She prayed, and sang verses of psalms, till the waves choked her voice. After she had tasted the bitter ness of death, she was, by a cruel mercy, unbound, and restored to life. When she came to herself, pitying friends and neighbours implored her to yield. ' Dear Margaret, only say, God save the King!' The poor girl, true to her stern theology, gasped out, ' May God save him, if it be God's will.' Her friends crowded round the presiding officer — ' She has said it; indeed, sir, she has said it.' 'Will she take the abjuration?' he demanded. ' Never ! ' she exclaimed, ' I am Christ's, let me go ! ' and the waters closed over her for the last time." — (Hist. vol. iv., p. 77.

Latest edition.) It is now pretty well understood, at least by all who read history for other purposes than mere amusement, that when Lord Macaulay discourses after this fashion, his facts are apt to be fabulous. The truth is, as regards the period of history he is thus professing to illustrate, the mind of this great author, all accomplished and well stored as it was, had become sadly warped on the subject of imaginary cruelties perpetrated, and always upon the weakest, the most innocent, and the most Christian, by the governments of the Restoration. Closing his mind against the light of truth from all incongenial quarters, he delighted to exercise his facile pen in epitomizing his political anathemas with a terseness of invective natural to his domineering talent, and in the current form, and upon such incidental occasions, as might scarcely seem to justify the expectation of an array of proofs, or a frank and accurate dis closure of authorities.

Indeed, he was utterly reckless of his torical proofs when in such a mood. Thus, in his essay on Hallam's History, referring to the commencement of the Restoration, he says : — " The Government wanted a ruffian to carry on the most atrocious system of misgovernment with which any nation was ever cursed; to extirpate Presbyterianism by fire and sword, by the drowning of women, by the frightful torture of the boot ; and they found him among the chiefs of the rebellion, and the subscribers of the Covenant." Of course, this means Lauderdale, who, as all the world knows, passed, by a transition easily accounted for, from his Presbyterian glory as a " prime Covenanter," to his more notorious career as a bloated courtier. But never a woman did Lauderdale drown, whatever other sins he may have to answer for.

AY as the fact really unknown to Lord Macaulay, that the only case ever specifically alleged by the bitterest and most unscrupulous of Covenanting pamphleteers in the very hey-day of the Revolution, of the drowning of any State criminal, male or female, from the restoration of King Charles to the crowning of King AATilliam, is this solitary mythical case of Margaret Lauchlison and Margaret Wilson in 1685 ? Un less that story be true, no woman whatever was executed by drowning during the whole period of the Restoration. And whether true or false, no woman whatever was so disposed of during the administration of Lauderdale, who died in 1682. Then as for Lord Macaulay 's version of this melo-dramatic martyrdom, what reflecting mind could peruse it and not be struck with the total absence of vraisemblance that pervades the whole narrative ?

Had such a story been told by Sir AValter Scott for the purpose of debasing the character of King AVilliam, Lord Macaulay would have been the first to visit it with the most withering scorn. Mark tho evasion of all explicit historical elucidation, or proof, in a question of great historical importance. Could that ad captandum mode of tell ing such a story have any other object than to escape the test of historical investigation ? Still, with all the art of his dic tion, the romance, as he gives it, seems improbable in the highest degree. Under what authority, judicial or executive, could it possibly have happened, that such a scene was enacted, hard by the royal burgh of AVigtown, as if wantonly to excite the feelings, inflame the passions, and strengthen the cause of the most rebellious population in Scotland, at the very time when Argyle's invasion was daily expected in that quarter ?

No such scene had ever occurred in Scotland before. No such scene has ever occurred in Scotland since. Can there be discovered any Commission of Justiciary, or any order of Council in 1685, under which aged and young of the female sex. saintly in their lives, and harmless in their habits, could, by any possibility, have been " sentenced to be drowned" for declining " to attend the Episcopal worship?" And as for .refusing " to abjure the cause of the insurgent Covenanters," what does that mean ? If it mean, obstinately and violently, in the face of a tribunal of justice, and in presence of an audience of the people in a rebellious district, refusing to disown, and to absolve themselves, in terms of the Government test, from being connected with Renwick's anonymous proclamation of war against the State, and his violent incentives to assassinate the advisers and loyal adherents of the Crown, paraded on all the church-doors and market-crosses in the south and west of Scotland (and the Abjuration Oath of 1685 required no more), Lord Macaulay was guilty of suppressio veri in not saying so.

And had he ventured to be historically explicit on the subject, the answer must have met him, that these females, whose mythical fate he so elaborately, but somewhat fantastically narrates, could not have been the para gons he figures, seeing it can be distinctly proved that they were tried and condemned by Lords Commissioners of Jus ticiary, to whom the Privy Council had issued this precise, peremptory, and humane direction, — " But at this time you are not to examine any women but such as have been active in the said courses in a signal manner." To all conversant with the history of Argyle's invasion in 1685, so alarming for the regal Government, and who are well read in the records of the Privy Council of Scotland, it is known that such Royal Commissioners were always placed under the most precise official instructions, strictly defining their duties, both as regards trial and punishment, instructions beyond which they never presumed to act, and could only have done so at their highest peril.

Was there ever any such direction as this, that if an aged matron and a young maiden should happen to be tried and condemned together, " for their religion," as Lord Macaulay has it, that they were to be drowned by this very novel modus operand!: — The old one was to be fastened to a stake driven into the sand of the mak ing tide, nearer the devouring ocean than the stake provided for her youthful partner, "that her last agonies might terrify the younger into submission ? " Was there any instruction or authority whereby venerable Christianity, hallowed by age, tried by long years, was, at the arbitrary fiat of some " presiding officer," to have no measure of mercy allowed, but was destined to enact, after this very peculiar fashion, the part of decoy-duck to " cruel mercy 1" The details of Lord Macaulay 's episode are absolutely incredible, and all the embellishments bear the stamp of the most fantastical invention.

The story runs (to adopt a favourite phrase of his own, certainly not belonging to legitimate history), that the "maiden of eighteen" was not to be so seduced ; that the tide of the terrible Solway came rolling on and " choked her voice " until she " tasted the bitterness of death," upon which she was " unbound and restored to life." What ! with the tide of the Solway rushing over head ? Was she tied to the stake by a slip-knot ? She was restored, however, to life, to speech, and to loyalty, for she " gasped out " a most orthodox, though somewhat elaborate version of God save the King. The " presiding officer," and, pray, who was he? being a glutton in "cruel mercy," was not satisfied, however, and without a vestige of authority to assume that very important function, pressed the Abjuration Oath upon a condemned criminal, dead in the eye of the law, and more than half executed in point of fact !

" ' Never ! ' she exclaimed, ' 1 am Christ's, let me go!' and the waters closed over her for the last time." Did Lord Macaulay really be lieve this nonsense himself? By this time, unless the tide stood still, the stake must have been under water. How was this virgin sacrifice really consummated ? Was she tied to the stake again, or did " cruel mercy " just cast her neck-and-crop into the water to sink or swim ? On the part of History proper ; common sense demands some explicit and intelligible statement as to the practical conclusion of this very extraordinary ope ration. We are not trifling : these are not carping or silly questions. AVe do not, indeed, profess to treat this sensation romance with the slightest respect. We have learnt to hold it in the greatest contempt. But here is a fair cross-examination of a highly responsible historian, under which, we suspect, Lord Macaulay would have found himself compelled to remain absolutely silent.

But let us now confront him with his sole. authority, which he only vouchsafes to give, at the foot of his page, in this very curt form — " Wodrow, III., ix., 6."

Section II

Wodrow's version of the Wigtown Martyrdom ignored by Lord Macaulay in its most essential circumstances, tuhile professing to found upon it. The passage in Wodrow's " History of the Sufferings of the Church of Scotland," referred to by Lord Macaulay, occurs under this violent ad captandum title, which Wodrow had copied from Alexander Shield's " Hind Let Loose." " Of the murders in the fields ; the barbarous drowning of women within the sea-mark ; the murder of Polmadie and others, this 1685." AVodrow's sole illustration, indeed the only example adduced by any chronicler whatever, from that time to this, of the " drowning of women," during the whole reigns of the Restoration, we must here give entire, in the very words of the martyrologist : — " Upon the 11th of May (1685), we meet with the barbarous and wicked execution of two excellent women near Wigtown, Margaret M'Lauchlane and Margaret Wilson.

History scarce affords a parallel to this in all its circumstances ; and therefore I shall give it at the greater length ; and the rather, because the advocates for the cruelty of this period, and our Jacobites, have the impudence some of them to deny, and others to extenuate, this matter of fact, which can be fully evinced by many living witnesses. And I shall mostly give my narrative of it, from an account I have from the forementioned Mr Rowan, now with the Lord, late minister of Penninghame, where Margaret Wilson tived, who was at pains to have its circumstances fully vouched by witnesses, whose attes tations are in my hands -s and I shall add, to make the account more full, the sufferings of the said Margaret's relations, though not unto death, as coming in natively enough here, and what will hand me in to what I have most in view.

" Gilbert AArilson, father to the said Margaret, lived in Glenvernoch, belonging to the laird of Castlestewart, in the parish of Penninghame, and shire of Wigtown, and was every way conform to Episcopacy, and his wife without anything to be objected against her as to her regularity. They were in good circumstances as to the world, and had a great stock upon good ground, and therefore were the fitter prey for the persecutors, 1 The nature of Mr Rowan's communication to AArodrow, and the dis ingenuousness of the latter in pretending to possess " attestations by witnesses" of the martyrdom in question, will appear in the sequel. if they could reach them. Their children, to be sure, not from their education, but a better principle, would by no means conform, or hear the Episcopal incumbent. This was a good handle to the persecutors ; so they were searched for, but fled to the hills, bogs, and caves, though they were yet scarce of the age that made them obnoxious to the law.

Mean while their parents are charged, at their highest peril, not to harbour them, supply them, or speak to them, or see them, without informing against them, that they might be taken ; and their father was fined for his children's alleged irregularities and opinions, which he had no share in ! and harassed by frequent quarterings of the soldiers, sometimes a hundred of them upon him at once, who lived at discretion upon anything in the house or field belonging to him. " Those troubles continuing upon him for some years together, with his attendance upon courts at Wigtown, almost once a week, thirteen miles distant from his house, his going lo Edinburgh, and other harassings, brought him under exceeding great losses. At a modest calculation they were above five thousand merks ; and all for no action or principle of his own, for he was entirely conformist.

He died some six or eight years ago in great poverty, though one of the most substantial countrymen in that county. And his wife (1711) lives, a very aged widow, upon the charity of friends. His son, Thomas AVilson, a youth of sixteen yeais of age this February 1685, was forced to the mountains, and continued wandering till the Revolution, at which time he went to the army, and bore arms under King William in Flanders, and after that in the Castle of Edin burgh. He never had a farthing from his parents to enter that ground which he possessed ; but having got together somewhat by his own industry, lives now in his father's room, and is ready to attest all I am writing. " It is Gilbert's two daughters who fell into the hands of the perse cutors — Margaret AVilson, of eighteen years of age, and Agnes Wilson, a child not thirteen years — that have led me to this account.

Agnes, the youngest, was condemned with her sister by those merciless judges ; but her father obtained a liberation from prison, under a bond of a hundred pounds sterling, to present her when called. However, Gilbert had to go to Edinburgh before she was let out ; but to all onlookers, and posterity, it will remain an unaccountable thing, to sentence a child of thirteen years to death, for not hearing, and not swearing.' " In the beginning of this year (1685), those two sisters were obliged to abscond, and wander through Carrick, Galloway, and Nithsdale, with their brothers and some others. After the universal severities slackened a little at King Charles's death, the two sisters ventured to go to Wigtown to see some of their suffering acquaintances there, particularly Margaret APLauchlan, of whom just now.

AVhen they came to Wigtown, there was an acquaintance of theirs, Patrick Stewart, whom they took to be a 1 Wodrow here assumes, as an unquestionable fact, that which coidd not possibly have occurred, which he makes no attempt to prove, and then calls it " an unaccountable thing!" Of this afterwards. friend and wellwisher; but he was really not so, and betrayed them. Being in their company, and seeking an occasion against them, he pro posed drinking the King's health. This they modestly declined; upon which he went out, informed against them, and brought in a party of soldiers, and seized them. As if they had been great malefactors, they were put in the thieves' hole ; and after they had been there some time, they were removed to the prison where Margaret M^Lauchlan was, whom I come next to give some account of.

" This woman was about sixty-three years of age, relict of John Mul ligen, carpenter, a tenant in the parish of Kirkinner, in the shire of Gal loway, in the farm of Drumjargan, belonging to Colonel Vans of Barn barroch. She was a countrywoman of more than ordinary knowledge, discretion, and prudence, and, for many years, of singular piety and devo tion. She would take none of the oaths now pressed upon women as well as men.1 Neither would she desist from the duties she took to be incum bent upon her, hearing Presbyterian ministers when Providence gave opportunity, and joining with her Christian friends aud acquaintances in prayer, and supplying her relations and friends when in straights, though persecuted. It is a jest to suppose her guilty of rising in arms and rebellion, though indeed it was a part of her indictment, which she got in common form now used.

For those great crimes, and no other, she was seized some while ago, upon the Lord's-day, wdien at family ivorship in her own house, which was now an ordinary season for apprehending honest folk. She was imprisoned, after she had suffered much in her goods and crop before she was apprehended. In prison she was very roughly dealt with, and had neither fire, nor bed to lie upon, and had very little to live upon. " Jointly with Margaret M'Lauchlan, or M'Lauchlison, these two young sisters, after many methods were taken to corrupt them, and make them swear the oath now imposed,2 which they steadily refused, were brought to their trial before the Laird of Lagg, Colonel David Graham, sheriff, Major Windram, and Provost Cultrain, who gave all the three an indictment for rebellion, Bothwell Bridge, Ayrds-moss, and being at twenty field conventicles.