Chapter I: Front Matter

BORDER RAIDS AND REIVERS.

BORDER RAIDS
AND
REIVERS

BY
ROBERT BORLAND

_MINISTER OF YARROW_

DALBEATTIE: THOMAS FRASER.
MDCCCXCVIII.

PRINTED AT THE COURIER AND HERALD OFFICES,
DUMFRIES,
FOR
THOMAS FRASER, DALBEATTIE.

CONTENTS.

PREFACE xv.

I.

THE AULD ENEMY.
PAGE.

Extent of Border reiving--Plunder and reprisal--All classes implicated--Double dose of original sin--Victims of an evil fate--Invasions--Threatened annexation of Scotland--Edward's twofold policy--Sacking of Berwick--Feeling of hostility produced--Edward visits Scone and carries off Scottish Sceptre and Crown--Douglas and Edward Bruce-- Borderers animated by a spirit of revenge 1-14

II.

PERCY'S PENNON.

Battle of Otterburn--Chief combatants--How the encounter was brought about--Destruction of the Abbeys--Meeting of the Scots at Aberdeen--Scottish army assembles at Yetholm-- Method of attack determined upon--Earl Douglas marches through Northumberland--Ravages Durham--Returns to Newcastle--Hotspur and Douglas--Otterburn--Preparations for battle--The English assault--The Douglas slain--Hotspur taken prisoner--Humanity of Borderers 15-32

III.

POOR AND LAWLESS.

Condition of Scotland--Ancient monasteries--Description of country by AEneas Sylvius--Ignorance of the people--Laws cannot be enforced--The Barons supreme--Law against harbouring thieves--Every man's hand against his neighbour-- Pledges demanded--Banished north of the Forth--Scottish Borderers forbidden to marry daughters of "broken men" in England--No respect paid to the law--Execrable murders committed--Without religion--Hand-fasting 33-54

IV.

RAIDS AND FORAYS.

Invasions constantly occurring--Many lives sacrificed--How the reivers conducted their expeditions--Leslie's account-- Tracked by bloodhounds--Froissart's description of Borderers--Invasion by Earl of Hertford--Raid by Sir Ralph Eure--Battle of Ancrum Moor--Lord Dacre's devastations-- Borderers retaliate--Horrid cruelties practised--Raid of the Reidswire--Indignation of English Queen--Morton's concessions 55-80

V.

WARDENS OF THE MARCHES.

Generally officers of high rank--Scottish King limited in his choice--Wardens invested with arbitrary powers--Bonds of alliance--Of little or no value--Ignored when convenient--Wardens well remunerated--Duties pertaining to the office 81-96

VI.

THE DAY OF TRUCE.

Arrangements for dealing with offenders--Of a primitive character--Prisoners could not be detained in custody--Often took "leg-bail"--Day of Truce every month--Date and place made known by proclamation--The meeting of the Wardens-- Regulations for conduct of business--Administering the oath--Three ways of trying cases--Bogus bills--Value of goods--Bills "fouled" or "cleared"--The hot-trod-- Baughling--Lord Russell shot--Foster's explanations 97-115

VII.

THE DEADLY FEUD.

Origin of the expression--Feuds of everyday occurrence-- Occasioned by trifling circumstances--Inherited--Made the administration of the law difficult--Feud betwixt the Kers and Scotts--How occasioned--The Maxwells and Johnstones--A disastrous feud--Battle of Dryfe Sands--Murder of Johnstone-- Lord Maxwell imprisoned--Returns to the Borders--Betrayed by Earl of Caithness--Beheaded in Edinburgh--Ker of Cessford slain--Pursuit of his murderers--How feuds staunched--Bonds of Assurance--Marriage--Pilgrimage--Assythment 116-135

VIII.

THE THIEVES DAUNTONED.

The "Family Tree"--Man's first right--The King connives at Border reiving--The Wardens often indifferent--The King's visit to Dumfries--Tytler's account of what transpired--The Turnbulls of Rule Water punished--The Earl of Mar in Hawick--Lack of trees and halters--Queen Mary at Jedburgh-- The Earl of Bothwell--John Elliot of Park--The Queen visits Hermitage--Struck down with fever--The suppression of Liddesdale--Buccleuch and Ferniherst--Mangerton destroyed-- The whole district given to the flames--Geordie Bourne-- Found guilty of March treason--Executed--Milder measures-- The Tower of Netherby--Cary's success 136-154

IX.

LIDDESDALE LIMMERS.

Border keeps and peels--Description of them--Hermitage-- Lord Soulis--Nine-stane-rig--Black Knight of Liddesdale-- Ramsay of Dalhousie starved to death--Armstrongs and Elliots--Maitland's "Complaynt"--Took everything that came to hand--The clan system--Names of Border clans-- To-names--Debateable land--The Scotch dyke--Cary's raid-- Driven to bay 155-180

X.

AFTER THE HUNTING.

James V.--Border barons put in ward--Sets out for the Borders--Hunts in Meggat--Eighteen score of deer slain-- Cockburn of Henderland--Border Widow's Lament--Adam Scott, "King of Thieves"--Johnie Armstrong--The loving letter-- Basely betrayed--Pitscottie's account--Maxwell's complicity--Ballad--_Blackmeal_--Increase of Border lawlessness 181-200

XI.

THE CORBIE'S NEST.

General characteristics of Border reivers--Kinmount Willie--Descendant of laird of Gilnockie--Encouraged to commit depredations on English border--Present at March meeting at Dayholm--Captured by Salkeld on his way home--Imprisoned in Carlisle--Violation of Border law--The bold Buccleuch determines to effect his rescue-- Arrangements made at a horse race at Langholm--Meeting at Tower of Morton--Marches on Carlisle--Breaks into the Castle--Carries off the prisoner--Relieves him of his irons--Names of principal assistants--Scrope indignant-- Addresses the Privy Council--Buccleuch on his defence-- Elizabeth demands his surrender--James complies 201-219

XII.

FLAGELLUM DEI.

International complications--The Queen difficult to pacify--Her letter to James--Scrope invades Liddesdale-- His conduct defended--Buccleuch retaliates--Invades Tynedale--Account of his depredations--_Flagellum Dei_-- Supported by King and Council--Elizabeth peremptorily demands his surrender--Places himself as a prisoner in the hands of Sir William Bowes--The Governor of Berwick afraid to undertake his safe custody--Surrender of Sir Robert Ker--Lives with Sir Robert Cary on terms of intimacy and friendship--Buccleuch returns to Liddesdale-- Adopts a new policy--Incurs the displeasure of the reivers--Inaugurates a new era in Border history--Appears before the Queen 220-236