Bannockburn. Peter Reese

HAD GOOD REASON to believe that few other aspirants to the Scottish crown had ever faced so many powerful and implacable enemies. Consequently, during the six weeks between 10 February 1306 when he killed John Comyn and his coronation at Scone, his energy was never more marked. This was essential for a man whom the English maintained had murdered Comyn because he would not join Bruce in fighting King Edward,¹ someone with the effrontery to declare himself ruler of a country whose strongholds were all garrisoned by the English and the large majority of whose nobles supported the Comyns. As if this were not enough his sacrilegious act of murder had put him at odds with the papacy and much of the Scottish church. However tenuous his hold, Bruce’s declared heritage must also have seemed unpromising, for middle Scotland had been laid waste from ten years of war. In comparison, although Edward I’s Scottish campaigns had stretched England’s finances to breaking point, it remained a far more powerful and influential country than its northern neighbour.

      In these six weeks Bruce set out to strengthen his base in southwest Scotland with his family’s estates at Carrick and Annandale as its core. These were opposite the western approaches from Ulster with whom the Bruces had traditional ties and from where they could bring reinforcements. The MacDonalds of the Western Isles were Bruce’s allies and their galleys could either bring him more men from the Outer Isles or if everything failed, place him safely on one of the remote islands or in Ulster. Along with his followers Bruce succeeded in obtaining a string of castles among which were Ayr on the west coast, Dumfries, Dalswinton and Tibbers in Galloway, and the trio Inverkip, Rothesay and Dunaverty that commanded the Firth of Clyde. These he prudently stocked with provisions and supplies. In Glasgow Bruce ordered all men of military age to be on twenty-four hours notice of mobilisation as he sent a formal request to Edward I that he should be recognised as king of Scotland. Unsurprisingly, Edward replied by furiously demanding him to return the castles he had seized, to which Bruce responded that until Edward acknowledged him as king he ‘would defend himself with the longest stick he had’.²

      His next step was to adopt the revered mantle of kingship. Here Bruce received notable assistance from the one-time guardian of Scotland and staunchly nationalist Bishop of Glasgow, Robert Wishart, who after absolving him for his crime provided vestments for his coronation together with a royal banner carrying the lion and scarlet lilies that Wishart had long been saving for such an occasion. As yet there was no crown and urgent orders had to be sent out to make up the circlet of gold to be placed on Bruce’s head.³

      With so many enemies it was crucial that Bruce’s coronation should be as dignified and heavily supported as possible. In the event the Scottish church was well represented not only by Robert Wishart but by Scotland’s two other senior bishops, William Lamberton of St Andrews and David of Moray, while the bishops of Dunkeld and Brechin were probably in attendance, together with various abbots and other senior clergy. Foremost among the non-clerics were the four earls sympathetic to Bruce, Atholl, Lennox, Menteith and Mar, as well as Bruce’s own kin. A hundred lesser nobles attended, including Robert Boyd, Reginald Crawford, Neil Campbell and the teenage James Douglas, disinherited by Edward from the Douglas estates, who was to become Bruce’s foremost commander. As a ward of the English court the young Earl of Fife was unable to perform his hereditary office of crowning the new king but his aunt Isabel, married to the Earl of Buchan, who supported Edward I, seized her husband’s best horses and rode to Scone to act on her nephew’s behalf. She arrived a day late but on 25 March, forty-eight hours after the first inauguration placed the coronet upon Bruce’s head in a second ceremony. Scotland might have a fighting king again but he was as yet so weak militarily that when his wife Elizabeth heard the news of his coronation she exclaimed ‘Alas we are but King and Queen of the May’.

      The chances of her fears being realised appeared all too likely when by 5 April the English king appointed Aymer de Valence, his own half-cousin and the Red Comyn’s brother-in-law, as special lieutenant in Scotland, and armed him with the widest powers. Valence was authorised to ride under the dragon banner which released him from the few restraints on warfare at this time; knights supporting Bruce lost their privileges of ransom and were to be regarded as outlaws: a terrible end awaited any of Bruce’s followers, or anyone found sheltering them. By June 1306 Valence had captured bishops Lamberton and Wishart who were only saved from hanging by their cloth, although this did not prevent them being despatched to England in chains. By 18 June Valence reached Perth, while Bruce was in the northeast raising support both from the Atholl and Mar estates and from among the followers of Bishop Moray. By such means Bruce managed to collect a sizeable military force of some 4500 men, although it was considerably smaller than Valence’s and lacked his armoured cavalry.

      Bruce moved his men across to Perth where, no doubt exhilarated by all he had achieved so far, he showed a degree of over-confidence about his chances of defeating Valence, a man whom he probably did not respect highly as a commander. In the chivalric tradition Bruce rode to Perth’s city gates and challenged Valence either to come out and fight or to surrender, to which Valence replied that as it was late afternoon it was impossible to fight the same day, but that on the following morning he would accept the offer.⁴ Bruce took him at his word and withdrew to Methven some six miles away to bivouac his troops for the night, neglecting in his confidence to set out pickets – an omission he came to regret. Working on the unprincipled advice given him by veteran Scottish commander, Ingram Umfraville, who now pledged himself to the English, Valence fell on Bruce’s men during the night of 18/19 June when they were either sleeping or dispersed. Bruce’s force was destroyed, although he and a group of knights managed to escape. Many of his bravest and devoted supporters were captured and under Edward’s orders sixteen were executed without trial, of whom two were drawn and quartered. Of the senior men only Thomas Randolph, a close friend of Valence, was pardoned on condition he promised to fight for the English. This was not all: at the same time the Prince of Wales moved north from Carlisle, subjecting the southwest lowlands to a reign of terror that cowed the inhabitants in an area where Bruce might normally have expected considerable support. In less than three months as king, Bruce’s army had been wiped out and many of his most notable followers killed or scattered. Yet worse was to come.

      In early July 1306 Bruce sought refuge in Drumalban, the mountainous country between Perthshire and Argyll but, at a place near Tyndrum, Bruce’s remaining detachment was again defeated, this time by the Comyn supporter, John MacDougall of Argyll. At this he sent off his womenfolk, including the queen and his daughter Marjorie, on the party’s few remaining horses through the mountains towards Kildrummy Castle on Donside. Bruce appointed the Earl of Atholl, Neil Bruce (his brother), Alexander Lindsay and Robert Boyd as escorts to the party but on their way they learned the English were bringing up siege engines to invest the castle and decided therefore to move further north in the hope of taking ship to Orkney. It appeared to be a sensible decision for, although Kildrummy was an immensely strong fortress capable of withstanding a protracted siege, in early September 1306 the castle’s blacksmith, Osborne, set fire to the grain store in its main hall, thus guaranteeing its early surrender. For his treachery the English subsequently rewarded him in gold – molten gold which was poured down his throat⁵ – but with the fall of the castle Neil Bruce, Robert’s younger brother was captured to be subsequently hanged and beheaded.

      However, the women and their escorts fared little better, for they were captured at Tain on the Dornoch Firth while they were staying at St Duthac’s shrine. At this time it must have seemed there was no escaping the English king for the Earl of Ross, who favoured the Comyns, broke the rules of sanctuary when he took them and handed them over to Valence.⁶ Most of the men were hanged and beheaded at Berwick while the women were sent south to Edward I under escort. There they met his full anger and the Countess of Buchan and Bruce’s sister, Mary, were confined in wooden cages jutting from the battlements of Berwick and Roxburgh castles, their only concession being the use of privies within the walls.⁷ There they were to stay in solitary confinement for the next four years. A similar cage was prepared at the Tower of London for Bruce’s twelve-year-old daughter, Marjorie, but the order was revoked and she was sent to a nunnery. Christina Bruce, whose husband Christopher Seton was hanged, drawn and quartered after being captured, was similarly lodged in a convent and Queen Elizabeth, wife of Robert Bruce but also daughter of Edward’s powerful supporter the Earl of Ulster, was placed under house arrest in spartan conditions