Scotland under Cromwell
Scotland was now still more helpless than she had been after the battle of Dunbar. Her last army had been destroyed at Worcester; her best general had been taken prisoner;…
From: 1651 C.E. To: 1660 C.E.
Location: Scotland
Note: This article has been excerpted from a larger work in the public domain and shared here due to its historical value. It may contain outdated ideas and language that do not reflect TOTA’s opinions and beliefs.
From A Short History of Scotland by Peter Hume Brown, 1908.
Scotland under Cromwell
Scotland was now still more helpless than she had been after the battle of Dunbar. Her last army had been destroyed at Worcester; her best general had been taken prisoner; and the king was gone. What made things still worse was, that the three parties in the country—the Royalists, the Resolutioners, and the Protesters—could never agree to combine for the defence of their country. There never was a time, therefore, when Scotland could be more easily conquered than now.
And Cromwell was determined to subdue Scotland and make it part of England, as so many English kings had tried to do and failed. When he marched after Charles to Worcester, he left behind him a part of his army under the command of one of his best generals, General Monk. Monk at once set about subduing the country, Highlands and Lowlands. As there was no Scottish army to prevent him, he had very little difficulty in taking town after town, and placing English garrisons in them. The only town that offered him any resistance was Dundee; but there was such a massacre of the inhabitants after it was taken that no other town dared to oppose him.
It was in August of the year 1651 that Cromwell had marched after Charles, and by the end of that year Monk had subdued the whole country from the Tweed to the Pentland Firth. So the English under Cromwell had done what no king of England had succeeded in doing. Edward I., indeed, had conquered Scotland; but he held it only for a short time, whereas the English under Cromwell held it for nine years.
Oliver Cromwell. Image from book, by P. Hume Brown.
To show that Scotland was no longer an independent kingdom, Monk did exactly what Edward I. had done. Edward had carried off the Stone of Destiny on which the kings of Scots had been crowned, as well as the Holy Cross of St Margaret and all the public records. So Monk sent off to England the Chair of State in which the Scottish kings had sat, the robes they had worn, and all the documents which showed that Scotland had been a free kingdom. Monk was also very anxious to get hold of the "Honours of Scotland," that is, the crown, sceptre, and sword of state; but, owing to the boldness and cleverness of a woman, he was disappointed.
After the battle of Dunbar the Honours had been placed for safety in the Castle of Dunnottar, a very strong castle on the coast of Kincardineshire. The English knew that they were there, and laid siege to the castle. Fearing that the stronghold would be taken, Mr Granger, a minister in the neighbourhood, devised a plan for getting them out safely. First he spread a report that they had been taken abroad. Then he got his wife to ask leave of the English general to enter the castle to bring out some bundles of lint. The general granted permission, and Mrs Granger brought out the Honours covered up with the lint. At night they were safely buried under the pulpit of her husband's church. At this day the Honours, which Mrs Granger so cleverly rescued, may be seen in the Castle of Edinburgh.
Scotland having now been conquered, it had next to be made part of England, for this was the plan of Cromwell and the Independents. How was that to be done? As we know, there was no king in England. After the death of Charles I. in 1649, what was called the Commonwealth was set up; and this government lasted till the year 1653, when Cromwell was made the chief person in the country, with the title not of King but of Protector. So it was first under the Commonwealth and afterwards under the Protectorate that Scotland was ruled by the English for nine years.
The first thing done by the Commonwealth was to send down Commissioners to Scotland, who were to see that the laws were obeyed throughout the whole country. And the Scottish people, though they hated the English, admitted that the laws were never better obeyed than under these Commissioners. Everyone got justice, and the country was so completely freed from robbers that it was said that a man with a hundred pounds in his pocket might ride through all Scotland with only a switch in his hand, and no one would dare to touch him.
This had never been the case before in Scotland, and other new things besides were now seen. For example, everyone was allowed to worship as he pleased, which had not been the case either under the Covenanters or under the kings. General Assemblies, however, were not permitted to meet, because the Protesters and the Resolutioners quarrelled so much that they disturbed the peace of the country.
Another thing done both by the Commonwealth and the Protectorate was to make one Parliament for Scotland, England, and Ireland, just as there is now. Scotland was to send thirty members to this United Parliament, and she did send twenty-one members. But the United Parliament pleased neither the Scots nor the English, because the time had not yet come when the two peoples were prepared to unite their Parliaments as they afterwards did.
How was it that the Scottish people did not rise against their English conquerors as they had done in the days of Wallace and Bruce? One reason, of course, was that they were so divided among themselves that they could not unite against their common enemy. Another reason was that there were English soldiers in all the chief towns, and that strong forts had been built at Leith, Perth, Inverness, Inverlochy, and Ayr. If any body of Scots had attempted to rise in rebellion, therefore, English soldiers from the towns and forts would have fallen upon them at once.
There was, indeed, one attempt made to drive out the English. In the Highlands, the Earl of Glencairn and others raised a number of the clansmen to fight for Charles, but the leaders quarrelled so much among themselves that they were not able to do great things. Charles, however, sent General Middleton, of whom we shall hear again, to command the Royalist forces. But Middleton had not been long in the country before one of Monk's officers completely defeated him at Dalnaspidal, at the head of Loch Garry, and after that defeat there was peace all the time the English remained in Scotland.
At last the time came when the Scots got rid of the English, though not by conquering them. Oliver Cromwell died in the year 1658, and his son Richard was made Protector in his place. But Richard was not a great man, and could not rule the country as his father had done. The people of England also began to be discontented with the way they were being governed, and to long for their lawful king. When General Monk saw this, he marched from Scotland to London at the head of his army, and then declared that the time had come for Charles II. to be restored to his throne. Soon the 25th of May, 1660, Charles landed at Dover, and became really king of Great Britain and Ireland, as his father and grandfather had been before him.
In this way, therefore, Scotland was freed from the English usurpers, as they were called, and almost every Scotsman was glad to see the last of them. They had, indeed, ruled more justly than any of the Scottish kings, and in many ways the country was more prosperous under them than it had ever been. But still they were invaders and had no right to govern Scotland. The Covenanters disliked them because they were Independents and not Presbyterians, and the Royalists disliked them quite as much because they kept the lawful king from his throne. Yet a time was coming when many people in Scotland were to look back with regret to the days of Oliver Cromwell.
Brown, Peter Hume. A Short History of Scotland. Oliver and Boyd, 1908.
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