Post by Waverley on Jun 22, 2008 19:16:11 GMT 1
The army awoke and began to cook breakfast. It was discovered that Lord Linton had left in the night. By a strange irony, 13 September was the anniversary of Aberdeen. In Paris Queen Henrietta Maria is said to have been singing a 'Te Deum' for the victory which heaven had vouchsafed her husband's arms at Kilsyth. Shortly before first light Leslie closed in for the kill. He split his army into two. The main force, led by himself, headed up the left bank of the Ettrick under cover of the dense mist, while 2,000 dragoons under Middleton, guided, according to tradition, by a local Covenanter, crossed the water and, approaching the Selkirk road by way of Will's Nick, circled round behind the camp to seal the trap shut. Half an hour after dawn, Leslie launched his thunderbolt. Montrose was eating a breakfast of boiled sheep's head" when his scoutmaster, Captain Blackadder, burst in with the news that the entire Covenant army was less than half a mile away and coming fast. Simultaneously a ragged fusilade of musket shots announced that the Royalist vedettes were being driven in. Rushing out into the street, Montrose threw himself onto the first horse he saw and galloped furiously down the hill towards the camp, his officers following as best they could. But even as he reached the stream Leslie's bugles were sounding the charge and the advancing Covenant squadrons threatened to cut him off from the main body of his army. On Philiphaugh everything was in complete confusion. Most of the Royalist cavalrymen were still in Selkirk and separated from their horses which had been turned loose to graze in the meadow and neighbouring fields. As a result they could not be brought into action at all. The Douglas levies fled at the first shot, and, making for the woods, most got safe away. But with their flight the Irishes had no chance. Leslie's cavalry were the cream of the Scottish army,t4 heavy cuirassiers encased in steel, who charged co'nfident in numbers and superior discipline and with the advantage of surprise. Twice O'Cahan's Irish counter-attacked and momentarily checked the advance, but overwhelmed by odds of almost ten to one they were driven back into the trenches and beset on all sides. Here and there a few isolated groups who had been separated from the rest fought their way out and reached the safety of the woods, but the fate of the rest was sealed by the arrival of Middleton and his 2,000 dragoons. To the right of the shattered line, Montrose rallied 150 horsemen around him and hurled himself in the path of Leslie's squadrons. They took the full brunt of the Covenanters' charge, checked it and, regrouping, tried hopelessly to fight their way through to the beleagured Irish. Montrose led them like a man demented. For him, who had never experienced it before, defeat came hard, and seeing in his disintegrating army the ruin of everything that he had striven for, he now seemed intent only on finding an honourable death on the battlefield. His small band was soon reduced to less than 50 cavaliers, but with these he repeatedly charged the enemy, and all would probably have died at the last had not the Douglas, with Sir Thomas Dalziel and others of his officers, finally persuaded him to leave the field while it was still possible. Insistently they argued that Philiphaugh was not necessarily the end. The troops lost were only a fraction of the army which he had so often led to victory. The clansmen, the Gordons and the bulk of the Ulstermen were still loose in Scotland and would fight again with him to lead them. But if the Captain-General were killed, the royal cause was down for ever. Flight now was no disgrace. They implored him with tears, wrung from them by deep affection, by the memory of his past achievements, for the sake of his friends, his house, his sweet wife and children, for the King, country, and church, to have a care for his life. Next to God, he was their only hope; with him they must live or die."
Out of the army of 2,000 that had been surprised at Philiphaugh, some 500 were left who would still fight, and as many of the Douglas levies had escaped before the battle began. In the strictly military sense some honour too remained since neither of the two royal standards had fallen to the enemy. (Indeed, it was a strange coincidence at Philiphaugh that the victor lost more standards than the vanquished. The infantry standard was saved by an Irish soldier who tore the cloth from its pole and wrapped it round his body. He fought his way out of the press and next day brought it to Montrose, who made him one of his life guard and appointed him to carry it thereafter.
But at Philiphaugh, O'Cahan and 500 of his Irishes had been left to die and their fate would haunt him hereafter. Surrounded, and with no hope of rescue, the Irishes defended the breastworks for an hour until over half their number were dead, and finally, on being offered quarter, the army adjutant, Stewart, as the senior surviving officer, surrendered to Leslie. According to Covenant estimates," 1,000 died at Philiphaugh, but not more than 500 of these could have been soldiers under arms. Some 200 camp followers, cooks and house boys were slaughtered. The rest were women and children who had followed the Irish. Much has been said about the brutality of Alastair's gaels at Aberdeen. It was now the turn of the Covenant troops to show what they could do: With the whole baggage and stuff, which was exceeding rich, there remained now but boys, cooks, and a rabble of rascals, and women with their children in their arms, all those without commiseration were cut in pieces; whereof there were 300 women, that being natives of Ireland, were the married wives of the Irishes;
There were many big with child, yet none of them were spared, but all were cut in pieces with such savage and inhuman cruelty. . . . For they ripped up the bellies of the women with their swords, till the fruit of their womb-some in the embryo, some perfectly formed, some 'crouling' for life, and some ready for birth, fell down upon the ground, weltering in the gory blood of their mangled mothers
Eighty more women and children who escaped the initial massacre were later rounded up by the local people and taken to Linlithgow, where they were thrown from the bridge into the River Avon. Those who survived the fifty-foot drop and tried to reach the bank were spitted or pushed back into the deep water by lines of pikemen until all were drowned." The countryfolk around Selkirk murdered dozens more. The surviving Irish soldiers were taken to Newark Castle and placed under guard until their fate should be determined. David Leslie was a professional soldier and not accustomed to murdering unarmed men in cold blood, but the Kirk triumphant was set on a tour of vengeance, and the ministers were 'rowping like ravens'.
Quarter, they argued, had been offered to Stewart alone and did not include the rank and file. By showing clemency towards prisoners, Leslie offended the Almighty, for had not Samuel so rebuked Saul for sparing the Kine of the Amalekites? 'What meaneth the bleating of sheep in my ears and the lowing of oxen which I hear?' -and they pointed at the waiting captives and howled for blood. Leslie succumbed (as he would do many times thereafter) and the Irishes were taken out to be shot in rows and their bodies thrown into a mass grave which came to be known as 'Slain-Man's-Lee'. O'Cahan and McLachlan, as officers of rank, were taken to Edinburgh and hanged without trial from the south wall of the castle. Only Stewart, seeing that his own execution would follow- promise of quarter or no-managed to escape and subsequently rejoined Montrose. It had been a feature of the Civil War in England that no commander had ever descended to such terrible extremes. In Scotland, Montrose's clansmen had slain thousands in hot blood and during the immediate pursuit, but the mass killing of unarmed prisoners had never been counted among their virtues. Leslie had set an awful precedent, and in years to come, when the Covenanters themselves had to endure the so-caned 'Killing Times', men would remember the quality of mercy which had been extended by the brethren.
Out of the army of 2,000 that had been surprised at Philiphaugh, some 500 were left who would still fight, and as many of the Douglas levies had escaped before the battle began. In the strictly military sense some honour too remained since neither of the two royal standards had fallen to the enemy. (Indeed, it was a strange coincidence at Philiphaugh that the victor lost more standards than the vanquished. The infantry standard was saved by an Irish soldier who tore the cloth from its pole and wrapped it round his body. He fought his way out of the press and next day brought it to Montrose, who made him one of his life guard and appointed him to carry it thereafter.
But at Philiphaugh, O'Cahan and 500 of his Irishes had been left to die and their fate would haunt him hereafter. Surrounded, and with no hope of rescue, the Irishes defended the breastworks for an hour until over half their number were dead, and finally, on being offered quarter, the army adjutant, Stewart, as the senior surviving officer, surrendered to Leslie. According to Covenant estimates," 1,000 died at Philiphaugh, but not more than 500 of these could have been soldiers under arms. Some 200 camp followers, cooks and house boys were slaughtered. The rest were women and children who had followed the Irish. Much has been said about the brutality of Alastair's gaels at Aberdeen. It was now the turn of the Covenant troops to show what they could do: With the whole baggage and stuff, which was exceeding rich, there remained now but boys, cooks, and a rabble of rascals, and women with their children in their arms, all those without commiseration were cut in pieces; whereof there were 300 women, that being natives of Ireland, were the married wives of the Irishes;
There were many big with child, yet none of them were spared, but all were cut in pieces with such savage and inhuman cruelty. . . . For they ripped up the bellies of the women with their swords, till the fruit of their womb-some in the embryo, some perfectly formed, some 'crouling' for life, and some ready for birth, fell down upon the ground, weltering in the gory blood of their mangled mothers
Eighty more women and children who escaped the initial massacre were later rounded up by the local people and taken to Linlithgow, where they were thrown from the bridge into the River Avon. Those who survived the fifty-foot drop and tried to reach the bank were spitted or pushed back into the deep water by lines of pikemen until all were drowned." The countryfolk around Selkirk murdered dozens more. The surviving Irish soldiers were taken to Newark Castle and placed under guard until their fate should be determined. David Leslie was a professional soldier and not accustomed to murdering unarmed men in cold blood, but the Kirk triumphant was set on a tour of vengeance, and the ministers were 'rowping like ravens'.
Quarter, they argued, had been offered to Stewart alone and did not include the rank and file. By showing clemency towards prisoners, Leslie offended the Almighty, for had not Samuel so rebuked Saul for sparing the Kine of the Amalekites? 'What meaneth the bleating of sheep in my ears and the lowing of oxen which I hear?' -and they pointed at the waiting captives and howled for blood. Leslie succumbed (as he would do many times thereafter) and the Irishes were taken out to be shot in rows and their bodies thrown into a mass grave which came to be known as 'Slain-Man's-Lee'. O'Cahan and McLachlan, as officers of rank, were taken to Edinburgh and hanged without trial from the south wall of the castle. Only Stewart, seeing that his own execution would follow- promise of quarter or no-managed to escape and subsequently rejoined Montrose. It had been a feature of the Civil War in England that no commander had ever descended to such terrible extremes. In Scotland, Montrose's clansmen had slain thousands in hot blood and during the immediate pursuit, but the mass killing of unarmed prisoners had never been counted among their virtues. Leslie had set an awful precedent, and in years to come, when the Covenanters themselves had to endure the so-caned 'Killing Times', men would remember the quality of mercy which had been extended by the brethren.