James Graham, Lord Montrose was born 1612 and widely respected and loved. Montrose excelled in riding, poetry and archery. His family were distinguished for loyalty and courage, supporting the monarch in all of Scotland’s civil wars since the 14th century. He grew up a rich and educated man, but was thoroughly generous and good-humoured, without any greed. Montrose was loyal and honest to the core, fit and athletic. Montrose completed his education by touring Europe for three years, before returning to pay homage to King Charles I. Already, Montrose had a rival, Lord Hamilton, who wanted no overshadowing by the young and promising Montrose. Once King Charles began to try and bring the Church of Scotland in line with that of England, Scotland rose in uproar. The whole country armed themselves and signed a national covenant to protect their church and Charles prepared to invade. Montrose was one of the leading men opposing Charles’ designs, but not the King himself. Montrose actively aided the Scots and significantly helped them win the King and force a peace. At this point, Montrose wrote to the King to protest loyalty to him, but disagreeing with his design. The letter soon fell into another of his enemies hands, the leader of the Scots, Lord Argyll. Using the letter and egging the Scots assembly on with hype, he imprisoned Montrose. Now Montrose began to see what Argyll was aiming at; the Kings powers. This drove Montrose towards the King, who stood for the traditional constitution. First Civil War Montrose and his Scotland stayed neutral until 1644, but Montrose, astute and intelligent as ever, foresaw the Scots move towards Parliament. He warned the King, who had just been told by his rival, Lord Hamilton, that Scotland would not enter the dispute. The King chose Hamilton’s view. When Montrose was proved right, Hamilton was imprisoned and Montrose was sent to Scotland in July 1644 with a commission from the King as Lieutenant Governor and Captain General of Scotland. With just two other men, he rode over the border and men flocked to him, whilst his presence and reputation swayed soldiers over to him from the Covenanters. Montrose found himself commanding several thousand men and he used them amazingly, with expert judgement and precise skill in battle. Winning a battle while outnumbered 4-5 times was normal to Montrose, as was managing to march his men and small amount of cavalry over snowy and previously thought impassable terrain, to fall unexpectedly on the enemy. His spectacular success was in fighting and getting his army over snow topped mountains and then flooding down upon the Campbell territory. He plundered and destroyed the lands, while its leader, Lord Argyll, fled to a ship for refuge with his cowardly streak waving high on the masthead. For once, the Campbell’s had a taste of their own medicine, growing rich on lands, which they had plundered from others. Montrose fought and won five battles within a year, successfully scaring the Covenanters and Argyll into recalling some Scots regiments from England. Montrose was tantalisingly close to becoming master of all Scotland, Edinburgh opened their doors to him and amazed to see no pillaging or spoiling by his well-controlled troops who had been fighting without wages. His secret seemed to have been his intense knowledge of the highlands, where enemy commanders dared not tread. The end came in Philiphaugh, 13th September 1645, when Montrose journeyed dangerously south and out of his highland den. With promises of much needed reinforcements, Montrose found he had been betrayed. The men he had expected had gone straight over to the enemy, after they had found them, before Montrose. Fortunately, Montrose escaped, though only because his senior commanders forced him. Afterwards Montrose sailed with difficulty from Scotland, to Bergen, eventually making his way to the other exiles. Travelling between Brussels and The Hague, he devised new plans for invading Scotland and raising men. In 1649 the shock news of King Charles I’s execution reached him and he dropped down, some thought dead. He had fainted, but the news was a terrible blow and he vowed in prose to return his late master’s son to power. Charles II accepted his plan to invade Scotland and before making for that country, his plans received a slight interruption. He seems to have been attracted to Princess Louise Palatine, the niece of King Charles I. She was in love with him and it is well founded that they intended to marry once he had put Charles II on his throne. Montrose was not successful however, Charles began bargaining with Montrose’s enemies in Scotland, whilst Montrose himself sailed to invade. This undermined his position and royalists in Scotland refused to join Montrose now the King seemed to have disapproved of his actions. Montrose’s invasion fell flat and he was captured, paraded through Scotland as a traitor and to Edinburgh to face execution. He had one brief encounter with the cowardly enemy Argyll. As he was being led through the streets, his eyes fell upon Argyll’s, peering down from a window. Argyll was struck with terror and slammed the shutter closed. Montrose was executed in 1650, brave to the last and winning the admiration of the crowd, which had been paid to stone and hurl insults. Such was his character, that even in humiliating captivity, he never shrank from his cheerful, polite and proud character. Ever faithful to his King to the last, he even gained a last minute victory over his old enemy Argyll, when he saw the fear in Argyll’s slamming of the shutter. Princess Louise eventually fled to a convent, declaring her conversion to Catholicism and leaving her family behind. Some say that this was due to her immense loss in Montrose and indeed a broken heart always entered a convent. Louise took strength from Montrose’s wish to live or die a loyal subject and no doubt she looked forward to the time she would be reunited with him. Although both were separated for over 50 years, their hearts were always together. Back to Table of Contents -- King or Parliament #2 Back to King or Parliament List of Issues Back to MagWeb Magazine List © Copyright 2002 by Mark Turnbull. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com