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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 August 2009
The rebellion against Charles I's authority that began in Edinburgh in 1637 involved the Scots in successive invasions of England and armed intervention in Ireland. Historians have almost universally taken a negative view of Scottish involvement in these wars, because it has been assumed that the Scottish political leadership sacrificed all other considerations in order to pursue an unrealistic religious crusade. This article suggests that aspects of the Anglo-Scottish relationship need to be reappraised. Using estimates of English payments to the Scots during the 1640s, it will be argued that the Scottish leadership made pragmatic political decisions based on a practical appreciation of the country's military and fiscal capacity. Substantial payouts from the English parliament enabled the Scottish parliamentary regime to engage in military and diplomatic activities that the country could not otherwise have afforded. The 1643 treaty that brought the Scots into the English Civil War on the side of parliament contrasts favourably with the 1647 Engagement in support of the king. It will be shown that, although the English parliament did not honour all of its obligations to the Scots, it does not automatically follow that the alliance was a failure in financial terms.
I would like to thank Dr Gayle Davis and Dr D'Maris Coffman for reading earlier drafts and making a number of helpful suggestions. Thanks are also due to the British Academy for the postdoctoral research fellowship that funded much of the research.
1 Letters and journals of Robert Baillie, ed. D. Laing (2 vols., Edinburgh, 1841), ii, p. 90.
2 D. Stevenson, Revolution and counter-revolution, 1644–1651 (Edinburgh, new edn, 2003), p. xvi (quotation); L. Kaplan, Politics and religion during the English Revolution: the Scots and the Long Parliament, 1643–1645 (New York, NY, 1976), pp. xviii–xx.
3 The role of the Scots in English parliamentary politics is explored in J. S. A. Adamson, ‘The triumph of oligarchy: the management of war and the Committee of Both Kingdoms, 1644–1645’, in C. Kyle and J. Peacey, eds., Parliament at work: parliamentary committees, political power, and public access in early modern England (Woodbridge, 2002), pp. 101–27; Peacey, J., ‘The exploitation of captured royal correspondence and Anglo-Scottish relations in the British Civil Wars, 1645–1646’, Scottish Historical Review (SHR), 79 (2000), pp. 213–32CrossRefGoogle Scholar; D. Scott, Politics and war in the three Stuart kingdoms, 1637–1649 (Basingstoke, 2004), chs. 3–4. Evidence that ‘English dislike of the Scots remained extremely strong’ in this period is not hard to find. M. Stoyle, Soldiers and strangers: an ethnic history of the English Civil War (Yale, CT, 2005), p. 73. Stoyle's elegant argument perhaps does not adequately consider the complexity of individual attitudes towards the Scots. See Barber, S., ‘The people of northern England and attitudes towards the Scots, 1639–1651: “The lamb and the dragon cannot be reconciled’”, Northern History, 35 (1999), pp. 96, 102, 105, 113.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
4 R. Mitchison, Lordship to patronage: Scotland, 1603–1745 (Edinburgh, 1983), pp. 54, 62.
5 Stevenson, Revolution and counter-revolution, pp. xvi, 177–8.
6 J. Scally, ‘The rise and fall of the covenanter parliaments, 1639–1651’, in K. M. Brown and A. J. Mann, eds., The history of the Scottish parliament, ii: Parliament and politics in Scotland, 1567–1707 (Edinburgh, 2005), p. 139.
7 A. I. Macinnes, British revolution, 1629–1660 (Basingstoke, 2005), pp. 157–8; Kaplan, Politics and religion, pp. 14, 108.
8 I. Gentles, The English revolution and the wars of the three kingdoms, 1638–1652 (Harlow, 2007), p. 127.
9 Stevenson, D., ‘The financing of the cause of the Covenants, 1638–1651’, SHR, 51 (1972), pp. 89–123Google Scholar. The gist of this article is summarized in M. Bennett, The Civil Wars in Britain and Ireland, 1638–1651 (Oxford, 1997), pp. 193–7. D. Stevenson, Scottish covenanters and Irish confederates: Scottish–Irish relations in the mid-seventeenth century (Belfast, 1981), p. 139.
10 P. Edwards, ‘Arming and equipping the covenanting armies, 1638–1651’, in S. Murdoch and A. Mackillop, eds., Fighting for identity: Scottish military experience, c.1550–1900 (Leiden, 2002), p. 264.
11 Scotland's parliamentary record is available in a cumbersome printed form: Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland, ed. T. Thomson and C. Innes (12 vols., Edinburgh 1814–75). The Scottish Parliament Project, St Andrews University, has recently completed a searchable online version of these records, The records of the parliaments of Scotland to 1707 (RPS), ed. K. M. Brown et al. (St Andrews, 2007). Its editors decided, as Thomson and Innes had done a century earlier, that the papers of the committee of estates (Scotland's government from c. 1638 to 1651) were not, strictly speaking, parliamentary records and so they remain in manuscript. See D. Stevenson, The government of Scotland under the covenanters, 1637–1651 (Edinburgh, 1982) for a useful guide. The main series for government papers in this period is National Archives of Scotland (NAS), PA11.
12 E. M. Furgol, ‘Scotland turned Sweden: The Scottish covenanters and the military revolution, 1638–1651’, in John Morrill, ed., The Scottish National Covenant in its British context (Edinburgh, 1990), p. 134; E. M. Furgol, ‘The Civil Wars in Scotland’, in J. Kenyon and J. Ohlymeyer, eds., The Civil Wars: a military history of England, Scotland and Ireland, 1638–1660 (Oxford, 1998), pp. 41–72; E. M. Furgol, A regimental history of the covenanting armies, 1639–1651 (Edinburgh, 1990), introduction. See also P. Edwards, Dealing in death: the arms trade and the British Civil Wars (Stroud, 2000), pp. 80–6, 99–102, 106–7, 118–20, 124–5, 181–4; S. Murdoch, ‘Scotland, Scandinavia and the Bishops’ Wars, 1638–1640', in A. I. Macinnes and J. H. Ohlmeyer, The Stuart kingdoms in the seventeenth century: awkward neighbours (Dublin, 2002), pp. 113–34; S. Murdoch, Britain, Denmark–Norway and the house of Stuart, 1603–1660 (East Linton, 2000).
13 Stevenson, D., ‘The king's Scottish revenues and the covenanters, 1625–1651’, Historical Journal, 17 (1974), p. 27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
14 Government accounts for the regime's early years are incomplete. Some of the key sources were compiled at a later date and are summaries, not detailed accounts. Thus, it is often difficult to know exactly when money came into the government's hands. NAS, PA15/1, PA16/3/5/3-4, E101/5; Stevenson, D., ‘The covenanters and the Scottish mint, 1639–1641’, British Numismatic Journal, 41 (1972), pp. 95–104Google Scholar; Stevenson, ‘The financing of the cause’, pp. 90–1.
15 All sums are in £ sterling unless otherwise stated. £12 Scots was worth £1 sterling.
16 The second part of the two almost identical copies of this account held in the NLS carries an error: the total sum that the Scots were willing to forgo was recorded in both accounts as £271,500, but when the individual items are added up, the total comes to only £221,500. National Library of Scotland (NLS), Adv.Ms.33/4/6, treaties at Newcastle and London, 1640–1, fos. 109r–110v; NLS, Wod.Fol.lxxiii, fos. 50v–51v; C. S. Terry, The life and campaigns of Alexander Leslie, first earl of Leven (London, 1899), pp. 147, 152; Stevenson, ‘The financing of the cause’, p. 95. See also David Stevenson, The Scottish revolution, 1637–1644: the triumph of the Covenanters (Newton Abbot, 1973), pp. 205–13, 217.
17 Stevenson, ‘The financing of the cause’, p. 95.
18 NAS, PA6/7, Appendix, 10 Aug. 1641, fos. 1r–1v. See RPS, A1641/7/39.
19 NAS, Letter, 28 July 1641, PA6/3, fos. 1r–1v. See RPS, A1641/7/17.
20 NAS, PA16/3/5/3, pp. 3, 4.
21 NAS, PA14/1, fos. 6v, 7v, 11r–12v, 28v, 29r, 30v, 35r, 110r, 125r. Cunningham explained the importance of satisfying key Dutch creditors in a letter to the committee at Goldsmiths' Hall, The National Archives (TNA), SP46/106, fo. 97.
22 Terry, Life, p. 152.
23 J. R. Young, The Scottish parliament, 1639–1661: a political and constitutional analysis (Edinburgh, 1996), pp. 56–63; A. Woolrych, Britain in revolution, 1625–1660 (Oxford, 2002), pp. 256–67.
24 NAS, PA11/1, fos. 36v–39r.
25 Stevenson, Scottish revolution, p. 287; A collection of the state papers of John Thurloe, ed. T. Birch (7 vols., London, 1742), i, pp. 30–1; Papers relating to the army of the Covenant, 1643–1647, ed. C. S. Terry (2 vols., Edinburgh, 1917), i, p. lxxv.
26 Gentles, English revolution, p. 207. See also Scott, Politics and war, p. 80.
27 Humbie's accounts were published by Army of the Covenant, ed. Terry. The figures produced here were compiled from the original manuscripts. This revealed that one of the accounts, now catalogued as NAS, PA15/7, had parts missing, although the survival of the last page meant that the final totals were unaffected. NAS, PA15/7, 7a, 8. For other army accounts, not included in Terry's edition, see NAS, PA15/5, 6, 9.
28 NAS, PA15/7a, pp. 1–4; NAS, 1645–6, PA15/8, pp. 2–3, 124–5, 138, 162.
29 By August 1644, the Scottish commissioners were observing that the Scottish forces were not receiving timely payment by the English. See Correspondence of the Scots commissioners in London, 1644–1646, ed. H. W. Meikle (Edinburgh, 1917), p. 35.
30 The controversy over Scottish behaviour in the north of England and its manipulation by interested parties at Westminster has been comprehensively analysed. See Scott, D., ‘The “Northern Gentlemen”, the parliamentary Independents, and Anglo-Scottish relations in the Long Parliament’, Historical Journal, 42 (1999), pp. 347–75CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Scott, D., ‘The Barwis Affair: political allegiance and the Scots during the British Civil Wars’, English Historical Review, 115 (2000), pp. 843–63CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Ronan Bennett has pointed out that, having sustained two royalist forces and a Scottish army by 1640, the northern counties would have complained about the presence of any army in 1644, although the fact it was a Scottish force certainly exacerbated tensions. R. Bennett, ‘War and disorder: policing the soldiery in Civil War Yorkshire’, in M. C. Fissel, ed., War and government in Britain, 1598–1650 (Manchester, 1991), pp. 254–6. See also Macinnes, British revolution, p. 159. James Graham, marquis of Montrose was also harrying the north-west border in early 1644 with a small force that may have contained Scots. E. J. Cowan, Montrose: for Covenant and king (Edinburgh, 1995), pp. 145–51.
31 The diary of Bulstrode Whitelocke 1605–1675, ed. R. Spalding (Oxford, 1990), p. 206; Scots commissioners, ed. Meikle, pp. 183–4.
32 Terry, Life, p. 412; Scots commissioners, ed. Meikle, pp. xxix, 184, 189.
33 Journal of the House of Commons (CJ), iv, pp. 653–6.
34 G. F. T. Jones's analysis was undermined by the author's mistaken assumption that the terms of the 1643 treaty had not survived. Stevenson spotted this error, but dismissed the article without presenting an alternative analysis of the account. Jones's error led him to critique the Scottish estimates from the wrong angle, but his conclusions were based on a good understanding of how the accounts had been compiled. Jones, G. F. T., ‘he payment of arrears to the army of the Covenant’, English Historical Review, 73 (1958), pp. 459–65CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Stevenson, ‘The financing of the cause’, p. 110.
35 One account was not closed until October, NAS, PA15/8, p. 159.
36 RPS, 1643/6/86.
37 CJ, iv, pp. 653–56; Stevenson, Scottish revolution, p. 287; Thurloe, ed. Birch, i, p. 50. Kaplan's claim that the Scottish army numbered over 30,000 men by mid-1644 was refuted by Furgol, who suggested that numbers had dropped not risen. Kaplan, Politics and religion, p. 74; Furgol, Regimental history, p. 6. Robert Baillie implies that there were less than 14,000 foot in England by mid-1645, Letters and journals, ed. Laing, i, p. 292.
38 The details of the agreement can be found in Whitelocke, ed. Spalding, p. 229. See also Army of the Covenant, ed. Terry, p. lxxvii.
39 A similar conclusion was reached by Jones, ‘Payment of arrears’, p. 465.
40 F. Peck, Desiderata Curiosa, or a collection of divers scarce and curious pieces relating chiefly to English history (2 vols., London, 1779), ii, pp. 370–1. There are two receipts, each for £100,000, dated 21 Jan. and 3 Feb. 1647.
41 Stevenson, Scottish revolution, p. 68.
42 Stevenson, Revolution and counter-revolution, p. 66, quoting D. Dalrymple, Lord Hailes, ed., Memorials and letters relating to the history of Britain in the reign of Charles the First (Glasgow, 1766), pp. 190–1.
43 The treaty had stated that 10,000 men would be sent, Furgol, Regimental history, p. 5; Stevenson, Scottish covenanters and Irish confederates, pp. 315–16.
44 Register of the Privy Council of Scotland (RPCS), 2nd ser., ed. P. Hume Brown et al. (8 vols., Edinburgh, 1899–1908), vii, pp. 407–8; Hazlett, H., ‘The financing of the British armies in Ireland, 1641–1649’, Irish Historical Studies, 1 (1938–9), p. 39CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Errors in this study have been exposed by Stevenson, Scottish covenanters and Irish confederates, p. 141, n. 116, p. 144, n. 125.
45 RPCS, 2nd ser., viii, pp. 83–92, cited in Stevenson, ‘The financing of the cause’, p. 98; Stevenson, Scottish covenanters and Irish confederates, 140; NAS, PA16/3/2/5, PA15/7, pp. 21, 30, 37.
46 Stevenson, Scottish revolution, pp. 245–6, 265–6, 286–7; NAS, PA11/2, fos. 18v, 19r, 28r.
47 Estimate based on TNA, SP46/106, fos. 90–126. No systematic attempt has been made here to collate references to loans that may not have been repaid.
48 NAS, PA11/1, fos. 110v–111r; TNA, SP46/106, fo. 97. Cunningham's debts were causing concern amongst the Scottish commissioners in London by at least the spring of 1645, Scots commissioners, ed. Meikle, p. 65.
49 RPCS, 2nd ser., viii, pp. 90–1; A. J. S. Gibson and T. C. Smout, Prices, food and wages in Scotland, 1550–1780 (Cambridge, 1995), p. 177.
50 CJ, v, pp. 113–14, discussed in Stevenson, Revolution, pp. 68–9.
51 NAS, PA11/5, 1 Apr. 1647, 10 May 1647, 8 June 1647, 27 Sept. 1647, 29 Oct. 1647.
52 Some members of the regime appear to have been concerned that the troops from Ireland would, if disbanded, diminish the number of experienced men available to fight in other parts of the British Isles. Stevenson, Scottish covenanters and Irish confederates, pp. 152–6. The war committee of Ayr made an offer of supplies for the army in Ireland contingent on it remaining there, NLS, Adv.Ms.33/4/8, pp. 63–4.
53 R. Gillespie, ‘An army sent from God: Scots at war in Ireland, 1642–1649’, in N. Macdougall, ed., Scotland and war AD79-1918 (Edinburgh, 1991), pp. 122, 125; W. S. Brockington, ‘Robert Monro: professional soldier, military historian and Scotsman’, in S. Murdoch, ed., Scotland and the thirty years' war, 1618–1648 (Leiden, 2001), pp. 222–3; Bennett, Civil Wars, pp. 198–9; Stevenson, Scottish covenanters and Irish confederates, pp. 160, 203.
54 For overviews of Scottish activity in Ireland, see M. Perceval-Maxwell, ‘Ireland and Scotland, 1638 to 1648’, in Morrill, ed., Scottish National Covenant; Stevenson, Scottish covenanters and Irish confederates; J. Ohlmeyer, ‘The Civil Wars in Ireland’, in Kenyon and Ohlmeyer, eds., The Civil Wars.
55 B. Coates, The impact of the English Civil War on the economy of London, 1642–1650 (Aldershot, 2004), p. 23.
56 J. Glete, War and the state in early modern Europe: Spain, the Dutch Republic and Sweden as fiscal-military states, 1500–1660 (London and New York, NY, 2002), pp. 174, 187.
57 N. Canny, Making Ireland British, 1580–1650 (Oxford, 2003), p. 562. Sir John Hotham asserted that if England paid the Scots, England would control them, Stevenson, Scottish covenanters and Irish confederates, p. 49.
58 This paragraph is informed by Stevenson, Scottish covenanters and Irish confederates, ch. 7.
59 Stevenson recognized the scale of the crisis facing the regime but did not overestimate Montrose's strengths. Stevenson, Revolution, pp. 29–35.
60 Scots commissioners, ed. Meikle, pp. 118–19.
61 Scott, Politics and war, p. 124.
62 Stevenson, Revolution and counter-revolution, p. 68.
63 These issues will be discussed more fully in a forthcoming article.
64 Gentles, English revolution, p. 110. This assessment is almost identical to the one put forward in an earlier article by Edwards, ‘Arming and equipping the covenanting armies, 1638–1651’, p. 264.
65 For example, Scott, Politics and war, pp. 82–5, 101–2.
66 Macinnes, British revolution, pp. 157–8.
67 Scottish historical documents, ed. G. Donaldson (2nd edn, Glasgow, 1974), p. 217.
68 ‘Radical faction’ has been used deliberately to replace the outdated notion of a ‘kirk party’. See Alan Macinnes, ‘The Scottish constitution, 1638–1651: the rise and fall of oligarchic centralism’, in Morrill, ed., Scottish National Covenant, p. 107.
