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https://electricscotland.com/scotnews.htm
Electric Scotland News
As the Christmas season is on the horizon I decided to visit the Taste of Britain store in London, Ontario to get in some of my favourite items. Ended up spending just over $300 but am sure I'll enjoy everything I purchased and it is once a year so worth it. They have 2 stores in London and another in Sarnia both of which are locations which are around a 3.5 hour round trip for me. I keep suggesting they put a store in Chatham but to no avail so far.
I usually purchase 10 packs of Irish Link pork sausages as they are the nearest I have found to the Richmond thick Irish sausages I used to purchase in Scotland. I also got a couple of Christmas cakes with marzipan and icing and three packs of milk chocolate digestive biscuits. To that I added some haggis and black pudding and a pack of Irish potato scones (the Scottish version is like cardboard). Also purchased a couple of small plum puddings and tinned custard to go with it. Few other one off items as well.
One thing I have never found in Canada is Ox Tongue. In Scotland all the large supermarkets stocked it and even the wee corner stores stocked a lunch tongue version with jelly and tongue pieces. So why this can't be found in Canada is something I really don't understand. Another thing I don't understand is why Canadian butchers don't do pies. Every butcher I know in Scotland does their own steak pie with puffed pastry top. I now make my own and it's not that hard to do.
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Many Canadians are unaware that this year’s Remembrance Day marks a major milestone, according to a new survey.
Armistice Day, now known as Remembrance Day, was first marked in Canada on Nov. 11, 1919. That date marked the one-year anniversary of the signing of the armistice that ended the First World War.
Sunday marks the 100-year anniversary of the end of the war. While there are events planned across the country, as is tradition, a survey from genealogy website Ancestry reveals that most Canadians don’t plan to attend them.
The survey also found that 56 per cent of its 1,524 Canadian respondents could not identify the importance of this year’s anniversary.
It also found several other signs that Canadians’ awareness of the First World War might be fading, including 38 per cent of respondents saying they do not know if they have a relative who served in the war.
Only 22 per cent of respondents were able to identify Sir Robert Borden as Canada’s wartime prime minister. Eight per cent believed it was Winston Churchill, who was prime minister of the United Kingdom during the Second World War.
Danny Martin, deputy director with the Royal Canadian Legion, says declining interest in Remembrance Day and the First World War does not surprise him given Canada’s last veteran of that war died in 2010.
“Our older generation of veterans are all gone,” he told CTVNews.ca in an Oct. 25 interview.
Additionally, Martin said, the war is no longer covered as thoroughly in schools as it was in the past.
“That might be like a 15, 20-minute exercise in the classroom. You don’t gain anything out of that. You don’t get the feel,” he said.
Other findings of the survey include:
80 per cent of Canadians are planning to commemorate Remembrance Day in some way this year, down from 86 per cent last year
Younger Canadians are even less likely to have Remembrance Day in mind, with 72 per cent of people under the age of 35 saying they expect to mark the occasion in some way
Alberta and the Atlantic provinces lead the way on Remembrance Day participation, with 91 per cent of respondents there saying they plan to
In Quebec, that number drops to 50 per cent
59 per cent of Canadians plan to purchase a poppy, down from 70 per cent in 2017
46 per cent expect to observe a moment of silence
The survey has a margin of error of 2.5 per cent, 19 times out of 20.
Some of the 54 Commonwealth member states, such as Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia, observe the tradition of Remembrance Day on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month. Other nations observe a solemn day but at different dates. For example, ANZAC Day is observed in New Zealand on April 25. In South Africa, Poppy Day is marked on the Sunday that falls closest to November 11.
Many nations that are not members of the Commonwealth also observe Remembrance Day on November 11, including France, Belgium and Poland.
The United States used to commemorate Armistice Day on November 11. However, in 1954 they changed the name to Veterans Day.
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Here is the video introduction to this newsletter...
Scottish News from this weeks newspapers
Note that this is a selection and more can be read in our ScotNews feed on our index page where we list news from the past 1-2 weeks. I am partly doing this to build an archive of modern news from and about Scotland as all the newsletters are archived and also indexed on Google and other search engines. I might also add that in newspapers such as the Guardian, Scotsman, Courier, etc. you will find many comments which can be just as interesting as the news story itself and of course you can also add your own comments if you wish.
Meet the Scot heard round the world working for top US news channel
He is heard by more than 300 million television viewers across the United States every week, but the chances are that very few realise the voice belongs to a man broadcasting from the bedroom of his cottage in North-east Scotland.
Read more at:
https://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/m...nnel-1-4823335
Life sciences furthering Scotland’s innovation reputation
Our approach to implementing the next phase of the Life Sciences Strategy is crucial to maintaining the momentum that keeps us on the path towards our bold target for life sciences set almost two years ago.
Read more at:
https://www.scotsman.com/business/co...tion-1-4823419
Test tube trees: An insurance policy against extinction?
A tiny oak tree emerges from a test tube in the laboratory.
Read more at:
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46065156
Kenneth Roy
26 March 1945 - 5 November 2018
Read his obituary at:
http://www.scottishreview.net/KennethRoyObituarya.html
Glenfiddich Piping Championships 2018
We are delighted to once again bring you the videos from each performance at this year's Glenfiddich Piping Championships which took place on Saturday 27th October at Blair Castle.
Listen at:
https://vimeo.com/piping
After Brexit, Britain has the chance to create a Restoration Economy
Brexit offers a golden chance to restore the British countryside
Read more at:
https://capx.co/after-brexit-britain...ration-economy
Three frontiers that are reshaping global power
The rise of the Indo-Pacific, Eurasia and the Arctic will change how nations view the world
Read more at:
https://capx.co/the-collision-of-the...w-world-order/
Brexit will allow us to write a tailor-made agriculture policy
80% of our welfare laws are made in Brussels, so of course Brexit hugely impacts animal welfare. And for no animals is this more true than for farm animals.
Read more at:
https://brexitcentral.com/brexit-wil...e-environment/
A vital message from the front-line
Amazing stories.
Read more at:
http://www.scottishreview.net/HowieFirth454a.html
The Scot who began the two-minute silence
A two-minute silence on Armistice Day has been observed since the first anniversary of the end of World War One in 1919. But what is perhaps less well known is that the idea for the silent reflection came from a Scot who lived in South Africa during the conflict.
Read more at:
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-46124328
Why Macron’s EU army wouldn’t keep Europe safe
Macron's call for a European army is motivated by his federalist ambitions, not what is best for European security
Read more at:
https://capx.co/why-macrons-eu-army-...p-europe-safe/
Electric Canadian
Canada and its Provinces
Added Volume XXI. The Pacific Province Part I. which you can read at:
https://electriccanadian.com/history/canadaprovinces.htm
The Engineering Journal
Added the volume for 1961.at: https://electriccanadian.com/transport/industrial/index.htm
Mining Review
Added the volume for 1919 at: https://electriccanadian.com/transport/mines/mining.htm
History of the North-West
By Alexander Begg (1894) in three volumes with volume 3 being the index.
You can read this at: https://www.electriccanadian.com/his...wt/history.htm
The Romance of Canada.
Stories from the History of her Discovery, Exploration, Conquest and Settlement edited by Herbert Strang (pdf)
You can read this at: https://www.electriccanadian.com/lif...ceofcanada.pdf
The Creation of Manitoba
or A History of the Red River Troubles by Alexander Begg (1871) (pdf)
You can read this at: https://www.electriccanadian.com/his...ofmanitoba.pdf
Early Days in Upper Canada
Letters of John Langton from the Backwoods of Upper Canada and the Audit Office of the Province of Canada edited by W. A. Langton (1926) (pdf)
You can read this at: https://www.electriccanadian.com/his...ppercanada.pdf
A Reminiscence of the Early Days
Written by Mrs. David Fleming, Cobourg in her eighty-second year (1921) (pdf)
You can read this at: https://www.electriccanadian.com/pio...fearlydays.pdf
1850 McKay and the Clipper Age
Born in a rural Loyalist community in Nova Scotia McKay emigrated at the age of seventeen to the
country his grandfather had abandoned after the Revolutionary war.
You can read about him at: https://electricscotland.com/history...McKay_Mini.pdf
Conrad Black
The Myth of an International Populist Uprising
http://www.conradmblack.com/1435/the...ulist-uprising
The future of our health care is being decided in the courts
http://www.conradmblack.com/1436/the...ing-decided-in
Electric Scotland
Highland Dancing
A wee compellation of Highland Dancing which you can watch at:
http://www.electricscotland.org/show...ghland-Dancing
A Yacht Voyage Round England
By William H. G. Kingston - New Edition, Revised and Enlarged which you can read at:
https://electricscotland.com/history...nd_England.pdf
Will Weatherhelm
The Yarn of an old Sailor by W. H. G. Kingston (New Edition 1915) (pdf) which you can read at:
https://electricscotland.com/history...eatherhelm.pdf
Archibald Hughson, The Young Shetlander
An Arctic Story by W. H. G. Kingston (1873) (pdf) which you can read at:
https://electricscotland.com/kids/Ar...Shetlander.pdf
A History of France
By André Maurois, Translated by Henry L. Binsse, Additional Chapters by Gerard Hopkins. It is in the spirit of telling a dramatic story, rather than of cautious scientific analysis, that M. Maurois has tackled his fascinating task and the result is, as it has already been hailed in France, the best modern one volume history of France (1964) (pdf)
You can read this at: https://electricscotland.com/history...ory-france.pdf
The Clipper Ship Era
An Epitiome of Famous American and British Clipper Ships, Their Owners,, Builders, Commanders, and Crews 1843-1869 by Arthur H. Clark (1911) (pdf)
You can read this at: https://electricscotland.com/history...ipperships.pdf
Scottish Stonemasonry at The White House
An interesting wee video which you can view at:
http://www.electricscotland.org/show...he-White-House
The Story
This story was taken from Tait's Edinburgh Magazine, volume 18, 1851.
SCOTTISH CAVALIER OF THE OLDEN TIME
We would not raise him from the dead, even if we could! For were he here, standing up in all his grim majesty of martial pomp, we would not sneer at him who in his time did his time’s work faithfully and manfully. Much less would we worship him as a hero; for even his exploits of bravery and endurance cannot raise him to the standard of a hero of our days. Why not, then, let him rest in his foreign grave? Yes, let him rest, but as a lesson to this century, as a proof that all human excellence and all ideas of human excellence are passing away to make room for other excellence and other ideas of excellence, let us try to raise, though it be but for an hour, the shadow of the shadow of Sir John Hepburn.
In East-Lothian, almost within sight of Berwick-Law, and on the brink of that deep hollow or ford where the Scots defeated and slew Athelstane, the Saxon king, stands a goodly-sized manorhouse, overlooking the rocky hills of Dirleton, flanked by an old kirk and surrounded by decayed moss-covered trees. The stone steps of the mansion are worn away with the tread of many generations of men and women who have passed away and left no trace behind them. Others, the denizens of that old gloomy house, are mentioned here and there in stray parchments and records; and from the collected evidence of these it appears that House Athelstaneford was built by a branch of the Hepburns of Hailes and Bothwell, and that the place was held feudally of their kinsmen the Hepburns of Waughton. These Hepburns of Hailes and Bothwell, and of Athelstaneford and Waughton, were an impetuous and warlike family, who took their fill of fighting and plunder in all the frays of the Border. Thus, in January 1569, we find them expelled from their ancestral seat at Waughton, and assembling in large masses to retake that place, “and Fortalice of Vachtune,” where they slew, “ Vmqle. Johnne Geddes,” and hurt and wounded “divers otheris,” besides breaking into the Barbican and capturing sixteen steeds. But while thus employed, they were attacked by the Laird of Carmichael, the Captain of the Tower, who slew three of them and drove off the rest. Among them was George Hepburn of Athelstaneford, who was subsequently tried for the proceedings of that day, and who was acquitted in this case not only, but also for the share he took in Bothwell’s insurrection, for his part in which he was arraigned as having slain “three of the king’s soldiers1’ at the battle of Langsides. Thus, escaping from sieges and battles, and, what is more, from the dangers of the law, George Hepburn died. No one knows how and whether he came to his end on the field or the scaffold, or in his own house of Athelstaneford. Nor is anything known of the day or year of his death, for little store was in those days set by the life of a simple yeoman. In the year 1616, it is found that his eldest son, George Hepburn, is “retoured” in the lands of Athelstaneford. George’s brother was John Hepburn, the chief hero of Mr. Grant’s Memoir. We say the chief hero, for he records other names and the deeds of other men of the time.
John Hepburn, the man in buff, had at that time, namely, in 1616, when his father was just dead, reached his sixteenth year. He had had what little schooling sufficed for a younger son of his day, and he was well informed for a lad who left school at fourteen. His back was yet unbent, and his mind rather stimulated than fraught with learning. But the best acquisition he made at school was a friend, Robert Munro; his dass-fellow in youth, his battle-fellow in after years. At that time, John Hepburn, too, was distinguished, even on the border, for the skill and grace of his horsemanship, and for the scientific use he made of the sword. And well it was for him that he, whose fortune lay at the sword’s point, should have known how to handle that instrument of his future elevation.
For to a youngster from the Scottish border the time offered scarcely any sustenance and much less promotion. The border wars and the home feuds of the Scottish nobles'were for the nonce terminated by the accession of James Stuart So monotonous and void of incident had life on the border become, that John Hepburn and Robert Munro actually set out on a tour to Paris and Poictiers, perhaps for the purpose of study, though it is much more probable that they intended looking out for vacancies in some of the Scotch ramenta in France. On this occasion it appears that the rising fame of the great Gustavus Adolphus, whom he “heard frequent commendations, gave birth to a spark of military ardour within his breast which was never extinguished till his death.”
Robert Munro remained in Paris, and learned a soldier’s trade in the body-guard of the King of France. How that trade was taught in those days will best be learned from his own account of military punishments:
“I was once made to stand, in my younger yeares, at the Louvre-gate, in Paris, for sleeping in the morning when I ought to have been at my exercise; for punishment I was made to stand, from eleven before noone to eight of the clocke in the night, centrv, armed with corslet, headpiece, bracelets, being iron to the teeth, in a hot summer’s day, till I was weary of my life, which ever after made me more strict in punishing those under my command.”
John Hepburn was destined to win his spurs in a school which was equally severe, though less distinguished. When he returned home, he found Sir Andrew Grey, a soldier of fortune, with a camp of recruits at Monkrig, in the vicinity of Atlielstaneford; and every day drummers were scouring the country, drumming out for volunteers to fight in Bohemia for the Princess Elizabeth and against the German Emperor. Their song of - "fre boy! fye boy! leave it not there, No honor is gotten by hunting the hare", had its effect on John Hepburn, who consented to “trail a pilke in Sir Andrew’s band,” that is to say, he enlisted as a private soldier in the division.
His captain, Sir Andrew, of all men was most fit to train young soldiers to the trade of arms. He was the type of a soldier of fortune and paid partisan, to whom the camp was a home, the march a recreation and the day of battle a season of gala and rejoicing. He had seen much service and hard fighting at home and abroad. As a friend of Lord Home, he had, in 1594, been outlawed by the General Assembly; and at the battle of Glen-livar he commanded the Earl of Huntley’s artillery, which consisted of “three culverins.” This old soldier wore his buff and armour as every-day dress, even in time of peace, and he was never seen without a long sword, a formidable dagger and a pair of iron pistols, all of which served greatly to annoy the King James Stuart, who said of old Sir Andrew that he was so fortified that, if he were but well “victualled, he would be impregnable.” Impregnable though he may have been to cold iron and leaden bullets, yet being sent into Holland, in 1624, with 12,000 English, it is presumed that he perished with his men, most of whom “deyed miserablie with cold and hunger,” and whose bodies lay “heaped upon another,” as food for “the dogs and swine, to the horror of all beholders.”
But we anticipate. In the year 1620, when John Hepburn joined Sir Andrew’s band, he led his force of 1,500 men and among them 120 mosstroopers whom the King’s Council had arrested and enrolled for turbulency through Leith and Holland into Bohemia.
That unfortunate country was just then exposed to all the horrors of a religious war. The Austrian Emperor had endeavoured to enforce his Roman Catholic tendencies, and the States had rebelled and offered their crown to the Elector of the Palatinate, son-in-law to James Stuart; and it was between him and the Emperor that the princes and powers of Germany and Europe had to choose. Sir Andrew Gray’s Scotch regiment joined the Elector’s forces in the campaign against the Emperor’s Spanish auxiliaries, under the Marquis Spinola; and in the course of that campaign John Hepburn was promoted to the command of a company of pikes. After the Battle of Prague, where the Elector’s forces were signally defeated, and where that prince himself abandoned his owti cause, the Scotch troops joined the army of the Count of Mansfeld, who undertook to carry on the war on account of the unfortunate queen. At his side they fought in the Palatinates, in the Alsace, and in Holland, at which latter place they assisted in the defence of the fortress of Bergen-op-Zoom; and on one occasion cut their way through the Marquis of Spinola’s army. On these fights, though we might adduce many instances of bravery and devotion on the part of the heroic Scots, we must nevertheless be silent; for so intrepid were they all, that John Hepburn’s deeds are lost amidst the number. His name stands first prominently forward when, at the end of the war in Holland, he led the remains of Sir Andrew’s band to Sweden, whither they were attended by the force of the great Gustavus Adolphus. That king, whose camp had risen to be the best military school in Europe, was almost monthly joined by troops of Scotchmen, and Mr. Grant, whose researches on the subject have been minute in the extreme, informs us that not less than 13,101 Scots served in the Swedish army during the wars in Germany.
Captain John Hepburn, joined by his cousin. James Hepburn of Waughton, was duly installed in the Swedish army, and 6oon promoted to the command of the Green Scots Brigade. Imagine him, decked with all the panoply of a warrior of that time, dressed in a gorget of richest stuff, covered with cunningly-worked and inlaid armour from the forges of Milan, his head surmounted with the plumed morion, arrow-shaped, with a gilt tiar turning up in front, his hair cut close, his moustache hanging down upon his gorget, and his long sword rattling against his enormous spurs. Imagine the Swedish king’s Scotch officer, his resplendent breast-plate, half covered with a scarlet scarf; his jackboots pistol-proof, and accoutred with enormous spurs, having each six rowels, measuring three inches from point to point, and projecting from a ball of bell-metal, within which were four iron drops, which jingled as he rode or walked. Imagine him leading his band of musketeers and pikemen, all duly clad in helmets, gorgets, buff-coats and breast-plates—the musketeers wearing their heavy matchlocks, the pikemen carrying pikes, varying from fourteen to eighteen feet long, and all of them, from the leader down to the last youngster who trailed a pike, looking more massive and stout than any men of our day ever can look; for their corselets were both large and thick, to cover well-padded doublets, and to resist the dint of bid-lets. In 1623 he was a colonel and commander of a regiment which formed part of the army which the King of Sweden despatched against the King of Poland. “It was in this Polish war,” sayB his biographer, “that Hepburn began the series of brilliant achievements which, marked his eareer under the banner of Gustavus. The most important of these deeds of arms was the relief of Mew, a town of Western Prussia, the Swedish garrison of which was closely blockaded by a Polish army of 30,000 men, who were intrenched upon a steep green eminence, cutting off all communication between the town and the surrounding country. The town of Mew being situate on the confluence of the Versa with the Vistula, it was over this eminence that the relieving army had to pass if they would raise tlie siege. The Poles had, therefore, furnished it with two batteries of ordnance, which commanded the approach by a cross fire, while the whole line of their intrenched infantry, armed with bows and matchlocks, swept the ground which descended abruptly from their earthen parapets. Against this army of 30,000 the King of Sweden sent 3000 Scots foot and 500 horse, under Count Thurn. This force left the Swedish camp in tlie dusk of die evening; and proceeding quietly and Bilently by a secret path, they soon came in view of the heights on which the Polish infantry, clad in mail of a half Oriental fashion, and armed with bows, matchlocks, iron maces, lances, scimitars and targets, were strongly intrenched, with their brass cannon bristling through the green brushwood on their right and left. In their rear lay the Bpires of Mew, the object of the contest and the prize of victory.
Night was fast setting in when Colonel Hepburn began to ascend the hill, by a narrow and winding path, encumbered by rocks and stones, thick underwood and overhanging trees, through which the heavily-armed soldiers threaded their way with great difficulty, as they clung to the projecting ledges of rock or grasped the furze and underwood in their attempts to gain the summit Not a sound was heard, not a word was spoken, and even the clang of armour or the jingle of a metal sword-sheath were drowned by the hoarse roar of the impetuous Vistula beneath. Thus guided by the white plume in Hepburn’s helmet, the Scots gained the summit and surprised the Poles, who were still working at their trenches. Muskets were clubbed, pikes advanced and the trenches taken. But bullets, arrows and stones fell upon them in a dense shower, and hordes of Cossacks in mail shirts and steel caps caused them great tribulation by their violent onsets, until Hepburn withdrew his column to a rock, against which he leaned his rear, while his front ranks, their pikes advanced, stood immoveable, presenting an impenetrable mass of bristling steel points, with every now and then a murderous volley from the musketeers in the centre. In this position he was reinforced by 200 German arquebusiers, whose assistance enabled him to hold out Advance was quite out °( th® question, for all along his front the Poles piled; their portable while the whole of their army attacked him incessantly or two nights and two days. But in the meanwhile, the King of Sweden succeeded in revictuallinj and regarrisoning the town of Mew. The Poles whose only hope was to reduce the place by fatigue and hunger, broke up their camp and abandoned the Biege.
Nor was it on land alone that Colonel Hepburn and his Scots volunteered the most desperate service. In the year 1630 he was sent, with ninety-two companies of foot and sixteen squadrons of horse, in two hundred small vessels, from Elfenaben, in Sweden, across the stormy Baltic to Pommern, where he remained in country quarters until be received orders to support Sir Donald Mackays Highlanders in the island of Rugen.
Those Highlanders, then under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Munro, had embarked at Pillan, from whence they were ordered to sail to Wolgast, in Pommern. They were in two Swedish vessels, and their baggage, horses, drums and ammunition were in a small ship which sailed along w ith them. Driven into the roads of Bom-holm by a tempest, the two vessels were separated, and one of them, in which were Lieutenant^Colonel Munro and Captain Robert Munro, with three Highland companies, sprung a leak, and was, after many dangers and hardships to the soldiers, thrown on the coast of the island of Rugen, where she parted amidships, and where the three companies of Highlanders had to cling to the wreck, over which the waves broke with an indescribable fury. Landed at length by means of a raft, which they constructed in the very midst of the surge, they found themselves eighty miles from the Swedish outposts, on an island all the forte d which were in the hands of the Imperialists, while all their means of defence consisted in an army, he drove the enemy out of Pommerland, and, lastly, sat down before Colberg to invest and blockade it In the course of this siege he was superseded in his command by a smdl German lordling, the Herr von Kniphausen, who held a higher rank in the Swedish army, and to whom we are indebted for many of the feats of the Scottish Hercules, which tins Herr von Kniphausen, too weak for execution, planned for the performance of others. Among these feats is the defence of the town and castle of Shevelbrunn, a pass at the distance of five miles from Colberg, and through which the Austrian forces of General Montecuculi, which were marching up for the relief of Colberg, would have to pass, before they could approach the town.
swords, pikes and some wet muskets, while every man of them was drenched, starving and exhausted with danger and toiL But it required greater hardships or dangers to break the spirit of these hardy soldiers of fortune. They hid among the cliffs until night, when they borrowed fifty muskets from the Pommeranian Governor of Ru-genwalde Castle, by whose assistance also they gained access to the city and killed and captured the Austrian garrison. Having thus obtained p«* session of the capital of Riigen, the next thing to be done was to retain the place and defend it against the Austrians, a large force of whom were at Colberg, at the distance of only seven mile from Rugenwalde. Lieutenant-Colonel Munre strengthened the castle by the erection of turt sconces and redoubts, and provisioned it by forsg-ing the country even to the very gates of BantEg* Then came a siege of nine weeks, with its eta* nonading, and its daily and nightly and sallies, until, one morning, the Austrians M from their trenches at the approach of Hepburn’s Green Brigade and Invincibles.
And here Sir John again appears on the scene, as governor of the town and castle of Riigenwalde, recruiting among the islanders, and 8000 fighting-men, whom he armed, disciplined and divided into companies.
The Herr von Kniphausen’s orders were very precise, and much more easy to give than to execute. “Maintain the town,” said that beer-bloated Teuton, “so long as you can; but give not up the castle while a single man remains with you.” That is to say, not “Go in and win!” but “Go in and be killed; but the longer you can be about it the more creditable it will be for you.”
Thus instructed, and accompanied by a squadron of steel-clad troopers, Sir John rode forth, thinking the place but “a scurvie hole for any honest cavalier to maintain his credit in.” But the Herr von Kniphausen had changed his mind already, and, withdrawing Sir John and the troopers, he sent Munro and his Highlanders, with exactly the same instructions, to be killed and to take time. These Highlanders fortified the ruined place with ramparts of rock and stockades breast high; and while they were completing their preparations the earth around shook with the tramp of Flemish horses and mailed men, for 8000 Imperialists, cuirassiers, Croats and arquebusiere, commanded by Montecuculi, marched up with great speed, but with still greater speed were they driven back by the well-regulated fire of the Highlanders. From their masses, still confused with the hurry of the retreat, a trumpeter advanced proposing a treaty of surrender, to which Munro replied," The word treaty having by some chance been omitted in my instructions, I have only powder and ball at the service of the Count de Montecuculi.” Back rode the trumpeter, incensed with the Scotchman’s saucy answer, and on came the Walloons and Croats. And the Highlanders, firing over their earthen breastworks, held the foe back with battle-built ramparts of dead men, which lay chin-deep in front of every barricade; and fighting, shooting, always retreating from one work to another, and burning tho streets as they fell back, they, with their faces still turned to the enemy, made good their retreat into the castle. But Montecuculi, who was not well pleased with the violence of those “ barekneed soldiers,” retreated during the night from Shevelbrunn, not without Munro despatching “ eighteen dragoniers to march after them for bringing me intelligence of his majestie’s forces from Stalin which were come betwixt the enemy and Colberg.”
The Austrian garrison of Colberg being hard pressed by the Scots and Swedes, and having no salvo upon the enemy’s works, while from every point of their approaches the musketeers poured volley after volley. . . . And while the imperial cannon, muskets, pistolettes and arquebuses-d-croix vomited a cloud of fire and dense white smoke, with bullets of every size—lead, iron and brass— from the walls, parapets and palisadoes, from casemate and cavalier, the brave Scottish brigade, with the green banners, rushed on with levelled pikes to storm the Guben Gate.
Hope of relief from Montecuculi, was at length compelled to capitulate, and marched out with the honours of war, namely, “all in their armour, with pikes carried, colours flying, drums beating and matches lighted; with bag and baggage, and two pieces of cannon with balls in their muzzles, and lintstocks burning.”
Six hundred of Lord Reay's Highlanders were, for nine days, beseiged by the Imperialists in New Brandenburg. On the ninth day the town was taken by assault, and the six hundred Highlanders with their chief, Colonel Lindsay, then 28 years of age, were unmercifully cut to pieces. Two officers, Captain Innes and Lieutenant Lumsden, escaped by swimming the wet ditch in their armour, and brought the news of their comrades’ death to the head-quarters of the Scotch brigade; and these, with carried pikes, matches lit, six standards displayed, and all the drums beating the “ old Scots* march,” which the shrill fifes poured to the morning wind, marched upon Frankfort-on-the-Odor to avenge the death of their comrades on Count Schomberg’s Austrian brigade of 10.000 old troops. As they came within sight of the city, they extended their lines, and marching up from different quarters, attacked it. And the Austrians, still reeking with the slaughter of New Brandenburg, and their ravages, their burnings, sackings and murders, the piking of children and the violence done to women in Brandenburg and Pommem, stood up on the line of the embattled wall which girt the city, and which was bright with the glitter of their helmets. Their cannon opened from the ramparts and, when the smoke was blown aside their pikes and muskets and sword-blades flashed in the sun. But on that day all the cannonading was a mere prelude, an earnest of what was to follow in the way of attack and defence. For the King of Sweden had yet to reconnoitre the place, which he did in person ; and having for that purpose come “ somewhat too near the town,” a sally was made by the Austrians and the king’s party fired at. Two officers fell badly wounded, namely, Lieutenant Munro of Munro’s regiment and Colonel Teuffel (Anglice Devil) Baron of Zinnersdorf, for whom the King “ made great mourn, alleging he had no help then but of Hepburns.” And indeed it wTas John Sinclair, of Hepburn’s regiment, who repelled the Imperialists ; and, following up his advantage, effected a lodgment in a churchyard, from whence he could enfilade and sweep the enemy’s works in flank. Captain Gunter, too, of Hepburn’s regiment, accompanied by a dozen of his men, clambered through the moat and reconnoitred the space between the outer rampart and the inner wall. These preparations having been made during the night and on the morning of Palm Sunday, the 3rd April, the general assault commenced at five o’clock on the afternoon of that day. We quote it in the words of Mr. Grant’s masterly description, adding only that the King of Sweden unleashed his Scots against the walls, after reminding them of their murdered countrymen at New Brandenburg.
“Sir John Hepburn and Colonel Lumsden, side by side, led them on. They both bore lighted petards to burst open the gate. Advancing, they hung their petards, and retired a pace or two: the engines burst and blew the strong barrier to a thousand fragments. And now the bullets poured through the gap thick as a hailstorm; for, charged to the muzzle, two pieces of Austrian cannon swept the approach and made tremendous havoc among the dense ranks of the Scots Brigade, forming absolute lanes through them.
"While Munro’s regiment crossed the wet ditch, among mud and water which came up to their gorgets, and boldly planting their ladders, clambered over the sloping bastions, under a murderous fire, storming the palisadoes at point of sword and push of pike, Gustavus, with the Blue and Yellow Swedish Brigades, all officered by Scotch Cavaliers, fell, sword in hand, upon that quarter which was defended by Walter Butler and his Irish regiment. Butler made a noble and resolute defence, fighting nearly to the last man around him.
“The Green Scots Brigade still pressed desperately to gain the strong Guben Gate; the valorous Hepburn, leading the pikes and being advanced within half-pike’s length of the door, was shot above the knee that he was lame of before. Finding himself struck, 4 Bully Munro,’ he cried jocularly to his old friend and fellow-student, whose soldiers had so gallantly carried the outer palisadoes.
"A major advancing to take his place, was 6hot dead; and, with the blood streaming from their wounds, the soldiers were falling fast on every side, till even the stubborn pikemen wavered for a moment; upon which Lumsden and Munro, each at the head of his own regiment, having their helmets closed and half-pikes in their hands, cheered on their men, and, shoulder to shoulder, led the way.
"My hearts!’ exclaimed Lumsden, brandishing his weapon, 'my brave hearts, let’s enter!’
"'Forward!’ cried Munro; 'advance, pikes!’ And the gate was stormed in a twinkling, the Austrians driven back, their own cannon turned on them and fired point-blank, blowing their heads and limbs into the air.
"The Austrians were slain on every hand; and to their cries of 'Quarter! quarter!’ the Scots replied, 'New Brandenburg! Remember New Brandenburg'.
"Hepburn’s brigade pressed on from the Guben Gate through one street which was densely filled with Imperial troops, who contested every foot of the way, while General Sir John Bannier scoured another with his brigade. Twice the Imperialists beat a parley ; Lut amid the roar of the musketry, the boom of the cannon from bastion and battery, with the uproar, shouts and yells in every contested street and house, the beat of the drum was unheard. Still the combat continued, the carnage went on, and still the Scotch brigade advanced in close columns of regiments, shoulder to shoulder, like moving castles, the long pikes levelled in front, while the rear ranks of musketeers volleyed in security from behind.
"The veteran Imperialists, ‘hunger and cold beatten souldiers,’ met them almost foot to foot and hand to hand. The stern aspect of Tilly’s soldiers excited even the admiration of their conquerors; for their armour was rusted red with winter’s storms, and dinted with sword-cuts and musketballs; their faces seamed with scars and bronzed by constant exposure in every kind of weather; they were forced to give way, and a frightful slaughter ensued.
"The Generals Schomberg, Montecuculi, Tiefenbach and Herbertstein mounted, and, with a few cuirassiers, fled by a bridge towards Geogan, leaving four colonels, thirty-six junior officers and 3000 soldiers dead in the streets, fifty colours, and ten baggage-waggons laden with plate; and so precipitate was their retreat that their caiwoar blocked up the passage to the bridge, while cannon, tumbrils, chests of powder and ball, piles of dead and dying soldiers, with their ghastly and distorted visages and battered coats of mail, covered with blood and dust, smoke, mud and the falling masonry of the ruined houses, made up a medley of horrors and formed a barricade which obstructed the immediate pursuit of the foe.”
Next day the dead were buried; friend and fee were laid side by side, a hundred in every grave!
Within a few days only after the capture of Frankfort, and though still suffering from his wound, we find Sir John Hepburn setting out to reinforce the Marshal Horne in his siege of Landsberg, a town on the eastern bank of the Oder. This town was held by the Austrian Colonel Gratz with 5000 foot and twelve troops of horse. As the valiant Scot marched along he fell in with a horde of Croats in short doublets, corslets of steel, long white breeches and fur caps, whom he attacked, routed and slew their colonel, in consequence of which these savage warriors fell back upon Landsberg, burning all the villages in their way and blowing up all the bridges. We need not here expatiate on the strength of Landsberg long famed for the manufacture of iron culverin3; or the mixture of boldness and stratagem—the crossing a deep ditch on planks and the taking o the strongest redoubt—which induced Colonel Gratz to capitulate, and leave the town with drinw beating and colours displayed, and accompanied by not less than 2000 female camp-followers, in reference to whom we fully subscribe to the of the Swedish Intelligencer: “Thus was a goodly towne and a strong most basely given vpe by a companie of cullions.”
Then, again, the battle-field of Leipzig! which has since been drenched with the offal of many other butcheries, but which had its bloodiest day, as was actual carnage went, in that year of 1631, when Gustavus of Sweden, with 30,000 men, marched upon Tilly, who lay encamped on the dull, monotonous plain of Leipzig, with a motley, grim-visaged, scarred and war-worn army of Walloon emissaries, Spanish infantry, and* Austrian artillery, all in all to the number of 40,000. Marching on from Wittenberg, the Swedish army came in sight of the Austrian camp, and halted within a mile of it, on the 6th September. They placed their outguard almost within the range of a falconet from the enemy’s batteries, when they and indeed the whole army with them—bivouacked on the bare plain in their armour, with their swords and muskets at their sides, and with their haversacks for pillows. As the shades of the evening thickened over the Swedish bivouack, a dense fog rolled lazily along from the direction of Meissen, leaving nothing visible but the line of red fires which marked Tilly’s position in front of Leipzig. These fires dotted the slope of a gentle eminence south-west of Podelwitz, and extended nearly two miles from flank to flank. That sight was a fit drop-scene for the next morning’s tragedy; which scene was drawn up for action when, st sunrise on Wednesday, the 7th September, 1631, the white mists rose like a gauzy curtain from the mighty plain of Leipzig and Breitenfeld. As that curtain rose, the Swedes prepared for action, which they did by field-prayers, which were said in front of every regiment. This done, the king’s forces moved in good order against the Imperialists, whose long lines of burnished arms shone again in the rays of the rising sun. There was a deep murmur floating from one line to another, as the soldiers on either side blew their gun-matches, opened their pouches, and sprung their ramrods.
The Swedish army is thus described by Munro : * In the van were the Scottish regiments of Sir James Ramsay the Black, the Laird of Foulis, and Sir John Hamilton. Sir John Hepburn’s Green Scotch Brigade formed part of the reserve. As senior-colonel, Sir John Hepburn commanded this column, which consisted of three brigades. His own regiment carried four coloure into the field that day.
“Field-Marshal Horne, General Bannier and Lieutenant-General Banditzen commanded the cavalry; the King of Sweden and Baron Teuffel, of Ziorersdorf and Weyersburg, led the main body of the infantry.”
And further we are informed by the chroniclers of the events of that memorable battle, that “as the Swedish troops took up their ground, a great flock of birds, which rose suddenly from among the long grass and furrows of the fields, and flew towards Tilly’s lines, was viewed by each army as an omen of victory.”
Tilly’s position was extremely strong. His troops were drawn up in close columns, according to the ancient mode; one flank rested on Sohausen, the other on Lindenthal, two miles distant He commanded the centre himself; Count Fiirstenberg commanded the right wing, and Count Pappenheim the left. His Walloons were intrenched behind a rampart flanked by two batteries, mounting each twenty pieces of heavy cannon. One commanded the Swedish approach in a direct line, the other enfiladed the Saxons. In their rear lay a thick wood of dark trees, where Tilly proposed to rally in case of a defeat His cuirassiers, led by Count Fiirstenberg, were sheathed in complete suits of armour, under which they wore coats of buff and leather. Among these were the gaudy Italian cavalry and Crothenberg’s horse, the flower of the Empire. These horse occupied the wings, the infantry the centre. Renconi’s regiment was on the extreme left of Tilly: a heavily mailed regiment of Reformadoes occupied the extreme right.
As the two armies approached still nearer, the battle-cry of each rang through the air.“Gott mit uns!” cried the Swedes; “Sancta Maria!” shouted the Imperialists.
And at this juncture the vanguard of the Scots, which had crossed the Lober rivulet, were furiously charged by a detachment of Pappenheim cuirassiers, whom they repelled, by dint of pike and musket, and compelled to fall back on their main body. As the Pappenheimers retreated through the village of Podelwitz, they set fire to it, and the crash of the burning and falling houses was mingled with the cannonade which now commenced, and which lasted two hours and a half. At the end of that time, when the space between the two armies was completely filled with a dense white smoke, a long line of Eteel was seen to glitter in front of the Swedish lines, and a strong column of Pappenheimers, with banners uplifted, sword brandished and helmet closed, poured like lightning into the field upon the Swedish and Finland cavalry, who, unshaken, received the shock and steadily repelled it. Again the Pappenheimers charged, and again they were repulsed, and driven upon the Saxon troops on the Swedish left, whom, after a hard contest, they dislodged and drove pell-mell across the plain. Foremost in the flight was the cowardly Elector of Saxony, who, hurrying from the field, sped on and rode ten miles without drawing bridle.
Of the Scottish officers vast numbers were slain, for the high plumes in their helmets made them conspicuous marks for the long swords of the Pappenheimers, who hewed them down on every side with yells of fierce delight and loud shouts of, "Victoria! Victoria!” "Follow, follow!” when, on a sudden, in the midst of this triumphant career, they were checked by the sharp, quick discharge of musketry and the loud roll of the old Scots march. Sir John Hepburn came up with his men drawn up six deep, and as they advanced they fired, the three front ranks kneeling and the three rear standing upright, but all firing together and pouring so much lead among the formidable Pappenheimers that their ranks were broken; and then on came the Swedish horse, scouring the field and scattering and felling the Pappenheimers in all directions.
Into the confusion of this rout rode the King of Sweden to seek succour from Hepburn and protection for his left flank, which the flight of the Saxons had exposed. The king gave his orders, and Sir John, calling out to the brigades of horse on hiB right and left Hank to “Wheel, form column of squadrons, advance to the charge!” placed himself at the head of his own brigade, and, supported by half of Vitzdam’s corps, he marched them from the rear of the centre to the left flank, where he was met by the Imperialists, led by the formidable Tilly, who rode in front of his lines dressed in his green doublet and conspicuous by his high pointed hat with the red feather.
That small shrunken man with the livid face and the piercing hawk's eye was met by Sir John Hepburn, who galloped along in full armour, with laurel in his helmet, sword in hand, on a charger which outshone all the horses in the Held by the splendour of his trappings. And behind Hepburn came the Scots in dense columns, with the pikemen in front, while behind them were three ranks stooping and three erect, giving thus six volleys at once from the face of their squares, and pouring in their shot over each others helmets like a hailstorm, mowing down the shrinking enemy even as grasB is mown by the scythe; and so they swept on, until so close to the Austrians that the very colour of their eyes was visible, when Hepburn gave the last command: “Forward pikes!”
The pikes were levelled; the musketeerB clubbed their muskets, and, with a loud cheer and the crash of broken helmets and skulls, Hepburn's, Lumsden's and Lord Reay’s regiments, each led by its colonel, burst through the columns of Tilly, driving them back in irredeemable confusion and with frightful slaughter. Lord Reay's Highlanders were the first to break through; and Munro on the right wing stormed the trenches against the Walloons, took the breastwork, captured the cannon and killed the gunners and their guards. Nor could any of the Imperialists have escaped the slaughter of that day but for the smoke and dust, which favoured their flight. Munro says:
“We were as in a dark cloud, not seeing half our actions, much less discerning either the way of our enemies or the rest of our brigades. Whereupon, having a drummer by me, I caused him to beat the Scots march till it cleared up, which recollected our friends unto us.'’
In the evening, the battle-plain of Leipzig presented an awful sight Five Imperialist field officers, Lerma, Furstenberg, Holstein, Schomberg, Gonzaga, and seven thousand soldiers lay dead on the field. In some places the corpses lay piled over each other chin deep, bleeding bodies and open gushing wounds mingled with rent and bloody armour, torn standards, dismounted cannon, broken drums and dying horses. Great bonfires were made of the broken waggons and tumbrils, and the shattered stockades and pikes whioh strewed the field. The red glow of these fires, as they biased on the plains of Leipzig, glaring on the glistening mail and upturned faces of the dead, lighted the Imperialists on their flight towards the Weser. Few of these fugitives escaped: for all night the vast plain rang with the reports of the petronels andpisto-lettes of the pursuing dragoons, and the alarm-bell of the villages tolled incessantly. All thepeMnts were up and in arms to take summary revenge on the wounded and weary Imperialists who came in their way. And Tilly, the grey-haired soldier and priest, thrice wounded, in a frenzy of fear and shame at the rout of his veterans, fled from the field which was won by the valour of the “invincible Scots." These Scots, who made such red havoc with Tilly’s glory, took his life also; for when he met them again on the banks of the Lech, they shot off his leg and drove him to Ingolstadt, where he died of his wound.
How Sir John Hepburn and his Scots stormed Marienburg and the Sconce on the Rhine, how they defended Oxenford, how Sir John quarrelled with the King of Sweden, and, in spite of his oath never again to unsheath his sword for that “ungrateful prince," how he did good service at Altenburg and Alta Feste, how he took service in France, and how ho fell, sword in hand, as he was lending his Scots against the rampart of the town of Ztbem; all this, and more, high eulogies paid to his memory by German, Swedish, and French chronidere, we might recount here; and if we refrain it is for want of space, not for want of will. Three who would follow Sir John Hepburn on his glorious career, will find an inexhaustible treasure an amusement and sound antiquarian lore in Mr. Grant’s book, which is the best of its kind that it has ever been our good fortune to meet with.
And that's it for this week and hope you have a great weekend.
Alastair
https://electricscotland.com/scotnews.htm
Electric Scotland News
As the Christmas season is on the horizon I decided to visit the Taste of Britain store in London, Ontario to get in some of my favourite items. Ended up spending just over $300 but am sure I'll enjoy everything I purchased and it is once a year so worth it. They have 2 stores in London and another in Sarnia both of which are locations which are around a 3.5 hour round trip for me. I keep suggesting they put a store in Chatham but to no avail so far.
I usually purchase 10 packs of Irish Link pork sausages as they are the nearest I have found to the Richmond thick Irish sausages I used to purchase in Scotland. I also got a couple of Christmas cakes with marzipan and icing and three packs of milk chocolate digestive biscuits. To that I added some haggis and black pudding and a pack of Irish potato scones (the Scottish version is like cardboard). Also purchased a couple of small plum puddings and tinned custard to go with it. Few other one off items as well.
One thing I have never found in Canada is Ox Tongue. In Scotland all the large supermarkets stocked it and even the wee corner stores stocked a lunch tongue version with jelly and tongue pieces. So why this can't be found in Canada is something I really don't understand. Another thing I don't understand is why Canadian butchers don't do pies. Every butcher I know in Scotland does their own steak pie with puffed pastry top. I now make my own and it's not that hard to do.
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Remembrance Day is a memorial day observed in Commonwealth of Nations member states since the end of the First World War to remember the members of their armed forces who have died in the line of duty.
Many Canadians are unaware that this year’s Remembrance Day marks a major milestone, according to a new survey.
Armistice Day, now known as Remembrance Day, was first marked in Canada on Nov. 11, 1919. That date marked the one-year anniversary of the signing of the armistice that ended the First World War.
Sunday marks the 100-year anniversary of the end of the war. While there are events planned across the country, as is tradition, a survey from genealogy website Ancestry reveals that most Canadians don’t plan to attend them.
The survey also found that 56 per cent of its 1,524 Canadian respondents could not identify the importance of this year’s anniversary.
It also found several other signs that Canadians’ awareness of the First World War might be fading, including 38 per cent of respondents saying they do not know if they have a relative who served in the war.
Only 22 per cent of respondents were able to identify Sir Robert Borden as Canada’s wartime prime minister. Eight per cent believed it was Winston Churchill, who was prime minister of the United Kingdom during the Second World War.
Danny Martin, deputy director with the Royal Canadian Legion, says declining interest in Remembrance Day and the First World War does not surprise him given Canada’s last veteran of that war died in 2010.
“Our older generation of veterans are all gone,” he told CTVNews.ca in an Oct. 25 interview.
Additionally, Martin said, the war is no longer covered as thoroughly in schools as it was in the past.
“That might be like a 15, 20-minute exercise in the classroom. You don’t gain anything out of that. You don’t get the feel,” he said.
Other findings of the survey include:
80 per cent of Canadians are planning to commemorate Remembrance Day in some way this year, down from 86 per cent last year
Younger Canadians are even less likely to have Remembrance Day in mind, with 72 per cent of people under the age of 35 saying they expect to mark the occasion in some way
Alberta and the Atlantic provinces lead the way on Remembrance Day participation, with 91 per cent of respondents there saying they plan to
In Quebec, that number drops to 50 per cent
59 per cent of Canadians plan to purchase a poppy, down from 70 per cent in 2017
46 per cent expect to observe a moment of silence
The survey has a margin of error of 2.5 per cent, 19 times out of 20.
Some of the 54 Commonwealth member states, such as Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia, observe the tradition of Remembrance Day on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month. Other nations observe a solemn day but at different dates. For example, ANZAC Day is observed in New Zealand on April 25. In South Africa, Poppy Day is marked on the Sunday that falls closest to November 11.
Many nations that are not members of the Commonwealth also observe Remembrance Day on November 11, including France, Belgium and Poland.
The United States used to commemorate Armistice Day on November 11. However, in 1954 they changed the name to Veterans Day.
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Here is the video introduction to this newsletter...
Note that this is a selection and more can be read in our ScotNews feed on our index page where we list news from the past 1-2 weeks. I am partly doing this to build an archive of modern news from and about Scotland as all the newsletters are archived and also indexed on Google and other search engines. I might also add that in newspapers such as the Guardian, Scotsman, Courier, etc. you will find many comments which can be just as interesting as the news story itself and of course you can also add your own comments if you wish.
Meet the Scot heard round the world working for top US news channel
He is heard by more than 300 million television viewers across the United States every week, but the chances are that very few realise the voice belongs to a man broadcasting from the bedroom of his cottage in North-east Scotland.
Read more at:
https://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/m...nnel-1-4823335
Life sciences furthering Scotland’s innovation reputation
Our approach to implementing the next phase of the Life Sciences Strategy is crucial to maintaining the momentum that keeps us on the path towards our bold target for life sciences set almost two years ago.
Read more at:
https://www.scotsman.com/business/co...tion-1-4823419
Test tube trees: An insurance policy against extinction?
A tiny oak tree emerges from a test tube in the laboratory.
Read more at:
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46065156
Kenneth Roy
26 March 1945 - 5 November 2018
Read his obituary at:
http://www.scottishreview.net/KennethRoyObituarya.html
Glenfiddich Piping Championships 2018
We are delighted to once again bring you the videos from each performance at this year's Glenfiddich Piping Championships which took place on Saturday 27th October at Blair Castle.
Listen at:
https://vimeo.com/piping
After Brexit, Britain has the chance to create a Restoration Economy
Brexit offers a golden chance to restore the British countryside
Read more at:
https://capx.co/after-brexit-britain...ration-economy
Three frontiers that are reshaping global power
The rise of the Indo-Pacific, Eurasia and the Arctic will change how nations view the world
Read more at:
https://capx.co/the-collision-of-the...w-world-order/
Brexit will allow us to write a tailor-made agriculture policy
80% of our welfare laws are made in Brussels, so of course Brexit hugely impacts animal welfare. And for no animals is this more true than for farm animals.
Read more at:
https://brexitcentral.com/brexit-wil...e-environment/
A vital message from the front-line
Amazing stories.
Read more at:
http://www.scottishreview.net/HowieFirth454a.html
The Scot who began the two-minute silence
A two-minute silence on Armistice Day has been observed since the first anniversary of the end of World War One in 1919. But what is perhaps less well known is that the idea for the silent reflection came from a Scot who lived in South Africa during the conflict.
Read more at:
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-46124328
Why Macron’s EU army wouldn’t keep Europe safe
Macron's call for a European army is motivated by his federalist ambitions, not what is best for European security
Read more at:
https://capx.co/why-macrons-eu-army-...p-europe-safe/
Electric Canadian
Canada and its Provinces
Added Volume XXI. The Pacific Province Part I. which you can read at:
https://electriccanadian.com/history/canadaprovinces.htm
The Engineering Journal
Added the volume for 1961.at: https://electriccanadian.com/transport/industrial/index.htm
Mining Review
Added the volume for 1919 at: https://electriccanadian.com/transport/mines/mining.htm
History of the North-West
By Alexander Begg (1894) in three volumes with volume 3 being the index.
You can read this at: https://www.electriccanadian.com/his...wt/history.htm
The Romance of Canada.
Stories from the History of her Discovery, Exploration, Conquest and Settlement edited by Herbert Strang (pdf)
You can read this at: https://www.electriccanadian.com/lif...ceofcanada.pdf
The Creation of Manitoba
or A History of the Red River Troubles by Alexander Begg (1871) (pdf)
You can read this at: https://www.electriccanadian.com/his...ofmanitoba.pdf
Early Days in Upper Canada
Letters of John Langton from the Backwoods of Upper Canada and the Audit Office of the Province of Canada edited by W. A. Langton (1926) (pdf)
You can read this at: https://www.electriccanadian.com/his...ppercanada.pdf
A Reminiscence of the Early Days
Written by Mrs. David Fleming, Cobourg in her eighty-second year (1921) (pdf)
You can read this at: https://www.electriccanadian.com/pio...fearlydays.pdf
1850 McKay and the Clipper Age
Born in a rural Loyalist community in Nova Scotia McKay emigrated at the age of seventeen to the
country his grandfather had abandoned after the Revolutionary war.
You can read about him at: https://electricscotland.com/history...McKay_Mini.pdf
Conrad Black
The Myth of an International Populist Uprising
http://www.conradmblack.com/1435/the...ulist-uprising
The future of our health care is being decided in the courts
http://www.conradmblack.com/1436/the...ing-decided-in
Electric Scotland
Highland Dancing
A wee compellation of Highland Dancing which you can watch at:
http://www.electricscotland.org/show...ghland-Dancing
A Yacht Voyage Round England
By William H. G. Kingston - New Edition, Revised and Enlarged which you can read at:
https://electricscotland.com/history...nd_England.pdf
Will Weatherhelm
The Yarn of an old Sailor by W. H. G. Kingston (New Edition 1915) (pdf) which you can read at:
https://electricscotland.com/history...eatherhelm.pdf
Archibald Hughson, The Young Shetlander
An Arctic Story by W. H. G. Kingston (1873) (pdf) which you can read at:
https://electricscotland.com/kids/Ar...Shetlander.pdf
A History of France
By André Maurois, Translated by Henry L. Binsse, Additional Chapters by Gerard Hopkins. It is in the spirit of telling a dramatic story, rather than of cautious scientific analysis, that M. Maurois has tackled his fascinating task and the result is, as it has already been hailed in France, the best modern one volume history of France (1964) (pdf)
You can read this at: https://electricscotland.com/history...ory-france.pdf
The Clipper Ship Era
An Epitiome of Famous American and British Clipper Ships, Their Owners,, Builders, Commanders, and Crews 1843-1869 by Arthur H. Clark (1911) (pdf)
You can read this at: https://electricscotland.com/history...ipperships.pdf
Scottish Stonemasonry at The White House
An interesting wee video which you can view at:
http://www.electricscotland.org/show...he-White-House
The Story
This story was taken from Tait's Edinburgh Magazine, volume 18, 1851.
SCOTTISH CAVALIER OF THE OLDEN TIME
We would not raise him from the dead, even if we could! For were he here, standing up in all his grim majesty of martial pomp, we would not sneer at him who in his time did his time’s work faithfully and manfully. Much less would we worship him as a hero; for even his exploits of bravery and endurance cannot raise him to the standard of a hero of our days. Why not, then, let him rest in his foreign grave? Yes, let him rest, but as a lesson to this century, as a proof that all human excellence and all ideas of human excellence are passing away to make room for other excellence and other ideas of excellence, let us try to raise, though it be but for an hour, the shadow of the shadow of Sir John Hepburn.
In East-Lothian, almost within sight of Berwick-Law, and on the brink of that deep hollow or ford where the Scots defeated and slew Athelstane, the Saxon king, stands a goodly-sized manorhouse, overlooking the rocky hills of Dirleton, flanked by an old kirk and surrounded by decayed moss-covered trees. The stone steps of the mansion are worn away with the tread of many generations of men and women who have passed away and left no trace behind them. Others, the denizens of that old gloomy house, are mentioned here and there in stray parchments and records; and from the collected evidence of these it appears that House Athelstaneford was built by a branch of the Hepburns of Hailes and Bothwell, and that the place was held feudally of their kinsmen the Hepburns of Waughton. These Hepburns of Hailes and Bothwell, and of Athelstaneford and Waughton, were an impetuous and warlike family, who took their fill of fighting and plunder in all the frays of the Border. Thus, in January 1569, we find them expelled from their ancestral seat at Waughton, and assembling in large masses to retake that place, “and Fortalice of Vachtune,” where they slew, “ Vmqle. Johnne Geddes,” and hurt and wounded “divers otheris,” besides breaking into the Barbican and capturing sixteen steeds. But while thus employed, they were attacked by the Laird of Carmichael, the Captain of the Tower, who slew three of them and drove off the rest. Among them was George Hepburn of Athelstaneford, who was subsequently tried for the proceedings of that day, and who was acquitted in this case not only, but also for the share he took in Bothwell’s insurrection, for his part in which he was arraigned as having slain “three of the king’s soldiers1’ at the battle of Langsides. Thus, escaping from sieges and battles, and, what is more, from the dangers of the law, George Hepburn died. No one knows how and whether he came to his end on the field or the scaffold, or in his own house of Athelstaneford. Nor is anything known of the day or year of his death, for little store was in those days set by the life of a simple yeoman. In the year 1616, it is found that his eldest son, George Hepburn, is “retoured” in the lands of Athelstaneford. George’s brother was John Hepburn, the chief hero of Mr. Grant’s Memoir. We say the chief hero, for he records other names and the deeds of other men of the time.
John Hepburn, the man in buff, had at that time, namely, in 1616, when his father was just dead, reached his sixteenth year. He had had what little schooling sufficed for a younger son of his day, and he was well informed for a lad who left school at fourteen. His back was yet unbent, and his mind rather stimulated than fraught with learning. But the best acquisition he made at school was a friend, Robert Munro; his dass-fellow in youth, his battle-fellow in after years. At that time, John Hepburn, too, was distinguished, even on the border, for the skill and grace of his horsemanship, and for the scientific use he made of the sword. And well it was for him that he, whose fortune lay at the sword’s point, should have known how to handle that instrument of his future elevation.
For to a youngster from the Scottish border the time offered scarcely any sustenance and much less promotion. The border wars and the home feuds of the Scottish nobles'were for the nonce terminated by the accession of James Stuart So monotonous and void of incident had life on the border become, that John Hepburn and Robert Munro actually set out on a tour to Paris and Poictiers, perhaps for the purpose of study, though it is much more probable that they intended looking out for vacancies in some of the Scotch ramenta in France. On this occasion it appears that the rising fame of the great Gustavus Adolphus, whom he “heard frequent commendations, gave birth to a spark of military ardour within his breast which was never extinguished till his death.”
Robert Munro remained in Paris, and learned a soldier’s trade in the body-guard of the King of France. How that trade was taught in those days will best be learned from his own account of military punishments:
“I was once made to stand, in my younger yeares, at the Louvre-gate, in Paris, for sleeping in the morning when I ought to have been at my exercise; for punishment I was made to stand, from eleven before noone to eight of the clocke in the night, centrv, armed with corslet, headpiece, bracelets, being iron to the teeth, in a hot summer’s day, till I was weary of my life, which ever after made me more strict in punishing those under my command.”
John Hepburn was destined to win his spurs in a school which was equally severe, though less distinguished. When he returned home, he found Sir Andrew Grey, a soldier of fortune, with a camp of recruits at Monkrig, in the vicinity of Atlielstaneford; and every day drummers were scouring the country, drumming out for volunteers to fight in Bohemia for the Princess Elizabeth and against the German Emperor. Their song of - "fre boy! fye boy! leave it not there, No honor is gotten by hunting the hare", had its effect on John Hepburn, who consented to “trail a pilke in Sir Andrew’s band,” that is to say, he enlisted as a private soldier in the division.
His captain, Sir Andrew, of all men was most fit to train young soldiers to the trade of arms. He was the type of a soldier of fortune and paid partisan, to whom the camp was a home, the march a recreation and the day of battle a season of gala and rejoicing. He had seen much service and hard fighting at home and abroad. As a friend of Lord Home, he had, in 1594, been outlawed by the General Assembly; and at the battle of Glen-livar he commanded the Earl of Huntley’s artillery, which consisted of “three culverins.” This old soldier wore his buff and armour as every-day dress, even in time of peace, and he was never seen without a long sword, a formidable dagger and a pair of iron pistols, all of which served greatly to annoy the King James Stuart, who said of old Sir Andrew that he was so fortified that, if he were but well “victualled, he would be impregnable.” Impregnable though he may have been to cold iron and leaden bullets, yet being sent into Holland, in 1624, with 12,000 English, it is presumed that he perished with his men, most of whom “deyed miserablie with cold and hunger,” and whose bodies lay “heaped upon another,” as food for “the dogs and swine, to the horror of all beholders.”
But we anticipate. In the year 1620, when John Hepburn joined Sir Andrew’s band, he led his force of 1,500 men and among them 120 mosstroopers whom the King’s Council had arrested and enrolled for turbulency through Leith and Holland into Bohemia.
That unfortunate country was just then exposed to all the horrors of a religious war. The Austrian Emperor had endeavoured to enforce his Roman Catholic tendencies, and the States had rebelled and offered their crown to the Elector of the Palatinate, son-in-law to James Stuart; and it was between him and the Emperor that the princes and powers of Germany and Europe had to choose. Sir Andrew Gray’s Scotch regiment joined the Elector’s forces in the campaign against the Emperor’s Spanish auxiliaries, under the Marquis Spinola; and in the course of that campaign John Hepburn was promoted to the command of a company of pikes. After the Battle of Prague, where the Elector’s forces were signally defeated, and where that prince himself abandoned his owti cause, the Scotch troops joined the army of the Count of Mansfeld, who undertook to carry on the war on account of the unfortunate queen. At his side they fought in the Palatinates, in the Alsace, and in Holland, at which latter place they assisted in the defence of the fortress of Bergen-op-Zoom; and on one occasion cut their way through the Marquis of Spinola’s army. On these fights, though we might adduce many instances of bravery and devotion on the part of the heroic Scots, we must nevertheless be silent; for so intrepid were they all, that John Hepburn’s deeds are lost amidst the number. His name stands first prominently forward when, at the end of the war in Holland, he led the remains of Sir Andrew’s band to Sweden, whither they were attended by the force of the great Gustavus Adolphus. That king, whose camp had risen to be the best military school in Europe, was almost monthly joined by troops of Scotchmen, and Mr. Grant, whose researches on the subject have been minute in the extreme, informs us that not less than 13,101 Scots served in the Swedish army during the wars in Germany.
Captain John Hepburn, joined by his cousin. James Hepburn of Waughton, was duly installed in the Swedish army, and 6oon promoted to the command of the Green Scots Brigade. Imagine him, decked with all the panoply of a warrior of that time, dressed in a gorget of richest stuff, covered with cunningly-worked and inlaid armour from the forges of Milan, his head surmounted with the plumed morion, arrow-shaped, with a gilt tiar turning up in front, his hair cut close, his moustache hanging down upon his gorget, and his long sword rattling against his enormous spurs. Imagine the Swedish king’s Scotch officer, his resplendent breast-plate, half covered with a scarlet scarf; his jackboots pistol-proof, and accoutred with enormous spurs, having each six rowels, measuring three inches from point to point, and projecting from a ball of bell-metal, within which were four iron drops, which jingled as he rode or walked. Imagine him leading his band of musketeers and pikemen, all duly clad in helmets, gorgets, buff-coats and breast-plates—the musketeers wearing their heavy matchlocks, the pikemen carrying pikes, varying from fourteen to eighteen feet long, and all of them, from the leader down to the last youngster who trailed a pike, looking more massive and stout than any men of our day ever can look; for their corselets were both large and thick, to cover well-padded doublets, and to resist the dint of bid-lets. In 1623 he was a colonel and commander of a regiment which formed part of the army which the King of Sweden despatched against the King of Poland. “It was in this Polish war,” sayB his biographer, “that Hepburn began the series of brilliant achievements which, marked his eareer under the banner of Gustavus. The most important of these deeds of arms was the relief of Mew, a town of Western Prussia, the Swedish garrison of which was closely blockaded by a Polish army of 30,000 men, who were intrenched upon a steep green eminence, cutting off all communication between the town and the surrounding country. The town of Mew being situate on the confluence of the Versa with the Vistula, it was over this eminence that the relieving army had to pass if they would raise tlie siege. The Poles had, therefore, furnished it with two batteries of ordnance, which commanded the approach by a cross fire, while the whole line of their intrenched infantry, armed with bows and matchlocks, swept the ground which descended abruptly from their earthen parapets. Against this army of 30,000 the King of Sweden sent 3000 Scots foot and 500 horse, under Count Thurn. This force left the Swedish camp in tlie dusk of die evening; and proceeding quietly and Bilently by a secret path, they soon came in view of the heights on which the Polish infantry, clad in mail of a half Oriental fashion, and armed with bows, matchlocks, iron maces, lances, scimitars and targets, were strongly intrenched, with their brass cannon bristling through the green brushwood on their right and left. In their rear lay the Bpires of Mew, the object of the contest and the prize of victory.
Night was fast setting in when Colonel Hepburn began to ascend the hill, by a narrow and winding path, encumbered by rocks and stones, thick underwood and overhanging trees, through which the heavily-armed soldiers threaded their way with great difficulty, as they clung to the projecting ledges of rock or grasped the furze and underwood in their attempts to gain the summit Not a sound was heard, not a word was spoken, and even the clang of armour or the jingle of a metal sword-sheath were drowned by the hoarse roar of the impetuous Vistula beneath. Thus guided by the white plume in Hepburn’s helmet, the Scots gained the summit and surprised the Poles, who were still working at their trenches. Muskets were clubbed, pikes advanced and the trenches taken. But bullets, arrows and stones fell upon them in a dense shower, and hordes of Cossacks in mail shirts and steel caps caused them great tribulation by their violent onsets, until Hepburn withdrew his column to a rock, against which he leaned his rear, while his front ranks, their pikes advanced, stood immoveable, presenting an impenetrable mass of bristling steel points, with every now and then a murderous volley from the musketeers in the centre. In this position he was reinforced by 200 German arquebusiers, whose assistance enabled him to hold out Advance was quite out °( th® question, for all along his front the Poles piled; their portable while the whole of their army attacked him incessantly or two nights and two days. But in the meanwhile, the King of Sweden succeeded in revictuallinj and regarrisoning the town of Mew. The Poles whose only hope was to reduce the place by fatigue and hunger, broke up their camp and abandoned the Biege.
Nor was it on land alone that Colonel Hepburn and his Scots volunteered the most desperate service. In the year 1630 he was sent, with ninety-two companies of foot and sixteen squadrons of horse, in two hundred small vessels, from Elfenaben, in Sweden, across the stormy Baltic to Pommern, where he remained in country quarters until be received orders to support Sir Donald Mackays Highlanders in the island of Rugen.
Those Highlanders, then under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Munro, had embarked at Pillan, from whence they were ordered to sail to Wolgast, in Pommern. They were in two Swedish vessels, and their baggage, horses, drums and ammunition were in a small ship which sailed along w ith them. Driven into the roads of Bom-holm by a tempest, the two vessels were separated, and one of them, in which were Lieutenant^Colonel Munro and Captain Robert Munro, with three Highland companies, sprung a leak, and was, after many dangers and hardships to the soldiers, thrown on the coast of the island of Rugen, where she parted amidships, and where the three companies of Highlanders had to cling to the wreck, over which the waves broke with an indescribable fury. Landed at length by means of a raft, which they constructed in the very midst of the surge, they found themselves eighty miles from the Swedish outposts, on an island all the forte d which were in the hands of the Imperialists, while all their means of defence consisted in an army, he drove the enemy out of Pommerland, and, lastly, sat down before Colberg to invest and blockade it In the course of this siege he was superseded in his command by a smdl German lordling, the Herr von Kniphausen, who held a higher rank in the Swedish army, and to whom we are indebted for many of the feats of the Scottish Hercules, which tins Herr von Kniphausen, too weak for execution, planned for the performance of others. Among these feats is the defence of the town and castle of Shevelbrunn, a pass at the distance of five miles from Colberg, and through which the Austrian forces of General Montecuculi, which were marching up for the relief of Colberg, would have to pass, before they could approach the town.
swords, pikes and some wet muskets, while every man of them was drenched, starving and exhausted with danger and toiL But it required greater hardships or dangers to break the spirit of these hardy soldiers of fortune. They hid among the cliffs until night, when they borrowed fifty muskets from the Pommeranian Governor of Ru-genwalde Castle, by whose assistance also they gained access to the city and killed and captured the Austrian garrison. Having thus obtained p«* session of the capital of Riigen, the next thing to be done was to retain the place and defend it against the Austrians, a large force of whom were at Colberg, at the distance of only seven mile from Rugenwalde. Lieutenant-Colonel Munre strengthened the castle by the erection of turt sconces and redoubts, and provisioned it by forsg-ing the country even to the very gates of BantEg* Then came a siege of nine weeks, with its eta* nonading, and its daily and nightly and sallies, until, one morning, the Austrians M from their trenches at the approach of Hepburn’s Green Brigade and Invincibles.
And here Sir John again appears on the scene, as governor of the town and castle of Riigenwalde, recruiting among the islanders, and 8000 fighting-men, whom he armed, disciplined and divided into companies.
The Herr von Kniphausen’s orders were very precise, and much more easy to give than to execute. “Maintain the town,” said that beer-bloated Teuton, “so long as you can; but give not up the castle while a single man remains with you.” That is to say, not “Go in and win!” but “Go in and be killed; but the longer you can be about it the more creditable it will be for you.”
Thus instructed, and accompanied by a squadron of steel-clad troopers, Sir John rode forth, thinking the place but “a scurvie hole for any honest cavalier to maintain his credit in.” But the Herr von Kniphausen had changed his mind already, and, withdrawing Sir John and the troopers, he sent Munro and his Highlanders, with exactly the same instructions, to be killed and to take time. These Highlanders fortified the ruined place with ramparts of rock and stockades breast high; and while they were completing their preparations the earth around shook with the tramp of Flemish horses and mailed men, for 8000 Imperialists, cuirassiers, Croats and arquebusiere, commanded by Montecuculi, marched up with great speed, but with still greater speed were they driven back by the well-regulated fire of the Highlanders. From their masses, still confused with the hurry of the retreat, a trumpeter advanced proposing a treaty of surrender, to which Munro replied," The word treaty having by some chance been omitted in my instructions, I have only powder and ball at the service of the Count de Montecuculi.” Back rode the trumpeter, incensed with the Scotchman’s saucy answer, and on came the Walloons and Croats. And the Highlanders, firing over their earthen breastworks, held the foe back with battle-built ramparts of dead men, which lay chin-deep in front of every barricade; and fighting, shooting, always retreating from one work to another, and burning tho streets as they fell back, they, with their faces still turned to the enemy, made good their retreat into the castle. But Montecuculi, who was not well pleased with the violence of those “ barekneed soldiers,” retreated during the night from Shevelbrunn, not without Munro despatching “ eighteen dragoniers to march after them for bringing me intelligence of his majestie’s forces from Stalin which were come betwixt the enemy and Colberg.”
The Austrian garrison of Colberg being hard pressed by the Scots and Swedes, and having no salvo upon the enemy’s works, while from every point of their approaches the musketeers poured volley after volley. . . . And while the imperial cannon, muskets, pistolettes and arquebuses-d-croix vomited a cloud of fire and dense white smoke, with bullets of every size—lead, iron and brass— from the walls, parapets and palisadoes, from casemate and cavalier, the brave Scottish brigade, with the green banners, rushed on with levelled pikes to storm the Guben Gate.
Hope of relief from Montecuculi, was at length compelled to capitulate, and marched out with the honours of war, namely, “all in their armour, with pikes carried, colours flying, drums beating and matches lighted; with bag and baggage, and two pieces of cannon with balls in their muzzles, and lintstocks burning.”
Six hundred of Lord Reay's Highlanders were, for nine days, beseiged by the Imperialists in New Brandenburg. On the ninth day the town was taken by assault, and the six hundred Highlanders with their chief, Colonel Lindsay, then 28 years of age, were unmercifully cut to pieces. Two officers, Captain Innes and Lieutenant Lumsden, escaped by swimming the wet ditch in their armour, and brought the news of their comrades’ death to the head-quarters of the Scotch brigade; and these, with carried pikes, matches lit, six standards displayed, and all the drums beating the “ old Scots* march,” which the shrill fifes poured to the morning wind, marched upon Frankfort-on-the-Odor to avenge the death of their comrades on Count Schomberg’s Austrian brigade of 10.000 old troops. As they came within sight of the city, they extended their lines, and marching up from different quarters, attacked it. And the Austrians, still reeking with the slaughter of New Brandenburg, and their ravages, their burnings, sackings and murders, the piking of children and the violence done to women in Brandenburg and Pommem, stood up on the line of the embattled wall which girt the city, and which was bright with the glitter of their helmets. Their cannon opened from the ramparts and, when the smoke was blown aside their pikes and muskets and sword-blades flashed in the sun. But on that day all the cannonading was a mere prelude, an earnest of what was to follow in the way of attack and defence. For the King of Sweden had yet to reconnoitre the place, which he did in person ; and having for that purpose come “ somewhat too near the town,” a sally was made by the Austrians and the king’s party fired at. Two officers fell badly wounded, namely, Lieutenant Munro of Munro’s regiment and Colonel Teuffel (Anglice Devil) Baron of Zinnersdorf, for whom the King “ made great mourn, alleging he had no help then but of Hepburns.” And indeed it wTas John Sinclair, of Hepburn’s regiment, who repelled the Imperialists ; and, following up his advantage, effected a lodgment in a churchyard, from whence he could enfilade and sweep the enemy’s works in flank. Captain Gunter, too, of Hepburn’s regiment, accompanied by a dozen of his men, clambered through the moat and reconnoitred the space between the outer rampart and the inner wall. These preparations having been made during the night and on the morning of Palm Sunday, the 3rd April, the general assault commenced at five o’clock on the afternoon of that day. We quote it in the words of Mr. Grant’s masterly description, adding only that the King of Sweden unleashed his Scots against the walls, after reminding them of their murdered countrymen at New Brandenburg.
“Sir John Hepburn and Colonel Lumsden, side by side, led them on. They both bore lighted petards to burst open the gate. Advancing, they hung their petards, and retired a pace or two: the engines burst and blew the strong barrier to a thousand fragments. And now the bullets poured through the gap thick as a hailstorm; for, charged to the muzzle, two pieces of Austrian cannon swept the approach and made tremendous havoc among the dense ranks of the Scots Brigade, forming absolute lanes through them.
"While Munro’s regiment crossed the wet ditch, among mud and water which came up to their gorgets, and boldly planting their ladders, clambered over the sloping bastions, under a murderous fire, storming the palisadoes at point of sword and push of pike, Gustavus, with the Blue and Yellow Swedish Brigades, all officered by Scotch Cavaliers, fell, sword in hand, upon that quarter which was defended by Walter Butler and his Irish regiment. Butler made a noble and resolute defence, fighting nearly to the last man around him.
“The Green Scots Brigade still pressed desperately to gain the strong Guben Gate; the valorous Hepburn, leading the pikes and being advanced within half-pike’s length of the door, was shot above the knee that he was lame of before. Finding himself struck, 4 Bully Munro,’ he cried jocularly to his old friend and fellow-student, whose soldiers had so gallantly carried the outer palisadoes.
"A major advancing to take his place, was 6hot dead; and, with the blood streaming from their wounds, the soldiers were falling fast on every side, till even the stubborn pikemen wavered for a moment; upon which Lumsden and Munro, each at the head of his own regiment, having their helmets closed and half-pikes in their hands, cheered on their men, and, shoulder to shoulder, led the way.
"My hearts!’ exclaimed Lumsden, brandishing his weapon, 'my brave hearts, let’s enter!’
"'Forward!’ cried Munro; 'advance, pikes!’ And the gate was stormed in a twinkling, the Austrians driven back, their own cannon turned on them and fired point-blank, blowing their heads and limbs into the air.
"The Austrians were slain on every hand; and to their cries of 'Quarter! quarter!’ the Scots replied, 'New Brandenburg! Remember New Brandenburg'.
"Hepburn’s brigade pressed on from the Guben Gate through one street which was densely filled with Imperial troops, who contested every foot of the way, while General Sir John Bannier scoured another with his brigade. Twice the Imperialists beat a parley ; Lut amid the roar of the musketry, the boom of the cannon from bastion and battery, with the uproar, shouts and yells in every contested street and house, the beat of the drum was unheard. Still the combat continued, the carnage went on, and still the Scotch brigade advanced in close columns of regiments, shoulder to shoulder, like moving castles, the long pikes levelled in front, while the rear ranks of musketeers volleyed in security from behind.
"The veteran Imperialists, ‘hunger and cold beatten souldiers,’ met them almost foot to foot and hand to hand. The stern aspect of Tilly’s soldiers excited even the admiration of their conquerors; for their armour was rusted red with winter’s storms, and dinted with sword-cuts and musketballs; their faces seamed with scars and bronzed by constant exposure in every kind of weather; they were forced to give way, and a frightful slaughter ensued.
"The Generals Schomberg, Montecuculi, Tiefenbach and Herbertstein mounted, and, with a few cuirassiers, fled by a bridge towards Geogan, leaving four colonels, thirty-six junior officers and 3000 soldiers dead in the streets, fifty colours, and ten baggage-waggons laden with plate; and so precipitate was their retreat that their caiwoar blocked up the passage to the bridge, while cannon, tumbrils, chests of powder and ball, piles of dead and dying soldiers, with their ghastly and distorted visages and battered coats of mail, covered with blood and dust, smoke, mud and the falling masonry of the ruined houses, made up a medley of horrors and formed a barricade which obstructed the immediate pursuit of the foe.”
Next day the dead were buried; friend and fee were laid side by side, a hundred in every grave!
Within a few days only after the capture of Frankfort, and though still suffering from his wound, we find Sir John Hepburn setting out to reinforce the Marshal Horne in his siege of Landsberg, a town on the eastern bank of the Oder. This town was held by the Austrian Colonel Gratz with 5000 foot and twelve troops of horse. As the valiant Scot marched along he fell in with a horde of Croats in short doublets, corslets of steel, long white breeches and fur caps, whom he attacked, routed and slew their colonel, in consequence of which these savage warriors fell back upon Landsberg, burning all the villages in their way and blowing up all the bridges. We need not here expatiate on the strength of Landsberg long famed for the manufacture of iron culverin3; or the mixture of boldness and stratagem—the crossing a deep ditch on planks and the taking o the strongest redoubt—which induced Colonel Gratz to capitulate, and leave the town with drinw beating and colours displayed, and accompanied by not less than 2000 female camp-followers, in reference to whom we fully subscribe to the of the Swedish Intelligencer: “Thus was a goodly towne and a strong most basely given vpe by a companie of cullions.”
Then, again, the battle-field of Leipzig! which has since been drenched with the offal of many other butcheries, but which had its bloodiest day, as was actual carnage went, in that year of 1631, when Gustavus of Sweden, with 30,000 men, marched upon Tilly, who lay encamped on the dull, monotonous plain of Leipzig, with a motley, grim-visaged, scarred and war-worn army of Walloon emissaries, Spanish infantry, and* Austrian artillery, all in all to the number of 40,000. Marching on from Wittenberg, the Swedish army came in sight of the Austrian camp, and halted within a mile of it, on the 6th September. They placed their outguard almost within the range of a falconet from the enemy’s batteries, when they and indeed the whole army with them—bivouacked on the bare plain in their armour, with their swords and muskets at their sides, and with their haversacks for pillows. As the shades of the evening thickened over the Swedish bivouack, a dense fog rolled lazily along from the direction of Meissen, leaving nothing visible but the line of red fires which marked Tilly’s position in front of Leipzig. These fires dotted the slope of a gentle eminence south-west of Podelwitz, and extended nearly two miles from flank to flank. That sight was a fit drop-scene for the next morning’s tragedy; which scene was drawn up for action when, st sunrise on Wednesday, the 7th September, 1631, the white mists rose like a gauzy curtain from the mighty plain of Leipzig and Breitenfeld. As that curtain rose, the Swedes prepared for action, which they did by field-prayers, which were said in front of every regiment. This done, the king’s forces moved in good order against the Imperialists, whose long lines of burnished arms shone again in the rays of the rising sun. There was a deep murmur floating from one line to another, as the soldiers on either side blew their gun-matches, opened their pouches, and sprung their ramrods.
The Swedish army is thus described by Munro : * In the van were the Scottish regiments of Sir James Ramsay the Black, the Laird of Foulis, and Sir John Hamilton. Sir John Hepburn’s Green Scotch Brigade formed part of the reserve. As senior-colonel, Sir John Hepburn commanded this column, which consisted of three brigades. His own regiment carried four coloure into the field that day.
“Field-Marshal Horne, General Bannier and Lieutenant-General Banditzen commanded the cavalry; the King of Sweden and Baron Teuffel, of Ziorersdorf and Weyersburg, led the main body of the infantry.”
And further we are informed by the chroniclers of the events of that memorable battle, that “as the Swedish troops took up their ground, a great flock of birds, which rose suddenly from among the long grass and furrows of the fields, and flew towards Tilly’s lines, was viewed by each army as an omen of victory.”
Tilly’s position was extremely strong. His troops were drawn up in close columns, according to the ancient mode; one flank rested on Sohausen, the other on Lindenthal, two miles distant He commanded the centre himself; Count Fiirstenberg commanded the right wing, and Count Pappenheim the left. His Walloons were intrenched behind a rampart flanked by two batteries, mounting each twenty pieces of heavy cannon. One commanded the Swedish approach in a direct line, the other enfiladed the Saxons. In their rear lay a thick wood of dark trees, where Tilly proposed to rally in case of a defeat His cuirassiers, led by Count Fiirstenberg, were sheathed in complete suits of armour, under which they wore coats of buff and leather. Among these were the gaudy Italian cavalry and Crothenberg’s horse, the flower of the Empire. These horse occupied the wings, the infantry the centre. Renconi’s regiment was on the extreme left of Tilly: a heavily mailed regiment of Reformadoes occupied the extreme right.
As the two armies approached still nearer, the battle-cry of each rang through the air.“Gott mit uns!” cried the Swedes; “Sancta Maria!” shouted the Imperialists.
And at this juncture the vanguard of the Scots, which had crossed the Lober rivulet, were furiously charged by a detachment of Pappenheim cuirassiers, whom they repelled, by dint of pike and musket, and compelled to fall back on their main body. As the Pappenheimers retreated through the village of Podelwitz, they set fire to it, and the crash of the burning and falling houses was mingled with the cannonade which now commenced, and which lasted two hours and a half. At the end of that time, when the space between the two armies was completely filled with a dense white smoke, a long line of Eteel was seen to glitter in front of the Swedish lines, and a strong column of Pappenheimers, with banners uplifted, sword brandished and helmet closed, poured like lightning into the field upon the Swedish and Finland cavalry, who, unshaken, received the shock and steadily repelled it. Again the Pappenheimers charged, and again they were repulsed, and driven upon the Saxon troops on the Swedish left, whom, after a hard contest, they dislodged and drove pell-mell across the plain. Foremost in the flight was the cowardly Elector of Saxony, who, hurrying from the field, sped on and rode ten miles without drawing bridle.
Of the Scottish officers vast numbers were slain, for the high plumes in their helmets made them conspicuous marks for the long swords of the Pappenheimers, who hewed them down on every side with yells of fierce delight and loud shouts of, "Victoria! Victoria!” "Follow, follow!” when, on a sudden, in the midst of this triumphant career, they were checked by the sharp, quick discharge of musketry and the loud roll of the old Scots march. Sir John Hepburn came up with his men drawn up six deep, and as they advanced they fired, the three front ranks kneeling and the three rear standing upright, but all firing together and pouring so much lead among the formidable Pappenheimers that their ranks were broken; and then on came the Swedish horse, scouring the field and scattering and felling the Pappenheimers in all directions.
Into the confusion of this rout rode the King of Sweden to seek succour from Hepburn and protection for his left flank, which the flight of the Saxons had exposed. The king gave his orders, and Sir John, calling out to the brigades of horse on hiB right and left Hank to “Wheel, form column of squadrons, advance to the charge!” placed himself at the head of his own brigade, and, supported by half of Vitzdam’s corps, he marched them from the rear of the centre to the left flank, where he was met by the Imperialists, led by the formidable Tilly, who rode in front of his lines dressed in his green doublet and conspicuous by his high pointed hat with the red feather.
That small shrunken man with the livid face and the piercing hawk's eye was met by Sir John Hepburn, who galloped along in full armour, with laurel in his helmet, sword in hand, on a charger which outshone all the horses in the Held by the splendour of his trappings. And behind Hepburn came the Scots in dense columns, with the pikemen in front, while behind them were three ranks stooping and three erect, giving thus six volleys at once from the face of their squares, and pouring in their shot over each others helmets like a hailstorm, mowing down the shrinking enemy even as grasB is mown by the scythe; and so they swept on, until so close to the Austrians that the very colour of their eyes was visible, when Hepburn gave the last command: “Forward pikes!”
The pikes were levelled; the musketeerB clubbed their muskets, and, with a loud cheer and the crash of broken helmets and skulls, Hepburn's, Lumsden's and Lord Reay’s regiments, each led by its colonel, burst through the columns of Tilly, driving them back in irredeemable confusion and with frightful slaughter. Lord Reay's Highlanders were the first to break through; and Munro on the right wing stormed the trenches against the Walloons, took the breastwork, captured the cannon and killed the gunners and their guards. Nor could any of the Imperialists have escaped the slaughter of that day but for the smoke and dust, which favoured their flight. Munro says:
“We were as in a dark cloud, not seeing half our actions, much less discerning either the way of our enemies or the rest of our brigades. Whereupon, having a drummer by me, I caused him to beat the Scots march till it cleared up, which recollected our friends unto us.'’
In the evening, the battle-plain of Leipzig presented an awful sight Five Imperialist field officers, Lerma, Furstenberg, Holstein, Schomberg, Gonzaga, and seven thousand soldiers lay dead on the field. In some places the corpses lay piled over each other chin deep, bleeding bodies and open gushing wounds mingled with rent and bloody armour, torn standards, dismounted cannon, broken drums and dying horses. Great bonfires were made of the broken waggons and tumbrils, and the shattered stockades and pikes whioh strewed the field. The red glow of these fires, as they biased on the plains of Leipzig, glaring on the glistening mail and upturned faces of the dead, lighted the Imperialists on their flight towards the Weser. Few of these fugitives escaped: for all night the vast plain rang with the reports of the petronels andpisto-lettes of the pursuing dragoons, and the alarm-bell of the villages tolled incessantly. All thepeMnts were up and in arms to take summary revenge on the wounded and weary Imperialists who came in their way. And Tilly, the grey-haired soldier and priest, thrice wounded, in a frenzy of fear and shame at the rout of his veterans, fled from the field which was won by the valour of the “invincible Scots." These Scots, who made such red havoc with Tilly’s glory, took his life also; for when he met them again on the banks of the Lech, they shot off his leg and drove him to Ingolstadt, where he died of his wound.
How Sir John Hepburn and his Scots stormed Marienburg and the Sconce on the Rhine, how they defended Oxenford, how Sir John quarrelled with the King of Sweden, and, in spite of his oath never again to unsheath his sword for that “ungrateful prince," how he did good service at Altenburg and Alta Feste, how he took service in France, and how ho fell, sword in hand, as he was lending his Scots against the rampart of the town of Ztbem; all this, and more, high eulogies paid to his memory by German, Swedish, and French chronidere, we might recount here; and if we refrain it is for want of space, not for want of will. Three who would follow Sir John Hepburn on his glorious career, will find an inexhaustible treasure an amusement and sound antiquarian lore in Mr. Grant’s book, which is the best of its kind that it has ever been our good fortune to meet with.
And that's it for this week and hope you have a great weekend.
Alastair
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