Reivers – Little Jock Elliot of the Park
Liddesdale Reiver Encounters Ilustrious Lord March Warden
May 5, 2009
Jock Elliot came from an area known as the Park in what was formerly known as Copshaw, modern day Newcastleton in the Scottish Borders. He was well known for his reiving propensities and contempt for authority.
When Bothwell, Lord High Admiral of Scotland, Duke of Orkney and recently appointed Lord Warden of the Scottish Marches heard that Jock had been seen in the vicinity of Hermitage castle he set out to apprehend the great Scottish reiver. He was determined to make his mark early in unruly Liddesdale.
A Brief Encounter in the Wilds of LiddesdaleBothwell soon met up with Jock, near the Billhope burn, and without any ceremony shot him out of his saddle. It appeared that Jock Elliot of the Park lay fatally wounded but when Bothwell leaned over the body to inspect his handiwork Jock, wily reiver that he most certainly was, sprang to his feet and knifed Bothwell. He inflicted some serious wounds including a cut to Bothwell's forehead which lay the bone exposed. Jock ran off before any of Bothwell's posse could re-act. He lived to reive another day.
Negotiations with the Prisoners in Hermitage CastleBothwell, bleeding heavily, was carried back to Hermitage castle. His wounds were life-threatening. Only within the castle could he count on aid and succour in this hour of his greatest need.
However, in his absence, the prisoners held in the castle dungeons, all a product of his efforts to clear out of Liddesdale the most notorious of the thieves who threatened the peace of the realm, had broken out.
They refused entry to the great Lord until, in desperation for his life, his servants promised their release. Thus for all Bothwell's reputation as one of the great Scottish warlords feared by all who came within his realm, the tables were turned. Like many another man who dared contest the reiving fraternities he came off second best.
Mary, Queen of Scots, Visits Bothwell in Hermitage CastleAt the same time as Bothwell's wounds were being attended to in Hermitage, Mary, Queen of Scots, was holding a meeting for justice at Jedburgh, some twenty miles to the north. It was the scandal of the day in Scotland that she was consorting with Bothwell whilst still married to Henry, Lord Darnley. There is really no evidence of this. It is probably nearer the truth that , at least at this time, Mary confided in Bothwell as one of the few men she could trust among the peers of Scotland.
On learning of Bothwell's predicament she rode with all speed to Hermitage to see and comfort him. The meeting lasted for only a few hours before she embarked on the return journey to Jedburgh. On the way her horse stumbled in the mud, it was a grey October day replete with the fine drizzle for which the Borders are well-known, and she lost a silver spur (some say a watch). Over two hundred years later, a shepherd draining a particularly wet area on the heights above Hermitage was to find it at a place still known as the Queensmire.
The Legacy of Jock of the Park's Actions
Throughout Mary's journey to Hermitage and then back to Jedburgh, the weather had been foul and she was to suffer as a consequence. By the time she was back in Jedburgh she had contracted a heavy cold which developed to the point where it was thought she would never recover and she was given the last rites.
However both she and Bothwell eventually overcame their near-death experiences and lived on only to write one of the most heart-rending episodes in British history.
Mary was to say in later life, incarcerated for nineteen years in England before her execution, that she wished she had died at Jedburgh.
Although Bothwell was never to say it, there would be many times that he would muse on his encounter with Jock of the Park and curse himself for the folly in taking for granted that he had bested one of Liddesdale's most notorious reivers. It took but a few seconds to lean over the body of Jock of the Park. The aftermath of such a simple action would shake the throne of Scotland.
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