Importance of forgotten Scottish battle in the Wars of Independence

Sometimes that involves me researching a subject I had not previously written about and that is the case today with the Battle of Boroughmuir in 1335.

A reader based near the home of the famous rugby club Boroughmuir RFC e-mailed me to ask if I knew anything about the battle as there is no record of the battle site or much detail about it even in local history books.

I immediately responded that it was not only one of the most important of the smaller battles of the Second War of Independence but was arguably the most complex, even bizarre, battles of that period.

That’s largely because the battle fought mainly on what was then the Burgh Muir of Edinburgh on July 30, 1335, featured intervention on the “wrong” side by a force of Continental fighters from the region of Namur which these days is part of the French-speaking area of Wallonia in Belgium.

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It was also one of the few battles of the Wars of Independence which took place on the streets of Edinburgh, and I am amazed that more prominence is not given to it in the annals of the city, or for that matter by usually reliable historians – Magnus Magnusson does not mention it in his Scotland: The Story Of A Nation and Michael Lynch ignores it in his magisterial Scotland, nor is the battle mentioned in John and Julia Keay’s Encyclopaedia Of Scotland.

The mainly English chroniclers of the period described the invading force as French, but that was misleading as France was very much still allied to Scotland at that time.

To put the battle in context, here’s a brief account of the history of the 1330s. Despite having recognised Scotland’s independence and signed a “perpetual” peace treaty with King Robert the Bruce – the Treaty of Northampton-Edinburgh of 1328 – Edward III was soon looking for ways to renounce the treaty which he said had been imposed on him at the age of 15, and which was known to the English as the “Shameful Peace”.

This was despite Edward putting his name to the treaty which stated that Scotland “shall belong to our dearest ally and friend, the magnificent prince, Lord Robert, by God’s grace illustrious King of Scotland, and to his heirs and successors, separate in all things from the kingdom of England, whole, free, and undisturbed in perpetuity, without any kind of subjection, service, claim or demand”.

They would prove to be weasel words from a contemptible monarch.

When King Robert died in 1329, the Bruce’s son became King David II, but he was just five at the time, though it should be noted that as part of the 1328 treaty he was already married to Edward III’s sister Joan who was three years older. Edward Balliol, son of disgraced king John “Toom Tabard” Balliol who had been humiliated, forced to abdicate and sent into exile in France by Edward I, rounded up the numerous nobles that the Bruce had disinherited for their support of his rivals and Edward II, and in 1333 marched north with Edward III’s army in support. The Second War of Independence was under way.

The Scottish army loyal to David II was virtually destroyed by the English at Halidon Hill that year, but with David II in exile in France, a succession of Guardians took up the conflict with Balliol and Edward III, who was becoming more interested in war with France. The most important of these Guardians was Sir Andrew Murray, son of the knight of the same name who had been co-commander with Sir William Wallace at the great victory at Stirling Bridge in 1297.

Like Robert the Bruce, Murray proved to be an expert in guerilla warfare and slowly but surely he and his troops forced the English southwards. The Battle of Culblean on St Andrew’s Day 1335 is often said to be the first Scottish victory of the Second War of Independence but that’s just not true as the Battle of Boroughmuir had been won four months earlier.

The “French” confusion was because the English army which had marched north from Carlisle to link up with Edward Balliol’s troops was supposed to join up with 300 knights and men-at-arms in the service of Guy II, the Count of Namur whose cousin Philippa was the wife of Edward III. Namur’s overlord was King Philip VI of France but Guy was very much acting on his own initiative.

Warned of his approach from Berwick, Scottish Guardian Thomas Randolph, the Third Earl of Moray, and his army moved to intercept Namur and his force as they crossed the Burgh Muir, ancient grazing ground of Edinburgh.

Battle was joined and soon the action moved into Edinburgh itself, becoming a vicious hand-to-hand conflict with the Scots very much gaining the upper hand.

The chronicler Walter Bower reported: “The men of Namur therefore, as they fled and fought bravely, kept together until they climbed the lamentable hill where there used to be the Maidens’ castle of Edinburgh (Edinburgh Castle, below), which had been demolished earlier (in 1314) for fear of the English.

These rocks they defended courageously, and killing their exhausted and injured horses besides, they made a defensive wall with their bodies. And thus, surrounded and besieged by the Scots throughout the whole of that night, they passed it continuously without sleep, hungry, cold, thirsty and weary.

Tired out and distressed in this way, and with no hope of any help, they in the morning of the next day surrendered themselves to the Scots in capitulation, after an agreement had been reached about the ransom to be paid, provided that they could depart to their home country.”

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Guy of Namur was one of those ransomed, with Moray escorting him to the Border only for the Earl to be captured himself and imprisoned for five years.

The Battle of Boroughmuir, then, was the first Scottish victory of the Second War of Independence and should be better known.