Published: Wednesday, 12th March, 2008 12:00
Battle at Aird's Moss
By by Douglas Skelton
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The memorial at Aird's Moss near Muirkirk
Pic by: Douglas Skelton
JULY 22, 1680
Nine Covenanters dead, five arrested after bloody encounter on rainswept land near Muirkirk
Nine Covenanters were killed today during a bloody struggle on moorland between Cumnock and Muirkirk.
Among the dead are Reverend Richard Cameron and his brother Michael who one month ago thundered into Sanquhar to read their now infamous 'Declaration’ which branded His Majesty King Charles a traitor.
On the morning of the encounter at a place called Aird’s, or Airs, Moss, Reverend Cameron is reported to have predicted his own death.
On the run following the Sanquhar incident, he and his men stayed at a local farmhouse. The Farmer’s daughter has told 'The Killing Times’ that as he washed his face and hands he paused and said; “This is their last washing. I have need to make them clean, for there are many to see them.
Later that day, a party of soldiers on patrol from their Sorn Castle garrison were directed to Cameron and his men on the moor by local landowner Sir John Cochrane. Under the command of Fifeman Andrew Bruce of Earlshall, the soldiers moved to arrest the Covenanters.
A survivor of the encounter has told 'The Killing Times’ that Reverend Cameron and his men displayed tremendous courage. “There was no leisure for a multitude of words, no space for anything. Three times he cried, 'Lord, spare the green and take the ripe.’ Then he turned to his brother and said, 'Michael, come-let us fight it out to the last!”
The subsequent battle was fought mainly by men on horseback. The hand-to-hand fighting was bitter and bloody, with a rainstorm turning the ground underfoot treacherous.
When the shooting ended, nine Covenanters lay dead, with 28 of the superior Government force dead or dying.
A spokesperson for the soldiers praised the Covenanter force saying that the men were “of the greatest courage they ever saw.”
He continued: “If they had been well-trained and armed and horsed as we were, we would have been put to flight and few of us escaped. Their shots and strokes were deadly, and few recovered.”
Five Covenanters were arrested on the field and transported to Edinburgh to face trial.
Their military commander, David Hackston of Rathillet, is expected to be put to death, not just for the battle but also his involvement in the murder of Archbishop James Sharp last year.
Richard Cameron died on the field. His head and his hands have been cut from his body and transported to Edinburgh, thus fulfilling his premonition. His remains - as well as his comrades who fell - are to be interred on the site of the battle.
The Government commander, Andrew Bruce, told 'The Killing Times’: “There’s the head and hands that lived praying and preaching, and died praying and fighting.”
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