IN connection with the commemoration of the tercentenary of the signing of the National Covenant, many references were made to the Church and Church Yard of Greyfriars. The place received its name from the Friars Minors of Observance in whose possession it was in pre-Reformation days. These Friars wore a grey habit, hence the name Greyfriars. Their church lay near the north gate and their burial place near where the Martyrs’ Monument now stands. At the time of the Reformation the Greyfriars had to give up their possessions and the magistrates of Edinburgh petitioned the Queen to have the Greyfriars Yard turned into a burial ground to relieve the congestion around St. Giles.
In 1598 Edinburgh was divided into four parishes or quarters, and room had to be found for the congregation that worshipped in the Upper Tolbooth or west end of St. Giles. It was not, however, until 1612 that a definite arrangement was come to and the building of a place of worship in Greyfriars Yard was commenced. After eight years the building was opened for divine worship. The building erected at this date was the eastern half of the present building. It was this building which was to witness the signing of the National Covenant in 1638. Thirty years after its erection the building suffered much damage internally from the attentions of the Cromwellian soldiers. In 1718 the tower which had been used by the magistrates as a powder magazine was blown up and it was never rebuilt. Owing to this catastrophe and the increase of the population a new building was erected to the west of the old building—this was the New Greyfriars. About 100 years ago the Old Greyfriars was destroyed by fire and nothing was left but the walls. The building was re-erected after twelve years and until 1929 two congregations, Old Greyfriars and New Greyfriars, worshipped with only a wall between them. In 1932 the wall was removed and the two congregations now worship in the same building. Within these buildings the gospel message was preached by such eminent ministers as George Gillespie of Aaron’s Rod Blossoming fame; Principal Carstares, who did so much for the Presbyterian cause after the Revolution: and Dr. John Erskine, whose memorable words:—”Moderator, rax me that Bible,” introduced his onslaught on the Moderate party when they opposed Foreign Missions in the General Assembly at the beginning of the 19th century.
Old Greyfriars is of historic interest as the building in which the new version of the National Covenant was signed by the Scottish nobility, etc., on 28th February, 1638. Alexander Henderson opened the proceedings with prayer. The Earl of Loudon then addressed the assembled gathering while Archibald Johnston of Wariston followed by reading the Covenant. The story of the Earl of Sutherland being the first to sign the Covenant, as has been pointed out in our pages already, has no historical foundation. Still less the picture of his venerable appearance as presented to us by Dr. Hetherington and others. John, Earl of Sutherland, was not yet 29 years of age at this date. The story of the signing of the Covenant by the Earl of Sutherland may have arisen from the fact that his name is the first to the National Petition of 1637. Furthermore, the Earl was not present at the signing of the Covenant in Greyfriars.
Pictures by imaginative artists representing the signing of the Covenant on a flat stone by crowds, while they were being addressed by ministers, have also been shown by Dr. Hay Fleming to have no historical foundation. The people of Edinburgh did not sign the Covenant, either in the Church or in the Churchyard of St. Giles at this date, as has been pointed out in a former article in our pages. The signatories of the Covenant who subscribed their names in Greyfriars were the nobles, privy councillors, etc., who were present in the town; thereafter, some of the lesser barons and commissioners to Parliament adhibited their names. Next day Johnston had prepared four further copies of the Covenant and these were subscribed by the ministers and the commissioners to Parliament for the burghs, in a hall in the Cowgate. From the 2nd March and onwards the people got their opportunity of signing first in the College Kirk, which stood near the east end of the Waverley Station, and then throughout Scotland.
Mr. H. M. Paton in an interesting address,* delivered to a company of Original Seceders in May says in regard to the Covenant signed in Greyfriars: “The whereabouts of the original copy of the Covenant signed in Greyfriars is unknown, and of the other copies signed on the following day it is difficult to trace anything. Hay Fleming inclined to think that one of them was that preserved in the City Museum, now Huntly House, Canongate, opposite the old Canongate Tolbooth, where so many of God’s saints were to languish in prison for the Covenanting cause. Various copies of the Covenant, some forty of them, are extant elsewhere. The nobles subscribed many of them as occasion offered; and the people’s turn came in Greyfriars, as in other Edinburgh Churches on 1st and 8th April, when as congregations they vowed and subscribed with their hands uplifted to the Lord. April 1st was for Edinburgh the great day of the Covenant.”
*This addressed was printed in the Original Secession Magazine (September) and we acknowledge our indebtedness to it for some of the facts stated in this article.—Editor.
The tradition that over 1000 prisoners were imprisoned in the Churchyard after the Battle of Bothwell Bridge in 1679, where, according to the traditional account, men and women were exposed to the inclemency of the weather is exaggerated. The prison camp, however, as Mr. Paton points out, “was perhaps larger than the whole area of the present cemetery; for it consisted of over three acres of ground, and extended as far as the junction of Bristo Place with Lothian Street (opposite the McEwan Hall). The entrance to it was somewhere on the line of Forrest Road. The prisoners were not, therefore, cramped for room, and besides the charity which the citizens were allowed to provide, a daily provision of meal or bread was made for them, and a supply of water was introduced to the field. Of the 1184 persons brought thither on 24th June (for it was mid summer), many who were wounded were taken to Heriot’s Hospital, close by, and there attended by the town’s physicians; while of the remainder all but 340 persons had within a fortnight availed themselves of the opportunity to regain their freedom. In less than two months after the capture the number had been reduced by another 100. It is true that 210 were steadfast to the last, and remained there till the middle of November, when they were taken to Leith and put aboard a vessel bound for the Plantations; and owing to stormy weather most of them perished off the coast of Orkney, where the ship was wrecked. It was tragedy enough, but tradition has added unnecessary colouring to the tale. I have found no record of any women having been among the prisoners in the yard—battles are generally fought by the sterner sex. The tragedy lay not so much in the exposure to the elements, for most of the captives would be well inured to that; it lay in the fact of these men having been torn from the midst of their loved ones, wives, children, and home—in most cases never to return.”
The Martyrs’ Monument is not the original stone. It now lies in the City Museum. The Monument commemorates many of those who suffered for Christ’s Crown Rights and the Covenant. Near the spot where the Monument stands lie the mortal remains of James Guthrie, Hugh McKail, James Renwick, Donald Cargill and the head and hands of Richard Cameron. In the Church Yard Alexander Henderson, David Dickson and Dr. McCrie, whose pen vindicated the name of John Knox lie buried and a multitude whose names may not be written in any earthly roll but which are written in the Lamb’s book of life lie buried. In another part of the Church Yard is a monument to the “Bloody Mackenzie”—Sir George Mackenzie of Rosehaugh in the Black Isle, who acted as the King’s Advocate during the persecutions. The monument records: Here lie the sacred remains of Sir George Mackenzie of Rosehaugh, the glory of his country, the vindicator of religion, the disseminator of justice, the strenuous and unwearied asserter of the rights of royalty . . . . a pattern of affability, a most learned patron of the learned . . . . distinguished by his fame, eloquence, uprightness of character.” Another verdict less complimentary has been passed upon him by the Scottish people.