Rev D W B Somerset
The ship on which the Dunnottar prisoners had been sailing finally reached Sandy Hook in Lower New York Bay on Sabbath, 13 December 1685, after three months at sea. The prisoners were landed the following Wednesday.
“Before the prisoners came ashore, it was once intended by Mr Johnstone, to whom Pitlochrie had made them over, to stop their getting out of the ship,
1In the previous article, we followed the prisoners in their disastrous voyage to America. In this final article we give an account of what happened when they arrived.
till they should all of them, under their hand, sign a voluntary declaration, as it was called, that they offered four years service at that place. But this they would not yield unto; yea, a considerable number of them joined in a protestation against their banishment, with a large narrative of the hardships they endured during their voyage, and formerly, for conscience sake. When the prisoners came ashore, the people who lived on the coast-side, and had not the gospel settled among them, were harsh enough to them and showed them no kindness. A little way up the country there was a town where there was a minister settled, and the inhabitants there were very kind to them.2 When they had information of the prisoners’ circumstances, they invited all who were able to travel, to come and live with them, and sent horses for such as were not, and entertained them that winter freely, and with much kindness.3”
At this point there is something of a divergence between Wodrow’s account and the surviving records in New Jersey. First we give Wodrow’s version:
“In the following spring, Mr Johnston, upon his father-in-law’s gift of the prisoners, pursued them, and got them all cited before the court of that province. After hearing both sides, the Governor4 called a jury to sit and cognosce upon the affair. They found that the pannels [defendants] had not of their own accord come to that ship, nor bargained with Pitlochie for money or service, and therefore, according to the laws of the country, they were assoiled [discharged]; upon which most of the prisoners retired to New England, where they were very kindly entertained, and employed according to their different stations and capacities. Pitlochie proposed to be enriched by the prisoners, and yet he and his lady died at sea in the voyage. He sold what remained of the estate to pay the freight, and much of the money remaining was spent upon the law-suit in New Jersey. Thus it appears to be but a hazardous venture to make merchandise of the suffering people of God. A good many of the passengers and prisoners died in the plantations; the rest returned to their country at the happy revolution.”5
There are various respects in which Wodrow’s account needs to be modified. The records of the Court of Common Right have survived, and they make no mention of any lawsuits involving John Johnstone prior to October 1687; they do, however, record a number of suits brought by Richard Hutton,
2Presumably Woodbridge, where John Allen from England had been settled as minister in 1680 (see below).
3Robert Wodrow, History of the Sufferings of the Church of Scotland, R Burns, ed, Glasgow, 1830, vol 4, p 333.
4Strictly, the Deputy Governor. Gawen Lawrie was Deputy Governor of East Jersey from February 1684 to October 1686. He was from London and, like several of the other settlers, was a Quaker and had suffered persecution in England.
5Wodrow, vol 4, pp 333-4.
the master of the Henry and Francis. Perhaps the cases were simply conducted in his name rather than Johnstone’s. The first suit was tried at Elizabethtown on 25 February 1686 before Deputy Governor Lawrie. Captain Hutton was the plaintiff and George Muir the defendant. It was an action of debt for five pounds sterling, being the price of the passage in the Henry and Francis. Witnesses were examined on both sides, and the Deputy Governor summed up the evidence and charged the jury. The jury, contrary to Wodrow’s statement, found for the plaintiff and George Muir was instructed to pay the five pounds and the cost of the suit. Similar suits against Christopher Strang, William Niven, Thomas Corbett and Robert Young were also successful.6
On May 13 the Court gave a further judgement favourable to Captain Hutton, that “a non-resident, arresting any person in this province not being a settled inhabitant, is not liable to give security to pay the defendant’s costs”. Evidently this case had arisen because the inhabitants had been arresting the prisoners from the Henry and Francis. At the same time, a date was fixed in June “for the trial of all such actions as are depending in this court at the suit of Captain Richard Hutton, and that a jury be summoned from the town of Amboy Perth to try the same”. On June 9, however, when the first case (Adam Hood’s) was called, Richard Hutton failed to appear, and the defendant was discharged on the payment of fees. A similar order was issued in the cases of “all the other defendants that were arrested to this Court of Common Right at the suit of the said Captain Hutton”. Why Captain Hutton failed to appear is left unexplained – perhaps Deputy Governor Lawrie had intervened in some way – but in any event the prisoners at long last secured their liberty.
One other respect in which Wodrow is not accurate is in the subsequent history of John Johnstone. It seems likely that Johnstone was of Covenanting sympathies. His brother James had arrived in East Jersey about December 1684 and Whitehead thinks that he was the “James Johnstone, son of John Johnstone of Ochiltree,” who was denounced on the list of Covenanting fugitives in May 1684.7 Three times over in his letters from East Jersey to his brother John he bemoans the lack of ministers and wishes that John could be “instrumental” to send some over.8 John Johnstone’s connection with Pitlochie suggests a Covenanting link, and so too does his part in the scheme to transport Covenanters to America. As long as the Covenanters were will-
6Christopher Strang was probably the son of the Covenanter Christopher Strang who was executed in Edinburgh on 7 December 1666. They were both from the parish of East Kilbride. William Niven had been tortured in Dunnottar Castle after a failed attempt to escape; see Article 1 in this series.
7William A Whitehead, Early History of Perth Amboy, New York, 1856, p 68; Wodrow, vol 4, p 18.
8A Whitehead, East Jersey under the Proprietary Governments, Newark, NJ, 1875, pp 435, 444.
ing, this scheme was an act of kindness; it was only when things started to go wrong and they sought to take unwilling Covenanters that it became evil. Such is the deceitfulness of the heart, however, that doubtless they could persuade themselves that their motives were still good. It appears from Johnstone’s subsequent career that generally he was a humane man.
He had been a “druggist” in Edinburgh, and on arrival in East Jersey he began practising medicine and was always referred to as Dr Johnstone. He was married to Pitlochie’s daughter Eupham Scot on 18 April 1686,9 and on 30 October 1686 he was appointed one of the guardians of her brother James, who was a minor.10 In January 1687 Johnstone was put in possession of the 500 acres of land in Monmouth County which had been granted to Pitlochie prior to his departure from Scotland. He moved to New York for a while, but in 1701 he was granted a further 30 511 acres of land “in consideration of the great loss they did suffer by importing the said people upon the proprietors’ encouragement, and which has contributed very much to the good of this province”. In 1709-10 he sat on the Provincial Assembly for New Jersey and in 1720 on the Council for New York. He also held a number of other prominent offices. He died in 1732, “very much lamented by all who knew him, and to the inexpressible loss of the poor, who were always his particular care”. A few stones from his house could still be seen about 1850, and he had a “great number of descendants” alive in 1922.11
Of the Dunnottar prisoners who settled in America, the one who had the most interesting career was Adam Hood (or Hude as it was spelt in America), who was mentioned above. In 1695 he was living on Staten Island (just opposite Perth Amboy) but that year he bought land in Woodbridge, where he built a farmhouse which was still standing in 1850. At first he worked as a weaver, but by 1709 he was “High Sheriff of the counties of Middlesex and Somerset”,12 and in 1718 he was appointed one of the Judges of the Court of Common Pleas for Middlesex County. How he acquired his legal knowledge is not clear, but he must have been a man of considerable ability. He was soon appointed the Presiding Judge, and was acting in that capacity as late as 1733. His wife Marion Renwick, whom he married in 1684, shortly before his imprisonment in Dunnottar, was banished along with the other Dunnottar prisoners on 18 August 1685.13 She died in November 1732 aged
9Not before they embarked for America, as Wodrow says.
10Edith H Mather, “George Scot of Pitlochy”, Proceedings of New Jersey Historical Society, vol 7 (1922), p 277.
11Perth Amboy, pp 68-72.
12William A Whitehead, ed, Documents Relating to the Colonial History of the State of New Jersey, 1703-1709, Newark, New Jersey, 1880-1886, vol 3, p 457.
13The Register of the Privy Council of Scotland 1685-6, third series, vol 11, Edinburgh, 1929, p 154.
70, and her tombstone, still surviving, records that “she lived a pattern of piety, patience, meekness and affability”. He lived until June 1746, and was aged 84 at his death. He was, therefore, aged 23 during the terrible year of 1685, when he endured two and half months in Dunnottar and then a further three months on board the Henry and Francis. In the providence of God, however, he had over 60 years of life remaining. He was survived by at least three children and he too had descendants alive in 1922, and presumably to this day.14
Many of the other prisoners returned to Scotland as soon as they could. John Corbet of Tinwald in Dumfries-shire had been captured by Claverhouse in 1684, imprisoned in Dunnottar, and taken out on the Henry and Francis. He returned home in 1687, presumably following the Declaration of Indulgence. He died on 17 March 1706, aged 63. His tombstone, which survives, concludes with the following rhyme: “Let this stone speak when speech is from me gone / How God me led when I was far from home / Banisht I was for Covenanted cause / And Non-Compliance with their wicked laws / God, whom I served, made me firm to stand / Brought back again unto my native land / My sober walk in each place of abode / Made me beloved of all that loved God / Gainst all assaults from first unto the last / Assisted me; I got not a wrong cast / His precious truth, fragrant thou wast to me / From first to last, as I lived so I die / Once more I’ll live and never die again / And sing His praise in a triumphant strain.”15
Another prisoner, who has several times been referred to, was John Fraser. He was born about 1658 and graduated MA at Kings College, Aberdeen in 1678. Soon afterwards he went to London, and in 1685 he was arrested with several others at a service conducted by Alexander Shields and shipped with them back to Edinburgh. From there he was sent to Dunnottar Castle. He was imprisoned in the small vault underneath the Whigs’ vault and developed a cough which remained the rest of his life. Refusing to take the oaths, he was banished with the other prisoners to America. Once he had secured his liberty, he was licensed to preach and given the oversight of a congregation in Waterbury, Connecticut. It appears from a notebook he kept that a dozen people traced their conversion to his preaching at that time. While at Waterbury he was married to Jean Moffat who had also been imprisoned in Dunnottar.16 In 1689 they returned to Scotland, and in December 1691 he
14Perth Amboy, pp 373-4.
15J H Thomson, Martyr Graves of Scotland, Edinburgh, nd, pp 476-7.
16James Fraser, The Scripture Doctrine of Sanctification, Edinburgh, 1834, p viii. The first edition of this book came out in 1774 prefaced by “A Short Account of the Author” from “a gentleman well acquainted with the family” and “furnished with authentic papers by a surviving branch of it”. One of these papers was the interesting notebook referred to. Jean
was ordained minister of Glencorse in the Presbytery of Dalkeith. In 1696 he became minister of Alness where he died in November 1711. He was the proprietor of the estate of Pitcalzean in the parish of Nigg. One of their sons, James Fraser, became minister of Alness in 1726 and was the author of the well-known book on Sanctification.
Archibald Riddell17 was another minister whom we have mentioned as sailing on the Henry and Francis. He had voluntarily agreed to travel with Scot of Pitlochie and there seems to have been an understanding that on his arrival he would become pastor of Woodbridge. At that time Woodbridge was a small town with a population of about 600, and with a meeting-house, a courthouse, and a prison.18 John Allen from England had moved there in September 1680 and been settled as minister in January 1681 but he was not a young man and probably his health was poor. He had been born in Suffolk in 1623 and had graduated BA at Harvard in 1643, his father having emigrated to America to avoid persecution. John Allen had then returned to England, where he became vicar of Rye in Sussex in 1653. He was ejected in 1662 and from 1668-80 he had practised medicine, before returning to America. He was still living in Woodbridge in 1686, but was clearly ready to hand over the work.19
Archibald Riddell was settled as the new pastor in January 1686, within a month of his arrival. He was allotted 200 acres of land, and he purchased further lands which he retained until 1700. His wife had died on the Henry and Francis, but his daughter Janet was married on 26 January 1686 to James Dundas, the son of Sir James Dundas of Armeston, who was presumably a fellow-passenger on the ship and who died in 1698.20 In April 1688 Riddell received a letter from the Presbyterian Church in Jamaica, Long Island inviting him “to come among us to dispense the Word of God”, and urging him “to give the town a visit in order to settling among us”. On 3 August 1688 a committee was appointed to pursue the matter, but Riddell evidently declined.21 In June 1689 he set sail to return to England. His companion on this voyage was another of the Dunnottar sufferers, Robert M’Lellan, the laird of Barmagechan, of whom Wodrow gives the following account:
“Robert M’Lellan of Barmagechan, in the parish of Borg, and Stewartry Moffat’s father James was another Dunnottar prisoner, see Duncan Stewart, Covenanters of Teviotdale, Galashiels, 1908. pp 198-211.
17See Article 4 in this series.
18East Jersey, p 404; Perth Amboy, pp 355-400.
19A G Matthews, Calamy Revised, Oxford, 1934, pp 5-6.
20Perth Amboy, pp 367-372.
21James Macdonald, Two Centuries in the History of the Presbyterian Church, Jamaica, LI, New York, 1862, pp 71,74.
of Kirkcudbright, was born of parents who were Presbyterian and carefully educated in the principles of the Church of Scotland. In his younger years he profited much under the ministry of that excellent person Mr Adam Kay minister at Borg.22 After he was forcibly removed from them, and a curate obtruded, Mr M’Lellan, with the godly and religious people in that parish, found it their duty to disown the Episcopal minister, as neither called of God to the place, nor invited by them. Great was the oppression of all that country, as hath been noticed, for their faithful adherence to Presbyterian ministers, and Barmagechan had his own share.”
After relating some of M’Lellan’s earlier sufferings, Wodrow continues: “He joined again, with others in his circumstances, at Bothwell rising, after which he retired a second time into England, and was a second time forfeited, as we have heard. The violences done to his family and friends about this time, were many and inexpressible. Claverhouse came with a party to his house, and after he had seized the corns and cattle, he was going to take away all his moveables, but a composition was made, and a hundred pounds paid him. The lady Nithsdale, a bigotted papist, got a gift of his forfeiture, as likewise of many others in that country, and miserably oppressed his tenants, drove their cattle, and exacted much more than their rent.
“His family was thus scattered, and he upon his hiding in England, where, towards the end of the year 1684, Squire Dacres seized him, with several other Scotsmen lurking thereabout, and sent them prisoners to Dumfries. Mr M’Lellan never disowned the king’s authority, as several about this time did, yet was as harshly dealt by as any of them. He was close confined in the castle of Dumfries, and laid in the irons for several days. From thence he was carried to Leith with the rest of the prisoners, and in a little time brought up to Edinburgh, and put in close prison, with fetters on his arms. Thus he continued from November till May this year, when he was sent to Dunnottar, and had his share of the severities of that place. When they came back to Leith, he was banished to America, and three of his children went with him in Pitlochie’s ship. His wife, with three other children, were left in Scotland upon the care of providence.
“It pleased the Lord to preserve him and his three children in the voyage. He himself was extremely weakened by sickness, and behoved to be carried in men’s arms out of the ship, when they landed. However, in a little time
22Kay became minister of Borgue in 1649 and died in 1665. John Livingstone lists him among the “faithful and able ministers of Jesus Christ”, “Memorable Characteristics”, in W.K. Tweedie, ed, Select Biographies, Edinburgh 1845-7, vol 1, p 336. His widow, Grizel Cairns, became the wife of the Dunnottar prisoner William M’Millan of Balmaclellan; see Article 1 in this series.
after he was ashore, his health returned, and he with his family set up in a plantation at Woodbridge in New Jersey, which he purchased. In this place he had the advantage, which he very much valued, of having the gospel preached to him and his family by Mr Archibald Riddell, who stayed with him at Newbridge, having a call from the congregation there, as likewise from Long Island, where he might have had a far greater encouragement; but Mr Riddell chose Woodbridge, and it was well he did so, otherwise probably he had scarce returned to Britain, where all his losses were made up, and he and his four children were in better circumstances than [if] he had conformed to prelacy. There Barmagechan continued from December this year till June 1689, when they had accounts of the comfortable turn of affairs in Britain; upon which he resolved to return to his native country.
“Accordingly, June 1689, they sailed for England, and were favoured with excellent weather, so that they found themselves on the coast of England the second of August; but there they were taken by a French man-of-war and carried prisoners to Nantz. From thence they were carried to Rochford, a common gaol, where there were near two hundred prisoners, English and Dutch, who were almost all sent to Toulon. They were chained two and two by the arm and, at first, each ten pair were tied with a rope; but that was found such a hindrance in the journey, that after the second day’s journey the ropes were no more used. Mr Riddel was chained to his son, a boy of ten years of age, for whom they were at the pains to make three different chains, before they got one small enough for his wrist. In this long and wearisome journey several of the company died. When Mr M’Lellan, through weariness and age, was unable to travel, he made application to the captain of their guard that he might be allowed the benefit of one of their carts, to help him forward some part of the way. He was answered by many lashes on the face with his whip, by which he lost the sight of one of his eyes.
“After six weeks’ travel, they came to Toulon, where they were not allowed a land prison, but were put into a large old ship lying upon the sea. There he continued nineteen months, and came through much sickness, and had none to look after him but his son, a boy scarce twelve years of age, who was now and then permitted to come ashore. Barmagechan and his son, with a few others, being sick, continued there, but all the rest, after a month’s rest, returned the same way they came, to Rochford, and thence to Denain near St Malo, where Mr Riddel continued more than a year, in a vault of an old castle, with some hundreds of other prisoners. They lay on straw, never changed save once a month, and were oppressed with nastiness and vermin.
“After two and twenty months’ imprisonment, Mr Riddel and his son were exchanged for two popish priests, whom the council of Scotland gave for
them.23 At length there came an exchange of prisoners, and those at Toulon were liberated; but the French king would not allow them to come back through France, but gave them a pass and put them in a ship going to Genoa. This occasioned a new scene of difficulties to them. At Genoa, Barmagechan got into a Hamburg vessel, bound for Cadiz in Spain, whence he came in a fleet bound for Amsterdam; but meeting with a storm on the back of Ireland, the ship he was in was forced into Bantry Bay in Ireland. There the Irish seized upon their company, stripped Mr M’Lellan of his clothes, and he continued eleven days among their hands under terrible hardships. When notice was given to the government, the ship was looked after, and the Irish obliged to bring back the prisoners, and they with the ship sailed up to Dublin. Through the inhumanities he met with among the wild Irish, his nakedness and want of necessaries, Mr M’Lellan fell very ill for some weeks at Dublin, but it pleased the Lord to recover him; and as soon as he was able, he came down to the north of Ireland and got home safe to his own house at Barmagechan, the last day of October 1691.”24