Lord Sempill will be attending the 2013 Stone Mountain Game

Every year during the third week of October, you’d be forgiven for thinking a little piece of Atlanta was in fact a little piece of Scotland. Over one weekend, the picturesque grounds of Atlanta’s Stone Mountain Park meadow resound with the sounds of bagpipes, fiddles and harps, as it plays host to one of the biggest Highland Games events in the world.

With only two weeks to go until the beginning of the 41st annual Stone Mountain Highland Games, half a world away in Scotland, Jamie, Lord Sempill is preparing to make the trek to his third international Highland Games event for 2013. “I’m coming back to America for a second time. Rain stopped play at Grandfather Mountain Games in July, so I’m coming back for a dry game – and I don’t mean no alcohol.” For American clans attending Stone Mountain, they’ll have the chance to meet with Jamie and who will be happy to share one of Scotland’s finest offerings, a dram of single malt whisky.

Lord Sempill comes from one of Scotland’s oldest families and has been actively involved in the international clan network for fifteen years. As the driving force behind Edinburgh’s 2009 Clan Gathering, Lord Sempill attracted 42,000 people from around the world to the event, which was described as the largest recorded international clan gathering. The Gathering also included a clan convention which became the largest meeting on record of Scotland’s clan chiefs. He’s certainly got his finger on the pulse in the world of the clans – as an active member of the Standing Council of Scottish Chiefs, an honorary member of the Council of Scottish Clans and Associations, Inc., and a board director at the American Scottish Foundation.

Over the years Lord Sempill has seen the relationship grow and prosper between the international clan network and Scotland, with his latest venture yet another step in building those ties. He’s currently working in collaboration with Macdonald & Rees, a new Scotland-based ancestral tourism company who specialise in providing the ultimate ancestral journey – bespoke visits to Scotland based on an individuals clan genealogy. Lord Sempill says that for many descendents around the world, tracing your roots can be a daunting prospect. “For many with Scottish ancestry, it’s a lifelong dream to travel to Scotland and discover family history and ancestral connections. Macdonald and Rees provide descendents with expert historians and genealogists on the ground, that ensure an incredibly meaningful and insightful visit home. Whether an individual or a family group, we can reconnect you to the world of your ancestors.” Jamie recently led a group of Clan Rose descendents to their ancestral homeland just east of Inverness, where they met with Clan chief Chief and 26th Baron of Kilravock, David Rose.

This year thousands of Scottish descendents will don their family tartans and make the trip to Stone Mountain, where two days of Highland Games competitions will take place including the ever-popular heavyweight events, piping, drumming and Highland dance competitions. There will also be a parade of the tartans and Clan Challenge athletic events, open to any attendees. The guest of honour, Margaret Elliot of Redheugh Chief of Clan Elliot will also be making the trip from Scotland. As well as Lord Sempill, other distinguished guests include Andrew Morrison – Viscount Dunrossil, Lord Montgomerie – Younger of Montgomerie and David Rose Chief of Clan Rose.

Lord Sempill and Mike McAlpin at Grandfather Mountain Highland Games, 2013

Attendees will also have the chance to find out more about their genealogy in the clan information area, with 65 clans and family associations confirmed in attendance. You’ll most likely find Lord Sempill at the Scottish Heritage USA tent, however he will be making visits to clan association tents. “The torrential rain stopped play at Grandfather Mountain, so I didn’t get to speak to a lot of the clans who were there. I’m especially interested in meeting those who want to make the trip to trace their roots and discover Scotland.”

For more information on the Stone Mountain games, view our event listing over at TartanFootprint.com where you can also download the schedule of events and get in touch with Lord Sempill directly.

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Murder, theft, arson, blackmail and feud were the canker of the Border Marches. Whatever resources, initiatives or amendments to the Border Laws were put in place to counter the disreputable practices of the Reivers, the strife and confrontation rolled on apace, even quickened.

One of the more formidable of the Elliot clan at this time was Jock of the Park. Hailing from Copshawholme (modern day Newcastleton), he was renowned for his relentless strikes against the English and, indeed, any of the Scottish clans with whom the Elliots were at feud.

By 1566 Liddesdale, which because of its notoriety had its own Warden, known as Keeper, had such a burgeoning reputation for lawlessness that a Lord Warden of the Marches was appointed. He had just one objective – subdue the unholy Reivers of Liddesdale!

Accordingly, James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell, Lord High Admiral of Scotland and Duke of Orkney moved south from Edinburgh. He was a man reputed for his fierceness, was fearless in any confrontation, a skilled military man. He was also a particular confidante of the young Mary, Queen of Scots. Rumours of a liaison between the pair were rife.

Bothwell was certain that he would rid the Borders of its worst offenders.

He was, however, to soon find out that position and reputation counted for nothing against the hard, obdurate and wily Border Reivers. At first his success rate was good. He managed to capture the Lairds of Mangerton and Whithaugh and other Armstrongs. Soon these men were festering in the dank hole of the Hermitage castle awaiting summary justice from the illustrious Lord Bothwell.

HERMITAGE CASTLE

When Bothwell heard that Jock of the Park had been seen in the vicinity of Hermitage he pursued him with alacrity. Jock was a prize not to be missed.

Somewhere near the Billhope burn Bothwell encountered Jock, and without any ceremony, shot him from the saddle of his horse. Jock lay motionless on the ground and Bothwell approached, sure he had severely wounded or killed the prostrate Reiver. As he leaned over to take a closer look, Jock sprang to his feet and knifed the astonished Lord. He even managed to cut to the bone the forehead of his foolish adversary before hobbling to his horse and making away.

BILLHOPE COTTAGE. NEAR HERE JOCK KNIFED BOTHWELL

Bothwell’s guard who had witnessed these events from a distance, conveyed the stricken Lord back to Hermitage intent on providing the shelter and succour that he needed for recovery. On the short journey back to the castle Bothwell appeared to be failing fast from loss of blood.

To the surprise of all, once there, they were refused entry. In the short time that they had been away, the Armstrongs had broken free of the hell-hole of a dungeon, and in true Reiver fashion, overpowered the garrison. Even though Bothwell appeared at death’s door they would not let him enter without assurance that their crimes would be forgiven and that a general amnesty should ensue.

Bothwell had no alternative but to agree; the Armstrongs and others walked free and he was to receive the aid he most certainly needed.

Thus Jock of the Park lived to fight another day and the Armstrongs returned to their loved ones.

Twenty-five miles north of the Hermitage, Mary, Queen of Scots was holding a justice court at Jedburgh. When she was told of the plight of Bothwell, she set off on a grey October day to travel the vast expanses of moor, bog and bent to comfort, console and help mend her favourite.

After but a few hours at Hermitage she made the return journey to Jedburgh. Thus she completed a round trip of fifty miles within a day in most inclement weather. Above the Hermitage her horse stumbled at a place still called the Queensmire to this day and she lost a watch which was found over two hundred years later by a farm worker draining the bog.

By the time she arrived back in Jedburgh Mary was so ill with fatigue and cold that it was thought, her being in a high fever and delirious state for day after day, that she would die. She was given the last rites of the Catholic Church.

She survived though as did Bothwell and the next year they were married not long after the murder of her second husband, Henry Lord Darnley, in which Bothwell was implicated.

The pair was to incur the wrath of the protestant Lords, including Mary’s half-brother, Moray, and two battles ensued for control of the country of Scotland.

After the Battle of Carberry Hill, at which not a sword was raised in anger, Bothwell fled north to Orkney purportedly to raise troops for Mary’s cause whilst she was warded in Lochleven castle. They were never to see each other again.

Bothwell was pursued and took ship for Norway to evade his would-be captors.

The ship floundered in a storm and when it eventually reached safe harbour it was soon recognised that one of its crew was special. It took little searching of the cabins to prove that it was Bothwell who sought sanctuary in a foreign land. The king of Norway and Denmark offered him to the Scots in exchange for the Orkney Isles which had been given to Scotland as part of a marriage dowry some one hundred years before. When the Scots refused the bargain Bothwell was incarcerated in Dragsholm castle in Denmark, tied to a post in the dungeons for ten years, it is said. He died of insanity in one version of his pathetic end.

His embalmed body could be seen for centuries in an open top coffin in the village church of Farjeville a few miles from the castle of Dragsholm. In the late 1970′s the lid to the coffin was secured on the order of the Danish monarchy.

Mary escaped from Lochleven and confronted the Protestant Lords yet again at the Battle of Langside where her forces were convincingly beaten.

She fled to England, determined to seek the aid of her cousin, Elizabeth l, in an effort to regain her throne. It was not to be and, after spending nineteen years in ward in various English castles and secure country houses, she was beheaded after conspiring to break free and overthrow the English monarchy.

She was to often remark during her time in captivity that she wished she had died at Jedburgh.

Given the obscene ordeal that was to end Bothwell’s life it is probably true that he reflected on his confrontation with Jock of the Park and wished that he had died listening to the burble of the Billhope burn.

Little Jock Elliot of the Park had a lot to answer for.

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