At the foot of the Lowther Hills there sits the tiny hamlet of Durisdeer. In the centre of this little community, of no more than a dozen houses, there sits a rather grand Parish Church. The unexpected grandeur of the church is due to the patronage of the Dukes of Queensberry, who resided a few miles away at Drumlanrig Castle. The mausoleum for the Queensberry family is housed within a building attached to the church. Since Medieval times a church has stood on the site, with the present building being the result of a major rebuild that was carried out in 1699. Other major works were then carried out on the building in the 18th and the mid-19th century.
.JPG "Durisdeer Parish Church")
.JPG "Durisdeer Parish Church")
.JPG "Durisdeer Parish Church")
Today, after walking along the winding
country roads that take you to Durisdeer, I made my way through from the main
gate of the church grounds and into the churchyard. Amongst the many old,
weathered and moss covered gravestones there, my attention was drawn to one
that stood by the walls of the church. This
being the ‘Martyrs Grave’, a table top gravestone dedicated to Daniel
McMichael, a Covenanter who was killed in 1685.
.JPG "The Martyrs Grave")
.JPG "The Martyrs Grave")
The Covenanters were followers of the Presbyterian
Church of Scotland who rejected the idea of the King being the spiritual head of
the church. As far as they were
concerned only Jesus Christ could be the head of their church. The name Covenanter
comes from the fact that in 1638 many of those who opposed interference in
their church by the King signed a document to this effect called the National
Covenant. The Stuart kings, Charles I
and later, after the Restoration, Charles II, were not happy about their roles
and their ‘divine rights’ being called into question and saw the Covenanters as
rebels. This led to many hundreds of the
Covenanters being imprisoned, transported, or executed. Platoons of Dragoons scoured the land looking
for these rebels and when they found any, they often summarily executed them.
Daniel McMichael was one of two brothers
who had both become Covenanters. His
brother James had been killed the year before, in 1684, whilst fighting against
a group of soldiers who had come to arrest him and his friends. In January 1685, Daniel had come down with a
severe fever and illness. However, his
friends would still come and meet with him at his house so they could worship
together. At one of these meetings a
lookout spotted a platoon of Dragoons heading their way and, realising that
they had been betrayed and the location of their meeting place given to the
authorities, he ran back to inform his friends.
The group quickly packed up and left, wrapping Daniel in the blankets
from his bed and taking him with them.
They then took shelter in a nearby cave, but soon learnt that the
Dragoons had been informed about the cave, so had to flee again. However, as they were burdened with carrying Daniel,
they found the going slow and Daniel, who realised that the authorities would
soon catch up with them, told then to leave him behind and flee. The friends reluctantly did this and left
Daniel in another cave in the hope that he would not be found. Unfortunately for Daniel, the hounds the
Dragoons had with them soon sniffed him out and he was taken prisoner. He was then dragged down to Durisdeer where
he was questioned, then asked to take an oath of allegiance to the King and
recognise him as the head of the church.
Daniel refused to do this. The
next day he was taken to be marched to another village around 12 miles away,
but it was found that he was too ill to walk that far. So, a few miles from Durisdeer, at the
entrance to the nearby Dalveen Pass he was told to prepare to die. He was then given a few minutes to pray while
a party of soldiers were brought together to carry out the execution. At a given signal the soldiers then shot
him. His body was later taken down to
Durisdeer and buried in the churchyard.
The epitaph on his gravestone reads –
As Daniel cast was into lions’ den,
For praying unto God, and not to men;
Thus lions cruelly devoured me,
For bearing unto truth my testimony.
I rest in peace until Jesus rend the
cloud,
And judge ‘twixt me and those who shed
my blood.
On walking round the graveyard and going
into the main part of the church I found there was some major refurbishment
work going on. I had a nose around
anyway and on making my way upstairs I found two young crows who had got
trapped in the building and were desperately crashing against the windows in
their effort to get out. Taking off my
jacket I managed to catch them one at time, wrap them in it and get them
out. They screamed at me all the way
out, but happily flew off once outside.
My good deed done for the day I cleaned the cobwebs, feathers, and bird
shit from my jacket, and then wandered around the outside of the building. There I found an entrance at the back of the church
and into the mausoleum.
Inside the mausoleum are the Queensberry
Marbles. These ornate, and very white
sculptures, commemorate James Douglas, the second Duke of Queensberry and his
wife, Lady Mary Boyle. The Duke was
known as the ‘Union Duke’ for his role in securing the union of the parliaments
of England and Scotland in 1707. This
role made him very rich and led to him being given various honours and titles
such as the Duke of Dover, Marquess of Beverley, and Earl of Ripon. However, it also made him very unpopular with
a large part of the population of Scotland, especially within Edinburgh, where
he had a second home, Queensberry House.
There, the rumour soon spread that while the festivities, riots or
whatever had been going on to celebrate the union, the Duke’s son James, who
was a little bit strange, had killed, cooked, and eaten a young servant boy. I’m not sure if the story has any truth to it,
or if it was meant as a representation of the smaller country of Scotland being
consumed by its larger neighbour, but it’s a story that has stuck and is still
told today on many of the ghost tours that stroll around Edinburgh.
.JPG "The Queensberry Marbles")
.jpg "A detail of the Queensberry Marbles")
On leaving the mausoleum I made my way
round to the old gravestones at the back of the church.
.JPG "Gravestone in Durisdeer Churchyard")
.JPG "Gravestone in Durisdeer Churchyard")
.JPG "Durisdeer churchyard and Parish Church")
.JPG "Gravestone in Durisdeer Churchyard")
I then found a rather marvellous moss
and lichen covered stone. It was for a David
Scott, but other than his name and the fact that his body lay there I could
make out nothing more of the inscription.
But what does that matter, when the carved skulls on the sides of his
stone have become quite wonderful in the way they have aged.
.JPG "Gravestone in Durisdeer Churchyard, with David Scott’s stone in foreground")
.jpg "Carved skull on side of David Scott’s gravestone")
.JPG "Carved skull on side of David Scott’s gravestone")
.JPG "Carved skull on side of David Scott’s gravestone")
.jpg "Carved skull on side of David Scott’s gravestone")
Before leaving the graveyard, I gave in
to temptation, and left the Skulferatu that had accompanied me on my walk in
the mossy nasal cavity of one of the carved skulls.
.JPG "Skulferatu #79")
.JPG "Skulferatu #79 in the mossy skull on a gravestone")
.JPG "Skulferatu #79 in the mossy skull on a gravestone")
.jpg "Map showing location of Skulferatu #79")
The coordinates for the location of the
Skulferatu are –
Latitude 55.315532
Longitude -3.743814
I used the following sources for
information on Durisdeer Church and the churchyard -
Traditions of the
Covenanters
Or Gleanings among the
Mountains
By Rev. Robert Simpson
1870
The Martyr Graves of
Scotland
By J. H. Thomson
1903
Monuments and Monumental
Inscriptions in Scotland
by Charles Rogers
1871
Canmore
https://canmore.org.uk/site/46336/durisdeer-parish-church
Wikipedia
