Walter Stewart

Notes on

Sir Walter Stewart, 6^th High Steward of Scotland

Born Dundonald, Ayrshire, 1296-1298; died Bathgate 9^th April 1327. Buried Paisley Abbey. First wife Marjorie Bruce. Second wife Isabel de Graham

From The Encyclopaedia Britannia:

Stewart: The family can be traced back to 11^th -century Britanny where for at least four centuries they were stewards to the counts of Dol. Alan, the 4th steward of Dol was a favourite of Henry I of England and is mentioned in English records as sheriff of Shropshire from 1101. His younger sons William (d. 1160) and Walter Fitzalan (d. 1177) both held lands in England. Walter, the third son, in about 1136 entered the service of David I, King of Scots. He was appointed steward (or high steward) of Scotland. His grandson Walter (d. 1241), the 3^rd steward, was appointed justiciar of Scotland in 1230 by Alexander II. Walter’s eldest son Alexander (1214-1283), the 4^th steward, in 1263 led the Scots against King Haakon IV of Norway at Largs.

Alexander had two sons, James (1243-1309) and John of Bonkyl. James was one of the six guardians appointed to rule Scotland on the death of Alexander III in 1286. James fought with William Wallace against Edward I and he supported Robert the Bruce. In 1314, James’s second son Walter (1292-1326), the 6^th steward, at the age of 21 was placed with Sir James Douglas in command of one of the divisions of the Scottish Army at Bannockburn, where he was knighted by King Robert on the field, and in 1315 he married the king’s daughter Marjorie. On the death of David II in 1371, their son Robert (1316-90), 7^th steward, became, as Robert II, the first Stewart king.

From The Surnames of Scotland by George F. Black

Stewart: In Old English the stiward (from older stigeweard, ‘ sty-warden’) was one who looked after the domestic animals; hence one who provides for his master’s table. By the 11^th– century the word had come to mean the one who superintended the household affairs of another, and was therefore a title of honour. In Scotland the steward was not only chief of the royal household, but … in time of war he took first place in the army next to the king. The Scottish royal family of Stewart descended from a family of Breton nobles, who were hereditary seneschals of Dol…. Walter Fitzalan was the first of the family to appear in Scotland. David I made him Steward of Scotland and gave him the lands of Renfrew, Paisley, etc… Walter the 6^th Steward fought at Bannockburn, 1314, and in 1319 he successfully defended Berwick against the English .. and was one of the signers of the Scottish Declaration of Independence in 1320. In 1315 he had married Marjory, daughter of King Robert the Bruce. Their son Robert, afterwards Robert II, first of the royal line of Stewart, was crowned in 1371.

Marjoribanks: From the lands of Ratho-Marjorie, Renfrewshire, so named from their having been bestowed on the Princess Marjorie, daughter of Robert the Bruce, on her marriage in 1316 with Walter the High Steward. The lands subsequently called “terre de Ratho-Marjoribankis” came into possession of a family of the name of Johnston who assumed the name of Marjoribanks. Also said to be from barony of same name which formerly comprised the greater part of the eastern division of West Calder parish.

[I can find no mention of Ratho-Marjorie in Renfrewshire. The Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland does say: Ratho, a village and parish of Edinburghshire. In 1315, the barony and patronage of Ratho were, along with much other property, granted by Robert I to the Steward of Scotland, as the dowry of Princess Marjory.]

From The Clans, Septs and Regiments of the Scottish Highlands by Frank Adam and Innes of Learney

STEWART: This Royal clan sprung from a scion of the ancient hereditary Stewards of Dol, in Normandy. Of this family Alan Fitz Flaald obtained from Henry I of England the Barony of Oswestry, in Shropshire. Alan was the father of three sons – William, Walter and Simon. From Walter, the second son, descended the Scottish Royal Family of Stewart. [This] Walter received from King David I the lands of Paisley, Pollock, Cathcart, etc. The Abbey of Paisley was founded by Walter, who was buried there… Walter, the 6^th High Steward, took a prominent part in the Battle of Bannockburn. Robert the Bruce bestowed upon him the hand of his daughter , the Princess Marjory, in marriage. From this union were descended the Royal line of Stewart. The 6^th High Steward died in 1326.

From The Tales of a Grandfather by Walter Scott [published by Adam and Charles Black, 1898]

p. 142 Marjory, the daughter of Robert Bruce, had married Walter, the Lord High Steward of Scotland, and the sixth of his family who had enjoyed that high dignity, in consequence of possessing which the family had acquired the surname of Stewart.

From The Book of Eminent Scotsmen by Joseph Irving

Stewart of Scotland, Walter the, Seneschallus or Dapifer in the court of David I. Obtained Royal grant of lands in Renfrew, Paisley, Pollok, and Cathcart; founded Paisley Abbey. Died about 1177 or 1178, and interred in the religious house which he had founded in Paisley. – Alan, a son, was also a benefactor of the Abbey, and interred before the high altar there, as was also a grandson, Walter, who fixed the name of Stewart as a surname. A still later Walter, who commanded the west wing at Bannockburn, 1314, by his marriage with Marjory, daughter of King Robert Bruce, became father of Robert II, the first of the Stewart kings.

From The Story of Scotland by Janet Glover.

p74: …Margery Bruce. This Margery, a much-loved daughter of Robert, had married Walter Fitzalan, the Hereditary Steward of Scotland. He was known more briefly as Walter the Steward, or

simply Walter Steward. The surname became Stewart, and Walter and Margery the founders of the future Scottish royal family.

From Collins Encyclopaedia of Scotland edited by John and Julia Keay

BATHGATE, West Lothian

This industrial town at the eastern of Scotland’s central industrial belt lays claim to considerable antiquity, having been given by Robert I as the dowry for his daughter Marjorie on her marriage to Walter the High Steward in 1316.

BRUCE, Marjorie (d.1316)

The only child of Robert I’s first marriage, Marjorie was captured at Tain along with Isabella, Countess of Buchan. Confined in the Tower of London in a ‘cage’ and forbidden speech except with the Constable, she was later sent to a nunnery. Exchanged for English prisoners after Bannockburn, she married Walter Stewart (1315). She died giving birth to the future Robert II after a riding accident. Her tomb in Paisley Abbey is marked by a memorial provided by Queen Victoria (her lineal descendant); a damaged effigy is preserved in a reconstructed niche nearby.

[It is interesting to note that the present royal family can trace their ancestry to Robert the Bruce, Walter Stewart and beyond. The Hanoverians came to the British crown because Elizabeth – ‘The Winter Queen’ – (1596-1662) the daughter of James VI, married Frederick V, Elector Palatine. Elizabeth’s daughter Sophia (1630-1714) married the Elector of Hanover. Their son became George I.]

STEWART, Walter (1293-1326) 6^th High Steward of Scotland

The son of James, 5^th High Steward (d.1309), who had been a guardian under Queen Margaret and later aligned with William Wallace and Robert I. Walter was associated with Sir James Douglas in the command of a division at Bannockburn. He was subsequently knighted and married to Marjorie, then the only legitimate child of Robert I…the son of Walter and Marjorie did succeed as Robert II, the first of the Stewart kings. Walter had meanwhile become Governor of Scotland (1316) and had continued to show military promise in the defence of Berwick, but died in his prime.

From The Lothians by Ian Finlay

p.155 Robert the Bruce presented the lands of Bathgate to Walter Stewart as the dowry of his daughter Marjorie. In those days the curious name of the town was rather different: Bathket or Batket, or even Bathcat. This seems to go far to dispose of Milne’s quaint Gaelic derivation of the name as “windy cow-house!”.

From Twixt Forth and Clyde by A.G. Williamson (1942)

p.165 To get to what had been Bathgate Castle I left the Square [Steelyard#] by the main Edinburgh road… after two or three minutes’ quick walking it changed to Stuart Terrace. Between the Lindsay High School and St Mary’s Secondary School, but on the other side of the road, was a bridge [Rennie’s Bridge] over the railway line. On my right where “three stunted fir trees” used to mark the site of the castle in the “morass” belonging to Walter Stewart, the High Steward of Scotland, who married the Princess Marjorie Bruce, was a golf course, a hole marked by a little black-and-white striped pole, and a red pennant and a “bunker”. The mound used as the “bunker” is, I believe, the exact site of the castle. The “three stunted fir trees” have disappeared, although it is still possible to trace the outline of what may have been the road leading up to the Castle, the fosse, or one of the Castle walls.

Walter Stewart, at the early age of twenty-one, was in command of the left division of the Scottish army at the Battle of Bannockburn. He was a grandson of that Alexander Stewart who was killed at Largs and was a descendant of Alan, Steward of Dol in Brittany, the leader of the first Crusade in 1097. Walter received as a wedding present the Castle in the “morass” at Bathgate. He had his principal seat at Renfrew but Bathgate remained his favourite residence, and it here that he died in 1328 at the age of thirty-five.

On a windy morning late in the month of February 1316, the Princess Marjorie left Bathgate for Renfrew to await the birth of her son. At length, on the morning of 2^nd March, she came in sight of Renfrew, but while crossing the ford there her horse stumbled and she broke her neck. Her son, afterwards King Robert II, was thus born of a mother who was already dead.

After the death of his wife Walter withdrew with his infant son to the Castle on the morass at Bathgate. He wanted seclusion. Nothing mattered now but the winning for the motherless babe a recognition of his claim to the crown of Scotland.

Because of its connection with the royal family, the town of Bathgate and the lands lying around it anciently formed a sheriffdom in themselves, a distinction enjoyed by few towns of its size in Scotland.

# Tron: a steelyard, weighing machine esp a public one in a burgh set up in or near a market place for weighing merchandise. (The Concise Scots Dictionary)

From History of Bathgate and District by Alex. M. Bisset

p17 The most interesting historic site in the parish is that of the old Castle of Bathgate, which lies to the south-east of the town, about four hundred yards from the Upper Station, on the golf course. These low grounds were in ancient times a morass or shallow lake, forming a natural moat for the castle, which stood on a slight eminence in the middle. The approach to the castle was by causeways built through the morass: and as the direction of these causeways would not be well-known to an enemy the position was thus a very strong one, and capable of easy defence. When the first Statistical Account of the parish was written in 1799, the foundations of the castle were still visible, and the causeways that led to it remained… various vessels of copper and brass, which were supposed to to have been used as kitchen utensils had been found among the ruins. In the Statistical Account of 1844, ‘Hardly a vestige of the foundations of the castle is now to be discovered’ but ‘some remains of the causeways still exist.’ … nothing remains now [1906] to mark the cradle of the Royal Stuarts but a grassy mound from which radiate several approaches that bear evidence from their slight elevation of being of artificial construction.

Walter, first lord of this ancient castle, was the sixth Hereditary High Steward of Scotland, and was one of the most distinguished of that band of able captains, trained in the War of Independence, who, under the leadership of the warrior king, raised the military renown of their native country to its highest pitch. While still a young man he distinguished himself at the Battle of Bannockburn, where, with Sir James Douglas, he shared in the command of the left wing of the Scottish army.

In the subsequent events of that stirring time the Steward took a leading part. When Bruce went to Ireland to the assistance of his brother in 1317 the Government was entrusted to the Steward, who, with the valiant Douglas not only repelled the invasions of the English but successfully carried the war into the enemy’s country. His most brilliant exploit, however, was his splendid defence of Berwick-on-Tweed…This is one of the most celebrated passages in the history of of that stirring time and won for the Steward the high praise of Bruce and lasting renown in the annals of his country. Prior to this (in 1315) he came into connection with Bathgate and into possession of the castle through his marriage with the Princess Marjory…In dowry with his royal bride the Steward received extensive lands in the shires of Linlithgow and Roxburgh. Among the former was the barony of Bathgate; and the castle of that barony appears thenceforth to have been with him a favourite residence… To Walter and Marjorie a son was born on the 2^nd of March 1316…The young mother barely survived the birth, having according to tradition, been thrown from her horse and killed while hunting between Paisley and Renfrew. The Steward… died of some insidious disease while still in the very prime of life. The event took place in his Castle of Bathgate on the 9^th of April, 1326, amid the universal sorrow of his countrymen, by whom, as well as by Bruce himself, he was held in the highest estimation for his prowess, knightly honour, and manly virtue.

From The Official Guide to West Lothian (Linlithgow) by Alex. M. Bisset

p.5 BATHGATE CASTLE: The most interesting site in the neighbourhood is that of the old Castle of Bathgate, which lies on the Golf Course, over the bridge [Rennie’s Bridge] spanning the railway at the extremity of the new housing scheme [which included Stuart Terrace] on the main Edinburgh-Glasgow Road.

[Alex. M. Bisset repeats much of what he says above.] Walter’s invasion of England, when he hammered at the gate of York, and his successful defence of Berwick which he held against several determined attacks by land and sea, won [him high praise and renown]. It was on this gallant youth that Marjorie bestowed her affection and her hand. On their marriage in the early summer of 1315, the castle and lands of Bathgate, then Crown property, were given by Bruce as part of the fair Marjorie’s dowry. Walter died at his Castle of Bathgate on 9^th April, 1327. After the death of Sir Walter the Castle was evidently allowed to fall into ruins as no further reference to it appears in the records.

From The New Statistical Account of Scotland – Linlithgowshire 1844

p.157 BATHGATE: There is little of historical interest connected with this parish.The barony of Bathgate formed part of the dower of Marjory Bruce, ‘the lass who brought the sceptre into the Stewarts’ house.’ A castle on it, situate in the low grounds south of the town, which must the have been a morass, was from this date occasionally inhabited by the royal family. Here Walter Stewart himself died in 1328. Hardly a vestige even of the foundations of the castle is now to be discovered. Kitchen utensils of brass, have, however, sometimes been found about it; and coffins, formed of flat stones, have been torn up by the plough in the neighbouring grounds.

From Scottish Pageant 55B.C. – A.D.1513 by Agnes Mure MacKenzie.

p. 179 When a mediaeval King of Scots was crowned, the crown was set on his head by the Earl of Fife. When Robert Bruce was crowned in 1306, the young Earl of Fife was in the hands of Edward I of England, and his place at the coronation, accordingly, was taken by his sister, the Countess of Buchan. In autumn she was captured with the Queen, and the King’s sisters and young daughter.

[It was decreed that the] ‘most impious conspiratress of Buchan shall be most firmly enclosed in a dwelling of stone and iron, made like a crown and at Berwick be hung up in the open air, that she may be given, in life and death, for a gazing-stock and an everlasting scorn to those who pass by. In the same manner it is ordered that Mary, sister of Robert Bruce, formerly Earl of Carrick, shall be sent to Roxburgh, to keep there in the castle in a cage. Also Marjorie, the daughter of Robert Bruce, shall be delivered to Messire Henry de Percy, to put her in England for safe keeping, and also Christina, the sister of the said Robert Bruce, who was the wife of Christopher de Seton, to be put in guard in England in the same manner.’

[Marjorie was the daughter of Bruce’s first wife Isabella (daughter of the Earl of Mar). His Queen in 1306 was Elizabeth de Burgh (daughter of the Earl of Ulster). Isabella, the Countess of Buchan died in captivity.]

From True Romances of Scotland by E. Maxtone Graham and E. Paterson.

p.65 [News reached Bruce that] The Queen and Marjory and his sisters were prisoners of the English king; the Queen was imprisoned in the Tower of London, Marjory and his sisters and the Countess of Buchan were close captives in caged turrets of Berwick Castle.

p.77 [At Bannockburn] Edward Bruce was given the command to the right, Randolph was to lead the centre, and the generous-hearted Douglas was to share the left with his young cousin Walter the Steward. The King’s place was behind with the reserve…

p.85-87 It must have been a great joy to Bruce to have the Queen and Marjory again after all the years of separation. Marjory soon married. Her husband was Walter the Steward the noble representative of a family that for long had been important in Scotland… Marjory died young. She left one little boy named Robert who, long after, became the first Stewart king in Scotland… It was another grief when Walter the Steward, Marjory’s husband died.

From A Student’s History of Scotland by David W. Rannie

p.90 Bruce’s heir was his daughter Marjory, the wife of Walter Fitzalan, the Steward of Scotland… Robert II, of the family of the Stewards, or Stewarts, was the first of that famous line.

p. 100 Robert the Steward of Scotland, now King Robert II, the son of Marjory Bruce, was of that Norman family of Fitzalan… They had large estates (Renfrew and the Isle of Bute)…

From The History of Scotland by the Rev James MacKenzie

p. 159 [At the siege of Berwick] A strong body of the enemy came up to the gate of St. Mary, each man carrying a bundle of light stuff to burn. They cast their combustibles against the gate, and set them on fire to burn it down. The governor, who was Lord Walter Stewart, son-in-law of the Bruce, bade throw open the gate. Making a sudden rush, they scattered the fire, and charged desperately on the enemy. A fierce conflict ensued… and the English retired…

From Robert the Bruce – King of Scots by Ronald McNair Scott.

p. xvii 1306 His brother Nigel captured at Kildrummy Castle and executed. His wife, sisters and daughter captured at Tain.

p.34 in 1295 Robert married Isabella, daughter of the tenth Earl of Mar… but it was a short-lived marriage, for after giving birth to a daughter, Marjorie, in 1296, Isabella died.

p.82 From Aberdeen Bruce sent word to his brother Nigel to bring to him from Kildrummy, his Queen, the Countess of Buchan, his daughter Marjorie and his two sisters, Mary, wife of his comrade Neil Campbell, and Christina, now twice widowed…

p.86-87 During this time, Nigel Bruce and his party of women had made their way through the mountains of Atholl and Braemar to the castle of Kildrummy on Deeside. When they arrived they were greeted with the news that the Earl of Pembroke was already installed in Aberdeen. The ladies therefore continued their journey towards the Orkneys under the guidance of the Earl of Atholl. The Earl of Ross, a supporter of the Comyns, heard of their presence and sent a party to apprehend them. They took refuge in the sanctuary of St Duthac at Tain… They were seized and dispatched to the English King. [Kildrummy Castle fell and] Nigel Bruce and all who were taken prisoner with him were dragged through the streets of Berwick and hanged and then beheaded… The Countess of Buchan and Mary Bruce, whose husband was still in arms with her brother, were the objects of Edward’s greatest displeasure. For them he ordained that wooden cages should be built jutting from the battlements of Berwick and Roxburgh Castles respectively, and that within them they should be shut up as animals in a zoo…A similar cage was prepared at the Tower of London for Marjorie Bruce, with the express condition that she should not be allowed to hold converse with any but the constable of the Tower… he later revoked the order and dispatched her to a nunnery at Watton. Christina Bruce was lodged in a convent at Sixhills in Lincolnshire. Queen Elizabeth was placed under house arrest in the manor of Burstwick-in-Holderness.

p.146 At Bannockburn, the third division was under the nominal control of the High Steward, Walter the son of Bruce’s old friend James Stewart who had died in 1309, but as Walter Stewart was a minor the control was actually in the hands of his cousin James Douglas. Their men came from Lanark, Renfrew and the Borders.

p.157 When they were all assembled he called forth and knighted in the field, as was the custom of the day before a battle, all those who had been chosen for that honour, among them Walter Stewart as knight and Sir James Douglas as knight banneret.

p.164 The captured Earl of Hereford was exchanged for Queen Elizabeth, his daughter Marjorie, his sister Christina, and Robert Wishart, Bishop of Glasgow… Mary Bruce had been released from her cage in 1310 and removed to Newcastle and from there exchanged for the brother of Sir Philip Mowbray. The Countess of Buchan had died.

p.177 His daughter Marjorie was expecting a child in the spring. On 2 March 1316, when near her time, Princess Marjorie was thrown from her horse and killed. The surgeons who were sent for at once cut open her abdomen and delivered a son from her dead body. Crippled throughout his life from the injury of his birth, the boy, fifty-four years later became King of Scots as Robert II, the first of the royal line of Stewarts.

p.191-192 [Walter Stewart is in command of the defence of Berwick, 1319] Early on the morning of 7 September the English trumpets sounded and a general assault began from the landward side. Walter Stewart with a troop of reserves rode from place to place to see where help was needed most… At dawn on 13 September the English once more assailed the town… news was brought to him that the English had stormed the outworks of the Marygate and set the gate on fire. Having no men spare from the fighting on the walls, he called out the garrison of the castle and flinging open the gate from within, drove the attackers back and, after stamping out the fire, held the entrance till the enemy withdrew.

p.200 No sooner had the two-year truce ended on 1 January 1322 than Bruce sent Randolph, Douglas and Walter Stewart on a powerful raid over the border: Randolph to Darlington, Douglas to Hartlepool and Walter Stewart to Richmond, plundering or taking ransom.

p.213-214

On 15 July 1326 the King summoned a parliament at Cambuskenneth Abbey…Robert Stewart’s father, Walter, had died three months earlier to the general grief and in particular to his father-in-law, the King. For he had trusted him with responsibility from an early age as a stripling at Bannockburn, as a governor of Berwick, as a cavalry leader at Old Byland, and had never found him wanting.

From Bannockburn 1314 – A new History by Chris Brown

p.27 Barbour pretty certainly ‘invented’ an extra Scottish division in order to provide a role for Sir James Douglas and for Walter Stewart, the father of Barbour’s patron, Robert II.

From Robert Bruce and the Community of the Realm of Scotland by G.W.S. Barrow

p.184 Ultimately, Marjorie Bruce was given in marriage to Walter, James Stewart’s second son, who succeeded as heir because his elder brother Andrew died in their father’s lifetime.

p.274 [At Bannockburn a brigade] was nominally under the command of Walter the Stewart. Since he was a mere youth the actual command was held by James Douglas, Walter Stewart’s cousin. The fact that Douglas, who had already proved himself one of Bruce’s most brilliant captains, should even nominally yield command to the hereditary Stewart of Scotland is a notable example of the conservatism of Scottish feudal society.

p.312 … in 1319, King Edward and Earl Thomas of Lancaster actually joined forces and besieged Berwick, where they were repulsed by Walter the Stewart, to whom Bruce had committed town and castle.

p.315 Barely had the two-year truce expired than Douglas and Moray were over the border (6 January 1322) and plundered Teesside. Walter Stewart (by now a hardened veteran) went to Richmondside and sold immunity to its inhabitants at a heavy price.

p.366-367 By far the most favoured of the king’s kinsmen were the Stewarts. In 1315, nine years before the birth of his son, the king took the momentous step of giving to Walter Stewart in marriage his daughter, Marjorie, then his only legitimate child. The royal house of Stewart was thus in a very real sense the creation, or at least the legacy, of Robert Bruce. With his wife (who was a few years his senior) Walter Stewart received the barony of Bathgate and other lands.

p.394-395 The barons’ letter, which ought more properly to be thought of as the community of the realm’s letter, has long been renowned, and has become generally familiar in modern times as the Declaration of Arbroath. The copy sent to the Pope at Avignon is lost, but by an astonishing piece of good fortune a duplicate fair copy, preserved for over two centuries at Tyninghame House in East Lothian, has survived, faded, fragile and much injured, yet rightly cherished as the most precious single item in the national archives of Scotland. The letter runs in the name of Duncan, earl of Fife; Thomas Randolph, earl of Moray, and six other earls; Walter the Stewart; William de Soules, the hereditary butler; James, lord of Douglas; and twenty-eight other barons; and it bears the date ‘at the monastery of Arbroath in Scotland on the sixth day of the month of April in the year of grace 1320’, and in the fifteenth year of King Robert’s reign.

From The Bruce by John Barbour (c1375). An edition with translation and notes by A.A.M. Duncan

p.416 [The muster at the Torwood, Bannockburn] Sir Edward Bruce… came with a fine great company of men… Next Walter Steward, who was just a beardless lad, came with a band of noble men.. And the good lord Douglas… The earl of Moray [Thomas Randolph] too came…

Footnote: Walter was the second son of James Stewart. Andrew, Walter’s elder brother died in English captivity in May 1308. James married in 1296 so Walter would be born in 1298 or later. This means that Walter was sixteen years old at Bannockburn. [The Scottish Biographical Dictionary gives Walter’s dates as 1293-1326 which would make him twenty-one years old at Bannockburn.]

p.420 Bruce gave the third division to Walter Stewart to lead, and to Douglas. They were close cousins and therefore Stewart was entrusted to him for he was young – but nonetheless I know he will do his duty manfully, and behave so well that he will need no more taking-care-of.

Footnotes:

p.420 Barbour says that the Scots fought in four divisions of infantry.. All English chronicles say that we had only three divisions.

p.445 Walter Stewart and Douglas did not have a division of men on foot. Rather, Keith and Douglas were in command of two small cavalry contingents. Keith was attached to the King’s division while Walter Stewart and Douglas were attached to Edward Bruce’s division. As Edward Bruce’s infantry stood to receive the impact of the English cavalry van, Douglas lead a counter-charge of cavalry which contributed to Gloucester’s failure and death.

p.468 The king made Walter Stewart knight, and James Douglas, and also he made others of great valour, each in their order of precedence.

p.488 Ah! Mighty God! Anyone who could see Walter Stewart and his following, and the good Douglas, who was so brave, fighting then in that mighty encounter, would say that those who pressed their foes’ might so hard in that fight, defeating them wherever they went, were worthy of all honour.

p.516 Eventually they negotiated a settlement whereby the Earl of Hereford would go home to England free without paying a ransom and that he should be exchanged for Bishop Robert, for the Queen, and for Dame Marjory… the King married off his daughter, who was fair and also his heir apparent, to Walter Stewart; very soon they begat of their bed a male child, who was called Robert after his good grandfather, and was later king after his worthy uncle David II who reigned for forty-two years.

Footnote: Robert II’s date of birth – 2^nd March 1316 – is found for the first time in an editorial note to Bower’s Scotichronicon.

Footnote p.564: Walter had not married Marjory in April 1315 but apparently he did so very soon after.

p.626 Walter Steward of Scotland, who was then young and handsome, the king’s son-in-law had such a strong determination and such a desire to be near at hand to the Marches, that he took Berwick under his charge.

Footnote: This is preparing the ground for Barbour’s version of the 1319 siege, when he claims that Stewart commanded the town.

p.636 [During the siege] Walter Stewart with a following kept riding about to see where there was the greatest necessity for help.

p.654 The folk who were attacking at the Mary-gate had cut down the outwork and made a fire at the draw-bridge, burning it down and crowding in large numbers right to the gate, to set a fire. Sir Walter Stewart caused come from the castle all the armed men who were there… and went speedily to the Mary-gate… he quickly set his purpose upon a great exploit, causing the gate to be opened wide and the fire which he found at it scattered by a force of men. He put himself at very great risk, for those who were attacking pressed on him with drawn weapons, and he defended himself with all his might.

Footnote: It would be foolish to burn the drawbridge, which in any case would be raised. ‘Burned it down’ means ‘burned the tackle to bring it down’.

p.662 The King went to Berwick, and when he heard how it had been defended so very boldly, he praised those who were there very greatly. He commended Walter Stewart’s great merits above the others… It was indeed right to esteem him who had put up a defence so stoutly at an open gate with hand-to-hand fighting. Had he lived until he had been of mature years, without doubt his reputation would have spread far. But death was very envious of his worthiness so that all his bold deeds ended thus in the flower of his youth…

p.690 When the king of England who was still based at Byland, saw his men openly defeated, he departed in great haste, fleeing forth with his whole force, Scotsmen chasing him hard. Edward got clean away with the majority of his followers. Walter Stewart, who always put a high price on distinguished chivalry, with a company of five hundred, gave chase to the gates of York, slaying some other men there and staying nearly till night-time to see if any would issue to fight. When he saw that none would come out, he turned back with all his force…

p. 708 At this time, when the truce was being kept on the Marches, as I said before, Sir Walter Stewart, the worthy man, took a serious illness at Bathgate. [Barbour calls it Bathgat.] His sickness kept worsening more and more, until men realised from his appearance that the time approached to pay the debt which no man can escape discharging. Shriven and very penitent too, when everything that a Christian man needs to have, had been done in all particulars, he gave up his spirit as a good Christian man. Then you could hear folk weeping and wailing, many a knight and many a lady openly showing great distress; whoever they were, they all did it, all men bemoaning him in common, for he was a worthy man among his contemporaries. When they had made their mourning for a long time, they took his corpse to Paisley, and there he was buried with great ceremony and deep mourning. May God in his might bring his soul where joy lasts and never ceases.

Footnote: He last witnesses a Royal Charter at Stirling on 31^st March, 1327. Bower who calls Walter Stewart ‘a noble warrior’ says he died on 9^th April.

p.779 THE DECLARATION OF ARBROATH

A LETTER FROM THE SCOTTISH MAGNATES TO JOHN XXII

ARBROATH ABBEY, 6 APRIL, 1320

To the most holy father and lord in Christ, the lord John, by divine providence, supreme pontiff of the holy Roman and universal church, his humble and devout sons, Duncan earl of Fife, Thomas Randolph earl of Moray lord of Man and Annandale, Patrick Dunbar earl of March, Malise earl of Strathearn,..; Walter Steward of Scotland, James lord of Douglas…

our people did live in freedom and peace till Edward I came in the guise of friend and ally to invade them as an enemy… For as long as a hundred of us remain alive, we will never on any conditions be subjected to the lordship of the English. For we fight not for glory nor riches nor honours, but for freedom alone, which no good man gives up except with his life.

Endnote: The events surrounding the birth of Robert II are not clear. All sources say that Marjorie fell from her horse and was so badly injured that she died instantly or soon after. If death was instantaneous then the child would have to be cut from her body within a few minutes. This could have been done by a surgeon, huntsman or knight skilled at hunting. Marjorie’s Wikipedia entry says that she was thrown at the junction of Renfrew Road and Dundonald Road in Paisley. ‘She went into premature labour and delivered the child at Paisley Abbey, surviving the birth by a few hours at most.’