Robert II of Scotland

Dumbarton Castle on Dumbarton Rock where Robert Stewart and King David took refuge in 1333

The first war of independence began in the reign of King John Balliol.[7] His short reign was bedevilled by Edward I's insistence on his overlordship of Scotland. The Scottish leadership concluded that only war could release the country from the English king's continued weakening of Balliol's sovereignty and so finalised a treaty of reciprocal assistance with France in October 1295.[8] The Scots forayed into England in March 1296—this incursion together with the French treaty angered the English king and provoked an invasion of Scotland taking Berwick on 30 March before defeating the Scots army at Dunbar on 27 April.[9] John Balliol submitted to Edward and resigned the throne to him before being sent to London as a prisoner. Despite this, resistance to the English led by William Wallace and Andrew Moray had emerged in the name of King John Balliol.[9] On their deaths, Robert the Bruce continued to resist the English and eventually succeeded in defeating the forces of Edward II of England and gained the Scottish throne for himself.[8]

David Bruce, aged five, became king on 7 June 1329 after the death of his father Robert. Walter the Steward had died earlier on 9 April 1327,[10] and the orphaned eleven-year-old Robert was placed under the guardianship of his uncle, Sir James Stewart of Durrisdeer,[3] who along with Thomas Randolph, Earl of Moray, and William Lindsey, Archdeacon of St Andrews were appointed as joint guardians of the kingdom.[11] David's accession kindled the second independence war which threatened Robert's position as heir.[12] In 1332 Edward Balliol, son of the deposed John Balliol, spearheaded an attack on the Bruce sovereignty with the tacit support of King Edward III of England and the explicit endorsement of 'the disinherited'.[13] Edward Balliol's forces delivered heavy defeats on the Bruce supporters at Dupplin Moor on 11 August 1332 and again at Halidon Hill on 19 July 1333, at which the 17-year-old Robert participated.[11] Robert's estates were overrun by Balliol, who granted them to David Strathbogie, titular earl of Atholl, but Robert evaded capture and gained protection at Dumbarton Castle where King David was also taking refuge.[12] Very few other strongholds remained in Scottish hands in the winter of 1333—only the castles of Kildrummy (held by Christina Bruce, elder sister of Robert I and wife of Andrew Murray of Bothwell), Loch Leven, Loch Doon, and Urquhart held out against Balliol forces.[14]

Dairsie Castle where the 1335 Parliament was held

In May 1334, the situation looked dire for the house of Bruce and David II gained safety in France.[12] Robert set about winning back his lands in the west of Scotland.[11] Strathbogie came over to the Bruce interest after disagreements with his fellow 'disinherited' but his fierce opposition to Randolph came to a head at a Parliament held at Dairsie Castle in early 1335 when Strathbogie received the support of Robert.[15] Strathbogie once again changed sides and submitted to the English king in August and was made Warden of Scotland. It is likely that Robert submitted to Edward in September 1335 and had relinquished the guardianship by early December.[16]

The Bruce resistance to Balliol may have been verging on collapse in 1335 but a turn-round in its fortunes began with the appearance of Sir Andrew Moray of Bothwell as a potent war leader at the Battle of Culblean.[17] Moray had been captured in 1332, ransomed himself in 1334, and immediately sped north to lay siege to Dundarg Castle in Buchan held by Sir Henry de Beaumont, with the castle falling on 23 December 1334.[18] Moray was appointed guardian at Dunfermline during the winter of 1335–36 while he was besieging Cupar Castle in Fife. He died at his castle in Avoch in 1338 and Robert resumed the guardianship.[19] Murray's campaign put an end to any chance of Edward III having full lasting control over the south of Scotland and Edward's failure in the six-month siege of Dunbar Castle confirmed this.[20] Balliol lost many of his major supporters to the Bruce side and the main English garrisons began to fall to the Scots—Cupar in the spring or summer of 1339, Perth taken by the combined armies of Sir William Douglas, Lord of Liddesdale, Robert Stewart and Maurice Murray of Drumsargard in June 1339.[21] Edinburgh was taken by stratagem by William Douglas of Liddesdale in April 1341.[22]

John Randolph, released from English custody in a prisoner exchange in 1341, visited David II in Normandy before returning to Scotland. Just as Randolph was a favourite of the king, David II mistrusted Robert Stewart with his powerful positions of heir presumptive and guardian of Scotland.[23] At the beginning of June 1341, the kingdom appeared sufficiently stable to allow the king to return to a land where his nobles, while fighting for the Bruce cause, had considerably increased their own power bases.[24] On 17 October 1346, Robert accompanied David into battle at Neville's Cross, where many Scottish nobles including Randolph, died—David II was wounded and captured while Robert and Patrick, earl of March had apparently fled the field.[11]

With the king now imprisoned in England and Randolph dead, the guardianship once again fell to Robert.[26] In 1347 he took the important step of ensuring the legitimation of his four sons, John, Earl of Carrick (the future King Robert III), Walter, Lord of Fife (d. 1362), Robert (the future Duke of Albany) and Alexander, Lord of Badenoch (and future Earl of Buchan), and six daughters by petitioning Pope Clement VI to allow a canon law marriage to Elizabeth Mure.[27]

Even though an English prisoner, David retained influence in Scotland and Robert had his guardianship removed by parliament and given jointly to the earls of Mar and Ross and the lord of Douglas—this did not last and Robert was once again appointed guardian by the Parliament of February 1352.[28] The paroled David attended this Parliament to present to Robert and the members of the Three Estates the conditions for his release. These contained no ransom demand but required the Scots to name the English prince John of Gaunt as heir presumptive. The Council rejected these terms, with Robert opposed to a proposal that threatened his right of succession.[29] The king had no option but to return to captivity—the English chronicler Henry Knighton wrote of the event:[30]

... the Scots refused to have their King unless he entirely renounced the influence of the English, and similarly refused to submit themselves to them. And they warned him that they would neither ransom him nor allow him to be ransomed unless he pardoned them for all their acts and injuries that they had done, and all the offences that they had committed during the time of captivity, and he should give them security for that, or otherwise they threatened to choose another king to rule them.

By 1354 ongoing negotiations for the king's release reached the stage where a proposal of a straight ransom payment of 90,000 marks to be repaid over nine years, guaranteed by the provision of 20 high-ranking hostages, was agreed—this understanding was destroyed by Robert when he bound the Scots to a French action against the English in 1355.[31] The capture of Berwick together with the presence of the French on English soil jolted Edward III into moving against the Scots—in January 1356 Edward led his forces into the south-east of Scotland and burned Edinburgh and Haddington and much of the Lothians in a campaign that became known as the 'Burnt Candlemas'.[32] After Edward's victory over France in September, the Scots resumed negotiations for David's release ending in October 1357 with the Treaty of Berwick. Its terms were that in turn for David's freedom, a ransom of 100,000 marks would be paid in annual instalments over ten years—only the first two payments were completed initially and nothing further until 1366.[33] This failure to honour the conditions of the Berwick treaty allowed Edward to continue to press for a Plantagenet successor to David—terms that were totally rejected by the Scottish Council and probably by Robert himself.[34] This may have been the cause of a brief rebellion in 1363 by Robert and the earls of Douglas and March.[35] Later French inducements could not bring David to their aid and the country remained at peace with England during his reign.[36]

David died childless on 22 February 1371 and was succeeded by Robert II.[37] David was buried at Holyrood Abbey almost immediately but an armed protest by William, Earl of Douglas delayed Robert II's coronation until 26 March 1371.[38] The reasons for the incident remain unclear but may have involved a dispute regarding Robert's right of succession,[39] or may have been directed against George Dunbar, Earl of March (also known as Earl of Dunbar) and the southern justiciar, Robert Erskine.[40] It was resolved by Robert giving his daughter Isabella in marriage to Douglas's son, James and with Douglas replacing Erskine as justiciar south of the Forth.[41] Robert's accession did affect some others who held offices from David II. In particular, George Dunbar's brother John Dunbar, the Lord of Fife who lost his claim on Fife and Sir Robert Erskine's son, Sir Thomas Erskine who lost control of Edinburgh Castle.[42]

The Stewarts greatly increased their holdings in the west, in Atholl, and in the far north: the earldoms of Fife and Menteith went to Robert II's second surviving son, Robert; the earldoms of Buchan and Ross (along with the lordship of Badenoch) to his fourth son, Alexander; and the earldoms of Strathearn and Caithness to the eldest son of his second marriage, David.[43] King Robert's sons-in-law were John MacDonald, Lord of the Isles, John Dunbar, Earl of Moray and James who would become the 2nd Earl of Douglas.[43] Robert's sons John, Earl of Carrick, the king's heir, and Robert, Earl of Fife, were made keepers of the castles of Edinburgh and Stirling respectively, while Alexander, Lord of Badenoch and Ross, and afterwards Earl of Buchan, became the king's justiciar and lieutenant in the north of the kingdom.[11] This build-up of the Stewart family power did not appear to cause resentment among the senior magnates—the king generally did not threaten their territories or local rule and where titles were transferred to his sons the individuals affected were usually very well rewarded.[11] This style of kingship was very different from his predecessor's—David tried to dominate his nobles whereas Robert's strategy was to delegate authority to his powerful sons and earls and this generally worked for the first decade of his reign.[43] Robert II was to have influence over eight of the fifteen earldoms either through his sons directly or by strategic marriages of his daughters to powerful lords.[43]

Robert the warrior and knight: the reverse side of Robert II's Great Seal, enhanced as a 19th-century steel engraving

In 1373, Robert ensured the future security of the Stewart dynasty by having Parliament pass entailments regarding the succession. At this time, none of his sons had heirs so it became necessary for a system to be devised to define precisely the circumstances in which each of his sons could inherit the crown—none of this would take precedence over normal succession by primogeniture.[44][45] By 1375, the king had commissioned John Barbour to write the poem, The Brus, a history intended to bolster the public image of the Stewarts as the genuine heirs of Robert I. It described the patriotic acts of both Sir James, the Black Douglas and Walter the Steward, the king's father, in their support of Bruce.[43] Robert II's rule during the 1370s saw the country's finances stabilised and greatly improved due in part to the flourishing wool trade, reduced calls on the public purse and by the halting of his predecessor's ransom money on the death of Edward III of England.[11] Robert II—unlike David II whose kingship was predominantly Lothian and therefore lowland based—did not restrict his attention to one sector of his kingdom but frequently visited the more remote areas of the north and west among his Gaelic lords.[46]

Robert II ruled over a country that continued to have English enclaves within its borders and Scots who gave their allegiance to the king of England—the important castles of Berwick, Jedburgh, Lochmaben and Roxburgh had English garrisons and controlled southern Berwickshire, Teviotdale and large areas in Annandale and Tweeddale.[47] In June 1371, Robert agreed to a defensive treaty with the French, and although there were no outright hostilities during 1372, the English garrisons were reinforced and placed under an increased state of vigilance.[48] Attacks on the English held zones, with the near-certain backing of Robert, began in 1373 and accelerated in the years 1375–77. This indicated that a central decision had probably been taken for the escalation of conflict rather than the previous small-scale marauding attacks by the border barons.[49] In 1376, the Earl of March successfully recovered Annandale, but then found himself constrained by the Bruges Anglo-French truce.[50]

Dunfermline Abbey which received Coldingham Priory as daughter house from King Robert

In his dealings with Edward III, Robert blamed his border magnates for the escalating attacks on the English zones, but regardless of this, the Scots retained the recaptured lands that were often portioned out among minor lords, so securing their interest in preventing English re-possession.[51] Despite Robert's further condemnations of his border lords, all the signs were that Robert backed the growing successful Scottish militancy following Edward III's death in 1377.[11] In a charter dated 25 July 1378 the king decreed that Coldingham Priory would no longer be a daughter house of the English Durham Priory but was to be attached to Dunfermline Abbey.[52] In early February the Scots—apparently unaware of the conclusion of an Anglo-French truce on 26 January 1384 that included the Scots in the cease-fire—conducted an all-out attack on the English zones winning back Lochmaben Castle and Teviotdale.[53] John of Gaunt led a reciprocal English attack that took him as far as Edinburgh, where he was bought off by the burgesses, but destroyed Haddington.[54] Carrick and James, Earl of Douglas (his father William had died in April),[55] wanted a retaliatory strike for the Gaunt raid. Robert may have concluded that as the French had reneged on a previous agreement to send assistance in 1383 and then having entered into a truce with England, any military action would have been met with retaliation and exclusion from the forthcoming Boulogne peace talks.[55][56] On 2 June 1384, Robert resolved to send Walter Wardlaw, Bishop of Glasgow to the Anglo-French peace talks, yet Carrick ignored this and allowed raids into the north of England to take place.[56] Despite this, by 26 July, the Scots were part of the truce that would expire in October. Robert called a Council in September, probably for working out how to proceed when the truce concluded, and to decide how the war was to proceed thereafter.[57]

A medieval miniature depicting the Battle of Otterburn where Carrick's close ally, James, Earl of Douglas was killed

Robert's son, John, Earl of Carrick, had become the foremost Stewart magnate south of the Forth just as Alexander, Earl of Buchan was in the north.[58] Alexander's activities and methods of royal administration, enforced by Gaelic mercenaries, drew criticism from northern earls and bishops and from his younger half-brother David, Earl of Strathearn. These complaints damaged the king's standing within the Council leading to criticism of his ability to curb Buchan's activities.[59] Robert's differences with the Carrick affinity regarding the conduct of the war and his continued failure or unwillingness to deal with Buchan in the north led to the political convulsion of November 1384 when the Council removed the king's authority to govern and appointed Carrick as lieutenant of the kingdom—a coup d'état had taken place.[43][60] With Robert sidelined, there was now no impediment in the way of war. In June 1385, a force of 1200 French soldiers joined the Scots in a campaign that involved the Earl of Douglas and two of Robert's sons, John, Earl of Carrick and Robert, Earl of Fife.[61] The skirmishes saw small gains but a quarrel between the French and Scottish commanders saw the abandonment of an attack on the important castle of Roxburgh.[62]

Dundonald Castle, where Robert II died in 1390

The victory of the Scots over the English at the Battle of Otterburn in Northumberland in August 1388 set in motion Carrick's fall from power. One of the Scottish casualties was Carrick's close ally James, Earl of Douglas. Douglas died without an heir, which led to various claims upon the title and estate—Carrick backed Malcolm Drummond, the husband of Douglas's sister, while Fife sided with the successful appellant, Sir Archibald Douglas, Earl of Wigtown and Lord of Galloway who possessed an entail on the Douglas estates.[63] Fife, now with his powerful Douglas ally, and those who supported the king ensured a countercoup at the December Council meeting when the guardianship of Scotland passed from Carrick (who had recently been badly injured from a horse-kick) to Fife.[63][64] Many had also approved of Fife's intention to properly resolve the situation of lawlessness in the north and in particular the activities of his younger brother, Buchan.[64] Fife relieved Buchan of his offices of lieutenant of the north and justiciar north of the Forth. The latter role was given to Fife's son, Murdoch Stewart. Robert II toured the northeast of the kingdom in late January 1390, perhaps to reinforce the changing political scene in the north following Buchan's removal from authority.[65] In March, Robert returned to Dundonald Castle in Ayrshire where he died on 19 April and was buried at Scone on 25 April.[66]