Volume 1 - Electric Scotland

cxxvi SIR JAMES JOHNSTONE OF JOHNSTONE, KNIGHT, 1567-lCOS.
hundred years. In tlie Xcw Statistical Account of Dryfcsdale, ijublished io tbe
year 1815, the statemeut of the existence of the very aucieut thorn trees with
the tumulus at their base, called " jMaxwell's Tliorns," is repeated almo.st iu the
same words as in tlie Old Account. Dryfehohn fields are covered with
thorns as if indigenous to the soil, and are used for hedge fences for the fields.
Large thorn trees grow at intervals in the ordiuary thoru-hedge fences.^
This conflict, wliich liappcucd on the Gth of December 15P3, is usually
called the battle of Dryfesands, from its occurrence upou the sands
bearing that name, formed by the floods of the ri%'er Dryfe as it falls into
the x\nuan. The slaughter whiclr look place in the battle has beeu
exaggerated, it being asserted that as many as seven hundred were slain.
On the contrary, very few appear to have fallen. Caldeiwood says that
twenty of the Maxwells were slain and the rest put to flight.- Eobert
Johnston in his Histoiy records that only five of Maxwell's company vvere
slain in the battle. But the official records shew that tlie conflict, though
not involving so great a loss as some modern writers represent, was yet of a
more serious character than that stated by Piobert Johnston in his History.-"
Tidings of the battle of Dryfesands having l)cen carried to Edinburgh,
the king convoked liis privy council on the 22d of December that they might
' Besides tlic present l.irgp thorn tree at former tcuaiit of Spriiigfielcl was .lUowed £20
Applegirtli in memory of Bell of Albic, v.ho to allow this lliorn to grow its the Held, as it
was cng.aged in the b.ittlc against tlie Max- is distant from the thoru hedge. Tiiorns and
wells, there was formerly another tree of even thorn hedges abound in this parish as well as
larger size, which was 1>Iomii or t.iken dov.ii. in Dryfesdalo, and form natural memorials
The wood of it was formed into a cabinet f"r when specially designated.
a collection of shells by the late Sir William - MacDow.aH's History of Dumfries, p.
Jardiue. The wood of that thorn tree as 32-'; Sir 'Waller Scoti's Tales of a Grandshown
iu this cabinet v.as white in colour, father at date ; Calderv.-ood's History, vol. v.
and of a very fine close grain similar to that p. 290.
of boxwood, used by engravers in wood. The ^ In the l!ook of Carlaveroct (vol. i. pp.
other .-Mbie thorn tree st inds soutli-east from 294, 255) it is stated that Lord Maxwell was
the church of Applegirth in a field on the farm interred iu the College of Liucludeu, on 30th
of Springfield. It is about twenty feet in Ueoember 1593, without a monument to
height and is much decayed in the trunk from mark his grave. This statement was made
the ground and forabout five feet upwards. A upou the authority of a letter of invitation