G.P.R. James' 'Gowrie' 1848

Simpkin, Marshall, and Co. first edition - 1848

The Gowrie Mystery or Plot is one of the great mysteries of Scottish history. What all are agreed on is that Alexander Ruthven, known as the Master of Gowrie, set out from Gowrie House in Perth on Tuesday, 4th August 1600 to ride to Falkland House, where James VI was staying. The king came out of the building to mount his horse to go buck hunting. He was approached by Ruthven, who had a private word with him. Nearby were the duke of Lennox, the earl of Mar, the brothers James and Thomas Erskine, John Ramsay and Sir Hugh Herries, with John Murray carrying the king's hawk. Apparently, Ruthven had found on the previous evening a man in the fields near Perth carrying under his cloak a pot filled with gold coins. He had arrested the man who was now in or near Gowrie House. During the proceeding hunt, Ruthven persuaded James to go to Gowrie House to 'discuss' the gold (It is of note that the earl of Gowrie, Ruthven's elder brother, owed the crown c.£80,000 from his father's time.) The king did so, with a relatively small escort.

Gowrie Place, Perth

At Gowrie House, the king was eventually given a dinner alone, while his gentlemen dined in the nearby great hall. Ruthven then said it was time for the private talk about the gold and that his brother should be sent to join the others. He took James up a great staircase, down a corridor to a large room, off of which was a small turret chamber. These 'facts' are as the king later described them. The courtiers, including the Earl of Gowrie, went out into the gardens. Suddenly, James was heard calling from the turret room, I am murdered. Treason. My Lord Mar, help, help.  John Ramsay was first to reach the room; he struck Ruthven with a dagger; the latter fell down the stairwell. He was despatched by Sir Hugh Herries. Gowrie ran up the staircase and was killed by Ramsay. An attempt had been made to murder the king; the two would-be murderers were themselves slain. The Ruthven properties were divided up. Sir Thomas Erskine gained lands around Dirleton; John Ramsay (c.1580-1626) received a knighthood. He was later created Viscount of Haddington (1606) and 1st earl of Holderness in 1621. James tried to track down and deal with the two youngest Ruthven brothers.  End of story. Or was it?

Not according to the two nineteenth-century novels I have read. Back in August 2021, I read the first of two works by Eliza Logan - St. Johnstoun; or, John, Earl of Gowrie (1823). The second, follow-up novel, Restalrig; or, the Forfeiture (1829) I read in February 2022 (see the two Blogs of those dates). I wrote then that there were at least three alternative scripts for the events of that day:

• that Ruthven and his brother concocted a plot to murder or, more probably, kidnap King James and that they lured him to Gowrie House for this purpose;
• that James paid a surprise visit to Gowrie House with the intention of killing the two Ruthvens;
• that the tragedy was the outcome of an unplanned brawl which followed an argument between the King and one of the Ruthvens.

Eliza Logan came down firmly on the Ruthvens' side and created a believable story of the perfidy and cowardice of King James, mashed with the jealousy and hatred of other Scottish courtiers and the scheming of a Jesuit spy. So, now we have G.P.R. James on his 66th work (out of 91, according to his biographer S.M. Ellis - The Solitary Horseman [1927]). James is firmly on the side of the Ruthvens and Logan's version of events. Not until page 170 out of 399 of the novel, do the Gowries set foot in Scotland. What James has done is to weave a love story between the earl and a (fictitious) young girl, called Julia Douglas, mainly set in Italy but then moving to Paris. He has also 'shown up' John Ramsay as an ignorant lout in the French capital.  Thus, by the time we accompany the earl to Scotland we are very much disposed to favour him. The author's Gowrie is one who seeks no trouble, merely wishes to reside quietly on his estates and work for Julia to regain her rights. Alexander Ruthven, the younger brother, is portrayed as flirting dangerously with Queen Anne of Denmark, but with the folly of youth rather than any malign political purpose. King James, on the other hand is cast as a vengeful, deceitful, untrustworthy man. As Beatrice Ruthven, Gowrie's unmarried sister attached to the Queen's court, says to her younger brother: the king never made atonement to any one. The king always thinks he is right, and has been ever right, and will be right to the end of his life...he may take the means to lull the objects of his dislike or his doubts till they are wholly in his power. James turns the official account on its head (like Logan). It is the king who plots the destruction of the Ruthvens from the moment they land back in Scotland. He is supported by a nasty Hugh Herries, an ambitious Ramsay, and other courtiers who wish to remain in the king's favour. Thanks to the treachery of the porter at Gowrie Place, the Gowries are surrounded by those who wish them ill.  Fortuitously, news of the murders of both Ruthvens reach their mother's home at Dirleton and the younger brothers, William and Patrick Ruthven have time to escape to England. The fictitious love of the earl, Julia, however loses her mind and dies ten weeks later.

James ended his penultimate chapter (the final one was a Postscript): ...all men thought him [Gowrie] innocent; the best and noblest of the clergy in his native land refused, even under pain of deprivation and banishment, to mock God as they were required, and far and wide, throughout Europe, the history of his asserted treason was treated with contempt, and the tale of his death received with sorrow and with pity.

James was more than peeved with The Examiner's review of Gowrie, which had accused the author of only superficially reading up one history of the affair. In reply, he issued a lengthy pamphlet entitled, An Investigation of the Circumstances attending the Murder of John Earl of Gowrie and Alexander Ruthven, By order of King James the Sixth of Scotland, With an examination of the forged Restalrig Letters brought forward to exculpate the King. However, the truth is that we just don't know what happened (as with the two Princes in the Tower). David Mathew, in his James I (Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1967), says at the end of his chapter on the Plot, it seems very likely that we shall never know what happened in the turret room in Gowrie House.

Two unrelated points:

One source maintains that  James ordered a holiday in future Augusts as a thanksgiving for his escape. When he became king of England, it was extended to that country. This might be the origin of the August Bank Holiday. Well, no! The August Bank Holiday was first introduced by the Bank Holidays Act of 1871, which decreed four holidays in England, Wales and Northern Island and five in Scotland (was James' the fifth?!) The August holiday was originally intended to allow bank employees the opportunity to participate and attend cricket matches and enjoy the end of summer. 

Of lesser import, I entertained my own 'mystery', when I purchased the first edition of James' novel. As I neared the end of the volume, I thought that the murder would have to be speedily effected. However, on the last page (222) the reader was nowhere near the denouement. Fortuitously, I recalled that I had another copy of the novel. This time it was Vol. XVII of The Works of G.P.R. James, Esq., revised and corrected by the author. This was also dated 1848 and printed by Simpkin, Marshall, and Co. In fact, the layout and numbering of the pages was the same, but this time the novel finished on page 408! and it contained the complete story. I knew James had deliberately ensured it was encased in one volume, rather than the usual three. The Advertisement at the beginning of the book explained why this was so (it involved the attempt to stop American publishers breaking copyright). What was wrong with my first edition? It was only then that I saw at the bottom of the spine, a large number I, stamped in gilt! I don't blame the bookseller, but clearly the novel had been split into two at a later date. I wonder where the II now resides.

One final point. I liked this rumination by James on the art of novel writing:

There is always in tale-telling, unless the action be compressed within a very short space, a period during which the interest would flag, if the regular passing of each day was noticed, and the small particulars detailed. Were life filled with those striking events which move and interest the reader, with those passions to which the sympathetic heart thrills, with those grand scenes of action which excite the imagination, or with those lesser incidents which amuse and entertain, the human frame, like an over-sharpened knife, would be ground down upon the whetstone of the world, and existence be curtailed of half its date...still, the more peaceful periods in any man's history are those which the least interest his fellow-men, and during the time which elapsed between Gowrie's departure from Paris and his arrival in Scotland, no adventures or impediments occurred which can justify much detail. So, there you have it, from an experienced teller of tales.