Inveresk Kirkyard

Posh Pete

Still got a pulse.
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OK. So its not the Somme or Normandy but it's worth a visit if you live in the area or if you are touring in Scotland. I was there today: just passing by and I decided to have a shuftie on a whim. First thing to note is its position on a ridge overlooking the river Esk and then the Forth estuary. The views are very fine, especially on a summer's day like today.
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A position like that made it important militarily and the church is built on the site of a Roman fort and was important during the battle of Pinkie Cleugh in 1547. There are information boards about the battle in the kirk yard. Boiling it down: an English army led by Somerset, Edward VIs Protector, was attacking Edinburgh in a bid to force the Scots to marry the child Mary (Queen of Scots) to Edward. AKA "The Rough Wooing". Although the Scots were in a good position at first, English artillery mounted on ships in the Firth gave them a hammering and forced them to retreat inland. The English then outflanked the Scots who were slaughtered. MQoS was then sent to France for an eventual date with an executioner's block back in England! Pinkie Cleugh was the last battle fought between Scots and English armies. With the exception of the odd fixture at Wembley etc!:D

Anyhoo ... the other interesting aspect is a couple of graves of characters who could have been culled straight from a Sharpe novel ...

Major General James Stirling
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and Major William Norman Ramsay.
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Here's a link to an account of Stirling's career. What a man! (Wonder if he's an antecedent of that other Stirling chap!)

Ramsay wasn't exactly a wimp either. He was killed at Waterloo but his body was brought back (in a lead casket or a barrel of brandy?) by his comrades. He'd also fought in the Peninsular war and there's a famous account of one action he was involved in ...

'At Fuentes d'Onoro (5 May) the British cavalry on the right wing was driven back by the French, which was in much greater strength, and I troop, or part of it, was cut off. It was supposed that the guns were lost, but soon a commotion was observed among the French cavalry; ‘an English shout pealed high and clear, the mass was rent asunder, and Norman Ramsay burst forth, sword in hand, at the head of his battery, his horses breathing fire, stretched like greyhounds along the plain, the guns bounded behind them like things of no weight, and the mounted gunners followed close, with heads bent low and pointed weapons in desperate career’

That's it. Just thought some might be interested!
 
I'm coming up for the Lauder Ridings, but that's as close to a horse I'll be getting, this year.
I think Norman''s headstone has more than a touch of poetic licence ... (...horses breathing fire, oh well).
 


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