1 May 1685 A.D. Scottish Covenanter, John Brown, murdered

1 May 1685 A.D.  Scottish Covenanter, John Brown, murdered. Murdered with premeditation, cool malice aforethought, and with the specific and developed formation of "intent," all the essential elements to satisfy the legal requirements for homicide in the first degree.

Dr. Rusten tells the story this way.

The story is told by Dr.  Rusten. Rusten, E. Michael and Rusten, Sharon. The One Year Christian History. Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 2003.  Available at: http://www.amazon.com/The-Year-Christian-History-Books/dp/0842355073/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1393302630&sr=8-1&keywords=rusten+church+history

John Bacon was shot point-blank in the head by an English officer, an officer of the Crown.  Mr. Bacon’s wife and infant were present.  The wife laid the child on the ground, bound up the head, and prepared him.  A poem by Henry Inglis captures the story:

The child on the moss she laid

And she stretched the cold limbs of the dead,

And drew the eyelid’s shade,

And bound the corpse’s shattered head,

And shrouded the martyr in his plaid;

And where the dead and living slept,

Sat in the wilderness and wept.

The backstory.

Scottish Covenanters were Presbyterians who resisted English Prelacy from 1637-1690, imposed variously by King Charles 1, Charles II, and James VI.  The Covenanters opposed the idea of the “divine right of kings” with a limitless and unbounded sovereignty.  Christ, directly and sovereignly, was the Head and Lord of the Church, not an English King.  During Charle II’s reign, Scottish Covenanters were hunted, jailed and killed in large numbers.

John Brown was a poor farmer in Priesthill, Scotland.  He aspired to be a Covenanter minister, but he stuttered.  But, he was intelligent.  He loved the English Bible and taught it to local youths in his barn. Students were inspired by him and he had a reputation for being a Covenanter.

In 1682, a Covenanting Presbyterian minister, Alexander Peden, married John Bacon and Isabel Weir.  After the ceremony, the Pastor told Isabel, “Isabel, you have a good man; but you will not enjoy him long.  Prize his company and keep his linen by you to be his winding sheet; for you will need it when you are not looking for it, and it will be a bloody one.”

On 1 May 1685, the king’s troops came to Priesthill looking for Pastor Peden, but they found John Bacon in the field.  They took him back to his house, ransacked the place, and found Covenanter literature.  An interrogation ensued and John Bacon spoke clearly and without his usual impediment.  His strong answers induced the officer to ask, “Are you a preacher?”  He answered in the negative.  The officer replied, “Well, if he has never preached, much has he prayed in his time.  God to your prayers, for you shall immediately die.”

Bacon fell to his knees.  He implored the officers for mercy on the Covenanters.

Brown said to his wife, “Now, Isabel, the day is come that I told you would come when I spoke to you first of marrying me.”

Isabel responded, “Indeed, John, I can willingly part with you.”

Brown said, “That is all I desire.  I have no more to do but die.  I have been ready to meet death for years past.”

Brown was allowed to kiss his wife and baby.  The troops were ordered to shoot Brown, but the officer broke in, pulled his pistol, walked over, and shot John Brown in the head.

The officer brusquely asked, “What do you think of your find husband now?

Through tears, she answered, “I have ever thought much good of him, and more now than ever.”

As the poem tells, Isabel lad her baby on the ground, bound up her husband’s head, straightened out his body, covered him with a plaid blanket, sat down and wept.

The poem is worth repeating:

The child on the moss she laid

And she stretched the cold limbs of the dead,

And drew the eyelid’s shade,

And bound the corpse’s shattered head,

And shrouded the martyr in his plaid;

And where the dead and living slept,

Sat in the wilderness and wept.

On 1 May 1685 the Scottish Covenanter, John Brown, was murdered. Lest we forget.