JOHNSTON, Sir Archibald (1611-63), Lord Wariston.

Sir Archibald Johnston of Wariston was born to a prominent Edinburgh family, and after an education suitable for his rank chose to pursue a career as a lawyer. For a time he considered entering the ministry, and from his early twenties he was a staunch Presbyterian, fostering friendships with radical ministers like David Dickson and Robert Blair, and beginning a series of devotional diaries recording his turbulent inner life in complete, and often startling, honesty. He greeted the introduction of the ‘Laudian’ prayer book in 1637 with revulsion, seeing it as ‘the image of the beast’ and the ‘vomit of Romish superstition’.14Wariston Diary, i. 258-9, 267. In the winter of 1637-8 he was closely involved in moves to oppose the new Prayer Book, and to draft the National Covenant, and in the last months of 1638 he was clerk of the General Assembly that formally abolished episcopacy.

Covenanter and commissioner, 1639-1651

Wariston marched south with the Scottish army in 1639, and was appointed a commissioner for the Pacification of Berwick that followed. In 1640 he was again heavily involved in hostilities against the king, and played a role in encouraging the English nobility to support the Scots. He was a commissioner for the treaty of Ripon in October of that year. In November he travelled to London to take part in the continuing talks with the English authorities, and he remained there until the following June. When Charles visited Scotland in November 1641 he tried to win over opposition through rewards and appointments, and Wariston was knighted, made a lord of session, and given a royal pension. Such favours did not change his political position, however, and in 1643 he was a key figure in negotiating the Solemn League and Covenant with the English Parliament. He was in London for much of 1644-6, and sat on the Committee of Both Kingdoms and the Westminster Assembly, returning at intervals to take up his seat in the Scottish Parliament. In October 1646 he attended the king at Newcastle, and was made lord advocate.15Oxford DNB.

Before 1647 Wariston was generally respected by the most prominent Covenanters, and enjoyed the friendship of men of such diverse opinions as Robert Baillie and Samuel Rutherford. This was not to last. With the departure of the Scottish army, and the surrender of the king to Parliament in January 1647, fissures began to appear among the Covenanting party, encouraged by men like James Hamilton, 1st duke of Hamilton, who sought to build a royalist party within Scotland.16Oxford DNB. Wariston joined the marquess of Argyll (Archibald Campbell*) as the most outspoken of Hamilton’s opponents in the autumn of 1647, and he was bitterly opposed to the Engagement signed with the king in December.17Baillie Lttrs. and Jnls. iii. 18. Hamilton’s defeat by Oliver Cromwell* at Preston in August 1648 gave Argyll and Wariston the whip hand. When Cromwell entered Edinburgh in October 1648, he was met by both men, who then entertained him at dinner.18Abbott, Writings and Speeches, i. 663, 665. The subsequent campaign against the Engagers was led by Wariston, and there were rumours that he and Argyll had deliberately delayed the Scottish Parliament’s discussion of the trial of Charles I in order to prevent any intervention in the regicide from north of the border. Wariston did not oppose talks with Charles Stuart in the months that followed, but he was one of those demanding the strictest terms with the new king.

Wariston’s prominence was recognised in March 1649, when he was appointed clerk register - the equivalent to the English master of the rolls. Wariston advocated the purging of the Scottish army in the summer of 1650, and accompanied the troops to Dunbar in September.19Oxford DNB. After the catastrophic defeat of the Scots, Cromwell occupied Edinburgh, and the lord general issued Wariston with a pass through the English lines.20Abbott, Writings and Speeches, ii. 377. Refusing to play any role in the coronation of Charles II in January 1651, Wariston instead tried to recover the Scottish registers, which had fallen into English hands. In April and May 1651 he lobbied Cromwell for the return of the registers, and had at least one private interview, although he was unable to extract any concessions.21Abbott, Writings and Speeches, ii. 404, 412-4. In the meantime, Wariston had turned decisively against the king, and in July 1651 joined the radical ministers who issued a protest against any further compromise. These ‘Protesters’ (or ‘Remonstrants’) were in a minority, and were opposed by the pro-royalist ‘Resolutioners’, including former friends of Wariston, like Robert Baillie.22Oxford DNB. The annihilation of the Scottish royalists at Worcester in September 1651 was seen by Wariston as God’s judgement. In return, the Resolutioners saw Wariston as a divisive figure, ‘the ruiner of the Kirk of Scotland’.23Wariston Diary, ii. 198.

Cromwellian Rule, 1652-7

Between 1652 and the end of 1654, Wariston was in a difficult situation, caught between the English invaders (whom he detested) and the majority of Scots (who detested him). His strict adherence to the Covenants, and his conviction that the Kirk must be free from any interference from the state, prevented any political flexibility. In March 1654 he told his fellow Protester, James Guthrie, that English moves to approve the appointment of ministers in Scotland would lead to an intolerable situation, with ‘no sacred or solemn setting a man apart to the ministry, but the ground and warrant of the magistrates giving to such the stipend, and so to shuffle and shut out ordination’. He said he was also scornful of those in Scotland who sought to do deals with the invader.24Baillie Lttrs. and Jnls. iii. 567-8. In July it was reported that Wariston ‘lives privily, in a hard enough condition, much hated by most, and neglected by all except the Remonstrants [Protesters], to whom he is guide’.25Baillie Lttrs. and Jnls. iii. 249. Under these circumstances, it was not long before Wariston began to change his tune. In November 1654 he petitioned the authorities in London for restoration to his positions, including that of clerk register, and for the payment of his arrears and debts.26Bodl. Rawl. A.20, f. 9. Within a year, he was courting the commander of the forces in Scotland, General George Monck*. According to Robert Baillie, in December 1655 ‘the general gave Wariston a visit in his house, which I know not if he hath yet done to any other of the nation’.27Baillie Lttrs. and Jnls. iii. 298. By September 1656, Baillie was fearful that Wariston and Guthrie were hand-in-glove with the English authorities, intending ‘to play the tyrants in the whole church, and put the magistracy of the land in their party’s hand’.28Baillie Lttrs. and Jnls. iii. 322.

This was not the whole picture, however. The president of the newly-convened Scottish council, Lord Broghill (Roger Boyle*) had little sympathy for Wariston and his friends, telling Secretary John Thurloe* as early as September 1655 that he suspected Wariston had hindered Monck’s efforts to win over the Protesters, ‘believing it might have ruined their interests’.29TSP iv. 49. In February 1656 he told Cromwell that Wariston and the other Protesters could be considered ‘fifth monarchy Presbyterians’, whose radical stance threatened both church and state. Others in the Scottish council shared this view, including the lord keeper, Samuel Disbrowe*, who was rumoured to have denounced Wariston and Guthrie ‘as these who would cut the protector’s throat’.30Wariston Diary, iii. 56. The difference in opinion over religion did much to divide Broghill and Monck, and when in the autumn of 1656 the Protesters and Resolutioners prepared to send agents to London to argue their case before the protectoral council, conflicting advice was sent from Edinburgh. While Monck told Cromwell that Wariston and his friends ‘are better to be trusted than the other party’, Broghill assured Thurloe that ‘the public resolution men will prove the honester of the two’.31Scot. and Protectorate ed. Firth, 345; TSP v. 656.

The prospective visit of the rival groups of agents to London also provoked great disquiet among the Protesters themselves. When he heard of Wariston’s intention to go to London, Alexander Brodie* of Brodie was ‘cast down, and desired the Lord to guide and direct’ his old friend, even though he respected his ‘neglect of the world, [and] abstractness from worldly employments’, and was confident of his ‘zeal’ and ‘fervency of spirit’.32Brodie Diary, 188. Wariston did not share Brodie’s confidence. In the diary entry for 4 September 1656 he recorded his resolution ‘not to meddle with engagements to stand and fall with them [the English] and to maintain their power and interest’, and to take ‘no state employments, except it were a commission as to Ezra, Nehemiah [and] Zerubabel, to build the House of God and settle and further Christ’s interests’. The difficulty was to distinguish between Christ’s desires and Wariston’s own ambitions; and Wariston was well aware of this danger. On the same day he admitted the strength of his ‘desire to use the means of getting my own, for the maintenance of my family’, and acknowledged that personal ambition risked leading him to ‘sinful compliances, contrary to the Word, my covenants, principles and testimonies’.33Wariston Diary, iii. 41-3. There followed a period of uncertainty and introspection, during which each new letter or conversation was seized upon as potentially providing providential signs. Argyll, already in London, assured Wariston that the prominent councillor Charles Fleetwood* was on his side, and that the protector would be prepared to grant him a pension of £300 even if he declined to take office under the regime - news that was greeted with much joy by Wariston and his wife, who ‘blessed the Lord that had looked on me in my low condition, and provided meat for me’.34Wariston Diary, iii. 48-9. On 30 October Wariston resorted to casting lots to divine God’s will, and despite a definite negative, two days later he wrote to the leading Protester minister, James Simpson, saying that he would be prepared to go if his colleagues insisted, but only as procurator of the Kirk.35Wariston Diary, iii. 52-3. In early November it was decided he should go, and even then a wary Wariston ‘prayed the Lord to order well all that concerns my business at London, that it may be free of snares and offences’.36Wariston Diary, iii. 53-4.

Protester Agent, 1657

Wariston arrived in London on 5 January 1657, where he joined James Guthrie and the maverick Patrick Gillespie as the Protester agents at Whitehall. In debate before Cromwell on 12 February, Wariston did not plead the Protester cause, rather concentrating on rubbishing his opponents. As the Resolutioner agent, James Sharp, complained, ‘Wariston comes off with his rambling usual expressions of our taking in the malignant party, our turning the mouth of the cannon against the godly, our sinful treating with the head of the malignants at Breda’. This last remark brought the quick riposte that Wariston’s ‘hand was as deep in that treaty as any one man’s in Scotland’, and Wariston was forced to admit that ‘he had consented to that treaty, but did repent of it’.37Consultations ed. Stephen, i. 353. As this exchange demonstrates, the complexities of recent Scottish history, along with the arcane nature of Scottish theological divisions, made it difficult for English politicians, unfamiliar with the issues and out of sympathy with the Kirk, to adjudicate between the rival parties. Wariston’s long-windedness did not help matters. As Sharp reported with satisfaction in February, he spoke ‘in such an impetuous, confused way as the protector … was troubled to hear him’.38Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 12-13.

Throughout the same period, Wariston was distracted by his pursuit of his old office as clerk register. On 10 February he learned that the Scottish councillor John Swinton* of Swinton was angling for the same position, and he immediately went to Fleetwood to voice his suspicion that Broghill and Disbrowe had encouraged Swinton to pursue it. As a compromise, he suggested ‘the sending them [the records] to some honest clerks, that the benefit of them might pay my debt, and between now and that time, the protector will have proof of my serving, and I will have his ruling’. He was also at pains to show that his eagerness to serve the regime was entirely in accordance with serving God, again likening his role to that of the prophets Nehemiah and Ezra.39Wariston Diary, iii. 57-8. This fig leaf did not impress other Scotsmen. Guthrie was appalled, and told Wariston so.40Wariston Diary, iii. 60. In reply, Wariston justified his actions, saying that Guthrie’s position would lead to ‘no magistracy and no ministry and no church nor state, or to one universally wicked, seeing we cannot choose the godly’; and he wrote to another Protester ally, Sir John Chiesley, citing the precedents of Ezra and Nehemiah once again.41Wariston Diary, iii. 61. Chiesley was unimpressed, warning Wariston against ‘meddling with the £300 pension’, as something which made him ‘contemptible as a forecasten [neglected] courtier, and to hang at their belt’; while Wariston’s wife told him that Guthrie now referred to him as ‘our Independent’ and the usually sympathetic Gillespie called him ‘our politician’.42Wariston Diary, iii. 63-4. By the end of February the tensions between the Protester agents effectively prevented them from working together. As Wariston admitted, at a private meeting ‘we could not agree about the business of union, but broke in pieces in heat and contest’.43Wariston Diary, iii. 67.

While the Protesters wrangled among themselves, the offer of the crown to Cromwell had postponed the discussions at Whitehall about the Kirk. The ‘great business of the hereditary government’ had been rumoured in London since the middle of February, and Wariston watched events unfold with a mixture of alarm and covetousness.44Wariston Diary, iii. 61. Even before the new constitution was unveiled, he worried ‘that a king and a bishop were in the belly of the nation’; and the details of the new Remonstrance did not calm his fears that a monarchy would ‘draw in bishops again, or superintendents’ over the kirk.45Wariston Diary, iii. 63, 72. He was also concerned that the 4th article, reconciling to the state all Scots who had ‘lived peaceably since 1652’, would give an advantage to the majority Resolutioner party, and that the new church settlement across the three nations would allow ‘universal toleration’, and thus destroy the supremacy of the Scottish Kirk north of the border.46Wariston Diary, iii. 73. On the other hand, Wariston saw that a new political order might provide opportunities for an elder statesman. This left him open to snide remarks from Guthrie, who told him, when they discussed Cromwell’s new powers, ‘who knows but the protector may name Wariston his successor?’, and later passed on a report that Wariston was likely to be a member of the new upper chamber, the Other House.47Wariston Diary, iii. 70-1. Instead of shrugging this off or denying it, Wariston began to picture himself in this more elevated role. On 6 March he recorded in his diary that ‘I awaked this morning and had many thoughts about this new House, and what if I were put to it in reality. What need had I of the council of God in all ways possible!’48Wariston Diary, iii. 71. Such thoughts again led Wariston to question the path he was taking, and on 19 March he considered whether to cast lots once again about the clerkship, to see if God wanted him to abandon it, or to wait until his debts were paid off.49Wariston Diary, iii. 74-5.

Moves to revise the new constitution (renamed the Humble Petition and Advice), prompted by Cromwell’s refusal of the crown in May 1657, gave the Protesters and their allies a chance to redraft the crucial 4th article to exclude their political and religious opponents from the Cromwellian polity. Wariston saw this as a way to restore himself in the eyes of his colleagues, and of the Almighty. As he put it on 7 June, ‘if the Lord would bless in my hand the diligence used to get the clause amended about our Scots malignants, I would see some use of God’s calling me here, and I would take it as some confirmation of his goodwill to have an evil magistracy there [in Scotland] amended’.50Wariston Diary, iii. 76. This was perhaps a reference to members of the Scottish council, especially Broghill and Disbrowe, who sought to broaden support for the protectorate through leniency to former royalists. Broghill was active in his opposition to changes to Article 4, and when he fell sick later in June, Wariston was triumphant. ‘I take Broghill’s sickness and absence out of thy hand’, he told God on 11 June, and repeated the sentiment three days later.51Wariston Diary, iii. 78, 80-1. On 15 June Wariston applauded the hard line taken by the military councillors John Lambert* and Charles Fleetwood, and noted that Fleetwood had told him that ‘he was glad to see all the swordsmen almost for us’.52Wariston Diary, iii. 81. One of the ‘swordsmen’, Colonel Jerome Sankey*, underlined the importance of Wariston to the army interest’s campaign on this issue, telling him on 17 June of ‘the usefulness of [his] coming up here, for otherwise the House would never have had that sense and feeling of our condition, nor that impression they have against the malignants in Scotland’.53Wariston Diary, iii. 84. The crucial vote occurred on 25 June, when Fleetwood warned Wariston that Samuel Disbrowe, John Thurloe* (who was acting as Broghill’s agent in his absence) and others were seeking to amend the article once again. Wariston reacted immediately, going to Westminster to rally support among the Scottish MPs. He first met

Lord Tweeddale [(John Hay*)] and Sir James McDowell*, both of whom I found drawn aside by Mr Sharp and Mr Disbrowe, to my discouragement, but God’s providence brought to my hand first Captain Ogilvie and then Major Darney and Major Ellis… [who] went to advertise some of our friends.

This intervention was crucial, for ‘after much contention it was carried not to change but keep the clause as it was, and that by three voices, after dividing of the House upon it’.54Wariston Diary, iii. 86, 88. As Wariston’s account makes plain, the Protester position could only be secured with the support of the army interest; and such an alliance was also becoming crucial for the success of his own private ambitions.

From the beginning of June 1657, Wariston was under renewed pressure from Lambert and others to take the clerkship, and, although he protested his unwillingness ‘to meddle in places so much tossed by the English and controverted by our own’, on 9 June he resolved to attend Lambert, Fleetwood and Cromwell ‘anent my condition and my rights, to see what they would do in it’.55Wariston Diary, iii. 76-7. The next day he waited on the protector, asking for his three ‘rights’ - the payment of debts incurred in public service, a pension of £400, and the post of clerk register. Cromwell responded by turning on the charm

He acknowledged the debt was due and said I had been long cruel to myself, my wife and children. He made a long discourse of his intentions and good affections to the Remonstrators [Protesters], and his desire of a union between that godly party there and with others of the other judgement and these here… He asked if I was clear and free to serve and take employments, and I told him I was free in things lawful and conduceable to the service of God and his people and his highness therein.56Wariston Diary, iii. 77-8.

Wariston was deeply impressed by Cromwell’s assurances, and on 11 June he asked God ‘to perfect what he had begun, and make good this hint and mint of my restoration’, as he wished ‘to take it out of his hand’. He also thanked God for the favours and respects of Cromwell, Fleetwood and Lambert towards him.57Wariston Diary, iii. 78. The reaction of the other Protesters to Wariston’s pursuit of worldly honours was predictable. Guthrie warned him ‘against the taking of places’ and ‘spoke passionately about my turning’.58Wariston Diary, iii. 79-80. Nevertheless, with the encouragement of Lambert and Fleetwood, Wariston was now set on accepting the clerkship from Cromwell.59Wariston Diary, iii. 83. On 9 July he was appointed one of the commissioners for the administration of justice in Scotland, with a salary of £300 per annum, and on the same received the longed-for commission as clerk register.60Young, Parliaments of Scot. i. 382; NLS, MS 7032, f. 106v; Nicoll Diary, 201; Wariston Diary, iii. 90. By this time Wariston had managed to convince himself that the latter appointment was providential, and in his diary he ‘blessed God for doing me right’.61Wariston Diary, iii. 94.

Amid the distractions of politicking and self-seeking, the settlement of the Kirk was neglected, and it was debated again only after the adjournment of Parliament on 26 June. On 14 July the council ordered that the papers from Wariston and Sharp should be issued to selected MPs and ministers, and on 25 July both parties were summoned to Whitehall.62Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 49, 54. The Protester case was weakened by the continuing tensions between their agents. Gillespie now treated Wariston with contempt, preventing him from speaking, and, according to Sharp, ‘desiring in my hearing he might speak briefly and calmly’.63Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 55, 57. In debate, Wariston continued to attack the Resolutioners, denying that they had any right to be represented in the meetings. This riled their friends at court, notably Lord Broghill. On 11 August Sharp reported an exchange between the two men: ‘Wariston coming in was asked by my lord when he purposed to go home, Wariston turned about to me, saying, “ask at Mr Sharp’s – he hath kept us here all this while”’.64Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 86. Others at Whitehall were also losing patience. ‘Judge [George] Smith* spares not openly to cry against Wariston and his way’, according to Sharp, ‘and now it is said at court that Wariston and Gillespie have the confidence to carry anything with the protector, but they may be deceived’.65Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 90. This was a shrewd comment, as there were already signs that the influence of the Protesters was on the wane.

From July onwards Wariston found it increasingly difficult to gain access to the protector, whether for public or private matters, leaving him close to despair.66Wariston Diary, iii. 94-5, 97. On 29 August he again failed to see Cromwell, and complained ‘I am like to go home disappointed of public business and of my debt and calling, only this place gotten which has a great noise and show, but not like to be so real and beneficial to me, and has raised much detestation and scandal against me’.67Wariston Diary, iii. 97. Wariston had received some consolation by the time of his return to Scotland at the end of September: he was assured that the council would consider his debts, and Thurloe presented him with commissions to be a judge of the Scottish exchequer and a lord of session, but without the attendant salaries.68Wariston Diary, iii. 99, 100. The last provision showed the air of disfavour that still surrounded Wariston. When Wariston’s debts were considered, Samuel Disbrowe questioned whether the money could be legitimately claimed by him.69TSP vi. 670; Worcester Coll. Oxf. Clarke MS LI, f. 30. As Sharp reported in the same month, the Protester agents ‘have driven so fiercely as they have put themselves out of breath and relish at Whitehall, save with the Lord Fleetwood and some capricious persons or men of their own principle’.70Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 125.

Cromwell’s Other House, 1657-9

Despite earlier hints to Wariston that he might be on the list of Members of the Other House as early as July 1657, Cromwell’s frostiness towards him in the autumn makes it likely that Fleetwood, rather than the protector, was the driving force behind his appointment to the upper chamber on 10 December.71Wariston Diary, iii. 92; HMC Lords, n.s. iv. 504. Wariston, who had fantasised about such an appointment in March, and on Cromwell’s reinauguration in June had ‘recommended this business about the nominations to the Lord’, appears to have suffered few qualms about his elevation when it became a reality.72Wariston Diary, iii. 71, 87. He did not, however, return to London for the sitting of Parliament that began in January 1658, and he was listed as excused absence, ‘being sick’, at the call of the Other House on 2 February.73HMC Lords, n.s. iv. 522.

Wariston’s diary does not survive for the period from October 1657 until the end of July 1658, and his activities have to be gleaned from other sources. For much of that period, it appears that Wariston busied himself with his administrative duties. He finally received the Scottish records into his custody in November 1657, and his moves to increase the cost of legal proceedings in February (to his own benefit) caused him to be denounced as ‘that cruel extortioner’, and as one who sought to ‘enrich himself upon the ruins of a poor fainting people’.74CSP Dom. 1657-8, p. 182; Nicoll Diary, 213; A Lively Character of some Pretending Grandees of Scotland to the Good Old Cause (1659), 2 (E.985.15). Later in the year he wrote to Thurloe concerning the appointment of judges in Scotland, and was involved in further efforts by the Scottish council to regulate the legal system.75Bodl. Rawl. A.61, f. 54; Wariston Diary, iii. 104. By the late summer, when his diary resumes, Wariston was a committed member of the protectoral government in Scotland, but he was not uncritical of its policies. When he heard of Cromwell’s illness in August, he asked God to preserve the old protector, as ‘the means under God of our peace, and his death may cause many troubles in these nations, and so may a wrong nomination of his successor’.76Wariston Diary, iii. 101. This indicates that he had little faith in Richard Cromwell*, who was almost certain to succeed his father, and it is probable that he favoured the appointment of Fleetwood instead. Indeed, in June 1657 Wariston had confided to his diary that ‘if there be any of my lord protector’s posterity that the Lord would make use of, it’s likeliest to be his daughter and his good-son, that are both godly and humble and much exercised and given to prayer’.77Wariston Diary, iii. 85. Richard Cromwell, by contrast, was an ally of Broghill and Thurloe, and favoured moderate Presbyterian forms inimical to Wariston. Despite his misgivings, and after weighing the pros and cons, Wariston attended Richard’s proclamation as protector in Edinburgh on 10 September, and for his pains received ‘a bitter and sharp letter from Mr James Guthrie’.78Wariston Diary, iii. 102-3.

On 22 December 1658 the writs for the new election, for the third protectorate Parliament, arrived in Edinburgh, and with them the summons for Wariston to attend the Other House.79CSP Dom. 1658-9, p. 225. On receiving his summons, Wariston prayed for divine instruction concerning ‘that voyage and my carriage and behaviour in it’; but his confidence was shaken a few days later by Sir Andrew Kerr* of Greenhead, who warned that ‘I had more enemies both here and above then I was aware of, and who thought my place too good a morsel for a Scot, and intended if they could to shift me out of it’.80Wariston Diary, iii. 104. Greenhead was among those Protesters involved in fielding candidates against those put forward by the Cromwellian regime in the Scottish elections, and he was apparently successful in recruiting Wariston to the cause. On 30 and 31 December, therefore, Wariston noted that he had ‘dealt for [Sir Andrew] Ingliston to be for Stirlingshire’, even though he had heard that Disbrowe and others in the Scottish administration ‘took ill other folks recommendations of men, as if they had plotted to have no Englishmen’.81Wariston Diary, iii. 105. This did not mark a reconciliation between Wariston and the Protesters, however, and he was still lambasted by Guthrie, who was indignant at his ‘going to London, and willingness to take the oath, which he thought inconsistent with our former covenants and engagements’.82Wariston Diary, iii. 105.

Wariston was at last given a pass to travel to London on 11 January 1659.83Worcester Coll. Oxf. Clarke MS XLIX, f. 25. He left Edinburgh the same day, and arrived in London on 22 January, where his first act was to meet Fleetwood and his ally on the protectoral council, William Sydenham*.84Wariston Diary, iii. 105. Wariston’s surviving notes ‘anent the Parliament’ show that he was again hopeful that his engagement with English politics would be blessed by God, and that he was aware of the need to bridle his tongue, striving ‘not [for] elegancy of expression, but to speak sense’. He also undertook to submit himself to those with parliamentary experience

If Lord Fleetwood or Thurloe will acquaint me with mysteries of business, I shall, after seeking God and thinking on it, either show my resolution to assist and further it, or if any scruple sticks with me, I shall friendly tell and debate it.85Wariston Diary, iii. 106.

Wariston took his seat in the Other House on 27 January, and during the next three months became one of the most regular attenders in the upper chamber.86HMC Lords, n.s. iv. 525-566. In the first few weeks, the business of the House was restricted by the uncertainty of its constitutional position, and the reluctance of the Commons to ‘transact’ with it, and Wariston was distinctly under-employed. On 28 January he was named to the committee to peruse the journal of the House for its brief sitting a year before; on 31 January he was appointed to a committee to peruse the acts in force against breaches in sabbath observation and moral failings such as drunkenness; and on 8 February he was named to the committee on a bill to consider tougher sanctions against the use of the Book of Common Prayer.87HMC Lords, n.s. iv. 527, 529, 534. Wariston was thus involved in the primary business of the early weeks of the Other House, whose members were said by one critic to do no more than ‘meet and adjourn to consult about making a catechism, and make speeches against plays and the common prayer book’.88Bodl. Clarendon 60, f. 129.

During March Wariston was named to other committees, for example those to consider the indemnity bill (3 Mar.), the custody of the Scottish records still in the Tower (5 Mar.) and the bill to limit the privileges of those sitting in the upper chamber (15 Mar.), but until the Commons agreed to transact, these were little more than theoretical legislative exercises.89HMC Lords, n.s. iv. 544, 547. Amid these impotent discussions, there were signs that Wariston was at least trying to fulfil his remit of defending Scottish interests. On 3 February, when the bill recognising Richard Cromwell as protector was debated, he entered ‘his dissent and protestation against the amendment restraining the exercise of the office of chief magistrate according to the Humble Petition and Advice, so far as concerns matters of religion, especially in Scotland’.90HMC Lords, n.s. iv. 532. The particular point at issue was religious toleration, which Wariston argued ‘might bring hazard and prejudice to the discipline of the Church of Scotland established by law’.91Consultations ed. Stephen, i. 150-1, 155.

Wariston’s position of influence at Westminster caused great concern among the Scots. In January the Resolutioner ministers had hurriedly sent James Sharp south, ‘knowing that the Lord Wariston is gone there to the Parliament, and that some other Protesters are to follow’.92Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 147. Wariston’s intervention in the recognition debate seemed to justify this decision. As the Edinburgh ministers pointed out, ‘it seemeth strange that his zeal is restrained to Scotland, when it might have been extended, according to the Covenant obligation, unto the three nations’.93Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 151. Sharp discussed the matter with Robert Beake* and Philip Jones*, who agreed that the intervention had been odd, and reported that Jones suspected ‘Wariston’s ends in speaking of our [the Scots’] dislike of toleration’.94Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 152. The political agenda was just below the surface. In early March Sharp was told by another sympathetic English MP that ‘Wariston talks very high as to our matters in Scotland… [and] professeth no less than that any in Scotland shall have the power of a justice of peace or a commissioner for assessment who are for another way than theirs’.95Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 155. On 8 March there was further intelligence, that Wariston was working with the religious Independents in England to prevent the imposition of the Westminster Confession as the basis for a religious settlement across the three nations.96Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 158. Later in the same month came the worrying news that Wariston had reforged his links with his old ally, the marquess of Argyll, who sat in the Commons as MP for Aberdeenshire. According to Sharp, Wariston ‘is thought to be Argyll’s man’.97Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 160. Another Scot in London, Sir William Balfour, told the earl of Moray (Alexander Stewart*) on 5 April that questions had been asked ‘how it comes to pass, and for what reason it is, that the marquess of Argyll sits in the House of Commons, and the Lord Wariston… in the Other House, formerly called to House of peers or the House of Lords?’98NRAS 217 (Stuart earls of Moray MSS), box 6, no. 140.

The Commons agreed in principle to ‘correspond and transact’ with the Other House on 28 March, but it was not until 8 April that the rules governing this interchange were decided. On 14 April Wariston wrote to Monck with the good news. He was hopeful that ‘we are to fall on debate on the declaration [for a fast day] tomorrow’, and that developments in foreign affairs ‘may necessitate us to leave off many idle debates, and come to more substantial correspondence’.99Clarke Pprs. iii. 188-9. One key issue was the renegotiation of the act of Union between England and Scotland. On 16 April Sharp reported that he had met Wariston and Argyll, who ‘told me that they were resolving to move in the committee that in the bill of Union there might be a clause for the confirmation of the liberties of all church judicatories and Assemblies before the year 1650, and that Wariston had urged [it] in point of conscience according to the league and Covenant’.100Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 174. This caused consternation among the Resolutioners, who feared that the decisions of later General Assemblies would be annulled, and that such a clause would ‘determine the controversy in the present differences in favour of the Protesters’.101Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 175. Yet, before this inflammatory measure could be pursued further, pressure from the army brought the dissolution of Parliament on 22 April.

The Council of State, 1659

It is uncertain whether Wariston was involved in the conspiracy that brought Parliament, and in due course the protectorate, to an end; but there is no doubt that he was party to discussions about the nature of the regime that would follow. On 30 April he noted in his diary that he had ‘met with Dr [John] Owen*, Colonel Sydenham and at last with my Lord Fleetwood, and told them largely my reasons against calling the Long Parliament’, and he also warned Fleetwood of ‘the danger of bringing in of Lambert’, as a potential rival influence over the army.102Wariston Diary, iii. 106. It was soon clear that the restoration of the Rump was a done deal, and Wariston could only hope that some good would come of it, and pray: ‘Lord, rule thou at Wallingford House!’103Wariston Diary, ii. 107. At the heart of Wariston’s opposition to the Rump was fear that he would lose his hard-won offices and perquisites. This is revealed in a diary entry of 10 May, in which he recorded hearing ‘that they had voiced all places civil to be void, and that the committee bring in a list of the fittest men for employments. This troubled me as a thunderbolt’.104Wariston Diary, iii. 109. Three days later he spoke to Lambert and the auditor general for Scotland, John Thompson*, ‘anent my place’.105Wariston Diary, iii. 110. Their replies were encouraging, and on 14 May cast lots to see ‘whether I should meddle to go to Owen and speak that one of our nation might be put upon their council’.106Wariston Diary, iii. 110. Although the answer was a negative, and Wariston did not go to see Owen, he did write to Sydenham instead, and on the same day learned that the council of state was to include one Scot, although it was as yet undecided who that should be.107Wariston Diary, iii. 111-2. Argyll was still in the running, but Wariston’s most serious challenger was his old rival, Swinton.108Clarke Pprs. v. 295; Wariston Diary, iii. 112. To salve his own conscience, Wariston piously declared on 15 May that ‘some men are using means and soliciting them for this employment. I solicit none but God!’109Wariston Diary, iii. 112.

On 17 May, Wariston was duly nominated for the new council of state, ‘by Dr Owen’s influence’, according to one source, while Wariston himself believed ‘that Sir Henry Vane [II*] was my good friend’ in the business.110Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 180; Wariston Diary, iii. 113, 118-9. He was approved by the Commons on 19 May.111CSP Dom. 1658-9, p. 349. On 20 May, Wariston agreed to take this oath as a councillor, but only once he had aired his scruples concerning it. He protested that the position ‘was not a place I did either desire, intend, seek, nor expect’, and that he was unwilling to bind himself to a particular regime in a changeable political climate, but as ‘you do not intend to oblige yourself to maintain this form, or any other, longer than it is consistent with the cause, and continued by the legislative power of the nation, and by the hand of God’s sovereign dominion and Providence, in which sense I am willing to take it’.112Clarke Pprs. iv. 11-14; Wariston Diary, iii. 115. This gave a flavour of the verbosity that was to come. Wariston had already been warned by a friend ‘that they feared my long speeches’, and when he was elected president of the council of state on 6 June, it was even rumoured that he had been chosen ‘that they may be rid of his multiloquy and impertinent motion… for the president must not make motions nor debate’.113Wariston Diary, iii. 114; Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 188. The choice of Wariston as president of the council was a curious one. His position as the only Scot on the board may have worked in his favour, as he had less of the political baggage of the leading politicians, and he may have been a compromise candidate. Characteristically, Wariston greeted his promotion with ambivalence, both revelling in his new authority and fearing it as the ultimate betrayal of his principles. When it was first mooted, he again resolved ‘not to speak to any for it’, and ‘cast it over on the Lord to hinder of further the motion as he thinks best’.114Wariston Diary, iii. 117.

As president of the council of state from June to September, Wariston made little impact on the order books, except for signing innumerable letters.115CSP Dom. 1658-9, pp. 368-70, 374, 388, 391; 1659-60, pp. 7, 15, 34-5, 38-9 and passim. These involved passing on the council’s decisions on matters of administration and security; receiving reports and issuing instructions to the forces in Flanders and the fleet; and conducting negotiations with foreign powers.116HMC Leyborne-Popham, 118; TSP vii. 711, 744-5; CSP Dom. 1659-60, pp. 27-8, 40, 98, 101, 123, 144, 164, 185, 187, 200, 213, 228, 231. The only area in which Wariston played a direct role was Scottish affairs. On being appointed to the council of state in May, he had vowed to use his position to the benefit of Scotland, ‘whom I alone in this council doth represent, as I did before in the House of Lords’.117Wariston Diary, iii. 114. The Resolutioners received reports in May that

Argyll and Wariston make propositions for their way of a union, which they would have with three provisions, the proportion of the assessment, the liberty of Presbyterian government, and the preservation of our laws.

This sounded reasonable enough, but the details were yet to be discussed, and ‘you may conjecture what a union Argyll, Wariston, Gillespie etc will hammer out amongst them’. The only hope was that ‘the present power will be more wise than to receive orders from them’.118Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 185. Even Protesters like Sir John Cheisley and Andrew Hay of Craignethan were concerned by Wariston’s influence over the union bill and judicial appointments, and saw his new involvement in government as yet another case of ‘meddling with public employments’.119Diary of Andrew Hay of Craignethan, ed. A.G. Reid (Edinburgh, 1901), 40. Tensions between the Scots in London had not improved since the contest for membership of the council, which saw Argyll and Wariston trading insults about the dangers of ‘meddling’ in English affairs.120Wariston Diary, iii. 112. In June, when Argyll travelled north, it was said that ‘he leaves Patrick Gillespie behind him to ride Wariston’.121Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 188. On 1 June Wariston complained that ‘I am in a difficult condition about Scots affairs, they in Scotland will wonder at delays as if from neglect, and some here blame me as ruining Scotland by haste’.122Wariston Diary, iii. 116. A few days later, an anonymous libel framed Wariston as a hypocrite - a man who had joined the army and espoused the Good Old Cause, even though he had ‘imprecated wraths and curses from heaven against them’ at the beginning of the decade.123A Lively Character, 1-2; Wariston Diary, iii. 118.

Beleaguered by the Scots, Wariston found few allies in England. The Scottish union bill was a major bone of contention. Frustrated by moves by Vane and others to put off Scottish business, on 8 June Wariston began to fear that his involvement in the government was ‘for evil and not for good, seeing I could get no good done for Scotland’.124Wariston Diary, iii. 118. On 28 June he discussed the Union bill with Vane and Lambert, but found them ‘loath to favour us, or admit of the proviso for religion which I offered’, no doubt because it reinforced the authority of the Presbyterian Kirk.125Wariston Diary, iii. 122. Such was Wariston’s disillusion with the slow pace of progress that he repeatedly sought to give up the presidency in late June and early July, but was overruled.126Wariston Diary, iii. 120, 122-4. On 7 July he received a new draft of the union bill, prepared by Bulstrode Whitelocke*, but ‘found the narrative unhappy and reflecting, and I told Sir Henry Vane that unless they abstained from such narratives we would not meddle in that union, do of themselves what they pleased!’127Wariston Diary, iii. 124. On 11 July he discovered that Vane had altered ‘the narrative of the union, to repress the distribution [of seats], the clause about the laws, and uncertainty in the proportion of the cess’; and on 19 July, when the council of state debated the union, he was disconcerted to find ‘they would not hear of my clause for religion, and had unilaterally altered other parts of the bill’.128Wariston Diary, iii. 124-5. On 21 July he ‘met with Sir Henry Vane, and found him very froward and untoward and humorous about the business of Union’; and on 26 July he despaired at the latest draft of the bill, blaming ‘my simplicity, preyed upon by the subtlety of others’.129Wariston Diary, iii. 126-7. The following weeks were filled with frustration. On 10 August Wariston spoke to Oliver St John* about the Union bill; on 19 August he attended the council when it discussed the bill, but remained unsatisfied; and in early September he complained that the bill had again been delayed.130Wariston Diary, iii. 131, 133, 136. He was also losing hope that other matters important to Scotland would ever be resolved. On 14 September he was appalled to learn of moves to double the Scottish assessment - ‘a terrible sin and wrong’; the next day he opposed the instructions to the Scottish commissioners as putting Scottish laws under those of England; and at the end of the month he bemoaned that ‘poor Scotland lies desolate, without law, justice, government, or settlement of public or private interest, religious or civil’.131Wariston Diary, iii. 136, 140.

Wariston’s faith in the commonwealth was also shaken by the course of English politics. He was aware of tensions between Parliament and the army as early as June 1659, and as president of the council he suggested the appointment of ‘some choice men to agree on the best ways and means of removing jealousies’.132Wariston Diary, iii. 118. On 6 July he ‘was troubled to find such jealous and hot words between Fleetwood and Sir Henry Vane’ that he thought a breach between the army and the commonwealthsmen was not far off.133Wariston Diary, iii. 123. Ten days later he was again concerned that a rift was forming.134Wariston Diary, iii. 125. The outbreak of the royalist rebellion led by Sir George Boothe* helped to keep the rival factions together, but by then Wariston had started to worry that the regime was fundamentally unsound. On 27 July, for example, be was concerned at the ‘confidence’ of the council of state, which smacked of hubris: ‘as if God were a necessary and not a voluntary agent for them, and as if deliverance were so habituated to them as it could not leave them’.135Wariston Diary, iii. 127. Furthermore, the rebellion had exposed divisions within the nations generally, as it was likely ‘to draw to two standards Charles Stuart and cavaliers, and yet many Presbyterian ministers with him, and on the other hand the commonwealth party, but the Quakers, Anabaptists and Fifth Monarchists with them’.136Wariston Diary, iii. 129-30.

In early August, the strain was becoming too much for Wariston. His health broke down, and he twice cast lots to see if he should continue on the council.137Wariston Diary, iii. 130, 132. On 15 August he brought home the good news that he had managed to have Edinburgh’s assessment reduced, ‘with a laughing countenance’, which his wife said ‘was the first time she saw me do that since I came sitting in the chair [of the council]’.138Wariston Diary, iii. 132. Thereafter, Wariston remained deeply unsatisfied. He felt an acute sense of ‘guilt and stain’ while ‘subscribing warrants whereunto I would not give my consent’, and greeted news of Lambert’s victory in the north with unease, as ‘I am very afraid of the design and endeavour of some party to put the Anabaptists and Quakers in arms’.139Wariston Diary, iii. 132, 133. In September there was no hiding the divisions at Westminster, or the jealousies in the army, and by the end of the month Wariston had become deeply suspicious of Vane, who was ‘backward and cankered’ in business, and increasingly hostile to Presbyterians, especially in Scotland.140Wariston Diary, iii. 138, 142-3.

When the army turned on the Rump, dissolving the Parliament on 13 October, Wariston did not take the opportunity to withdraw from London; instead he allowed himself to be drawn into the unstable, and unpopular, military regime. At first, he seems to have favoured reconciliation, ‘dealing with both parties to prevent blood, and went between and got a meeting of the council and the officers at it’.141Wariston Diary, iii. 144. He attended the subsequent discussions, and on 17 October was nominated by the army to an interim committee ‘to carry on the affairs and government’.142Wariston Diary, iii. 145-7; Whitelocke, Diary, 536. On 26 October he was appointed to the new supreme executive, the committee of safety, but soon found himself at loggerheads with Vane and Richard Salwey* over the settlement of the government, and, above all, religious toleration.143Wariston Diary, iii. 147-51; Whitelocke, Diary, 537. On 11 November he was made president of the committee of safety, perhaps in the absence of other willing candidates, but the ‘uncertainty of public business’ made this an invidious appointment.144Whitelocke, Diary, 543; Wariston Diary, iii. 153. By late November he was close to falling out with his political patron, Charles Fleetwood. As Wariston wrote in his diary on 22 November

I was troubled all night about Lord Fleetwood’s being on the wrong side of the debate anent vast liberty of conscience… I told I would never consent to the last clause of rescinding former acts and covenants made in favour of reformation. Lord Fleetwood said I would stick by old foundations, though rotten. I was much troubled … I feared evil to him.145Wariston Diary, iii. 153-4.

As president, Wariston was also forced to take the lead in corresponding with George Monck. Responding to Monck’s ‘dislike of some late actions here relating to the Parliament’ on 29 October, Wariston warned him of the consequences ‘in case you shall persist in your former mistakes, and break the peace of this commonwealth’.146Clarke Pprs. iv. 80-1. Monck’s reply included a personal comment that he was ‘heartily sorry your lordship does interest yourself in such councils’, and in another letter of early November he refused to pay any money assigned to Wariston from the Scottish coffers, as the new regime in England was ‘an illegal foundation’.147Clarke Pprs. iv. 88, 100. In the following weeks, Monck took the precaution of intercepting Wariston’s letters to Scotland.148Clarke Pprs. v. 9.

In the meantime, Wariston’s public reputation in Scotland had fallen lower than ever. At the end of November one newsletter reported that the members of the old council of state had refused to work with the army grandees, ‘except the Lord Wariston (who is for any change)’.149Clarke Pprs. iv. 126; v. 339. On 7 December Wariston ‘heard that I was like to be arrested for signing warrants in the name of the committee’.150Wariston Diary, iii. 155. Yet as late as 10 December, Wariston hoped for some kind of compromise. He told his brother-in-law Sir James Stewart that the officers were resolved to call a new Parliament, and ‘to use all possible means to prevent war, blood and mischief so far as they can’.151HMC Leyborne-Popham, 132. Wariston may still have seen his role as that of an honest broker, but no-one else did. On 16 December it was said that ‘the great anti-sectarian, Wariston, and Lord Whitelocke [who] are for anything, for nothing, and everything for money, [are] now at their wits’ end’.152Clarke Pprs. v. 353. In early January 1660 there were reports that ‘Wariston and that gang’ hoped for ‘a new overturning’, with the support of the army.153Consultations ed. Stephen, ii. 194. On 20 December he tried for the last time to persuade Fleetwood and Lambert to make peace, but this was a forlorn hope, and later on the same day he and his wife considered ‘some secret hole for me to lurk in’.154Wariston Diary, iii. 159-60. On 24 December Fleetwood urged Wariston to go into hiding and gave him £500, and a few days later arranged for him and his family to stay in the house of a London pewterer.155Wariston Diary, iii. 161, 169.

Restoration and Retribution, 1660-3

The decision to retire was a wise one. On 6 January 1660 Wariston heard that he had been denounced by Monck ‘as an incendiary’, while in the Rump ‘sundry spoke… against me in a huff and a hear (sic)’.156Wariston Diary, iii. 167. The restored council of state would have no truck with Wariston, and on 10 January he was formally evicted from his lodgings in Whitehall.157CSP Dom. 1659-60, p. 307. On 24 March Wariston ventured out of hiding to attend Monck, and ask for the payment of the arrears due to him - a request that was turned down flat.158Wariston Diary, iii. 179. In early April Wariston returned to Scotland, where he was described as ‘hated of all sorts of the people of this kingdom for being president in England of the committee of safety and for his great oppression in Scotland’ as clerk register.159Nicoll Diary, 279. In May Wariston noted that he and Argyll were now ‘hated men’.160Wariston Diary, iii. 182. Both had collaborated with the English while making powerful enemies in Scotland, and along with Guthrie they were the chosen scapegoats after the restoration. The warrant for Wariston’s arrest was issued on 16 July 1660; he fled to Hamburg, and then to France.161Young, Parliaments of Scot. i. 382. He was declared a fugitive in Edinburgh in October, and in May 1661 pronounced a traitor by act of the Scottish Parliament, and his lands were confiscated. He was arrested at Rouen at the end of 1662 and taken to the Tower of London, where he languished until June 1663, when he was sent to Scotland.162Nicoll Diary, 303, 332, 392, 394-5.. On 8 July he was brought before the Edinburgh Parliament, where he made a pitiful sight, ‘disordered both in body and mind’.163Oxford DNB. He was hanged at the Mercat Cross in Edinburgh on 23 July 1663.164Young, Parliaments of Scot. i. 382.

Conclusion

The later career of Lord Wariston had a tragic quality. Wariston tried, and failed, to allow the dictates of conscience - and God’s will, as revealed in the casting of lots – to trump his innate desire for success and prosperity. This failure led to increasing private desperation. Bulstrode Whitelocke showed great depth of perception when he said of Wariston that he was ‘angry at everything but himself, and at that too, sometimes’.165Abbott, Writings and Speeches, iv. 342. Wariston’s own assessment was typically honest. In a diary entry on 6 June 1659, the day he became president of the council of state, he recorded that: ‘I got letters from my wife, showing my despondency when I am out of place, and presumption while now in it … Alas, both are too true!’ In January 1660, when all had come to nothing, Wariston was even more damning of his own behaviour: ‘the truth is, I followed the call of Providence when it agreed with my humour and pleased my idol and seemed to tend to honour and advantage… and now the Lord punishes my ambition’.166Wariston Diary, iii. 167. Yet there is another dimension to Wariston’s career that needs to be considered. Despite the obvious reasons for joining the majority of Scots in refusing to negotiate with the English, he continued to hope that he might be able to make a difference through engagement. His repeated claim to be the sole representative of the Scottish nation - whether in the Other House or the council of state or the committee of safety – should not be dismissed too lightly. Alexander Brodie noted in the days before Wariston’s execution that ‘he took with the complying with the English as his sin [sic]; but what he did in the work in Scotland as his duty’.167Brodie Diary, 306. It was perhaps naïve to expect the English to make Scottish concerns a priority and to expect the Scots to look favourably on one who involved himself so openly in English government; but the attempt was not in itself ignoble.