Black Agnes Randolph - Countess and Warrior By Leigh Michaels | July 20th, 2007
Agnes Randolph, Countess of Dunbar, March, and Moray. Quite a mouthful. But the title of a woman warrior to be reckoned with. Agnes, known often as “Black Agnes” because of her coloring, was the daughter of Isobel Stewart and Thomas Randolph, 1st Earl of Moray. Randolph was a nephew and supporter of Robert Bruce, or Robert I, King of Scotland, and Isobel Stewart was the first cousin of Robert I’s son-in-law. This is a pedigree of some interest in the time of the Wars of Independence in Scotland. Her family had been staunch supporters of Bruce, which might be considered hard to live up to. But not by Agnes.
She was married to Patrick Dunbar, Earl of Dunbar and March, around 1324. This causes most people to place her birth in 1312, as most girls in this era were married at that age, but nothing is certain. The Dunbars, with all of their territory within a few miles of the English border and straddling the main invasion route always taken by the English, had changed sides several times during the Wars of Independence. Patrick himself had given asylum to the English king, Edward II, in 1314 after the Scots’ victory at the Battle of Bannockburn. Patrick later on made his peace with Robert I, and will put his seal on the Declaration of Abroath – the Scots Declaration of Independence – in 1320. After the disastrous defeat of the Scots at Halidon Hill in 1333, Patrick was allowed to return to his English alliance by Edward III. With the advantage of an English alliance, Patrick was able to refortify his castle at the expense of the English in 1334. In 1335, he returned to his Scots alliance, and went of on military service for the Scots Government – which was acting for the young David II, his father, Robert I having died in 1329. Since he had changed sides, Edward III of England declared all of the Earl of Dunbar’s estates forfeited. He didn’t get them, so in 1337/8 (the date is usually given as 1338, but it is also dated 1337 – dating in this period tends to be unclear) he ordered William Montague, 1st Earl of Salisbury to take Dunbar Castle.
It should have been simple, Salisbury was one of the great generals of the era, and Earl Patrick was gone. Only the Countess was in the castle, and Black Agnes had only a small group of servants with her. Castle fortification was built to withstand a siege, though, so heavy equipment was brought. The English under Salisbury brought a mangonel, a huge rock throwing machine, several catapults, and a battering ram known as a “sow”.
The English arrived at the gates of Dunbar Castle on 28th January, and as was the accepted form, asked the Countess Agnes to give them the castle. Her reply – or at least her supposed reply – is usually given as “Of Scotland’s King I haud my house, he pays me meat and fee, and I will keep my gude auld house, while my house keeps me.” Taking this as the ‘no’ it was meant to be, Salisbury settled down to begin throwing boulders and other rocks at the castle walls.
The universal agreement is that Black Agnes and her ladies would come out on the battlements dressed in their finest dresses, and use their handkerchiefs to brush away the dust whenever the English scored a hit on the walls. The typical feminine touch – keeping the place tidy. But Black Agnes did more than that. All the chronicles admit that she, and she alone, was the organizer of the defenses. It is very rare that women are mentioned at all in the chronicles, let alone given credit for military command, so it is safe to say that Black Agnes was indeed the organizer of the defense of Dunbar Castle.
When Salisbury got tired of the humiliation of the dusting of the walls, he tried the sow, and battered at the gate. Agnes ordered her men to recover some of the stones that the mangonel had thrown over the walls, and drop them down onto the heads of the defenders. Not only was this an effective strategy, it led to the decision that continuous bombardment, and simply waiting to starve the castle’s inhabitants out was going to be the strategy for Salisbury from now on.
It was not an effective one, Dunbar Castle has a postern gate – a back door – that is accessible by sea. While the English had blockaded Dunbar harbor, local people could sneak some supplies in by small boats. While it was possible that the castle garrison could have been starved out – the locals were taking the risk of their lives if they got caught, so there couldn’t have been many willing – it would be a close run thing to keep his own supplies coming regularly for an indefinite period. So Salisbury tried something else.
The Earl of Moray – Black Agnes’ brother, John Randolph – was an English prisoner, so Salisbury had him brought to the castle walls and threatened to hang him. Black Agnes pointed out that if Salisbury killed her brother, she would become the Countess of Moray all the faster. What his feelings were by this denouncement aren’t recorded anywhere, but John Randolph wasn’t hung by Salisbury. (He will actually ransom himself from the English, and be killed in the young King David II’s invasion of England in 1346 – making Agnes the Countess of Moray anyway.)
After a five month siege Sir Alexander Ramsay of Dalhousie was able to get substantial supplies into the castle by the postern gate on or around 10th June, and the siege was abandoned by Salisbury. Black Agnes, Countess of Dunbar and March, and soon to be Countess of Moray, had successfully defeated the English by holding out against the siege.
While it is sometimes labeled “anonymous”, just as often the following verse is attributed to William Montague, 1st Earl of Salisbury:
She kept a stir in tower and trench
That brawling, boisterous Scottish wench!
Came I early, came I late,
I found Agnes at the gate!