James Gordon (British Army officer, died 1783)

Lieutenant-Colonel James Gordon, the third and last Laird of the barony of Ellon,[1] (c. 1735—17 October 1783)[2] was a British Army officer who fought in the American Revolutionary War. He was highly regarded by friend and foe alike, and became the hero of "The Asgill Affair" of 1782, in which a British prisoner of war was selected by lottery for retaliatory execution, but was eventually released on parole.[3]

James Gordon
Bornc.1735
Died17 October 1783 (aged 48)
Allegiance Great Britain
Service/branch British Army
RankLieutenant-Colonel
Battles/warsAmerican Revolutionary War
RelationsFather: James Gordon second Laird of Ellon (died April 1749)
Mother: Elizabeth Gordon (née Glen) (1712-1792)
Brother: Lieutenant-General Andrew Gordon (died 1806)
Nephew: Lieutenant-General Robert Balfour, 6th of Balbirnie (1772-1837)

Early life
On 1 February 1746 (when James Gordon was 11 years old) his family lived at Linlithgow Palace. Government troops, under the command of Lieutenant General Henry Hawley, were pursuing Jacobites in the area. They left their overnight camp in the palace, and rushed out leaving their campfires burning. The 320-year-old structure was badly damaged. This 1839 engraving shows the Keeper of the Palace, Mrs Glen Gordon chastising the fleeing troops.[4]
Mary Ellen Gordon, daughter of James Gordon of Ellon, married 23.7.1771 John Balfour, 5th of Balbirnie, mother of Lt.Gen. Robert Balfour and sister of Lt. Col. James Gordon. Photograph courtesy of Robert Balfour, Lord Lieutenant of Fife

Gordon's father was James Gordon, the second Laird of the barony of Ellon (died April 1749).[5][6][1] "The second Laird became his father’s heir on 25 July 1732; and on 22 November 1732, heir male and of provision special to his brother William. On 4 September 1747, he executed a deed (registered 23 March 1732) empowering his spouse, Elizabeth Glen, conjoined with others, to have full charge of his lands or to dispose of them. It began – I, James Gordon of Ellon, considering that I am to reside for some time out of Scotland, and that it may be necessary for the expeeding of my affairs to sell and dispose of my lands - before my return to Scotland or in case of my decease." Why James should have found it necessary to go out of Scotland is not clear, unless he was a Jacobite, the Battle of Culloden having taken place on 16 April 1746. He seems to have been accompanied by his son, James, aged approximately 12 at the time. James Gordon the second Laird died, according to his will, in April 1749. His inventory was given up by his widow, Elizabeth Glen.[7]

Gordon, the second Laird, married Elizabeth Glen (1712-1792),[8][9] daughter of Alexander Glen and sister of James Glen (1701-1777),[10][11] Governor of South Carolina and keeper of the Palace of Linlithgow.[12] She lived in the Palace of Linlithgow, of which her relations, the Linlithgows, had charge.[7] A staunch Jacobite herself,[13] she was particularly well connected. When Charles Edward Stuart (Bonnie Prince Charlie) arrived in Linlithgow in 1745, he was entertained by her.[12][8] And in 1762, on being presented to King George III, she told him that she had four beautiful daughters (James Gordon's sisters) who were each married in one of his four kingdoms. "I have heard of three" said King George, "but never four." "Did your Majesty never hear of the Kingdom of Fife?" was Mrs Glen Gordon’s reply.[14][8]

James Gordon the third Laird "did not keep Ellon long, for the lands were offered for sale on 8 April 1752. The articles of roup, in the Ellon Charter Chest, show that the upset price was £16,000 sterling, and in addition there is a stipulation that there shall be a present of 200 guineas for a gown to the said Elizabeth Glen. After a protracted competition, the lands were bought for George Gordon, 3rd Earl of Aberdeen in 1752, at £17,600, plus 200 guineas for the gown. There was an annuity of £120 to Elizabeth Glen reserved from the price".[1]

That same year, 1752, Gordon petitioned for a writership (administrator) in the Honourable East India Company.[12][13]

"On 25 June 1765, Charles Gordon of Auchleuchrie, son of James Gordon of Meikle Mill of Esslemont, got decreet and sentence before the Lords of Council against James Gordon, "late of Ellon and sometime captain in H.M. [80th] Regiment of Foot, eldest son of the late deceased James Gordon of Ellon, and grandson of James Gordon of Ellon, in the matter of a bond of 1,000 marks which James I of Ellon had borrowed from James at Meikle Mill of Esselmont on 17 June 1730. The sum of £20 figures in Charles’s will 1777 as the expenses of the plea and for extracting the decreet. On 23 September 1772, Captain James had sasine in life-rent (political) in Auchanachie (Banffshire sasines)".[1]

Military career

Gordon initially served as an officer in the 115th Regiment of Foot (Royal Scotch Lowlanders)[15] which were raised at Paisley in 1701, and disbanded about 1763, when he was placed on half pay.[1] He was appointed major in the 80th Regiment of Foot (Royal Edinburgh Volunteers)[16][lower-alpha 1] on 16 December 1777 and accompanied the regiment on active service during the American Revolutionary War[15] in August 1779. Gordon fought under General Charles Cornwallis, but became an American prisoner of war following capitulation after the siege of Yorktown, Virginia, in October 1781.[18] In 1783, by a curious coincidence, he was a member of the Court Martial in New York in which his Aberdeenshire neighbour, Cosmo Gordon, son of the Earl of Aberdeen, was involved.[19][20][1]

In Katherine Mayo's book she describes him thus:

James Gordon, First Major of the Eightieth Foot, was, like his regiment, Scot to the core. Middle-aged, tall, rather heavily built, one glance at the man revealed his character. Frank as the sun and as friendly, brave to a fault, and as generous, utterly self-forgetful in the face of others' needs, neither the activity of his mind nor the dignity and cheerfulness of his spirit would bow to the worst of days. His soldiership, as displayed in the two past years of campaigning, had won him Lord Cornwallis' special praise - coupled once with an aside: 'When I first knew Gordon, twenty years ago, gay in gay London, who could have guessed how much lay in the man?’[21]

In April 1782, a captain of the Monmouth Militia and privateer named Joshua Huddy was overwhelmed and captured by Loyalist forces. Huddy was accused of complicity in the death of a Loyalist farmer. Huddy was conveyed to New York City, then under British control, where he was summarily sentenced to be executed by William Franklin, the Loyalist son of Benjamin Franklin.[22] Huddy was held in leg irons aboard a prison ship until 12 April 1782, when he was taken ashore and hanged. General George Washington responded to pressure for retribution by declaring that a British captain would be executed in retaliation for the killing of Huddy. On 27 May 1782, lots were drawn at the Black Bear Inn, Lancaster, Pennsylvania,[23] with Captain Charles Asgill drawing the paper which put him under threat of execution.[22] Gordon, who was a fellow officer of Asgill, and was in charge of prisoners-of-war, protested in the strongest terms to both General Washington[24] and to Benjamin Lincoln, the Secretary of War that the use of a lottery was illegal by contravening the 14th Article of Capitulation.[25]

Death and legacy
The Morris House which served as the headquarters of both the American and the British Forces during the War and in which Gordon died
Gordon's bedroom in the Morris House

Gordon was the hero of the Asgill Affair: he remained at Asgill's side throughout his ordeal, never once leaving, unless on a mission to save his life. Not only did he offer to go to the gallows in Asgill's stead, saying: “I wish to God they would take me in your place; for I am an old worn out trunk of a tree, and have neither wife nor mother to weep for me. But even to that they will not consent; so all that I can undertake to do is, to accompany the unfortunate individual, whoever he may be, to the place of his martyrdom, and to give him every consolation and support while life remains, and to obey his wishes after it is taken away.” Having nobody to mourn his loss, was, of course, a lie - the most honourable of lies, overlooking that he had a mother, a brother and four sisters. But he also laid a detailed plan (with the help of several ladies in Chatham, New Jersey and no doubt beyond) to 'spirit Asgill away' to escape execution (to which proposal, as Katherine Mayo also reports, Asgill made the noblest of statements, not wishing to break his parole, "The lot fell to me, I will abide by it").[26] Mayo explains that Samuel Graham’s close friendship with Gordon, and the time they spent together in Manhattan in the year before Gordon’s death, brought the two Scotsmen closer together. Graham also served with Gordon in the same court and the two spent much time talking over past times. It was now that Graham learnt of Gordon’s part in planning an escape for Asgill: “With the help of certain American ladies whose friendship he had reason to know and to trust, Gordon had laid a well-ensured plan for the spiriting away of Asgill, should the order for his execution come through. This plan, in its entirety, could not be confided to Asgill, since, had he guessed its full nature, he would certainly have refused to stir. For it involved, for Gordon, the final sacrifice. The boy once safely off beyond recall or the possibility of return, Gordon, avowing his own authorship of the escape, would have stepped into the place of the condemned. Such, in essence, was his purpose. This project, so Graham in later time affirmed, “would have been effected.” That he declared no more, it is safe to say, was because of the women concerned, whom he would not implicate.“ [27]

According to Ambrose Vanderpoel: “Major Gordon seems to have been the chief sufferer from the threatened act of retaliation. He took Asgill's misfortune keenly to heart, and his health, which previously had been somewhat delicate, was permanently impaired by the anxieties of the summer. He returned to Lancaster a changed and broken man; a lively and jovial disposition which had formerly distinguished him gave place to profound depression; and even his release from captivity upon the cessation of hostilities, and subsequent appointment to a command at Kingsbridge, New York, with the brevet of lieutenant-colonel, failed to restore his health or revive his spirits.“ [28]

During his final moments he was greatly cheered and comforted by the knowledge that his conduct in the Asgill case had won for him the approval and commendation of the Prince of Wales.[29]

On his deathbed he was visited by Captain Samuel Graham who had served with him throughout the Revolutionary war. Gordon handed Graham a letter he had received from Lady Asgill (Charles Asgill's mother) in which she expresses her deepest gratitude for all that Gordon had done for her son. In Gordons under arms; a biographical muster roll of officers named Gordon in the navies and armies of Britain, Europe, America and the Jacobite risings it is said that this letter did not reach New York before he died.[30] But in Samuel Graham's Memoirs he recalls that Gordon asked him to thank Lady Asgill for her letter and to apologise to her for being unable to respond. This he did once he himself had returned to Britain.[31]

Gordon died of dropsy on 17 October 1783 at the Morris House in Kingsbridge, Upper Manhattan.[32][33]

He was given a military funeral[2] and was buried in an unmarked grave at Trinity Church Cemetery.[34][31]

Timothy Day's Tavern, Chatham, NJ, the location of Asgill and Gordon's confinement in 1782. From "At the crossing of the Fishawack" by John T. Cunningham (p.11) with permission from the Chatham Historical Society. "The Asgill Affair" is re-written in The Journal of Lancaster county's Historical society VOL. 120, NO. 3 Winter 2019 which has devoted the entire issue to this subject.[23]

On 20 December 1786, Captain Charles Asgill wrote to the Editor of the New-Haven Gazette and Connecticut Magazine.[35] It was a lengthy eighteen page letter in response to Washington’s Papers being published in that newspaper on 16 November 1786. However, the Editor chose not to publish Asgill’s letter and it has lain hidden from public view ever since. This letter has now been published and the following passage extracted since it refers to James Gordon.[23]

… These were the attentions I received from General Washington ― I had however a comfort beyond his reach ― totally above his power to invade      it was the Pride, the Consolation & Support which I derived from the exalted Friendship & Kind Compassion of Major Gordon of the 80th Regt who feeling for the distresses of a Brother Officer, [entrusted] by the best of Hearts in the cause of humanity & unwilling to leave a Youth of eighteen unadvised & unsupported to act in so peculiar & difficult a situation, sacrificed every Comfort to partake my hardships & Confinement & by the impulse of his excellent & noble Heart, felt on the [first] acquaintance all the steady & persevering Zeal that the longest & most tried Friendship could hope for or Claim     he was there the whole of this transaction the partaker of my hardships the support of my Spirits, & the monitor of my conduct     I am delighted at having the opportunity of proclaiming to the World his generous & benevolent attentions     Tho whilst I do justice to his Memory I aggravate the sensations of regret, which I must ever retain, for the loss of him

In his review of General Washington's Dilemma by Katherine Mayo, Keith Feiling writes: "If in any sense a novel, because it is a human story, it is right that it should have a hero. It is not Washington, alas, not young Asgill; not the murdered Huddy. But Major James Gordon of the 80th Foot, whose plain courage and humanity shines in this ugly, tangled business, who spent himself till death for the imprisoned British soldiers, steeled Asgill to his fate, and shared all his prisons and trials, spurred Frenchmen and British and Americans to action, and shamed them back to a semblance of civilised man. There have been, as readers of Sir John Fortescue know, or of Mr. Churchill, other such men in British armies, of all tempers from Cameronian saints under Marlborough down to sinners with a part in the great game of Asia. To find another such a one is to get a reward in history, and a rich compensation for meanness or timidity in high places. It is for this that most of us will be specially grateful to Miss Mayo, as the curtain falls on her intensely-wrought, moving, brief, and rounded tragedy".[36]

Notes
  1. A uniform of this regiment has been sold at auction.[17]

References
  1. "James Gordon". Huntly Express. 7 December 1906. Retrieved 8 May 2020.
  2. Monday 20 October 1783 New York Gazette and the Weekly Mercury
  3. Graham, James John (1862). Memoir of General Graham: with notices of the campaigns in which he was engaged from 1779 to 1801. Edinburgh: R. & R. Clark. p. 105. So much was he esteemed.
  4. Jamieson, Bruce (2014). Linlithgow Through Time. Amberley. ISBN 978-1445636221.
  5. "Elizabeth Gordon". Find-a-grave. Retrieved 16 November 2019.
  6. Edward J. Davies, "The Balfours of Balbirnie and Whittingehame", The Scottish Genealogist, 60(2013):84-90.
  7. "James Gordon". Huntly Express. 30 November 1906. Retrieved 8 May 2020.
  8. Jamieson, Bruce (2019). Linlithgow Lives. p. 11.
  9. "Edinburgh and The Lothians Chapter XXIII - Linlithgow". Electric Scotland. Retrieved 15 November 2019.
  10. "James Glen (1701-1777)". Scottish Places. Retrieved 15 November 2019.
  11. Robinson, Walter Stitt (1996). James Glen: From Scottish Provost to Royal Governor of South Carolina. Greenwood Publishing. p. 130. ISBN 9780313297601.
  12. Graham, James John (1862). Memoir of General Graham: with notices of the campaigns in which he was engaged from 1779 to 1801. Edinburgh: R. & R. Clark. p. 18. Glen Gordon.
  13. "Select Writings of Robert Chambers Volume 5 History of the Rebellion 1745-1746". W. And R. Chambers. 1847.
  14. "Grahams of Airth and Graham-Stirling of Strowan". A Book of the Graemes. Retrieved 19 November 2019.
  15. "The raising of a regiment in the American War of Independence III". Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research. 1949. Retrieved 14 September 2019.
  16. "80th Regiment of Foot (Royal Edinburgh Volunteers)". Regiments.org. Archived from the original on 28 November 2007. Retrieved 14 September 2019.
  17. "Uniform of 80th Regiment of Foot (Royal Edinburgh Volunteers)". Retrieved 14 November 2019.
  18. Wright, Waldo Carlton. "The Captain Asgill Affair" (PDF). Dalhousie University. pp. 452–458. Retrieved 14 September 2019.
  19. "Captain The Hon Cosmo Gordon". British Empire. Retrieved 8 May 2020.
  20. Kiernan, Victor (2016). The Duel in European History: Honour and the Reign of Aristocracy. Z Books. ISBN 978-1783608386.
  21. Mayo, Katherine (1938). General Washington's Dilemma. London: Jonathan Cape. p. 12.
  22. "General Washington's terrible dilemma". Massachusetts Historical Society. Retrieved 21 August 2019.
  23. "The Journal of Lancaster county's Historical society Vol. 120, No. 3 Winter 2019".
  24. "To George Washington from James Gordon, 27 May 1782". US National Archives. Retrieved 14 September 2019.
  25. Damon, Allan L. (1 February 1970). "A Melancholy Case". American Heritage. Retrieved 14 September 2019.
  26. Mayo, Katherine (1938). General Washington's Dilemma. London: Jonathan Cape. p. 223.
  27. Mayo, Katherine (1938). General Washington's Dilemma. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company. p. 256.
  28. Vanderpoel, Ambrose (1921). History of Chatham New Jersey. Charles Francis Press. p. 455.
  29. Vanderpoel, Ambrose E. (1921). History of Chatham, New Jersey. New York: Charles Francis Press. p. 456.
  30. Skelton, Constance Oliver; Bulloch, John Malcolm (1912). Gordons under arms; a biographical muster roll of officers named Gordon in the navies and armies of Britain, Europe, America and the Jacobite risings. University of Aberdeen. p. 162.
  31. Graham, James John (1862). Memoir of General Graham: with notices of the campaigns in which he was engaged from 1779 to 1801. Edinburgh: R. & R. Clark. p. 107. Copy of Lady Asgill's letter to Lieutenant-Colonel Gordon, delivered to me by him on his deathbed.
  32. "Morris-Jumel Mansion". Morris-Jumel Mansion. Retrieved 14 September 2019.
  33. Scott, Keith (1977). Genealogical Data from N.Y. Gazette-Mercury, 1783. Genealogical Publishing Company. p. 242. ISBN 0-8063-0777-3.
  34. Mayo, Katherine (1938). "General Washington's Dilemma". Jonathan Cape. p. 259.
  35. "The New-Haven gazette, and the Connecticut magazine. | Library of Congress". Loc.gov. Retrieved 2019-12-13.
  36. Feiling, Keith (29 May 1938). "Only one hero - Major James Gordon". The Observer. p. 8. ProQuest 481400900.

Further reading
  • Ammundsen, Anne; Abel, Martha (December 2019) The Journal of Lancaster county’s Historical society Volume. 120, No. 3 Winter 2019
  • Davies, Edward J. "The Balfours of Balbirnie and Whittingehame", The Scottish Genealogist, 60 (2013) p.84-90. Available from the Scottish Genealogy Society (www.scotsgenealogy.com)
  • Graham, James J., (1862) Memoir of General Graham with notices of the campaigns in which he was engaged from 1779 to 1801, Edinburgh: R&R Clark
  • Jamieson, Bruce, (2019) "Linlithgow Lives, Insights into Linlithgow life through the centuries" p.11.Available from Linlithgow Museum (www.linlithgowmuseum.org)
  • Jones, T. Cole, Captives of Liberty, Prisoners of War and the Politics of Vengeance in the American Revolution 2019 | ISBN 9780812251692
  • Mayo, Katherine, (1938) General Washington's Dilemma London: Jonathan Cape.
  • Skelton, Constance Oliver, Mrs; Bulloch, John Malcolm, (1912) Gordons under arms; a biographical muster roll of officers named Gordon in the navies and armies of Britain, Europe, America and the Jacobite risings p.162-163
  • Vanderpoel, Ambrose E., (1921) History of Chatham, New Jersey. Charles Francis Press, New York, Chapters 17-20.
  • C-Span 3 American History TV. Philadelphia - Museum of the American Revolution. Talk by Professor Gregory Urwin, of Temple University, Doylestown on 4 October 2019
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