RK - Origins of the Girvan Crisis

I've dedicated most of the last few posts to a bit of background information about Renaissance Scotland and some of its institutions, Clan, County and RSA. One of the reasons for that is that I wanted to tell another RK story but realised that without some idea of the levels of interaction within the world of Renaissance Kingdoms it might be a bit hard to follow.

In early March Galloway elected a rather tetchety independent old warrior as Count, and he appointed a virtual rogues gallery of local rebels and robbers into the council positions. Of importance was the local Campbell Chieftain as Captain 'Protector' and the local MacGregor Chief, leader of several local revolts and armed rebellions across scotland, as Chief Judge. Egged on by a Forbes Chief who was Trade Minister of the County and the local power monger Campbell who ruled the Municipality of Dumfries, Capital of the County, the Council set about creating its medieval county of Galloway.

Two institutions they created were a prison colony in the isolated town of Drummore and an armed force (ingame army) separate from the RSA called the Ducal Guard. The MacGregor judge therefore sent all of his cronies off to the same town to work off their fines in the gold mines and to fraternise in the pubs of drummore. The Judge travelled to Drummore, and then recruited the conveniently gathered rogues gallery into his 'Ducal Marine' armed force.

At the same time, the Ducal Guard paraded around the county, well filled with Campbells and a few members of the RSA demonstrating their good will to these outspoken Gallowegian patriots, trying to find a middle ground. I myself even spent five days under the Ducal banner before my Easter retreat.

But, observant people could see that the Ducal Guard was essentially a reformation of the old Campbell army that had attacked Whithorn earlier in the year (and of the Caledonian army which had caused so much trouble in the year previous), while the Ducal Marines were our old friends of the road, a confederation of MacGregors, Snows and their assorted english robber mates. Observant people were a bit concerned at what was brewing.

Yet, unlike previous troublesome occasions, there were no bullying threats. In fact, there was nothing but protestations of legitimate self defensive goals for a strong independent Galloway. Being independent Gallowegian ourselves, and again in a spirit of goodwill, we soldiers and other good citizens gave these darker elements the benefit of the doubt. All appeared well.

But that all changed rather suddenly when, one day...