The Covenanter James Renwick’s Tree in Moniaive

By Dr. Mark Jardine - Posted at Jardine's Book of Martyrs:

Renwick's Tree in 2006 - Image from Jardine's Book of Martyrs

It is a curious fact, that James Renwick, the minister of the Covenanters, has remarkably few places named after him considering his central role in their struggle in the 1680s. That stands in marked contrast to Alexander Peden, whom Renwick opposed, who has a plethora of trees, caves and stones associated with him. One reason for that may be that Peden’s wanderings through the landscape had a superb and evocative publicist in the form of Patrick Walker, whose Life of Peden was a very popular work in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

One place where Renwick is remembered in the landscape is at his place of birth, Moniaive, in his native parish of Glencairn in Dumfriesshire. There a monument was erected ‘about 100 yards from the place where he is supposed to have been born’ just over the hill to the north of the monument.

Thanks to Evelyn Boyes who posted about Renwick’s Tree on the ‘Moniaive, Dunscore and the Cairn Valley down to Newbridge’ Facebook page, we can now add another and more interesting site dedicated to Renwick at Moniaive.

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Rev. James Renwick