One of the peers slain at Flodden was William St.Clair, Earl of Caithness. This nobleman had been forfeited by James III, and the sentence still remained in force, yet his rank was acknowledged and he joined the army with his retainers. When the English were pressing hard on James at Flodden, he perceived a knight and his followers advancing in gallant order, all clad in green. He asked those beside him who they were. They replied that they thought they were the men of Caithness, and that the Earl himself was at their head. The king mused a little, and then said, "If that be William Sinclair, I will pardon him" The knight was William Sinclair, the name of the Earl of Caithness. There being no parchment in the camp, King James ordered the deed of removal of forfeiture to be extended on a drum-head. When the pardon had received the royal signature, it was cut out and delivered to the Earl, who forthwith despatched one of his men with it to Caithness, strictly enjoining him to deliver the valuable document to his lady, that in the event of his death in battle the family might be secured in his restored honours and estates. The bearer - one of the Clan Gunn - was the only one of the Caithness corps that ever returned, the rest having been slain in the engagement. Such was the impression which their fate made in the remote district of their birth, that, as he and his followers had passed the Ord of Caithness on a Monday to join the royal army, the Sinclairs had a mortal aversion to pass that promontory on Mondays, or to wear any dress of a green colour.
What youth, of graceful form and mien,
Foremost leads the spectred brave,
While o'er his mantle's fold of green
His amber locks redundant wave?
When slow returns the fated day,
That viewed their chieftain's long array.
Wild to the harp's deep, plaintive string,
The virgins raise the funeral strain,
From Ord’s black mountain to the northern main,
And mourn the emerald line which paints the vest of spring.
[Leyden]
It has been said that this deed, granted to the Earl of Caithness on the field of Flodden, was preserved by his descendants, Earls of Caithness, until the death of Earl Alexander in 1766, when it was secured by his son-in-law and executor, the Earl of Fife, with whose family it still remains. The author is advised by the Duke of Fife that there is no record of such an instrument ever having been in the Fife archives.