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THE KRINGELEN AMBUSH

[Vedder; Scottish Soldiers of Fortune: An Oxonian in Norway; History of Caithness]

Misfortunes never come singly. The Sinclairs of Caithness have bitter experience of the truth of this adage. Reference has already been made to the losses suffered at Flodden (1513) and Summerdale (1528), and now the third and heaviest wave of adversity was to break over them. It was the depopulation of Caithness from these three disasters that weakened the Sinclairs in their family feud with the Sutherlands. Their third misfortune was the massacre of Kringellen, in which a whole regiment was blotted out. There are several accounts of this tragical incident, and recently (1886) Michell has written a "History of the Scottish Expedition to Norway in 1612". Epitomised the story reads thus:

Colonel George Sinclair was a natural son of David Sinclair of Stirkoke, and "nephew" of the Earl of Caithness. A soldier of fortune, he had been early in the army of "The Bulwark of the North". Before embarking for Norway he had been engaged in a somewhat desperate affair, the arrest of John Maxwell, Lord Nithsdale, whose pathetic "Good Night" is printed amongst the Ballads in the Border Minstrelsy, and when the hand of fate overtook Colonel Sinclair, it was deemed but a just retribution by the whole Maxwell clan. The Colonel's action in apprehending Lord Nithsdale for the murder of Sir James Johnstone was, however, an ordinary unavoidable executive duty as justiciary for his uncle the Earl.

Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden, dispatched officers to Scotland in 1612, for the purpose of raising troops to assist him in a war with the Danes and Norwegians. As King James of Scotland was brother-in-law to the Danish king, Christian IV, troops were levied in a clandestine manner, and the Privy Council as a deterrent threatened to put the leaders "to the horn", i.e., to declare them outlaws after three blasts of the horn at the cross of Edinburgh. Among those who volunteered their services from Scotland was Colonel George Sinclair, son of Stirkoke, who in his native county, Caithness, raised a regiment of 900 men, almost all of them of his own clan and name. Landing at Vibelungsuaest, on the Romsdal coast, he discovered that owing to the Swedish shore from Nyborg to Calmar being in temporary possession of the Danes, and Stockholm invested by their fleet, his only way of reaching Sweden was by an overland march across the Norwegian Alps. He therefore determined upon that hazardous experiment, which had recently been managed by Colonel Munckhoven. As soon as the news of the arrival of the Scottish invaders reached Lars Hage, the Lehnsman of the Dovre, he hurried to the parish church, where service was being held. Striding into the building, he struck thrice upon the floor, and cried, "Listen! the foeman is in the land". The congregation upon this immediately broke up, and it was finally agreed to lay an ambush at Kringelen, which from the precipitous nature of the ground over hanging the road, was well adapted for the purpose. Signal fires were lighted on every commanding height, and the budstiel (message-rod or fiery cross) transmitted to all for a general muster. Some 500 peasants assembled, armed with rifles and axes, under the leadership of Berdon Segelstadt of Ringeboe, and, unable to meet the Sinclairs in open field, had recourse to stratagem. One of the Norwegians offered to guide the regiment, his intention being to lure them to their destruction, whilst on the opposite side of the river rode a peasant on a white horse, whose orders were to keep alongside of the advancing enemy. A peasant girl was stationed on a hill over the water, with her cow-horn, with which to signal as soon as the Scots had fallen into the snare. These precautions were necessary, as from their ambuscade the peasants were unable to see below. In the march Colonel Sinclair was accompanied by Fru (or Lady) Sinclair. She was a young and beautiful woman, unwilling to part from her husband, to whom she had been but recently united. Disguising herself in male attire, she succeeded in getting on board; nor did she reveal herself until the corps had landed in Norway. The title of Fru implies that she was his wife, and she is still affectionately remembered by the Norwegians. A mermaid appeared to Colonel Sinclair by night, and warned him of death if he advanced; but he replied that when he returned in triumph from the conquest of the kingdom, he would punish her as she deserved". The mermaid's name was Ellen, and some allege that she was Fru Sinclair in disguise. An insolent speech of the Colonel's is still repeated by the Norwegians with great indignation: "I'll recast the old Norway lion, and turn him into a mole that will not venture out of his burrow!"

On marched the Sinclairs through the fatal Pass of Kringelen, the "defile of death". The air which their pipes played is still remembered in Norway, and it was certainly their own "dead march".

Presently the strange and melancholy tones of an Alpine horn resounded from a distant height. At the same instant down thundered a mass of half hewn trees and loosened rocks, urged over by levers, that swept away whole sections and hurled them into the mountain torrent that foamed below. Sinclair himself fell as a Scotsman should always fall - in the foremost rank, when gallantly essaying to storm the rocks, claymore in hand. He was shot by Berdon Seilstadt, who had bitten one of his silver buttons into the shape of a bullet, so as to be sure of Sinclair, who was supposed to hear a charmed life. Taking aim, he hit him on the left temple, and death was instantaneous. Among those hurled into the stream was the Fru, "but, being supported by her ample robes, she was able to carry her infant son safe across in her arm". All perished in the pass save sixty and the adjutant. These were at first distributed among the inhabitants; but the latter grew tired of supporting them, and, marching them in to a meadow, murdered nearly all in cold blood, excepting the Fru and two others. One of these escaped through the instrumentality of a robust female peasant, whom he afterwards married. Their descendants are numerous, and their origin is well-known in the district. Another Sinclair, a prisoner, when about to be killed, rushed up to a Norwegian horseman, exclaiming, "Protect me! I am not prepared to die!" The Norwegian was more merciful than his compatriots, and Sinclair afterwards sent his saivor in Norway a stained glass window representing an angel protecting a suppliant. The window has been preserved, and is highly valued by the people. The Fru Sinclair apparently remained in the place, and when the child died, adopted a young Norwegian. The bodies of the slain were barbarously left unburied, a prey to the wolf and the vulture. But some respect was paid to the remains of the leader, which were decently interred. The Norwegians are proud of pointing out to strangers the spot where he is buried. It lies in a remote solitude near the fatal pass, and over the graves is a wooden cross with a tablet, on which is the following inscription in the Norse language: - "Here lies Colonel Jorgen Zinclair, who with 900 Scots, were dashed to pieces, like earthen pots, by the boors of Lessoe, Vaage, and Froen Bergen Segelstadt, of Rigeboe, was their leader". There is a fairly long Norwegian ballad on the event, entitled, "Herr Sinclair's Vise of Storm", that is literally, "Lord Sinclair's Song" by Storm, in which the prowess of the peasants is highly extolled. It is sung everywhere throughout Gamel Norge", and constitutes one of the great national airs. There are several translations of this ballad. Calder has one in his History of Caithness; Vedder, the Orcadian poet, has one in his collection; but perhaps the best is that given in the "Scottish Soldiers of Fortune", by Grant, who calls it a translation from Oehlenschalager, the Danish national poet. The opening lines by Vedder run thus:

Childe Sinclair and his menyie steered
Across the salt sea waves;
But at Kringellen's mountain gorge
They filled untimely graves.

They crossed the stormy waves so blue,
For Swedish gold to fight;
May burning curses on them fall
That strike not for the right!

The horned moon is gleaming red,
The waves are rolling deep;
A mermaid trolled her demon lay,
Childe Sinclair woke from sleep.

Turn round, turn round, thou Scottish youth,
Or loud thy sire shall mourn;
For if thou touchest Norway's strand,
Thou never shalt return.

In Storm's ballad the Sinclairs are untruly accused of burning and plundering all in their line of march. Their best vindication is the official report of Buvold Kruse, a local stadtholder: "We have also ascertained that those Scots who were defeated and captured on their march through this country have absolutely neither burnt, murdered, nor destroyed anything"

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