Ross & Shields' Gravestone

John Ross (of Mauchline) and John Shields (a tenant on the estate of Pollok) were captured by the dragoons during the time of the Pentland Rising. They had gone on a foray to search out whether the soldiers were in the area, but were captured and taken to Edinburgh for trial. They were sentenced to execution, which took place in Edinburgh on 7 December 1666. Their heads were cut from their bodies and sent to Kilmarnock, where they were set up on pikes on the tolbooth for public display, as a warning against rebellion. The heads were subsequently interred in the old graveyard.

Ross & Shields' Gravestone

Laigh Kirkyard

Kilmarnock

Ayrshire

NGR - NS 427380

Ross and Shields' gravestone is located on the north side of the Laigh Kirk (now known as the New Laigh Kirk) in the surrounding graveyard. The church is located in the centre of the town, with access to the graveyard from John Dickie Street.

The inscription reads:

Here lie the heads of John Ross and John Shields who suffered at Edinburgh Decr. [2]7th 1666 and had their heads set up at Kilmarnock.

Our persecutors mad with wrath & ire;

In Edinh members some do lie, some here,

Yet instantly united they shall be,

& witness ‘gainst this nation’s perjury.

(See Cloud of Witnesses.)

The gravestone includes the date 27 December, but it is thought that the 2 was a misreading of a suberscript R, used in Decr.

John Shields was a tenant farmer at Titwood, in the parish of Mearns, Renfrewshire. He was captured with John Ross and was transferred to Edinburgh, where they were subsequently tried. A further eight Covenanters, who had been active on the field at Rullion Green, were tried at the same time. They were sentenced to hang at Edinburgh’s market cross, in the Grassmarket, and once they were dead their heads were to be removed from their bodies and sent to the western shires as a warning. The heads of Ross and Shields were affixed to the Watergate in Kilmarnock. The hands of Ross and Shields, like the other martyrs, were to be severed from their arms and sent to Lanark for public display on the town’s ports. This was because it was at Lanark the Covenanters had raised their right hand when swearing the Covenant. John Shields wrote his final testimony before his death, in which he is described as a ‘yeoman’.

John Ross was a Covenanter from Mauchline who was captured at the same time as Shields and who suffered the same fate.