This article first appeared in the May 1992 issue of Scottish Field. A fuller account of the David Beaton and the reign of James V is contained in Tranter's novel, Stake in the Kingdom and the three novels of the James the Fifth trilogy -- The Riven Realm, James by the Grace of God and Rough Wooing. -- Rory Mor

      If Davie Beaton had not unlocked that door, in 1546 . . .! David Beaton, the seventh son of a Fife lairdie, rose to the highest possible status in Church and State. He more or less single-handed held up the Reformation in Scotland for a score of years. He was a man of great talents, courage and ambition, although perhaps somewhat lacking in scruple in an unscrupulous age.

      Despite his modest birth he became ambassador to France at the age of twenty-five, Abbot of Arbroath at twenty-nine, a bishop at forty-three and a cardinal a year later. By 1543, aged forty-nine, he was Chancellor of Scotland, that is Prime Minister, and Archbishop of St. Andrews, Primate of the Church in this land. And as such he guided the distinctly irresponsible and unreliable James the Fifth in matters of state, and kept the would-be reformers of the Church at bay, long after they had won the day under Henry the Eighth of England.

      It was in 1546, a month or so after he had had George Wishart burned at the stake at St. Andrews for plotting against him and preaching revolt against the Holy Church, that, early one morning, in his bed-chamber up in the top of the Sea Tower of St. Andrews Castle -- the window of which may still be seen, in the now ruined building -- a knock came to his door, which, being a careful man he kept locked.

      Awakened, he called to ask who was there, and was told åa friend¼. He sensibly asked which friend, at that hour, and was told åfriend Norman¼. This was Norman Leslie, Master of Rothes, who hitherto had indeed been a friend. So Beaton rose, and unlocked the door.

      Eleven men burst in, daggers already drawn, including friend Norman. And they started stabbing. Presently, however, one of the intruders, a reforming priest, held up his hand and cried to halt, that this was not being done godly! Let them pray.

      So down on their knees all the reformers got -- Davie Beaton was already down, of course -- and prayed. They then finished off the Cardinal-Archbishop and Chancellor, and hanged his naked body by one ankle out of that window, facing the place where George Wishart had been martyred.

      John Knox was not actually present at this assassination although he joined the company later, as they became besieged in the castle, and he described this scene in his famous History of the Reformation, declaring 'these things we write merrily!'

      So if Beaton had not unlocked that door? He controlled State as well as Church, and acted for the King and parliament, the most powerful figure in Scotland. It is safe to say that the Reformation would not have taken place when it did, or as it did; indeed it might not have occurred at all, for the Cardinal was a realist and recognised that the Church gravely required reforming and was seeking to achieve this internally, as it were, by improving standards, easing dogma, wiping out corruption and replacing ignorant and unworthy clerics. He was no saint but a very able and determined man.

      We might never have heard of John Knox, therefore, or Andrew Melville, or the so-called Lords of the Congregation; and Mary, Queen of Scots, James's daughter twenty years later, might have returned from France to a non Protestant Scotland. History changed indeed.

Next: Mary Queen of Scots