Anglo-Scottish War (1559–1560)

Anglo-Scottish War (1559–1560)

PRINCIPAL COMBATANTS: England and Scottish Protestants
vs. Scottish Catholics and French forces in Scotland

PRINCIPAL THEATER(S): Scotland

DECLARATION: None

MAJOR ISSUES AND OBJECTIVES: During the ongoing
conflict between Catholic and Protestant Scots, the
Catholics appealed to France for aid and the Protestants
to England.

OUTCOME: The French withdrew from Scotland, and the
Presbyterian Church of Scotland (the Scottish Kirk) grew.

APPROXIMATE MAXIMUM NUMBER OF MEN UNDER ARMS:
Unknown

CASUALTIES: Negligible

TREATIES: Treaty of Edinburgh, July 6, 1560, among
England, France, and Scotland; Treaty of Berwick,
February 27, 1560, between England and Scotland.

Following after a decade the costly ANGLO-SCOTTISH WAR
(1542–1549), the 1559–60 conflict between the Protestants
and Catholics of Scotland was more a stand-off or
showdown than it was a full-scale war. In the midst of the
heated religious conflict, Mary of Guise (1515–60),
French Catholic widow of King James V (1512–42) of
Scotland, withdrew to Leith Castle and, fearing for her
life, secured French troops to come to her aid. For their
part, the Scottish Protestants appealed to England’s queen
Elizabeth I (1533–1603) for troops. Although Elizabeth,
cognizant of the perilous economic health of her kingdom
and the relative weakness of her army, did not wish to provoke
hostilities with France—much less its ally, Spain—
she felt it her duty to defend Protestantism when it was
threatened at her borders. Accordingly, she sent an army
as well as a fleet and laid siege against Leith for the better
part of a year. There was no battle, but at last the French
yielded to this pressure and concluded the Treaty of Edinburgh,
by which all foreign troops were to withdraw from
Scotland. Separately, England and Scotland drew up the
Treaty of Berwick, a mutual defense pact.

See also ANGLO-FRENCH WAR (1557–1560); ANGLOSCOTTISH
WAR (1482); ANGLO-SCOTTISH WAR (1513);
ANGLO-SCOTTISH WAR (1542–1549).

Further reading: Richard Glen Eaves, Henry VIII and
James V’s Regency, 1524–1528: A Study in Anglo-Scottish
Diplomacy (Lanham, Md.: University Press of America,
1987); Rosalind Mitchison, A History of Scotland, 3rd ed.
(London and New York: Routledge, 2002); Raymond
Campbell Paterson, My Wound Is Deep: A History of the
Anglo-Scottish Wars (Edinburgh: John Donald Publishers,
1997); Pamela E. Ritchie, Mary of Guise in Scotland,
1548–1560: A Political Career (East Linton, East Lothian,
Scotland: Tuckwell, Press, 2002); David Starkey, Elizabeth:
The Struggle for the Throne (New York: Harper-
Collins, 2001).