King’s Own Scottish Borderers

It is recorded of Sir Walter Scott that he claimed descent from one of the most distinguished families of “ the land louping gentry ” of the Scottish border. The title, “ King’s Own Borderers,” borne by the Twenty – fifth, would induce the belief that the regiment had sprung from the same source; and however much we may excuse the military license of the times, or the marauding propensities of our border country men, and extol their martial achievements, so prolific with romantic incident and chivalric feats of daring, we cannot but question the respectability of such a parentage. “ She’s o’er the border, and awa’ wi’ Jock o’ Hazeldean . ” Happily the Twenty- fifth owns a much more recent connection with the Scottish border, when the feuds which had disgraced earlier years, by the wrongs and cruelties they occasioned were healed, and the failings of the past are for gotten amid the excellencies and the glories of the present. The regiment was raised in the City of Edinburgh by the Earl of Leven, in 1688, from among the noblemen and gentle men who had come over from the Continent as the adherents of William , Prince of Orange. The advent of the House of Orange, apart from the religious and political liberty it conferred and assumed to guarantee, had been further hailed by an emancipated people as restoring to the bosom of their dear native land, and to the home of their fathers, those “ lost and brave,” who, for conscience’ sake, had endured a long and painful exile. Consistent with that fidelity which has ever been a conspicuous jewel in Scottish character, once that the Reformed faith found an entrance and an abiding place in the heart of the Scotsman, nor priest, nor king, nor pope could drive it out, quench the light of truth, or shake the steadfast ness of the Covenanter.

• History of the Scottish Regiments in the British Army  By Archibald K. Murray, 1862