Newark Castle - Scottish Borders
Newark Castle near Broadmeadows in Selkirkshire, Scottish Borders, is a ruined fifteenth-century royal castle on the banks of the Yarrow Water, associated with the Douglas family and notable as the site of the execution of several hundred prisoners following the Battle of Philiphaugh in 1645. The battle, in which Covenanting forces commanded by David Leslie defeated the Royalist army of the Marquess of Montrose, ended the brilliant Royalist campaign of 1644-45 and the subsequent massacre of prisoners and camp followers at Newark was one of the more brutal episodes of the Scottish Civil War. The castle ruins in their woodland setting beside the Yarrow are a picturesque but historically sobering reminder of the violence of seventeenth-century Scottish politics. The Yarrow valley is one of the most beautiful river valleys in the Scottish Borders, associated with Scott, Hogg and the Border ballad tradition.