Captain John Stuart of Phisgul to be Remembered too ...

Not only Gardiner was formally acknowledged....

Colonel Gardiner was immortalised by Rev. Doddridge in 1746 and by many other Hanoverians after his death from wounds sustained in battle on September 21st 1745, and received his own obelisk from the community in 1853 at Bankton House. He had died in Tranent Manse and was buried there in its churchyard but no tombstone exists today, having presumably been lost when that church was rebuilt at the beginning of the 19th century. It seems accordingly most likely that Captain John Stuart of Phisgul in Galloway has been publicly acknowledged longest and consistently from the outset.

John Stuart's tombstome with its inscription, most difficult to read nowadays but recorded at Prestongrange Church, is shown below. He was a Captain in Lascelles Regiment and it reportedly took four Highlanders to defeat him.

From September 2010 the Battle Trust intends that a wreath shall be laid at the Captain's tombstone as well as those already traditionally laid at the 1953 Battle Cairn and the Colonel's obelisk.

click to enlarge - photograph by Arran Johnston


Here lyeth the remains of John Stuart of Phisgul, a Galloway gentleman and Cap. in Lessel's Regmt, a man of true bravery who died honourably in defence of his King and country, and of civil and religious liberty,
..... being barbarously murder'd by four Highlanders near the end of the Battle fought in the field of Preston on the 21st Septr 1745


Colonel [later General] Lascelles Memorial

Lascelles has his own tombstone, recording that he 'remained forsaken on the field ... after a fruitless exertion of his Spirit and ability at the disgraceful rout of Preston pans.....' at St Mary's Church, Witby.