The Battle of Knock Mary, also known as the Battle of Rottenreoch, was a Scottish clan battle fought in 1511 (though some sources place it as early as 1490), north of Crieff in Scotland. The dispute arose when the Murrays of Ochtertyre seized cattle from Drummond of Strathearn in order to settle a debt demanded by the Abbot of Inchaffray. In retaliation, William Drummond, son of the 1st Lord Drummond, led an attack upon the Murrays.
The two sides met at Knock Mary, a hill on the south bank of the River Earn lying between the river and Drummond Castle. Initially the Murrays held the upper hand, but the tide turned decisively with the arrival of reinforcements for the Drummond side: Campbells from Dunstaffnage under Duncan Campbell, McRobbies from Balloch, and Faichneys from Argyllshire. Campbell had come to Strathearn specifically to avenge the Murrays' recent murder of his two brothers-in-law and father-in-law, Drummond of Menie.
The defeated Murrays fled the battlefield, crossed the River Earn, and took refuge in the Kirk of Monzievaird, approximately a mile north of the river. William Drummond was content to allow them to remain there, but as Duncan Campbell was departing, an arrow fired from the church struck and killed one of his men. In revenge, Campbell's forces burned the church to the ground with those inside, an event that became known as the Massacre of Monzievaird. Reported casualties among the Murrays varied between 120 and 160 dead. The dead from the battle itself were traditionally believed to be buried in the cairn of Rottenreoch, just north of Knock Mary, though this is now thought to be a Neolithic long cairn. In the aftermath, William Drummond was arrested; despite his protestations that the Drummonds had played no part in the burning of the church, he was executed at Stirling along with many of his associates.
As Duncan Campbell's forces withdrew from the field at Knock Mary, an arrow loosed from the Kirk of Monzievaird killed one of his men; in swift and terrible reprisal, Campbell ordered the church burned to the ground, incinerating the Murray survivors sheltering within and producing what accounts record as between 120 and 160 deaths in what became known as the Massacre of Monzievaird.
Between 120 and 160 Murrays killed, the majority in the burning of the Kirk of Monzievaird
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