Broadside regarding the murder of Margaret Rankin

Transcription

A full, true and particular account of a cruel, barbarous and inhu-
man murder committed on the body of Margaret Rankin daugh-
ter of John Rankin Polichorkin in Argyleshire, of which
Archibald M'Allum, by whom she was big with child is suspected
because he has fled from his father's house at Ardnoe.

MAN's natural reason unassisted by divine
grace, is still hurrying him on to the
commission of daring acts of cruelty; but
While these keep short of shedding human
blood, We are apt to look upon them with less
detestation, and paliate some part of their guilt
in our minds; or even when blood is shed
in a person's own defence when attacked by
another person, we do not look upon it in so
black a light as when one unprovoked attack,
in cold blood an innocent, unsuspecting per-
son with a manifest intention to take away
his life. In the first case, the laws of both
God and man has provided certain cafes in
which the dilinquent is not to be punished
with so great Severity as in the last, where
we are premptorily forbid to spare or have
pity upon them, but in anywise to put them
to death; which if we do not, the scripture
expressly saith, that we become partakers of
their crime, and thereby bring innocent blood
upon the land.

It is very hard to account for the reasons
which induce men to murder one another in
cold blood,--and in such a manner as the
following, where we may see a wretch em-
brueing his hands in the blood of an innocent
young woman, whose only crime to him, was,
that the had too, too much regard for the
inhumane monster! This wretch, (for I can-
not call him a man) Archibald M'Alluw, son
of John M'Allum in Ardnoe, in the shire of
Argyle, he had pretended love, I say pre-
tended (for it was only malice) to Margaret
Rankin, daughter of John Rankin in Poli-
chorkin in the county of Argyle, one of his
father's neighbours, and, no doubt, had used
all these hellish arts praised by villains, too
often with success, to seduce her into a crimi-
nal correspondence with him, to which she,
alas! too easily consented. O! had the known
his black heart, and the hellishness of his in-
tentions, she never had consented to such
criminality, nor suffered to unmerited a pu-
nishiment from him : But to return, she at last
proved with child by him, and was far ad-
vanced in her pregnancy, and, no doubt im-
portuning him to fulfill his promises of marry-
ing her, to take away her reproach from a-
mong women.    This humble and reasonable
requist only hurried him on to commit what
he had no doubt, concerted before in his
mind, the horrid intention of murdering her
to be quite of her importunity, as he never
had any intention of marrying her.

This malevolent crime he put in practice
on Sunday the l2th of August 1792, choos-
ing that day as the most convenient for his
infernal purpose, when her father and the
rest of the family were at divine worship, who
if at home would have protected her from his
blood thirsty hands; on that day, as we may
easily suppose, she had known the family's
intentions and that the would be alone in the
house, and therefore sent or desired him to
come to her in order to consult how matters
were to be settled, and as she had a heart full
of honest sentiments, and the deepest regard
for him, never doubted but that his dissem-
bling professions were as sincere as her own,
on that account little thought of her fast ap-
proaching fate.    He attended her at her fa-
ther's house according to proposal, but little
to her profit, for, when her people returned
from church,   to their great surprize, they
found her strangled. With several marks of
Violence upon her body.   They could not
think of any person who could be guilty of
this except the said Archibald M' Allum, and
as it was late before they could settle matters,
they could not send that night, but, however,
they sent next   morning,   and   found that
Archibald had absconded, and that night they
heard he had been seen running through
Glenkinlas in a frighted like manner on that
day, which is the nearest road to the low
country in order to escape.    Fool that he is
to think to escape from his own guilty con-
science, and the wrath of an offended God.

By this fatal catastrophe, he has not only
brought wrath upon himself, but has render-
ed two families compleatly miserable, his own
family unhappy in having such an unnatural
child who has brought disgrace upon them,
such a disgrace as will bring their gray hairs
with sorrow to the grave; while her family
must be unconsolable in having a blooming
daughter both debauched and murdered by
such a villain.    Now let us consider the case
fairly, and we will easily fee what havock sin
makes in the world, especially such sins as
this.    If he had been virtuous and married
the woman,   What a contrast! instead of the
miserable situation they are now in, the one
family a son and the other a daughter living
together in harmony and peace, an offspring
rising from thence to gladen their aged hearts,
and make one gleam of joy shine on their
evening hours,    In, the mean time, I hope
this will be a lesson to young women not to
trust too far the flattering delusions of young
men, for if their love be real, they will ra-
ther chuse the solid enjoyment of the married
state, than the stolen enjoyment of a criminal
correspondence.

What is remarkable, this man, so old in
villainy, is only about 26 years of age, as
may be seen by the advertisements for appre-
hending him in the Glasgow news papers.

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