There is said to have been a tradition among the Borderers that when a male child was christened his right hand should be excluded from the ceremony, so that in time of feud he would be better equipped to strike “unhallowed” blows upon his family’s enemies.

At the end of the 2001 Common Reader edition of George MacDonald Fraser’s 1971 book The Steel Bonnets: The Story of the Anglo-Scottish Border Reivers, an interview with the author is inserted. There, in response to a question as to whether he plans to write more straight history books, Fraser (most famous for his Flashman series of serio-comic romances) replies that “he found he could get closer to the truth of the past in fiction.”

I think his instincts were good. Although The Steel Bonnets seems to me (a fairly uninformed reader in that area of history) a masterful work on a challenging subject, I also found it hard to follow, and wished it no longer than it was. If I had Scottish roots I might feel differently. A lot of people, I’m told, are very keen on this book, which is not surprising when you note how many of the names that show up again and again in the accounts of the Border feuds are familiar today—especially in America. At the beginning of the book, Fraser muses on Richard Nixon’s inauguration ceremony, in which you found a Johnstone (Lyndon Baines Johnson), a Graham (Billy) and a Nixon together on the platform. Nor does he fail to note that the first man on the moon was an Armstrong, a scion of perhaps the greatest Reiver family of them all.

The Border Marches between Scotland and England, from the Middle Ages until the beginning of the 17th Century, presented the classic problem of all frontiers. Dangerous and dishonest people tend to gather there, where a short ride will take them out of the law’s jurisdiction. The traditional way of the Marches became mutual raiding, Scot against Englishman and vice versa. The whole thing was complicated by intermarriage and transnational clan ties. The people of the Border on both sides seem to have been generally ruthless, merciless, and dishonest, and the only way to control them would have been draconian and impartial justice, a commodity not much available.

The result was centuries of chaos. When one considers the whole business, it seems obvious that if all parties had agreed to just stop raiding one another, the losses saved from murder and property damage would have resulted in a far better life for everyone. But I suppose the Borderers would have asked, “Where’s the fun in that?”

Because of the necessity of putting events and personalities into context, Fraser does not follow a strictly chronological plan for The Steel Bonnets. This is technically wise, but left me sometimes having trouble keeping track of the players. This problem wasn’t relieved by the fact (which bedeviled the author too) that many characters bear identical names—or, alternatively, some individuals carry multiple nicknames.

As I read, I was reminded of another Border War—the one fought by pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces in Kansas and Missouri in the late 1850s. Many bushwhackers and jayhawkers were born to those same Scottish names, and may have been easily reverting to family traditions.

The Steel Bonnets is an excellent work for anyone interested in its somewhat specialist subject.