GORDON, Gen. PATRICK, one of the most distinguished of the many soldiers of fortune whom Scotland sent to the wars of Europe, was b. at Easter Anchleuchries, a bleak homestead on the eastern coast of Aberdeenshire, on March 31, 1635. His father, a "goodman " or yeoman, was a grandson of the family of Gordon of Haddo,afterwards raised to the earldom of Aberdeen. His mother, an Ogilvie, who could count kindred with the noble houses of Deskford and Findlater, was the heiress of Auchleuchries, an estate of five or six petty farms, worth in those days about £360 Scots, or £30 sterling. a year, and hopelessly burdened by mortgages. In his fifth year Gordon was sent to the neighboring parish school, where lie seems to have got a fair knowledge of Latin. The gates of the university were closed against him by his devotion to the Roman Catholic faith of his mother; and so at the age of 16, lie resolved—to use his own words—" to go to some foreign country, not caring much on what pretense, or to what country I should go, seeing I had no known friend in any foreign place." A ship from Aberdeen landed him at Dantzic in the summer of 1651, and some Scottish acquaintances or kinsfolks placed him at the Jesuit college of Braunsberg. His restless temper could not long endure the stillness and austerity of that retreat, and making his escape from it in 1653, he led for some time an unsettled life, in 1655, he enlisted under the flag of Sweden, then at war with Poland. During the six years that he took part in the struggle between these two powers, he was repeatedly made prisoner, and as often took service with his captors, until again retaken. Ile had risen to the rank of capt.lieut., when he resolved to try his fortune next with the czar, and, in 1661, joined the Muscovite standard.
Here his services in disciplining the Russian soldiers were duly appreciated, and his rise was rapid. He was made lieut.col. in 1662, and col. in 1665. Hearing that the death of his elder brother had made him " goodman of " lie wished once mom to return to Scotland; but he found that there was no escape from the Russian service. The czar, however, sent him on a mission to England in 1666. On his return
lie fell into disgrace, for what reason, does not very clearly appear. In 1670 he was sent to serve in theUkraine against the Cossacks; and when these were subdued, he was sent back in 1677 to defend Tschigirin against the Turks and the Tartars. His gallant performance of that duty gained him high military reputation and the rank of maj.gen. In 1683 he was made lieut.gen.; and two years afterwards he obtained leave to visit England and Scotland. KingJames II. wished him to enter the English service; but it was in vain that he petitioned for leave to quit Russia. In 1688 he was made gen., and now began his intimacy with the czar Peter, who, in the following year, owed to Gordon's zeal and courage his signal triumph over the conspirators aginst his throne and life. Nor was this Gordon's ohly great service to his imperial master. In 1698 he crushed the revolt of the Strelitzes, during the czar's absence from Russia. Peter was not ungrateful, and Gordon's last years were passed in opulence and honor. He died at Moscow, in the morning of Nov. 29, 1699. "The czar," says his latest biographer, "who had visited him Eve times in his illness; and Lad been twice with him during the night, stood weeping by his bed as be drew his last breath; and the eyes of him who had left Scotland a poor unfriended wanderer, were closed by the hands of an emperor." Gordon kept a journal for the last 40 years of his life. It seems to have filled 8 or 10 thick quartos, of which only six are now known to exist. An abridgment of them, rendered into German, under the title of Tagebuch des Generals Patrick Gordon, was published at Moscow and St. Petersburg,. in 3 vols. 8vo, in 1849-1851-1853, very carefully edited by Dr. Posselt. In 1859, Passages from the Diary of General Patrick Gordon, in the original English, edited by Mr. Joseph Robertson, were printed by the Spalding Club in 1 vol. 4to.