FLETCHER, ANDREW ( 1655-1710 . A Scotch patriot and publicist. lie was born in Saltoun, East Lothian. His father, Sir Robert Fletcher, dying when his son was ten years of age, committed him to the care of Gilbert Burnet, who superintended his education for five years. In 1681 he sat in Parliament as commissioner for East Lothian. Prior to this he had strongly opposed Lauderdale's policy, and now offered it determined opposition to the test oath and to the Duke of York's oppressive measures. Ile was obliged to flee to Belgium; but fearing arrest by Spanish agents, he secretly returned to Eng land, and after the Rye House Plot, in which he had counseled moderation, he joined the Duke of Monmouth in Holland. He lauded with Mon. mouth's expedition at Lyne, Dorsetshire, but in a quarrel about a horse, shot a local ex-alderman, a fellow-campaigner, and fled to Spain for safety. The authorities imprisoned him when he landed; but he made a romantic escape, and after travel in disrruise through Spain, reached Hungary, where he ['ought as a volunteer against the Turks.
He joined of Orange at The Hague in 1688, and in the Revolution returned to Scotland. His policy was now to create a Scotch Home Rule Party. After the Union he retired from public life and devoted himself to agriculture. Among his improvements was the introduction of win nowing fanners and of pot barley into Scotland. His polemical tracts, which appeared anonymous ly, were collected and published after his death. Consult: Fletcher, Political Works (London, 1732) ; Erskine, Essays on the Lives and Writ ings of Fletcher, etc. (London, 1792) ; Omond, Fletcher of Saltoun (New York, 1897) ; Burnet, History of His Own Time (6 vols.. Oxford, 1833) ; Dalrymple. Memoirs of Great Britain and Ireland (London, 1873) : Wodrow, History of the Suffer ings of the Church of Scotland (Edinburgh, 1842).