The friends from a Scottish village who took Robert the Bruce's 'heart' to the Holy Land

Details of the journey that took Robert I’s ‘heart’ to the Holy Land have emerged in a new book. The very modern pilgrimage started in an old railway station building in Renton in West Dunbartonshire and ended in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem.

For more than 15 years, the Strathleven Artizans, a historical group who founded the Robert the Bruce Heritage Centre in the old Renton station, have met to share knowledge and passion for the King of Scots, who led his army to victory at the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314 and secured recognition for Scotland as an independent nation.

As the group formed, it became its first hope to carry out the King’s final wish.

Duncan Thomson, one of the founders of the centre, said he originally made a request to Historic Environment Scotland around 2008 to take the King’s true heart from Melrose Abbey to Jerusalem.

Mr Thomson, who works as a carer and driver, said: “We decided when we set up that we wanted to take Robert the Bruce’s heart to the Holy Land in honour of his last wish.

“We phoned Historic Environment Scotland, who are the keepers of the heart, and said ‘I am taking it to Jerusalem’. I wanted to dig it up and take it there to bury it. They said ‘absolutely no way’. They just refused. It went on from there.”

In the rooms of the heritage centre, an imagined Robert the Bruce throne decorated with a double dragon stands proud. It is carved, no less, from the Bruce Oak Tree, which legend states was planted by the young nobleman in the grounds of what is now Strathleven House near Dumbarton.

The tree was burned down in an arson attack in 2004 - it was so big that people used to light fires within its trunk, it is said - with the remains of the once-mighty oak now owned by the Strathleven Artizans. The remains of the tree are stored in a secure container nearby, where it dried out for 15 years.

From this oak, many pieces which honour Robert I have been carved, including a wooden heart, which was made by member Arthur Murdoch.

“Arthur said ‘take this wooden heart to Jerusalem’. Robert the Bruce touched the tree, he planted it, he is connected to it,” Mr Thomson said.

It was this heart that travelled from Renton to Jerusalem in 2023, with the piece also heading through Spain in a nod to the fatal journey attempted in 1330 by Sir James Douglas, a Scots nobleman and key figure during the Wars of Independence, to take the embalmed heart of his friend to the Holy Land. He wore it around his neck in a silver casket.

Mr Thomson added: “For about 15 years, we always said we were going to do it, to take the heart, and then a couple of years ago, it happened.”

The man charged with taking the heart to Jerusalem was Simon Collins, of Renton, who took it with him on a trip to see his family. He carried it not in a silver casket, but a black rucksack.

Mr Thomson said: “We said to him ‘you will be the guy who fulfils Robert the Bruce’s greatest wish’. To think it is a wee charity, a wee visitor centre that has saved the tree and made a heart which then went to Jerusalem. It is we, the people, who have done this.”

Mr Collins, 46, who is originally from Palestine, described it as a “privilege” to take the heart to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which stands on the spot where Jesus is said to have been crucified, buried and rose from the dead.

Mr Collins said: “It was a privilege to take the heart there. It really is a very special place. I said a wee prayer for Robert the Bruce.”

The original pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 1330 to honour Robert I’s wishes came to a violent end when Sir James, who set sail from Dundee with his entourage of knights and nobles and moored up in Seville, was killed when the men were diverted to join fighters of Alfonso XI of Castile in a crusade against the Nasrid Moors near Teba, a fortress town on the frontier of Adalucia.

Sir James was killed in battle with his body and King Robert’s heart later brought back to Scotland.

The king’s heart was finally buried at Melrose Abbey, where it remains today. Melrose and Teba have long been twin towns.

The wooden heart has also travelled to Spain with Mr Thomson, who regularly attends the Jornadas Escocesas (Scottish Festival) - or the ‘Douglas Days’ - at Teba, with the event in August commemorating the sacrifice made by Sir James as he lent his support to Alfonso XI.

READ MORE: On this day in 1330: Black Douglas killed taking Robert the Bruce’s heart to Holy Land

Mr Thomson said: “The people of Teba know all about James Douglas and how he stepped aside to help them be free. We are always welcomed with open arms.”

Days after the death of Sir James, the castle of Teba fell to Castilian control. But the Moors showed their respect for the Scot by returning his body to his men, along with Robert I’s heart.

Mr Thomson said: “Sir James was so distinguished that the body is taken to Alfonso and they apologised for killing such a warrior. They then ask if they can prepare the body before it is buried.”

Sir James’s body was then boiled in vinegar, with the flesh parting from the bones and the skin buried in a chapel in Teba. The bones were then returned to Scotland where they were later buried in St Bride’s Church in Douglas, South Lanarkshire.

“He was shown so much respect - it makes me emotional to think about it,” Mr Thomson said.

The adventures of the Strathleven Artizans have now been documented in a new book The Bruce Oak Heart: Tour of the King’s Realm, which has been compiled by Jim Gilhooly.

The book has won the endorsement of Lord Charles Bruce, the 12th Lord Elgin, who is a direct descendant of Robert I. In his foreword, written last year, he wrote: “I commend this book as a fitting tribute to King Robert in his 750th anniversary year, but also as the culmination of diligent and painstaking research.”

The Bruce Oak Heart: Tour of the King’s Realm, compiled by Jim Gilhooly, is available on Amazon.