In 1627 the Swedish monarch knighted Alexander Leslie, by now a full colonel, along with three of his countrymen; Patrick Ruthven, David Drummond and John Hepburn.

Gustavus Adolphus had a particular affection for him, trusting him with guarding the crucial strategic garrisons in North Germany while the main Swedish army established a foothold on the Baltic shoreline and advanced slowly southwards.

In 1628, Leslie was appointed governor during the Siege of Stralsund, replacing Colonel Alexander Seaton and the Scottish regiment of Donald Mackay who had been holding the town on behalf of the Danes.

Leslie continued the defence of Stralsund successfully defending the town against Albrecht von Wallenstein's imperial army in what effectively constituted Sweden's entrance into the Thirty Years' War, Gustavus Adolfus also sending eight warships to help raise the siege.

[7] In 1638, events in his native country again compelled him to return to Scotland, where he was appointed "Lord General" in command of the Army of the Covenant by the Scottish administration,[10] and as such participated in the Bishops' Wars.

Scottish regiments were generally called into service by the lairds and clan chieftains obliging their tenants with feudal duty or coercion to send their kin into battle.

This took place after careful negotiations in the Swedish Riksråd (state council) during which Leslie worked behind the scenes to ensure Chancellor Axel Oxenstierna allowed up to 300 officers to be decommissioned along with an unknown number of ordinary soldiers.

Leslie's reputation, guile and discretion were frequently noted by contemporary observers including the English officer John Aston and intellectual, Sir Cheney Culpeper, who both commented on his qualities in their writings.

In 1641 King Charles I in reward for his extraordinary military achievements at home and abroad appointed Leslie to the Scottish Privy Council and bestowed upon him, at Holyrood, the titles of Lord Balgonie and Earl of Leven, and made him captain of Edinburgh Castle.

His affirmations of loyalty to the crown, which later events caused to be remembered against him, were sincere enough, but the complicated politics of the time made it difficult for Leslie, as lord general of the Scottish army, to maintain consistent policies.

in Germany, but the Ulster massacres gave this force, when raised, a fresh direction and Leven himself accompanied it to Ireland as lord general.

He did not remain there long, for the Civil War had begun in England, and negotiations were opened between the English and the Scottish parliaments for mutual armed assistance.

He rose to become a commander of the Covenanter Army between 1644 and 1647 and fought for the Solemn League and Covenant, which bound both the Scottish and English parliaments together against the Royalist forces in the Three Stuart Kingdoms.

[16] In 1645 after his English Allies won a victory at Battle of Naseby, he marched to take the Royalist city of Hereford but his siege was unsuccessful against the local commander Barnabas Scudamore.

As part of the negotiation for the Army of the Solemn League to leave England, Leven transferred the king to his Presbyterian allies unaware that these would soon lose power to the Independents.

[7] In one of his final military acts, Leven helped his son-in-law, Colonel William Cranston, to raise troops for Swedish service largely drawn from Scottish prisoners of war.

They had two sons and five daughters: Gustavus, who apparently died young, Alexander (2nd Lord Balgonie), Barbara, Christian, Anne, Margaret and Mary.

Young Leslie later followed his father into service in the Army of the Solemn League and Covenant, commanding Leven's lancers and cavalry on the right wing at the battle of Marston Moor.

[20] The song "General Lesley's March" is said to have been sung by Scottish soldiers during the wars of the Covenant in the 1640s, though it is more likely to be a mockery of the Covenanters: When to the kirk we come, We'll purge it ilka room, Frae popish relics, and a' sic innovation, That a' the world may see, There's nane in the right but we,