Hist. Forms: 7 whigimyre, whiggamaire, -mer, whigmuir, wickhamer, wiggomer, 7– whiggamore, 8 whiggamor, whigamoor, 9 whigamore. [The form whig(g)amore, used by Bp. Burnet in the often cited passage given s.v. WHIG sb.2 2, and later popularized by Scott, is app. an erratic form (like whigmuir, whigimyre) of wiggomer, whiggamaire, which is prob. f. WHIG v.1 + mere, MARE sb.1
The word whiggam adduced by Burnet as a term used in driving horses is unsupported by evidence.]
Originally, One of a body of insurgents of the West of Scotland who in 1648 marched on Edinburgh, their expedition being called the ‘whiggamore raid, road, or inroad’; later (contemptuous), = WHIG sb.2 2. Also attrib.
1649. Sir Jas. Balfour, Hist. Wks. (1825), III. 388. Anent the Scotts last going into England, and the Englishe, with Cromwell and Lambert, ther heir-coming at the Wliggamaire roade. Ibid., 420. Since Julij last, 1649, and the Whigamore road.
1654. in R. Baillie’s Lett. & Jrnls. (Bann. Club), III. 568. Some hes maid a report … that wee wer raysing a Whigimyre road vnder Argyle.
1662. in Wodrow, Hist. Suff. Ch. Scot., I. iii. (1721), I. 151. There was another Statue in a Whigmuir’s Habit, having the Remonstrance in his Hand.
1666. Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1666–7 (1864), 302. 68 of the Wickhamers.
1666. in Dom. State Papers Chas. II., CLXXIX. lf. 136 (MS.), The Wiggomers, for so they call the mutineers, being a middle sort betwixt Anabaptist and Presbyterian, are quite quelld onely that they shifft their quarters as they heare they are pursued.
1670. Sir Jas. Turner, Mem. (1829), 63. So soone as the news of our defeate [sc. of the Scots at Preston] came to Scotland, Argile and the Kirks partie rose in armes everie mothers sonne; and this was calld the Whiggamer rode.
a. 1715. [see WHIG sb.2 2].
1816. Scott, Old Mort., viii. There’s a thousand merks on the murdering whigamore’s head. Ibid. (1818), Rob Roy, xxv. It isna good for my health to come in the gate o’ the whigamore bailie bodies. Ibid. (1821), Pirate, iv. ‘Hear to him,’ said an old whigamore carline.
1830. J. Rickman, Extr. Life & Lett., 17 Sept., 267. I hear the Whiggamores begin to be frightened.
1886. Stevenson, Kidnapped, ix. 77, note. Whig or Whigamore was the cant name for those who were loyal to King George [an. 1751].
1891. Gardiner, Hist. Civil War, lxvi. III. 491. The Whiggamore leaders constituted themselves … into a Committee of Estates.
1898. W. S. Douglas, Cromwell’s Sc. Camp., 9. It is certain that after the events of 1648 they must have considered the ‘Whiggamores’ more closely bound to their interest than that body proved to be.
