AS one of Britain's foremost politicians, Sir David Steel may have encountered some opposition over the years but it pales into insignificance compared with that which faced one of his ancestors.

"David Steel was shot outside his house in front of his wife and child. The date was December 20, 1686. Doubtless there have been times when some wished that his descendant might suffer the same fate."

So begins the modern Steel's gripping autobiography Against Goliath where he points out that the story of his ancestor makes instructive reading.

It is unlikely, however, even considering the controversy of the Lib-Lab pact, that anyone would wish such a gruesome end to the current Lord Steel of Aikwood, although it is true that he shares certain similarities with his namesake, such as a determination to see justice and democracy.

The Steel who was murdered was a Covenanter and as such "stood for the rule of the people against the domination of an arbitrary prince. It was democracy against tyranny" ( James Barr, The Scottish Covenanters).

When Charles II came to the throne he at first accepted the separation of Church and State but by 1661 had changed his mind. Ministers not appointed by the Crown and not accepting the authority of Episcopal bishops were dismissed from their pulpits. However, they and their congregations continued to meet secretly and soldiers were sent to quell the rebels.

At the battle of Bothwell Brig in 1679, the Covenanters, with David Steel among them, were crushed: 400 were killed, 1500 taken prisoner and 257 sold as slaves to Barbados.

"The ship taking them from Leith ran into heavy seas in the Orkneys, whereupon the hatches were nailed down lest they should swim ashore and escape. Most of them accordingly drowned off Deerness. It was altogether a cruel and bloody period, " points out Steel in his book.

Remarkably, the rebel Steel managed to escape and lived as a fugitive for five years. He was a tenant of Nether Skellyhill near Lesmahagow but after the battle of Bothwell Brig he slept in a moorland hut four miles from Skellyhill, until in December 1868, he grew tired of his rough shelter and made his way home.

Somehow word got out and on December 20, a party of soldiers under the command of Lieutenant Crichton tried to surprise him. Steel slipped out a back window to run for his life.

Not far from Skellyhill he was cornered. Outnumbered and holding a useless musket, he accepted the promise of a fair trial in Edinburgh if he surrendered.

Treacherous Crichton, however, marched him back to Skellyhill where he was shot in front of his infant daughter and wife, Mary. The soldiers rode off leaving the grieving widow at the body of her husband. When neighbours came to her aid they found her gathering up the scattered brains of her husband.

JH Thomson's The Martyr Graves Of Scotland records the story as such: "She bound up the shattered head with a napkin, and, as she gazed at the dead body, she said - for tradition has preserved the words that broke from her lips - 'the archers have shot at thee my husband, but they could not reach thy soul; it has escaped like a dove far away, and is at rest. Lord give strength to thy handmaid that will prove she has waited for Thee, even in way of Thy judgements'."

Steel was buried at Lesmahagow where his headstone still lies. It reads:

HERE LIES The Body of DAVID STEEL, Martyr who was murdered by Crichton for his Testimony to the Covenants and Work of Reformation and because he durst not own the Authority of the Tyrant destroying the same . . . .

David a Shepherd first and then Advanced to be King of Men Had of his graces in this Quarter This Heir, a Wand'rer and now a Martyr Who for his Constancy and Zeal Still to the Back did prove true Steel Who for Christ's Royal Truth and Laws And for the Covenanted Cause Of SCOTLAND'S famous Reformation Declining Tyrant's Usurpation By Cruel Crichton Murder'd Lies Whose Blood to Heaven for Vengeance cries.

A monument to him also stands at the site of the murder. King William came to the throne four years after Steel's death declaring "he had no obligation to be a persecutor". Since then Presbyterian forms of worship have existed freely and in fact became the predominant denominations in Scotland.

Oral tradition is that the covenanting David Steel is Steel's ancestor but he says: "Unfortunately no-one in my family has yet had the patience or inclination to establish unambiguous proof of our direct descent either from the wretched babe in arms or from one of David's brothers, although it is the oral tradition in the family."

What is known is that two centuries later, Steel's great grandparents Elisabeth Scott Groves and David Steel married at Lesmahagow. He was a miner's foreman and the couple lived with their 10 children in a room and kitchen.

Like Steel this David Steel was a staunch liberal but his sister Catherine married James Brown, the Labour MP for South Ayrshire.

He had gone down the mines as a boy and by 22, was president of the Ayrshire Miners' Union. He later became secretary of the National Union of Scottish Mineworkers and was elected MP for South Ayrshire in 1918.

Despite his lowly background, he and his wife were resident at Holyrood Palace when Brown was appointed Lord High Commissioner to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1925 - an event which would have seemed completely unbelievable to Catherine's rebel ancestor.

Brown's appointment was made by the King, on the recommendation of Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald, and it was the first time in 300 years that a commoner had represented the sovereign. The couple stayed at the palace for the duration of the Assembly in 1924 and again when Brown was reappointed in 1930.

Lord Steel says it is something he always recalled when he himself was Lord High Commissioner in 2003 and 2004 and was at Holyrood with his wife Judy.

From the mines, the Steels eventually moved into the retail business with Steel's grandfather John Scott Groves Steel, a grocery manager in the Scottish Co-operative Wholesale Society complex at Burnbank, near Hamilton.

He married Jane Scott, the daughter of Andrew Scott, who had a clothing business in Hamilton and was prosperous enough to build a house for himself and a terrace of eight other houses, three of which were occupied by his daughters when they married.

It was in one of these houses that Steel's father, David, was born. He went on to have a distinguished life of service as a minister in the Church of Scotland.

Steel was born on March 31, 1938, when his father was minister in Denbeath, Buckhaven, Fife.

Like his covenanting namesake, Steel is a staunch believer in democracy and was Leader of the Liberal Party in Great Britain for 12 years, an MP from the age of 26 and Scotland's first Presiding Officer in the new parliament before being appointed to the House of Lords.

Against Goliath, David Steel's Story is published by Weidenfeld and Nicolson

BIOGRAPHIES

JUDY Steel founded the Rowan Tree theatre company in 1987, and established the Borders Youth Theatre in 1989.She is a published poet and has written several plays, and has also also co-authored two books with her husband, Sir David Steel: Border Country and Mary Stuart's Scotland.

Sir David Steel was born in Fife in 1938, and was raised in Nairobi and later Edinburgh.

He was leader of the Scottish Liberal Party between 1976 and 1988 and continued as an MP with the newly formed Liberal Democrats until 1997.

Between 1999 and 2003, Steel was the Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament and was awarded the KBE in 1990.