See Child III 456. The notes aren't all that long, so I may as well quote the lot. Although parts have already been quoted here, the answer to Michael's question is in the following:

"The murder of the 'Bonny Earl of Murray' was the occasion of serious commotions in the North Highlands. Towards the end of the year 1592, the Macintoshes of the Clan Chattan, who of all the faction of Murray 'most eagerly endeavoured to avenge his death,' invaded the estates of the Earl of Huntly, and killed four gentlemen of the name of Gordon. Huntly retaliated, and 'rade into Pettie (which was then in the possession of the Clan Chattan), where he wasted and spoiled all the Clan Chattan's lands, and killed divers of them. But as the Earl of Huntly had returned home from Pettie, he was advertised that William Macintosh with eight hundred of Clan Chattan were spoiling his lands of Cabrach; whereupon Huntly and his uncle Sir Patrick Gordon of Auchindown, with some few horsemen, made speed towards the enemy, desiring the rest of his company to follow him with all possible diligence, knoeing that if once he were within sight of them they would desist from spoiling the country.

Huntly overtook the Clan Chattan before they left the bounds of Cabrach, upon the head of a hill called Stapliegate, where, without staying for the rest of his men, he invaded them with these few he than had. After a sharp conflict he overthrew them, chased them, killed sixty of their ablest men, and hurt Willie Macintosh with divers others of his company.' (The History of the Feuds and Conflicts among the Clans, etc., p. 41 f, in Miscellanea Scotica. Spottiswood, ed., 1666, p. 390).

Two William Macintoshes are confounded in the ballad. The burning of Auchindown is attributed, rightly or wrongly, to an earlier William, captain of the clan, who, in August, 1550, was formally convicted of conspiracy against the life of the Earl of Huntly, then lieutenant in the north, sentenced to lose his life and his lands, and, despite a pledge to the contrary, executed soon after by the Countess of Huntly. (Lesley, History of Scotland, p. 225; Gregory, History of the Western Highlands, ed. 1881, p. 184; Browne, History of the Highlands, IV, 476. For the traditional story, Finlay, II, 95, note; Lang's Thistle of Scotland, p. 107 f.; Whitelaw, p. 248).

Auchindown castle is on the banks of the Fiddich, B 1. By Cairn Goom, A4, is meant, I suppose, the noted Cairngorm mountain, at the southern extremity of Banffshire."