The Jacobites
by Martin Frost
(Anatomy of Scotland)
The Jacobites, and 'Bonnie Prince Charlie' in particular, are
often seen in a romantic light. Here I attempt a more objective
view.
After the death of Charles II (he of the 'Restoration', Nell
Gwynne etc.) his brother, James VII of Scotland and II of England
managed to make himself so unpopular by his absolutist behaviour
and his open support for Roman Catholicism that the English
parliament invited James's son-in-law, William of Orange (aka 'King
Billy'), to become King of England.
Catholicism was the religion of England's traditional enemies,
France and Spain, and therefore regarded as unpatriotic in England.
England had its own religion which had as its head the English
monarch. To subscribe to any other religion was therefore suspect.
James VII, as a Roman Catholic, was therefore in a contradictory
position. In Scotland, which had had close links with France in the
past, the abhorrence of Catholicism was, at least in theory, of a
more spiritual nature.
The head of the Roman church (the Pope) was regarded as a
servant of Satan by protestant zealots. This may all seem a rather
odd way for Christians to look at things but it was about par for
the course then. Sadly there are residual echoes of it all to be
heard to this day.
In any case, when William of Orange accepted the invitation from
the English parliament and set foot on English soil (November
1688), James did not attempt to fight for his crown. He fled the
country instead. William became William III of England, ruling
jointly with his wife, Mary, who as James's daughter, conferred a
somewhat dubious legitimacy to their supplanting of the English
king.
In Scotland it took until April 1689 for a Convention of the
Estates to decide that James had forfeited the Scottish crown and
recognize William as William II of Scotland. The Convention had
received letters from both James and William stating their
positions. William's showed a political understanding completely
absent from James's enraged and threatening letter. As mentioned
above, the fact that Scotland and England were separate countries
with a common monarch created political tensions which were not
resolved until decades after the political union of the two
countries in 1707.
1689....The term 'Jacobite' became the name for those who
supported James VII after his deposition. The most famous Jacobite
rebellion took place in 1745 when Charles Edward Stewart (aka
'Bonnie Prince Charlie' and the 'Young Pretender'), James VII's
grandson, led his Jacobite army to ultimate disaster at the Battle
of Culloden (near Inverness, in the North of Scotland) in 1746.
After that Jacobite hopes of another 'Restoration' were effectively
dead but the campaign had lasted on and off from 1689 to 1746,
nearly sixty years.
The first Jacobite rebellion in Scotland occured in 1689, after
the Scottish Convention had accepted William III as king. John
Graham, Viscount Dundee (aka 'Bonnie Dundee') withdrew from the
convention in protest and raised a small army based on the cavalry
group of which he was commander. His spectacular victory against
the Williamite army at Killiecrankie was won at the cost of his own
life. He was killed at the moment of victory. Thereafter the
rebellion was fought to a standstill at Dunkeld by a regiment of
the religously fanatical Cameronians. Ironically, Colonel Cleland,
their commander, died at the moment of their victory.
When James died in 1701 (before the union of the Scottish and
English parliaments), his son James Francis Stewart (aka the 'Old
Pretender'), became the legitimate king of Scotland (James VIII) in
the eyes of the Jacobites. In 1707 that union took place and in the
following year the Old Pretender attempted to assert his claim as
king of both Scotland and England. The important prize was the
throne of England since England was a much richer and more powerful
country than Scotland but the Jacobites hoped to attain that goal
by gaining Scottish support first. Given the unpopularity of the
Union in Scotland it allowed the Jacobites to portray themselves as
nationalists whatever the reality. In practice, although the Union
was unpopular, most lowland Scots were unwilling to resist it by
force.
This meant the Jacobites mainly having to use the highland clans
as an army against the forces of the now British government. The
willingness of the Jacobites to use force to destroy the Union was
simply because, over most of the period discussed, that held out
the only real hope the Jacobites had of succeeding. It became an
increasingly desperate hope.
1708....Seeking to capitalize on popular Scots' discontent at
the recent Union of the Parliaments, the Old Pretender set out from
France in 1708, his expedition sponsored by Louis XIV. The French
king involved himself for the usual reason which led France to
involve itself in Scottish affairs, namely to distract the English
(now the British) from their fighting with the French. The Duke of
Marlborough had been giving the French a bad time in Flanders and a
Jacobite rising in Scotland might have taken some of the heat off.
In the event the expedition was a fiasco.
James did not even land in Scotland. Having anchored off the
Fife coast, the French naval commander of the expedition refused to
put James ashore when a superior English naval force appeared, and
the Jacobite expedition returned, after a detour round Ireland(!),
to France. English politicians of the time, who naturally dominated
the now British parliament, had scant interest in Scotland, and it
was virtually defenceless. If James had landed with his force of
5,000 infantry it is just possible that he might have regained his
Scottish kingdom.
It was in the aftermath of this abortive rebellion that the
barbaric 'Act for Improving the Union of the Two Kingdoms'
(commonly referred to as the 'Treason Act') was passed. This
brought Scotland's previously comparitively humane law of treason
into line with the severe English one.
1715....The next Jacobite military attempt to regain the British
throne was in 1715. It was perhaps the best chance the Jacobites
ever had of restoring the exiled Stewart dynasty to the British
throne. The Union with England was more unpopular than ever in
Scotland and in England too there was deep discontent with the
non-English-speaking King George and the authoritarian Whig party
which had taken over political power since the king's accession.
The rebellion was bungled, however. Queen Anne had died in August
1714. She was the daughter of James VII, and the last Stewart
monarch to rule in Britain (as it turned out). In 1701 the English
had passed the Act of Settlement which decreed that on Anne's death
the English throne would pass to Sophia, Electress of Hanover, and
her heirs since Queen Anne had no surviving issue. Sophia was
grand-daughter of James VI but there was little enthusiasm for the
House of Hanover. With the Union of the Parliaments the English had
ensured that the House of Hanover would succeed in Scotland too and
the Jacobite rebellion in 1715 was an attempt, originated by the
Earl of Mar, to capitalize on discontent at the Union in general
and the accession of George I (Sophia's son) in particular.
What actually provoked the rebellion was the eclipse of Mar's
political career on George 1's accession. The Whig party had
convinced the king that Mar had Jacobite sympathies and the king
had conspicuously snubbed Mar when he had appeared at court. In
reality Mar was only interested in being in government, any
government, with the power that gave him. He was prepared to change
allegiance if that was necessary to maintain his power. He had been
a supporter of the Treaty of Union and had helped ensure the easy
transition of the monarchy to the House of Hanover in the person of
George I. Rejected by George, his only hope of a political future
was by switching his support to the exiled House of Stewart, the
Jacobites. (His reputation for changing sides when it suited him
earned him the sobriquet 'Bobbing John'.)
In fact the Earl of Mar started the rebellion without the
knowledge of the exiled Stewart court. The Jacobite standard was
raised on 6 September 1715 in the north-east Highlands. There was
wide support for the rebellion and the Jacobite forces initially
vastly outnumbered the British government forces. If swift and
vigorous action had been taken by the Earl of Mar then success
would have been virtually certain. Unfortunately for the Jacobite
cause, Mar was an administrator, not a soldier, and not given to
taking advice from others. The corrupt and odious British political
system, run by Whig extremists, was ready to be overthrown but Mar
was not the man to do it. He moved south to capture Perth on 14
September but did not capitalize on this success. The Duke of
Argyll, commander of the government forces in Scotland, had a much
smaller number of men than Mar alone. Another Jacobite army in the
south also wasted time and instead of attacking Argyll, marched
into England with the intention of raising Lancashire. Their hopes
dashed, they surrendered to government forces at Preston on 14
November 1715.
The day before, at Sheriffmuir, Mar had finally taken on Argyll.
The Duke, unlike Mar, was an experienced soldier and, though his
troops were outnumbered four to one, the Battle of Sheriffmuir was
inconclusive. It was a strategic disaster for Mar, however. He had
failed to seize the moment. He was not the only one. The exiled
Stewart 'king', James VIII, did not land in Scotland until 22
December by which time the government had regained the initiative.
The Duke of Argyll had received reinforcements of battle-hardened
Dutch troops. On 4 February 1716 James admitted defeat and returned
to France.
1719....Jacobite plans for regaining the British throne
continued. By 1719 they had managed to enlist the help of the
Spanish for another military expedition. The precise reasons for
the Spanish support were born out of complex European power
politics. Surprisingly England's old enemy, France, and Britain
(which in the main pursued the old English policies) had come to a
peace settlement in 1713, which ended the 'War of the Spanish
Succession'. Amongst other things the treaty required the 'Old
Pretender' to move his exiled court from France.
The Jacobites had therefore to cast about for support elsewhere.
Spain had also signed a peace treaty with Britain but did not
respect the provisions which excluded Spanish influence in Italy.
By 1718 Spain had seized the Italian islands of Sicily and Sardinia
and planned to invade the mainland in the south. This was a direct
challenge to Austria which had inherited Spain's Italian lands but
it was also a challenge to Britain which was a guarantor of the
Peace of Utrecht. The Royal Navy promptly smashed the Spanish navy
near Messina. The Spanish knew that Britain's George I was involved
in an expensive naval campaign in the Baltic (financed by Britain
although it was in pursuance of aims associated with his Hanoverian
territories) so they declared war on Britain. For Spain, as
previously for France, the Jacobites were useful pawns in a war
against Britain. Consequently the Jacobite Duke of Ormonde was
invited to Madrid for talks about an invasion of England.
This invasion was undoubtedly regarded by the Spanish as a
merely a diversionary tactic to distract the British from the
Mediterranean theatre of operations. This possibly made it easier
for Ormonde to persuade the Spanish that there should be a
two-pronged invasion of Britain, taking in Scotland as well as
England.
There were delays in mounting the expedition, giving the British
ample time to prepare militarily, so that when the expedition set
sail from Cadiz in March 1719 with a mere 5,000 soldiers it had
virtually no chance of success. In the event, before the fleet of
twenty-nine ships reached Corunna, where the Duke of Ormonde was to
join it, it was substantially destroyed in a storm. The British
heaved a sigh of relief believing an attempted invasion in 1719 now
impossible. They were wrong. The Spanish still wanted a distraction
for the British. They recognized that there was no chance of
success before the start, but the main force was defeated by the
weather again and did not reach England.
A tiny diversionary force of two frigates and just over three
hundred Spanish infantrymen which was to have distracted British
forces from the target of the main expedition, England, reached
Scotland. This force was joined by a group of Jacobite exiles from
France. Squabbling soon broke out among the leadership. When they
received the news that the main force would not reach England there
was argument for and against returning to Spain, the logical thing
to do given that their small force was now meaningless. The faction
which was for fighting anyway won the day. There was little support
from the clans, though the famous Rob Roy Macgregor appeared with a
handful of men. In all about a thousand or so men made up the
Jacobite army which faced a British government force of about the
same size, which had marched down from Inverness to meet them.
On June 10th they fought in Glenshiel, where the Jacobites had
erected rough defences. In a forewarning of what was to happen 27
years later at Culloden the government force brought artillery to
bear on the enemy before routing them. The Jacobite clansmen
disappeared into the Highlands; the Spaniards surrendered. The
farcical 1719 'invasion' was over.
In the years following, the exiled Jacobite court engaged in
plotting and planning which became increasingly divorced from
reality. The court had been comprehensively infiltrated by British
spies but Jacobite security arrangements were so laughably
amateurish that the spies were scarcely needed. Correspondence
between Jacobite sympathisers in England and on the mainland of
Europe was often sent through the ordinary postal service.
The British government was known to open letters and even had a
deciphering department to break such rudimentary codes as were used
by conspirators. Scare stories of possible Jacobite invasions were
not so much real as Whig propaganda to divert public attention from
their own corrupt regime. It is a common enough ploy for
governments to exaggerate the threat from a supposed enemy for
domestic consumption. Support for the Jacobite cause in England
went into terminal decline, its only real expression being verbal
protest against the corrupt and repressive government. More support
remained for the cause in Scotland but more as a philosophy than as
a hope for a restoration of the Stewart monarchy. Even here the
Jacobites failed to capitalise on the great unpopularity of the
London based Whig government.
The British knew that there was no possibility of an effective
Jacobite invasion without substantial financial backing from a
foreign power, which in practice meant France or Spain, and while
Britain was at peace with these two countries this would not be
forthcoming.
1745....While, as far as foreign powers were concerned, in time
of war the Jacobite cause was a useful stick with which to irritate
and distract Britain, this cut both ways. If Britain was not at war
she was able to maintain a large standing army at home, well able
to resist a few thousand troops which was as many as the Jacobites
could be expected to muster. If the Jacobites were to hope for a
successful invasion of Britain they therefore required Britain to
be at war, since she traditionally denuded her home forces in order
to wage war abroad, trusting to the navy to repel invaders. Years
passed and it wasn't until the late 1730s that war began to rear
its ugly head. For reasons of European politics Britain and France
were gradually sliding into open conflict until in 1743, with a
change in the French government, there came a radical change in
policy towards Britain. France was well aware of the benefits which
came from being at peace with Britain, after all they had
experienced these since 1716.
The problem was that the king of Britain was also Elector of
Hanover and he conducted Britain's European policy more with
Hanover in mind than Britain, often at the expense of France. The
solution to the French was a restoration of the Stewart dynasty to
the British throne. Not only would Britain's European policy no
longer be driven by anti-French Hanoverian considerations but the
suitably grateful Stewarts would adopt a pro-French stance. An
invasion of Britain was planned to restore the Stewarts early in
1744 and it was a serious force which was assembled: 10,000 French
troops of the regular army.
Prince Charles Edward Stewart,'Bonnie Prince Charlie', the
Jacobite 'Prince of Wales', was secretly summoned to France to
embark with the invasion fleet and act as Regent for his father.
With a cunning political plan, amongst other things reassuring the
British that the French invasion was a short-term mission merely to
restore the Stewarts, the French would probably have achieved their
objective if they could have got their seasoned troops across the
English Channel. After all, the British Whig government was
unpopular and the king was from a foreign dynasty. Not for the
first time in the history of the Jacobites, though, delays in
invasion plans allowed British spies in Europe to discover details
of what the French intended. Not for the first time either did the
weather play a hand. As the invasion fleet was about to sail in
February 1744 a gale blew up which dispersed the warships which
were to protect the ships transporting the troops. The transports
were themselves damaged in Dunkirk harbour. The initiative had been
lost and the British had the chance to bring reinforcements over
from Holland.
The French King, Louis XV, got cold feet. He had never been
confident of the success of the invasion plan. It is at this point
that the 23 year old Prince Charles Edward Stewart,'Bonnie Prince
Charlie', comes into his own. There are two main schools of thought
about Prince Charlie, one pro, the other con. To some he was a
noble and romantic hero who initiated a glorious, if unsuccessful,
adventure. To others he was an egotistical personality, rash, vain
and irresponsible. Both views have elements of truth about them but
real life is too complex to be summed up so superficially. His
brief period of glory was followed by a long period of embittered
and drink-sodden exile. Let us examine only the brief period of
glory.
It used to be thought that Prince Charlie was entirely
responsible for instigating the 1745 Jacobite rebellion. It
certainly would not have happened without him but the French
government played a significant part which they were very
successful in covering up later. In late 1744 Charles was
introduced to a group of Franco-Irish privateers who operated out
of northern French ports. They had Jacobite connections e.g.
Antoine Walsh was the son of Philip Walsh whose ship had taken
James II to France after his defeat at the Battle of the Boyne.
Philip became rich through building naval ships and in the slave
trade. Antoine also engaged in the slave trade and added
privateering to his accomplishments. Privateering was the practice
of privately owned and operated ships sanctioned by their
government attacking the ships of hostile nations. Great fortunes
were made this way. In addition to their Jacobite sympathies a
landing in Scotland was appealling to the group of privateers since
it would distract the British navy into decreasing their ability to
protect British merchant shipping. In other words, commercial
advantage encouraged political loyalty. The French government's
involvement was even more cynical: the sacrifice of Scots for
French advantage in Europe. After the failure of the rebellion they
naturally did not wish to broadcast this and Charles was happy to
be portrayed as solitary hero.
The 1745 rebellion did not start well. Charles had only been
able to put together a small expedition with only two ships, one a
light frigate, the "Du Teillay", the other a much larger French
naval vessel of 64 guns, the "Elisabeth", chartered from the
government. These two ships set sail from the Loire on 22 June
1745. On 9 July they encountered the British 54 gun HMS 'Lion'
which damaged Charles' larger ship so badly it had to return to
France. Since it was carrying most of the arms and ammunition for
the Prince's force this was a severe blow. Nevertheless he
continued on to Scotland, landing on the island of Eriskay on 23
July 1745 at what is still known as Cladach a'Phrionnsa (the
Prince's beach). Charles' first meeting, with Alexander Macdonald
of Boisdale, in South Uist was a shock. He told the Prince that he
could expect no support for his rebellion and advised him to go
home. Charles supposedly replied "I am come home, sir." It was
almost the shortest of visits since his entourage were soon
quarrelling. They had heard of the arrest by the government of the
chief of the Macleans of Mull as a Jacobite plotter. Only Antoine
Walsh and Charles argued that the rebellion should continue.
Growing paranoia led to the "Du Teillay" sailing for the safety
of the sea lochs of the mainland. Charles set foot on the mainland
at Loch nan Uamh on 25 July. Meetings with other important clansmen
were as discouraging as that with Alexander Macdonald had been.
They were Jacobite supporters but also realists. They knew the
likelihood of success was negligible and that failure would spell
disaster for their clans. Charles refused to listen to any advice
and gradually assembled a few local supporters. He secured the
support of Cameron of Lochiel, who had also been pessimistic about
the outcome of the rebellion, by sneering that Lochiel could stay
at home and learn of the Prince's fate in a news sheet. Lochiel's
support and the men he could put in the field were vital if the
rebellion was to proceed. Charles sent letters and messengers from
his HQ at Borrodale summoning support and he decided on Glenfinnan
as the place where he would first assemble his army. On Monday 19
August the Jacobite standard was raised there. Of the approximately
1200 men who gathered at Glenfinnan about 700 were Lochiel's
Camerons. All the same, Lochiel's faith in the rebellion can
perhaps be judged by the fact that he sought and received a promise
from Charles that he would not suffer financially if the rising did
not succeed.
If the rebellion had not started well the fact that it began to
flourish was largely the fault of the British government. With
their customary disregard for Scotland they had left the country
inadequately defended. Even the locally raised troops in the
Highlands, the Black Watch, told originally that they would only
serve in their own land, had been marched down to England in 1743.
This was in spite of (perhaps because of) the known plans for a
French invasion in 1744 (see above). In addition, Clan Campbell,
traditionally militarily strong and allied to the government, had
been very much weakened as a military force because of structural
changes the Clan chief had made. As a result Charles was able to
march from Glenfinnan to Edinburgh, taking Perth on the way,
virtually unopposed.
A government force under General Cope had marched north but
avoided engagement believing the Jacobite force to be larger than
was the case. He had received very little support in Scotland
because of the London-based government's great unpopularity. After
marching to Inverness to get supplies, he marched to Aberdeen from
where his force sailed down the coast to land ahead of the
Jacobites, who were at Edinburgh, at Dunbar.
On 21 September 1745 General Cope's force was routed by the
Jacobites at the so-called Battle of Prestonpans. This engagement
lasted no more than 15 minutes before the government forces lost
their nerve and ran away. Incidentally, the small forces on either
side at the battle (approx.2,500 men) indicate what a small-scale
uprising, despite its great fame, the '45 really was. Be that as it
may, Charles was now, however temporarily, master of Scotland. The
government in London had expected the rising to fizzle out at the
first show of force. Now they began to take it more seriously.
Despite the reluctance of major figures to support him and
despite the lack of willing volunteers (attempts to raise a
regiment in Edinburgh had failed), Charles managed to muster a
force of about 5,000 for his invasion of England. His officers,
including his most experienced general, Lord George Murray, advised
against it but Charles was adamant that he would receive massive
support in England. In the event he was wrong. His force got all
the way to Derby without any more than about 200 Englishmen joining
his cause. By that time the cause was lost. The Prince was keen to
continue the march to London where there was some panic but the
British military held firm and, with the return from Europe of
troops, vastly outnumbered Charles' force. Three government forces,
two bigger than his own, now faced him. He reluctantly agreed to
retreat to Scotland.
The march back began on 6 December 1745. At Charles' insistence
a garrison of about 400 were left behind when the Jacobites passed
through Carlisle. They subsequently received harsh treatment at the
hands of King George II's 25 year old third son, William Augustus,
Duke of Cumberland ('Butcher' Cumberland): the officers were hanged
and the men transported to the West Indies.
On Christmas Day the Jacobite army entered Glasgow and stayed
for 10 days while the strongly pro-government city was reluctantly
forced to refit it. Though time was running out the Jacobites had
still not been defeated and they won another battle at Falkirk on
17 January against a government force led by the brutal General
Henry Hawley. Hawley blamed his men for the defeat and executed
about 60 men for cowardice. The Jacobites continued north pursued
by a force led by the Duke of Cumberland who was a seasoned
soldier, having had experience in the War of the Austrian
Succession. As Scotland became increasingly lost to Charles he
needed funds from elsewhere to keep his troops in the field.
France, which had given little help, sent a ship with £12,000 in
gold. Crucially it was captured by (Scottish) forces loyal to the
government.
Above: The not-so-bonnie Prince
Charlie in later life, ravaged by age, disappointment and
drink.
The end came for the Jacobite cause on Wednesday 16 April 1746
at Drummossie Moor near Inverness. The Prince mistrusted his most
able general, Lord George Murray, and rejected his advice as to
where to best ablish the Jacobite base. Instead he was persuaded to
choose an open moor which was military insanity. For the first time
Charles took personal charge of his force. In less than an hour the
fresh, well-fed government force, which outnumbered the tired,
half-starved Jacobites two to one, defeated them for the first and
last time.
The key to their success was the effectiveness of their
artillery, which they had in abundance, and used to pulverize the
Jacobites who were not ordered to charge by their commanders until
many had been killed or wounded. Jacobite artillery was virtually
non-existent and ineffective. Charles fled the field before the
battle was over and spent months in hiding in the Highlands before
escaping to France.