The Road to Culloden Moor Page 6

  This required immediate action, and Captain Durbé made for a safer anchorage among the islands between Barra and South Uist. According to tradition the exact spot was An-t-Acarsaid Mhor, between Gighay and Fuday. However, on the afternoon of the 24th, it looked as if the larger vessel were making for the same anchorage, perhaps with sinister intent. Charles and his little party were hastily put ashore on the west side of Eriskay, a rocky islet racked by storms and owned by Alexander Macdonald of Boisdale.

  And so the great adventure began — a hurried landing on a white wind-swept strand. The landing place is still known as ‘Cladach a’ Phrionnsa’, gaelic for ‘the Prince’s shore’. It is said that a rose-pink convolvulus blooms there and only there because of seeds planted by Charles to mark his coming. O’Sullivan described Charles’s first moments on Scottish soil less romantically: ‘The Prince and his Suite set foot to ground … fearing least that man of war, which we saw plainly was one, shou’d come into the harbor. His design was to go to Boisdale’s … house that was just on the borders of the bay, but it blew so hard, that it was not possible, and made the first land he cou’d. There was such a cruel rain, that he was obliged to stay in the first cabin he met with …’

  This ‘cabin’ was a small noisome hut belonging to one Angus Macdonald — typical of the smoky little hovels described by Captain Burt. Their first priority was to find some food, and the story goes that ‘they catched some flounders, which they roasted upon the bare coals’. Duncan Cameron acted as the cook and Charles was mightily amused at his efforts: ‘The Prince sat at the cheek of the little ingle, upon a fail sunk [heap of peats], and laughed heartily at Duncan’s cookery, for he himself owned he played his part awkwardly enough.’ When the time came for sleep Charles examined Sheridan’s bed to ensure that the sheets were well aired out of affection for his indulgent old tutor. This annoyed Angus who ‘observing him to search the bed so narrowly, and at the same time hearing him declare he would sit up all night, called out to him, and said it was so good a bed, and the sheets were so good, that a prince need not be ashamed to lie in them.’ It never crossed his mind that he was, indeed, entertaining a prince.

  Charles certainly did not look like one. His beard had grown and he was still dressed in his abbé’s outfit of ‘a plain shirt, not very clean, a cambric stock fixed with a plain silver buckle, a fair round wig out of the buckle, a plain hat with a canvas string, having one end fixed to one of his coat buttons; he had black stockings and brass buckles in his shoes.’

  There were other elements of farce that night. ‘The Prince, not being accustomed to such fires in the middle of the room, and there being no other chimney than a hole in the roof, was almost choked, and was obliged to go often to the door for fresh air. This at last made the landlord, Angus Macdonald, call out, “What a plague is the matter with that fellow, that he can neither sit nor stand still, and neither keep within nor without doors?”’ All his physical training could not have prepared Charles for the realities of Highland life but he was to adapt quickly and win a surprising reputation for hardiness.

  The morning brought harsh reminders of how precarious it all was, with the realisation that some of the chiefs were thinking of reneging on their pledges to him. Alexander Macdonald of Boisdale came hurrying across the two mile stretch of water that separated Eriskay from South Uist with the sole purpose of telling Charles to go away. According to the stories the conversation was along the lines of ‘You must go home, Your Highness’ to which Charles replied ‘Home? I am come home.’ There was no doubting Boisdale’s loyalty, but he was old and frightened and he was not going to risk everything for a cause which appeared to have no chance of succeeding. Furthermore, he brought categoric messages from Sir Alexander Macdonald of Sleat and Norman Macleod of Macleod that ‘if he came without troops, that there was nothing to be expected from the country, that not a soul wou’d join with him, & that their advice was that he shou’d go back & wait for a more favourable occasion’. It was a bitter blow. ‘Every body was struck as with a thunder bolt, as you may believe, to hear that sentence … especially from Macleod, who was one of those that said, he’d be one of the first that wou’d join the Prince, in case even he came alone ….’

  Charles could not believe his ears and sent urgent messages to Sir Alexander. However, the reality of the situation was soon to be confirmed. Sir Alexander would not even agree to see Charles. Worse than that he and Macleod lost no time in writing virtuously to Duncan Forbes, the Lord President of the Council and the most important government official in Scotland, that Charles had arrived and that they had done their duty ‘for the best’. They confidently asserted that not a single man of any consequence north of the Grampians would assist this ‘mad rebellious attempt’.

  However, Charles did not know this yet and assumed that these two great lairds could be brought to honour their obligations. He and his bedraggled little party went back on board the Du Teillay where ‘it was strongly debated again, for his going back to France, but the Prince would not hear to it upon any account’. He had a passionate conviction that his faithful Highlanders would stand by him. Backed by Walsh and O’Sullivan he decided to sail to the mainland and try his chances there. On 25 July, St James’s day, the Du Teillay arrived at Loch nan Uamh — the Bay of Whales — a sea loch running into the Sound of Arisaig between Arisaig and Moidart. Charles now prepared to launch his most powerful weapon — a charm offensive.

  Aeneas Macdonald had been despatched the previous day in a small boat to fetch his brother, the laird of Kinlochmoidart. He now returned with him and also brought back Boisdale’s elder brother Macdonald of Clanranald and a clutch of other Macdonalds. Next day Clanranald’s son — referred to everywhere as young Clanranald — arrived and some emotional meetings took place.

  One of the Macdonalds described their first encounter with their ‘long wished for’ prince. A large tent had been erected on the ship’s deck ‘well-furnished with variety of wines and spirits’. After a while a tall youth of ‘a most agreable aspect’ entered. He was plainly dressed, probably still in his clerical garb, but it was too much for the emotional Macdonald whose heart swelled ‘to my very throat … He asked me if I was not cold in that habite (viz. the highland garb). I answered I was so habituated to it that I should rather be so if I was to change my dress for any other. At this he laugh’d heartily and next enquired how I lay with it at night, which I explained to him; he said that by wrapping myself so close in my plaid I would be unprepared for any sudden defence in the case of a surprise. I answered, that in such times of danger, or during a war, we had a different method of using the plaid, that with one spring I could start to my feet with drawn sword and cock’d pistol in my hand without being in the least incumber’d with my bedclothes. Severall such questions he put to me; then rising quickly from his seat he calls for a dram, when the same person whisper’d me a second time, to pledge the stranger but not to drink to him, by which seasonable hint I was confirm’d in my suspicion who he was. Having taken a glass of wine in his hand, he drank to us all round, and soon after left us.’

  News of Charles’s arrival rippled out through the western Highlands. Young Clanranald was sent to Skye with messages for Macdonald of Sleat and Macleod of Macleod. Kinlochmoidart was despatched to the Duke of Perth, Murray of Broughton, Donald Cameron of Lochiel and other Jacobite clans. As he was sailing over Loch Lochy full of his momentous news he met another boat carrying Bishop Hugh Macdonald, Roman Catholic Vicar Apostolic of the Highlands, who was returning from Edinburgh. He asked Bishop Hugh, ‘What news?’ When the Bishop replied that he had none to give, Kinlochmoidart shouted across the water, ‘I’ll give you news. You’ll see the Prince this night at my house.’ The Bishop asked what prince and when Kinlochmoidart told him is said to have replied, ‘You are certainly joking … I cannot believe you.’

  The next part of their exchange was a telling one. ‘“Then,” said Mr Hugh, “what number of men has he brought along with him?” “Only seven,
” said Kinlochmoidart. “What stock of money and arms has he brought with him then?” said Mr Hugh. “A very small stock of either,” said Kinlochmoidart. “What generals or officers fit for commanding are with him?” said Mr Hugh. “None at all,” replied Kinlochmoidart. Mr Hugh said he did not like the expedition at all, and was afraid of the consequences.’ To which Kinlochmoidart gave the famous reply, ‘I cannot help it …. If the matter go wrong, then I’ll certainly be hanged, for I am engaged already.’ He was right — he was to be hanged, drawn and quartered for his pains at Carlisle in October 1746.

  Bishop Hugh hurried to Arisaig to urge Charles to return until he could muster some foreign help. However, Charles was well prepared for that line of argument and knew how to turn it around to his advantage saying, ‘he did not chuse to owe the restoration of his father to foreigners, but to his own friends to whom he was now come to put it in their power to have the glory of that event …. As to returning to France, foreigners should never have it to say that he had thrown himself upon his friends, that they turned their backs on him and that he had been forced to return from them to foreign parts. In a word if he could get but six trusty fellows to join him, he would chose far rather to skulk with them in the mountains of Scotland than to return to France.’ He knew instinctively how to appeal to the Highlander’s sense of honour and the Highlander’s conceit.

  But brave words were one thing. Firm promises of support were another. Young Clanranald’s errand to Skye had been in vain. The news came back that Sir Alexander of Sleat and Macleod of Macleod were sticking to their guns that ‘the P. coming without some regular troops, more arms and money, they were under no engagement to concur in the enterprise.’ However, Charles continued to work on his emotional appeal. On hearing the news from Skye he turned dramatically to Kinlochmoidart’s brother Ranald with a plea for help and won a famous declaration along the lines ‘I will! I will! though not another man in the Highlands should draw his sword; my Prince, I am ready to die for you!’ This emotional outburst ‘which appealed so strongly to the feelings and prepossessions of a Highland bosom’ as an early nineteenth-century writer put it, so overpowered some of the other Macdonalds, including young Clanranald, that they also swore allegiance.

  Yet a far more spectacular and significant coup was to come. Cameron of Lochiel had pledged his support to Charles whether he came with foreign help or alone. His powerful clan — which could raise eight hundred fighting men — was famed for its loyalty to the Stuarts. Furthermore Lochiel’s twelve sisters had married into a number of great houses so the Cameron influence was a powerful one. Charles was accordingly anxious to summon this blond warrior to Arisaig to ask him to honour his word. He came but with the greatest reluctance, convinced it was hopeless.

  On the way he consulted his brother Fassefern who urged him not to see Charles, correctly anticipating the outcome: ‘Brother, I know you better than you know yourself. If this Prince once sets his eyes upon you, he will make you do whatever he wishes.’ He was proved right but Lochiel felt in duty bound to see his Prince. The story of their meeting is woven deep into the Jacobite fable and again, if it is to be believed, Charles knew exactly how to play his hand: ‘In a few days with the few friends that I have, I will erect the Royal Standard and proclaim to the people of Britain that Charles Stuart is come over to claim the crown of his ancestors, to win it, or perish in the attempt; Lochiel, who, my father has often told me, was our firmest friend, may stay at home, and learn from the newspapers the fate of his prince.’

  Lochiel’s reply was just what Fassefern had been dreading. ‘No,’ he cried, ‘I’ll share the fate of my Prince; and so shall every man over whom nature or fortune hash given me any power.’ Whether he really said anything so high-flown or not he was as good as his word. Despite his reputation as the ‘gentle Lochiel’ he did not scruple to burn reluctant clansmen out of their homes to force them out for Charles, nor to secure from Charles a guarantee of income equivalent to the revenue from his estates in the event of failure. His support was a turning point as the Jacobites all agreed — if Lochiel had persisted in his refusal to take arms the other chiefs would not have joined the standard without him and that would probably have been that. A Whig critic was complimentary about Lochiel as ‘a very humane Gentleman’ but was less so about the Camerons who he described as a ‘lazy Clan, averse to Improvements … always ready to embrace every Occasion of Spoil’.

  As it was, Lochiel returned to his lovely house of Achnagarry where he had been planting trees when the summons came. His friends noticed a ‘deep sadness’ and how he set about arranging his papers and affairs ‘as a man does before setting out on a journey from which he was not to return’. Like others he seems to have sensed the inevitability of the events about to be played out. Alexander Macdonald of Keppoch also now pledged his support, afflicted by the same sense that there was no other option. Murray of Broughton observed shrewdly that ‘nothing has so great an effect upon brave and generous minds as when a person appears to despise their own private safety when in competition with the good of their country.’

  Convinced that the die was cast Charles sent away the Du Teillay. As Lord Lovat — a wily old fence-sitter who was willing to support whichever side would grant him the dukedom he craved, — observed, ‘If he succeeds the whole merit will be his own; and if his mad Enterprise bring misfortunes upon him, he has only himself to blame.’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  ‘TEARLACH’

  The Du Teillay had been hovering offshore in case of emergencies but it was necessary to cut this umbilical cord. Charles ordered her back to France and Antoine Walsh sailed away the richer for a knighthood and a gold-handled sword. He also carried a letter from Charles to his father exulting in the heroism of the Highlanders and affirming his passionate resolve to lead them to victory or to ‘die at the head of such brave people’.

  The ship’s log shows the disquiet of Walsh and Captain Durbé about leaving Charles with just the gentlemen who had come over with him, ‘two chiefs of the district, and with no more than a dozen men — these being all his companions’. It must have looked like suicide. However, Charles was cheerful about his prospects and set about his campaign for winning hearts and minds. He made Borrodale House his headquarters and became the centre of attraction for the neighbourhood with everyone ‘without distinction of age or sex’ crowding in to watch him. Overhearing a gentleman toasting the King’s health in Gaelic, Charles immediately appointed him as his language master. Here was a willingness to learn that Charles had seldom displayed as a boy, but he knew the value of wooing his public, particularly as that public was proving worryingly fickle.

  On 8 August he sent out appeals to the chiefs of the loyal clans to rally to the standard at Glenfinnan on 19 August. These included such stirring themes as his resolution to restore the King his father, or to perish in the attempt. He also offered an amnesty to those who had served the ‘usurpers’ from Hanover, provided they now swore allegiance to James, and he promised religious tolerance. He hoped such messages would strike a chord, but these were anxious days.

  It may have been an act of consummate bravery to send away the Du Teillay but it was also a rash one. What happened at Glenfinnan would be crucial. Clanranald and his men set off along the shore to the rallying point, but Charles went by boat with the baggage to Kinlochmoidart where news was brought to him of the first Jacobite victory of the ’45 — or skirmish to be more exact.

  The governor of Fort Augustus had got wind that the Highlanders were ‘hatching some mischief’ and sent additional soldiers of the first Royal Scots regiment of foot to reinforce Fort William. What happened on 16 August was evidence of the Englishman’s absolute terror of the Highlander: ‘Within eight miles of Fort William stands High Bridge, built over the river Spean, a torrent … extremely difficult to pass but by the bridge. Captain John Scott … who commanded the two companies … was near High Bridge, when he heard a bagpipe, and saw some Highlanders on the other side of t
he bridge skipping and leaping about with swords and firelocks in their hands.’ They were shouting and yelling and the soldiers ‘were struck with such an accountable panic as with one consent to run off without so much as taking time to observe the number or quality of their enemy’. They retreated only to find themselves blocked on all sides by advancing clansmen. Keppoch, with his sword drawn, ran up to them and delivered the uncompromising message that if they didn’t surrender they would be cut to pieces.

  They laid down their arms at once. Lochiel arrived with a body of his Camerons and carried the terrified prisoners back to his house. Not a single Highlander had been hurt and it had really been an absurd victory: ‘… I can’t help thinking that never accident of this kind showed more the extraordinary effects of fear than this, they had marched about an hundred miles and owned themselves greatly fatigued, yet after all upon seeing a trifling Enemy Idly throw away their fire without doing the least execution, and run twelve miles with incredible speed.’

  The Highlanders were delighted with this early success which ‘had no small effect in raising their spirits, and encouraging them to rebel’. Forbes, the Lord President, understood the propaganda value of this early victory and observed that it would ‘elevate too much and be the occasion of further folly. Two companies of the Royals made prisoners sounds pretty well and will surely pass for a notable achievement.’ It did.