Over the Sea to Skye

We follow the trail of Bonnie Prince Charlie and the Jacobites through the Highlands

In the summer of 1745, Bonnie Prince Charlie sailed from France aboard the Du Teillay, landing on the island of Eriskay in the Outer Hebrides on 2 August. It was the start of the “Forty-Five” or the second Jacobite rising, which ended not in the restoration of a Stuart monarch, but in bloody ruin on the fields of Culloden, the last full-scale battle fought on British soil.

The dramatic tale has received a recent boost in popularity thanks to American author Diana Gabaldon’s bestselling historic fiction series Outlander and the popular television adaptation – although Gabaldon takes a severely critical view of the oft-romanticised Prince Charles, characterising him as egomaniacal, out of touch and a disastrous tactician. Yet this last hope for the Jacobite Stuart dynasty remains a fascinating symbol of a turbulent quest for identity, faith and nationhood that still has resonance today.

The origins of the risings lie in the 17th century. The restoration of the Catholic King Charles II to the throne ended the Commonwealth era that followed the English Civil War, but not the accompanying religious turmoil Charles’s brother and successor, King James II and VII, introduced promoting religious tolerance, but that alarmed the Anglican establishment, who interpreted it as a propping up of the Catholic minority.

When James’s second wife gave birth to a son, heralding the continuation of a Catholic dynasty, the king’s son-in-law, William of Orange – a staunch champion of Protestantism – began to assemble an expeditionary force. A group of seven English noblemen (the “Immortal Seven”) sent William a formal invitation in 1688 to come to England and overthrow the monarch, promising that the people would rise up and support him. The invitation was a key political strategy, making palatable the invasion of a foreign power.

William landed with a Dutch army at Brixham in Torbay, Devon, that November and James’s support quickly dissolved, with major defections from the English army; James fled to Catholic France. William’s victory, known as the Glorious Revolution, made him and wife Mary, the oldest daughter of James II and VII, joint monarchs and was a relatively peaceful transition.

However, James still had staunch supporters in the Scottish Highlands – the term “Jacobite” is derived from “James” – who saw this as a coup by force and refused to pledge loyalty to the new monarch.

Led by the Viscount Dundee, and supported by troops from Ireland as well as Roman Catholic and Church of Scotland clans and members of many Scottish noble families, the rebels defeated William’s superior army at the Battle of Killiecrankie in 1689.

An English soldier is said to have escaped by making a death-defying jump across the wooded gorge –you can still visit the spot, now known as Soldier’s Leap. But the Jacobite forces went on to suffer heavy defeats, and when William offered the Highland clans a pardon in exchange for taking the oath of allegiance, they accepted.

The Old Pretender

Yet the Jacobite cause survived, nurtured by resentment of taxation and the English-dominated Westminster parliament. Following an aborted effort to invade in 1708, James IL’s son, known as the Old Pretender, corresponded with the Earl of Mar and encouraged him to raise the clans. In 1715, Mar called clan leaders to a hunting match in Braemar in Aberdeenshire, where he raised the old Scottish standard and hailed James as their lawful sovereign. That instigated the first rising, with Mar’s forces making significant gains before succumbing to the Hanoverian army.

The Jacobites found new Spanish allies in 1719. George Keith, 10th Earl Marischal, led an invading advance party, arriving in Loch Duich and occupying Eilean Donan Castle which stands on a tidal island. However, they were left stranded when neither Highlanders nor the main Spanish force arrived, and in May the Royal Navy dispatched a trio of heavily armed frigates.

After three days of bombardment – which had limited effect due to the castle’s enormous walls, in some places 14ft thick – a detachment went ashore and overwhelmed the Spanish occupiers. The naval force discovered their stores of gunpowder and systematically demolished the castle, which was left in ruins until John MacRae-Gilstrap restored it to its former glory in the early 20th century.

The Young Pretender

Undaunted, James’s son, Charles Stuart, inherited and championed his exiled father’s cause, underlined by the belief that it was God’s will they should reclaim the throne. In July 1745, Charles sailed from France to Scotland, but the mission immediately met with misfortune: British warship the HMS Lion attacked their vessels, the Du Teillay and Elisabeth, the latter nearly sunk and was forced back – along with its precious cargo of men, weapons and supplies. Charles’s ship, successfully landed on Eriskay; local lore has it that the pink flowers which bloom there grew from seeds he dropped from his handkerchief on arrival.

To the dismay of his Scottish allies, Charles had come without French troops and with very little money, only a burning self-belief. However, he gathered support from Clan Cameron, meeting the chief at Glenfinnan, where there now stands a monument to fallen Jacobite clansmen at the head of Loch Shiel. The Lord Justices put out a £30,000 bounty on Charles’s capture; undaunted, Charles offered the same amount for the capture of the English King George II.

The first clash came at Highbridge – known as the Highbridge Skirmish – on 16 August, and was the first of several victories for the Stuart cause. The Jacobites captured Perth and Edinburgh, with Charles entering Holyrood Palace in triumph; 60,000 people lined the Royal Mile to welcome him. Lord George Murray’s surprise attack at nearby Prestonpans routed government forces.

But Charles was short of funds, promised support from England never materialised, and the young leader was feuding with his war council. In November, he left a garrison of 400 at Carlisle Castle to hold off the English pursuit led by George EE’s son, the Duke of Cumberland, but, following a long siege, the castle fell on 30 December. The Jacobites then tried and failed to take both Stirling Castle and Fort William – though the latter now hosts the West Highland Museum, featuring Jacobite weapons, medals and miniatures and Charles’s silk waistcoat.

The final reckoning came at the Battle of Culloden in April 1746. Short and bloody, more than 1,200 died in just one hour of battle, with the sword-wielding Highlanders running into cannon and musket fire. Visitors today can tour the battlefield and watch a Living History re-enactment of this tragic event.

Speed, bonnie boat

Charles fled and hid in numerous places – you can follow his trail through the Highlands and OuterHebrides, including a hut in Rarnish, Benbecula, Glen Corodale, Wiay, Acarsaid Fhalaich, Loch Eynort, Calvay Island and Rossinish, from where he escaped to Skye with Flora MacDonald disguised as her Irish spinning maid, Betty Burke (immortalised in “The Skye Boat Song”). He then returned to France, and the Prince’s Cairn on the shores of Loch nan Uamh in Lochaber marks the spot of his final departure from Scotland.

Though unsuccessful – and responsible for a crackdown on clan life – the risings captured the imagination, from writers Sir Walter Scott, Robert Louis Stevenson and Henry Fielding to the band Genesis and Doctor Who.

Those wishing to explore them further will have ample opportunity at the National Museum of Scotland’s new exhibition, which opens in June.

Featuring little-seen artefacts, from costumes, glassware and jewellery to documents and paintings, the exhibition also includes Charles’s elaborate set of travelling cutlery and wine beakers, and a lost portrait of the Bonnie Prince, discovered in the collection of the Earl of Wemyss at Gosford House in East Lothian. The exhibition promises to reveal the reality behind the myths, but whether history or legend, there’s no doubt that the stories of the risings will live on .