George Keith, 10th Earl Marischal, by Placido Costanzi, circa 1733
Battle of Sheriffmuir
When Mar had raised the Jacobite standard at Braemar on 6 September 1715, James Edward Stuart was still exiled at Bar-le-Duc in the Duchy of Lorraine. He remained there for nearly two months, unable to influence events, while the government moved swiftly and effectively to put down the planned uprising in the West of England. Through subterfuge, James managed to leave Bar-le-Duc on 28 October, narrowly escaping assassination by two agents acting for the Earl of Stair who in his role as British ambassador in Paris had kept a close watch on the Prince. Disguised as an abbeA, James reached Saint-Malo with the help of an innkeeper’s wife at Nonancourt, near Dreux. Suspecting Stair’s agents of plotting a murder, she persuaded the local magistrates to arrest them, after locking them in a room.
James arrived at Saint-Malo in early November, planning to sail across the English Channel to land near Plymouth for a march upon London, but he was met with the report that the West of England was now held securely by the government. Only at this point did James realise that he would have to land to Scotland, as his half-brother, the Duke of Berwick, had always recommended. Berwick wrote in the summer of 1715: `Now or never he must make the attempt, otherwise he may make himself a Cardinal – he will never be a King.’ Ironically, this remark held some degree of prophecy as James’s younger son, Henry, did indeed, become a cardinal of the Catholic Church, after the failure of the 1745 Rebellion under James’s elder son, Charles Edward Stuart.
James initially planned to sail from Saint-Malo by way of Ireland to land at Dunstaffnage Castle, north of Oban on the west coast of Scotland, but, before he could leave, he learnt that Dunstaffnage had fallen to the government. He was, therefore, forced to travel from Saint-Malo on another dangerous journey across France to reach Dunkirk, from where he could sail across the North Sea to the east coast of Scotland. Delayed by contrary winds until mid-December, he then embarked on what was to be a repeat of his 1708 winter voyage, at risk both of capture and from storms. James may not have attracted the same admiration as his son thirty years later, but, as Sir Charles Petrie comments in The Jacobite Movement:
It was hardly the act of a coward to set sail in the middle of winter across a sea infested with enemy frigates for the sake of sharing the dangers of a dwindling band of adherents, whom, as he well knew, nothing save the direct interposition of the Almighty could save from destruction.
On 22 December 1715, James finally landed at Peterhead in his `own ancient kingdom’ of Scotland with only six companions. He then travelled south in disguise, reaching Feteresso Castle near Stonehaven on Christmas Eve, then the principal seat of George Keith, tenth Earl Marischal. There he was joined on Boxing Day by Mar and several other Jacobite leaders, including the Earl Marischal. However, James caught a feverish cold with fits of shivering and was not fit to travel until 2 January. After making a formal entry into Dundee on 6 January, he finally arrived at Perth on 9 January 1716 to review what remained of the Jacobite army.
James was in Perth for only three weeks. Contrary to popular legend, he was never crowned at Scone, judging the moment inopportune. An air of despondency settled upon the Jacobite camp soon after his arrival, as his followers realised the strength of the forces being marshalled against them at Stirling. Before James’s arrival, Mar had written to him:
Unless your Majesty have troops with you, which I’m afraid you have not, I see not how we can oppose them even for this winter, when they have got the Dutch troops to England, and will pour in more troops from thence upon us every day.
The Jacobite forces in Perth were bitterly disappointed that James had brought no reinforcements from France. After arriving in Scotland, James wrote immediately to the Duke of Orleans (then acting as Regent to Louis XV), appealing for troops, but there seemed no hope that he would help, given the closeness of Anglo-French relations after the Treaty of Utrecht.
Unfortunately, James’s personality also did not inspire confidence in his followers. One contemporary account, possibly written by Daniel Defoe in his role as a government agent, described him as:
tall and thin . . . [and] sanguine in his constitution . . . [He] has a vivacity in his eye that would perhaps have been more visible if he had not been under dejected circumstances and surrounded by discouragement . . . His speech was grave, and not very clearly expressing his thoughts, nor overmuch to the purpose . . . His behaviour and temper always seemed composed . . . I must not conceal that when we saw the person who we called our King, we found ourselves not at all animated by his presence, and if he was disappointed in us, we were tenfold more so in him . . . we saw nothing in him that looked like spirit.
Meanwhile, Argyll had made his final preparations to march north against Perth. He was encouraged to act by General William Cadogan, sent north by the government in London when Argyll appeared ready to offer terms to the rebels after Sheriffmuir. The Hanoverian forces had now more than 9,000 men in seven regiments of cavalry and twenty battalions of infantry, after reinforcement by 6,000 Dutch auxiliaries. At the end of January, additional munitions arrived from Berwick, Edinburgh and England. By then, Argyll was ready to march out of Stirling, although the weather was bitterly cold with heavy snowfalls.
On 21 January, Argyll had dispatched 200 dragoons to reconnoitre the state of the roads leading to Perth. Three days later, he left Stirling in person for another reconnaissance, along with many of his officers and a large party of dragoons. They advanced as far north-east as Auchterarder, greatly alarming the Jacobites at Perth, who responded by creating a belt of `scorched earth’ between Dunblane and Perth. The burning of the Perthshire villages became notorious. It should, however, be seen in the context of mutual reprisals ± the Hanoverian forces under Argyll also had been ordered to plunder Jacobite estates in the Lowlands before Sheriffmuir and, afterwards, raided other estates in the Perthshire Highlands.
James himself was reluctant to sign the order for
destroying all the corn and forage which may support them [Argyll’s forces] on their march, and burning all the houses and villages which may be necessary for quartering the enemy, which nevertheless it is our meaning should only be done in case of absolute necessity.
Mar wrote to Gordon: `The burning goes mightily against the King’s mind, but there is no help for it.’
Ranald MacDonald, now chief of Clan Ranald after the death of his brother at Sheriffmuir, was detailed to carry out the burnings, although he too had qualms. He left Perth on the evening of 24 January with 600 clansmen, mostly Camerons and MacDonalds. On 25 January, they arrived long before daybreak in Auchterarder, which they put to the flames, moving on to burn Blackford and Crieff the same day. The weather was atrocious, with heavy falls of snow, and many of the inhabitants were stripped of their clothes as they struggled through the snowdrifts and were then left out in the open. Lord George Murray joined whole-heartedly in the action on 28 January, when he burnt Dunning:
while men, women and children were exposed to the injury of the weather and the rigour of that severe and stormy season, it being in the midst of a terrible storm of frost and snow . . . and some of them died in a few hours thereafter, particularly one man and two women, who had formerly been weak and tender, and thereby the less able to bear up under such a terrible [ordeal], and to endure the sharp and cold air.
The burning of the villages in Perthshire gave the government a propaganda coup, which it exploited to the full. The Jacobite cause was irreparably damaged and James regretted the action for the rest of his life. Indeed, the memory of it preyed more on his mind than the failure of the 1715 Rebellion itself. Before he left Scotland, he gave instructions that the inhabitants of the burnt-out villages were to receive any money left over from paying off the Jacobite army. However, it was left to the government to pay compensation, which it eventually did in 1781, sixty-five years later, distributing the sum of £3,474 to the descendants of those survivors that could then be traced.
On 29 January, Argyll’s army eventually marched out of Stirling towards Perth, making slow progress as the snow had first to be cleared from the roads. The Jacobites had already heard, from their spies in Stirling, that Argyll was ready to depart and their camp promptly split into two factions. The Highland clansmen and their chiefs were said to be delighted at the news and were eager to move into action. But, cautious as ever, Mar and his senior officers had already agreed in secret that the army should withdraw from Perth if Argyll advanced from Stirling.
Mar now called a council of war, which started on the evening of 29 January and lasted all the next day, without reaching agreement. After it had broken up, Mar hinted at a meeting with his closest advisers that there was a plot to seize the Prince and surrender him to Argyll. This story, whether true or not, horrified those present, who then united behind Mar in his decision to retreat. The speech given by James himself to his troops before they marched out of Perth, showed that he also evidently sided with Mar:
I am in despair at finding myself compelled to withdraw from Perth without a fight; but to offer battle would be to expose brave men for no reason, since the enemy is twice as strong as we are, and I wish to preserve them for a more fitting occasion.
Accordingly, the Jacobite army started to withdraw from Perth on 31 January, leaving the city to be occupied by government forces just a day later.
The Jacobite forces now retreated towards Aberdeen by way of Dundee, Montrose and Stonehaven, closely pursued by Argyll’s army, just a day or two behind them. Only at Aberdeen did they realise that James Edward Stuart had already left Scotland for France with Mar. They had embarked on the night of 4 February at Montrose, where two small vessels were waiting, having sailed from Dundee. Since the vessels had left Dundee before the Jacobite army had actually begun to withdraw north from Perth, there appears to have been a pre-arranged plan, although Mar claimed later that it was providential.
In order to distract their attention from James’s movements, the troops had been actually ordered to parade after dark on the evening of 4 February, while his baggage had already been sent ahead to Aberdeen. While his army was marching out of Montrose, James Edward Stuart’s horses were being made ready at his lodgings. But, instead of following his men, James slipped down to the harbour and boarded the Marie-TheAreAse, along with a few senior officers, including Mar himself. A number of Jacobite commanders were missing from the party including Berwick’s son (afterwards the Duke of Liria), William Murray, Marquis of Tullibardine, George Keith, tenth Earl Marischal, and several others. It had proved impossible to alert them all in time, although it seems George Keith deliberately stayed behind to command the Jacobite rearguard as it retreated towards Aberdeen without its other commanders.
The Jacobite forces were now under the command of General Alexander Gordon of Auchintoul. They marched from Aberdeen through Old Meldrum and Inverurie towards Strathbogie, where Alexander Gordon, fifth Marquis of Huntly, refused them any help. Indeed, he ordered all his cannon to be buried to prevent them being used for a projected attack upon Inverness. Soon afterwards, Huntly surrendered to the Earl of Sutherland and Gordon Castle was garrisoned by forces loyal to the government. Meanwhile, the remnants of the Jacobite army had reached Ruthven in Badenoch, after marching through Keith, Glen Rinnes and Strathdon into Strathspey. Gordon wrote from there to Argyll, seeking a general indem- nity, but his letter was never answered. On 16 February 1716, the clansmen dispersed to their own territories at the end of hardly the most glorious chapter in Highland history. Their leaders would mostly escape abroad to exile.
Clanranald returned to the safety of South Uist, apparently with George Keith and his younger brother, while Gordon took refuge on Skye with Sir Donald MacDonald, fourth Baronet of Sleat. Another party of 160 officers rode north from Ruthven, after hearing that two French frigates were patrolling the Pentland Firth. From Burghead on the southern shores of the Moray Firth, they first sailed to Orkney and then to Gothenburg, where most of them took service in the Swedish army under Charles XII.
Even at this late stage, the Highland chieftains apparently still hoped to renew the struggle. On 31 March 1716, Clanranald reported that Seaforth had joined Glengarry, Lochiel and Keppoch in raising fresh forces with Gordon on the mainland, although he had earlier surrendered to the government. These hopes were illusory and many of the Highland chief- tains of the Jacobite clans sailed soon afterwards from the Western Isles to join James Edward Stuart in exile on the Continent.
James, however, was not welcomed by the French government, given their friendly relations with Britain following the Treaty of Utrecht and the Anglo-French alliance of 17 November 1716. By the last week of March 1716, James was forced to retreat to the papal enclave of Avignon, where many of the Jacobite exiles joined his court. Within a year, he had left Avignon for Urbino in Italy before moving to Rome in 1719 at the insistence of the British government, which wished to emphasise his close attachment to the Catholic Church for propaganda purposes. James Edward Stuart remained in Rome for the next fifty years until his death on 1 January 1766.
