by John Buchan
When, on April 16, 1746, the clans were broken on Culloden Moor, the first thought of loyal hearts was for the safety of the Prince’s person. The Rising had terrified the Government of George II., for it had won a glamour and a success which no one had believed to be within the bounds of possibility, and the glamour was created by the personality of Charles Edward. From a boy he had dreamed one dream and hoped one hope, and he had never ceased to see in solemn vision the crown placed upon his father’s head by his own hands, and his father’s subjects delivered by his own sword from a usurper’s tyranny. When he was about twenty, a young Scottish poet, a member of a great Whig family which had been the enemy of his house, was visiting Rome. The Prince, who made it his business to know all about British travellers in Italy, found the young Scotsman in the Capitol, and laying his hand on his shoulder, addressed him by name. “Mr. Hamilton, do you like this prospect, or the one from North Berwick Law best?” North Berwick Law was near the home of Hamilton’s Whig relatives, but early prejudices vanished before the charm of the Prince’s manner and conversation, and Charles Edward had gained a recruit for his future army.
This personal fascination had been the real strength of the Jacobite cause from the moment of the Prince’s landing in Scotland. There had been great expectations of French help, and when these seemed likely to fail, Prince Charlie had said in 1744, “I will be in Scotland next summer, though it is with a single footman.” Next summer, he had landed on the little island of Eriskay with seven men. His small following alarmed the few friends who met him. The task seemed hopeless, and they advised him to return home. “I am come home,” he replied, and gave orders to sail to the mainland.
His personal appeal led men to join him in defiance of every dictate of interest and common-sense. “I will erect the royal standard,” he said to Cameron of Lochiel, “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.” The words changed Lochiel’s mind. “I will share the fate of my Prince,” he replied. “Will not you assist me?” Charles asked another young Highlander, and drew the expected answer, “I will, though no other man in the Highlands should draw his sword.” Throughout the whole campaign, it was the Prince who maintained the Jacobite army; hope and inspiration came from him, and his were the fleeting triumphs that brightened the early months of an effort foredoomed to failure. “I leave for England in eight days,” he said in Edinburgh, “England will be ours in two months;” and in the Council of War at Derby his voice alone was given for the march to London: “to put it to the test and win or lose it all.” After the retreat and the victory at Falkirk, Charles wished to remain in the Lowlands and meet Cumberland there. He hoped to the end, and refused to seek safety in flight while he had still an army to fight for him.
On his arrival the Government had offered a reward of £30,000 for his head, and tradition tells that the Prince wished to retort by offering £30 as an adequate sum for the head of the Elector of Hanover. Even in the hour of defeat at Culloden, his followers felt that the ministers of King George would still be eager to secure the person of an enemy, whose charm and fascination had wrought one miracle and might be employed to work another. While the Prince was still a free man, could the House of Hanover be safe? The savage Duke of Cumberland would certainly wish to add to his tarnished laurels the glory of the capture of the fugitive. There was little time for consideration; the battle was fought and lost in less than half an hour, and Cumberland’s fresh troops might be trusted to be active in the pursuit. The Prince would not believe that all was lost, and he tried to induce the stragglers to return to the charge. Those nearest to him begged him not to expose his person needlessly, for the broken clans would not rally. He hesitated, and one of them seized his bridle and turned his horse’s head to the rear, just as, a hundred years before, his great-grandfather, Charles I., had been led off the field of Naseby with the words, “Will you go upon your death?”
I
IN BADENOCH AND LOCHABER
For a few minutes it seemed as if the Prince were still “going upon” his death. The fire of Cumberland’s artillery did not slacken as the Jacobite army wavered, and the retreating Prince had his horse shot under him. A groom brought him a fresh horse, and, as he mounted, the man fell dead by his side. Whither was he to flee? No plan had been made for the event of a defeat, and no rendezvous had been appointed for the beaten army. Accompanied by a few friends, and a body-guard of some fifty horse, he rode off towards the river Nairn. His direction was southwards, and Cumberland was pushing the pursuit westwards to Inverness, but had detached a body of horse to ride down the stragglers. Charles left the field blinded with tears that fell for his lost hopes, and he very narrowly escaped falling in with this force as he pursued his uncertain way.
His bonnet fell from his head, and a private in his Life Guards brought him another. It was Edward Burke, whom the Prince recognized as a servant of one of his aides-de-camp. Burke belonged to an Irish family which, for some generations, had been settled in the Hebrides, and he was a native of North Uist. When he joined the army he was a “chairman” (the carrier of a sedan chair) in Edinburgh, but he had been a gentleman’s servant, and had travelled much with his master, and he knew the country. “Ned,” said the Prince, “if you be a true friend, lead us safe off.” Ned, greatly honoured, did his best, and was the wanderer’s first guide. Ned Burke was described by those who knew him as true as steel but a rough man, and he addressed the Prince with the wonted familiarity of the Scottish peasantry. Charles humoured him and chaffed him, and they had a standing joke about “Deil speed the leears (liars),” a wish obviously appropriate to a disguised prince and his companions.
When Ned took command of the party, the Prince dismissed his body-guard, and with Ned’s master and five others he crossed the Nairn and rode for some distance up the right bank. It was growing late and they sought refuge at Tordarroch, but in vain, and pushing on, they recrossed the river near Aberarder, where they were again refused entrance. Both of these places were too near Inverness for safety. It was fortunate that they did not halt until they reached the hamlet of Gortuleg, where, in a house still in existence, they found the aged Lord Lovat, the Fox of the Highlands, who had played false to both sides, and was attempting to escape from the fate that was to overtake him on Tower Hill. The Prince drank three glasses of wine with Lovat, who reminded him that Robert the Bruce had lost eleven battles and won Scotland by the twelfth. Doubtful history, and a moral which could not be acted upon, were poor consolation, and Charles speedily left his host and rode on through the night.
There was some moonlight — the moon was in her first quarter — and the tired little company reached Invergarry Castle just as the moon was setting. The house was empty and there was no food; but the Prince had some rest, and Ned Burke noticed a fishing net which had been set, and found two salmon, which he cooked for their breakfast. In the afternoon they took to their horses again and rode along Loch Arkaig to Glenpean, where they spent the night. Next day the Prince expected a communication from his friends or a hint of the doings of his pursuers, but none came. Cumberland, in fact, was on the wrong track. He thought that the fugitive had made his way to Lovat’s country near Beauly, and the real route was unknown to the enemy. Making for the sea, the Prince walked from Glenpean over the hills to the beautiful region of Morar, had some sleep in a lonely shieling, and through the night of the 20th April tramped to Borrodale, in Arisaig, where he had landed nine months before.
Less than a fortnight later, two French vessels, carrying gold, reached Borrodale, but the Prince was no longer there. He had stayed for five days, but he could not know where his safety lay, and his friends had sent him a fresh guide in the person of a Skye farmer named Donald MacLeod. The Prince went out to meet Donald and they had their first conversation alone in a wood. His new
friend was horror-struck at the Prince’s first suggestion. Like his ancestress Queen Mary, Charles was seized with a mad desire to throw himself on the mercy of his enemies. He did not, indeed, propose to surrender to Cumberland’s troops, but he asked Donald to carry letters for him to his own chief, MacLeod, and to Sir Alexander MacDonald of Sleat. These men were on the Government side, but he believed that they would do everything in their power for his safety. Donald replied that his life was at the Prince’s command, but that nothing would induce him thus to reveal his whereabouts. “Does not your Excellency know that these men have played the rogue to you altogether, and will you trust them for a’ that? Na, you maunna do’t.” Then Donald told him that the Laird of MacLeod and Sir Alexander MacDonald were searching for him about twelve miles away by sea, and urged that the sooner he left Borrodale the better. Donald was a skilful seaman, and he undertook to conduct the Prince to the Hebrides, in the hope of finding a ship to take him to France.
It was not good advice, for a British fleet commanded the seas, and the islands were easily watched. The best hiding-place was in the wild district of Morar, whence, as we have seen, he could have escaped within a fortnight. But he could not tell that his refuge might not be discovered. It was quite well known among the people, for Donald’s son Murdoch, an Inverness schoolboy, who had run away from school to fight at Culloden, astonished his father by appearing at Borrodale; he had traced and followed the Prince, and less friendly inquirers might do the same. Charles thought of the £30,000 reward, and as yet he did not realize that the Highlanders were not thinking about it. He spent five more unhappy and restless days at Borrodale, while Donald MacLeod obtained a boat and a crew. At last an eight-oared boat was ready, with eight boatmen, among whom were Ned Burke and the boy, Murdoch MacLeod. The Prince’s companions were Captain O’Sullivan, Captain O’Neil, Captain Allan MacDonald, and a Roman priest. Donald MacLeod was skipper, and he is known to history as the Prince’s Pilot.
On the evening of 26th April the Pilot warned the Prince that a great storm was coming, and begged him not to sail; but Charles was anxious about the parties which were searching for him on the mainland, and he insisted. They were unobserved by any of the Government vessels; indeed, the fleet had gone off to the remote island of St. Kilda, misled by some rumour that the Prince was there. But the Pilot’s prophecy was fulfilled; he said afterwards that the tempest was more violent than any “he had ever been trysted with before, though all his life a seafaring man.” Thunder and lightning and torrential rain, a hurricane, and a heavy sea, were a new experience for a Prince in an open boat. “I had rather face cannons and muskets than be in such a storm as this,” he said, and told Donald to make again for the shore. To obey the command would have been certain death. “Since we are here,” said the Pilot, “we have nothing for it but, under God, to set out to sea. Is it not as good for us to be drowned in clean water as to be dashed in pieces upon a rock and to be drowned too?” So they made for the open sea; it was pitch dark, they had neither lantern nor compass nor even a pump. Through the whole night scarcely a man spoke one word; the thought of all was that it would be better to be drowned in clean water than to be driven on the coast of Skye, where bodies of militiamen were on the outlook for the wanderer.
II
IN THE OUTER ISLES
Morning broke, and the storm was still raging, but they were far beyond the shores of Skye. They succeeded in landing at Rossinish in Benbecula, and found an uninhabited hut in which they lit a fire and dried their clothes. In this desolate region they remained two days, and on the night of 29th April set sail for the island of Scalpa, the tenant of which, Donald Campbell, was a friend of the Pilot. They agreed to represent themselves as the captain and crew of a ship which had been wrecked on the island of Tiree. O’Sullivan took the name of Captain Sinclair, and the Prince passed as young Sinclair, his son. They were hospitably received at Scalpa, and their host, Donald Campbell, was in the secret of the shipwrecked crew. They were eager, they said, to return to their home in the Orkneys, and sent the Pilot to Stornoway to hire a vessel.
Meanwhile, mischief was brewing. John Macaulay, minister of South Uist (grandfather of Lord Macaulay), had heard of the Prince’s coming, and he informed his father, Aulay Macaulay, minister of Harris. The Macaulays were strong Whigs, and there is a tradition that, while Prince Charlie was in Scalpa, Aulay Macaulay and a neighbouring laird landed in the island with a boatful of armed men and announced their intention of earning the blood-money which the Government had offered. But Donald Campbell warned the Prince and his followers, and told the invaders that he would himself fall in the Prince’s cause rather than give up a man who had entrusted him with his life, and Macaulay and his friends “sneaked off the island.” At all events, the information sent by John Macaulay (who long afterwards was snubbed at Inveraray by Dr. Johnson) spoiled the plan of the shipwrecked mariners. When Donald MacLeod reached Stornoway, he found difficulty in securing a ship and suspected that the truth was known; but at last he succeeded in buying one and sent the good news to Scalpa.
On 4th May the Prince, with O’Sullivan, O’Neil, and Ned Burke, crossed to Harris. The journey was unfortunate, for they were misled by a guide whom they had engaged, and they tramped all night through wind and rain. The Pilot met them and told them that he had arranged for their reception at Kildun House, two miles from Stornoway, and he himself returned to the town to make final preparations. To his surprise, he found the road barred by two or three hundred men in arms, who explained that they knew the Prince was coming with a force of five hundred men to seize a vessel in Stornoway, and that they feared the vengeance of the Government. He told them the truth, and they disowned any intention of doing the Prince an injury, but insisted on his taking his departure. It was in vain that Donald asked for a guide who knew these stormy seas, and he had to return and tell the news. The boat had followed them, though two of the boatmen had deserted, and on the morning of 6th May they set sail for Scalpa.
As they approached the island they had the “comfort and mortification” of seeing, without being observed, three Government vessels on the outlook, and they changed their course for the desert island of Euirn or Iubhard, where they found some fishermen who had erected little huts, like pigsties, for a temporary shelter. The fishermen mistook the newcomers for a press-gang from the war-ships and fled, but they left their fish behind them, and the fugitives had brought some provisions. They remained for four days on this desolate island, occupying one of the “pigsties.” It rained hard and they had to cover the hut with the boat-sail for shelter, but the Prince was in excellent spirits. He insisted on doing the cooking himself, and laughed at Ned Burke for being too fine to eat butter which had got mixed up with bread-crumbs. A large stone served as a table for the Prince and the gentlemen, and the boatmen ate by themselves. Leaving this retreat on 10th May, they returned to Scalpa, but found that their kind host had been compelled to flee, and that it was not safe for them to remain.
It was after leaving Scalpa that the Prince had his first narrow escape. They were sailing south along the coast of Harris, when, near Finsbay, they found themselves within two musket shots of a man-of-war under full sail. Their little boat was itself under full sail and the boatmen rowed for dear life. “I will never be taken alive,” said the Prince as the race went on. They were hotly pursued for three leagues, until they reached shallow water near Rodil Point, where their enemy could not follow them as they sailed among the creeks. After an ineffectual attempt, he turned his course out to sea, and they hugged the coast until they reached Loch Maddy. There they spied another war-ship, but retreated from the loch without attracting observation, and that night (11th May) they landed on an island in Loch Uskavagh in Benbecula. During their two days’ sail they were short of food, and the Prince, who had given his followers some lessons in cooking at Euirn, was taught how to make drammock, that is, meal mixed with water — salt water unfortunately. He ate heartily of it, and his Pilot loved to tell h
ow “never any meat or drink came wrong to him, for he could take a share of everything, be it good, bad, or indifferent, and was always cheerful and contented in every condition.”
There was need of cheerfulness, for though, as they were landing in the rain, one of the boatmen captured a crab and waved it triumphantly at the Prince, the hut, which was their only refuge, was so low that they had to dig below the door and line the hole with heather for the Prince to crawl through. The hut, said the Prince, had been inhabited by the devil, who had left it because he had not room enough in it. After three days in this island, they crossed to South Uist and walked to Coradale, where Charles had more comfortable quarters in a cottage. He was delighted with his new abode and sat on a turf seat smoking a pipe very happily until bedtime. The three weeks spent at Coradale were the least troubled period of his wanderings. He was a good shot, and brought down a deer one day “firing off-hand”; he also fished from a small boat with a hand-line. The weather was fine, and he often sat on a stone by the door, basking in the sunshine and watching the ships pass; he deluded himself with the hope that they were French, but his friends knew that they were on the watch for him. Occasionally he was melancholy, but he would recover, and dance for a whole hour together to the music of a Highland reel, which he whistled as he tripped along.
The happy days did not last long; the Government troops returned from their vain journey to St. Kilda, and Barra and Uist began to be dangerous. Donald MacLeod, the Pilot, had been sent to the mainland and returned with news and two ankers of brandy, in time to accompany the Prince in the flight which was rendered necessary by the presence of troops in the neighbourhood. On 6th June they sailed to the island of Ouia or Wiay, about twelve mites distant, but they were not yet safe, and returned to Rossinish in Benbecula, fortunately not taking the Pilot with them. At Rossinish Charles was in grave danger, for he was warned to make his escape, and the passage to Ouia was guarded by Government vessels. Taking advantage of the short midsummer hours of darkness or twilight, Donald MacLeod brought a boat to the rescue, and they made for their old retreat at Coradale; but a storm and a glimpse of two war-ships forced them to land where they could, and the Prince slept in a cleft of a rock, drawing his bonnet over his eyes for shelter. The storm continued to rage all next day, but the enemy were within two miles of them, and at night they found another refuge. Their hope was to reach the territory of MacDonald of Boisdale, who, they believed, could help them, and on 15th June they sailed for Boisdale in South Uist.
