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Scottish Nationalism and Stuart Unionism: The Edinburgh Council, 1745

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 December 2012

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Copyright © North American Conference of British Studies 2010

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References

1 Lenman, Bruce P. and Gibson, John S., eds., The Jacobite Threat: England, Scotland, Ireland, France; A Source Book (Edinburgh, 1990), 200Google Scholar; Bell, Robert F., ed., Memorials of John Murray of Broughton, Sometime Secretary to Prince Charles Edward, 1740–1747 (Edinburgh, 1898), 507.Google Scholar

2 The prince; John William O’Sullivan; Sir Thomas Sheridan; John Murray of Broughton; Lord George Murray; James Drummond, 3rd Duke of Perth; Lord Lewis Gordon; David Wemyss, Lord Elcho; David Lord Ogilvy; Alexander Forbes, 4th Lord Pitsligo and Lord Nairne; Donald Cameron of Lochiel; Alexander Macdonald of Keppoch; Ranald Macdonald of Clanranald; Alexander Macdonald of Glencoe; Donald Macdonald of Lochgarry (eldest son of John Macdonald of Lochgarry); Charles Stuart of Ardshiel; and John Gordon of Glenbucket comprised the core membership of the council. According to Maxwell of Kirkconnell, all colonels were eventually admitted. From the outset, it was riven by bitter divisions and factionalism, principally between Lord George and the chiefs, on one side, and the prince and his close circle of associates, namely, O’Sullivan, Sheridan, and Sir John MacDonald (not a member), referred to by the Scots as the Irish intriguers. Following the retreat from Derby, the prince refused to hold councils, prompting Lord George and the chiefs to complain about the prince's secrecy, his lack of consultation with the chiefs, and his reliance on Secretary Murray, John Hay, and Irish officers such as O’Sullivan. Unhappy about the way decisions were being made and their exclusion from the process, the Scots wanted a greater say and demanded more frequent councils. Little changed, and the prince rarely held councils for fear of being overruled, preferring to exclude the Scots from crucial decision making—fatally, of course, at Culloden.

3 Maxwell, James, Narrative of Charles Prince of Wales’ Expedition to Scotland in the Year 1745 (Edinburgh, 1841), 7677Google Scholar; Henderson, Andrew, The History of the Rebellion, MDCCXLV and MDCCXLVI (London, 1748), 61Google Scholar; Ray, James, A Compleat History of the Rebellion from its First Rise in 1745, to its Total Suppression in the Glorious Battle of Culloden, in April 1746 (Manchester, 1747), 175–78Google Scholar; Ewald, Alex Charles, The Life and Times of Prince Charles Stuart, Count of Albany Commonly Called the Young Pretender (London, 1904), 181Google Scholar; Chambers, Robert, History of the Rebellion of 1745–46 (Edinburgh, 1869), 197Google Scholar; Duke, Winifred, The Rash Adventurer (London, 1952), 122–24Google Scholar; Cruickshanks, Eveline, Political Untouchables: The Tories and the ’45 (London, 1979), 100101Google Scholar; Black, Jeremy, Culloden and the ’45 (Sutton, 1990), 115Google Scholar; Duffy, Christopher, The ’45 (London, 2003), 313Google Scholar; Pittock, Murray G. H., Jacobitism (London, 1998), 102CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Harrington, Peter, Culloden 1746 (Oxford, 1991), 17Google Scholar; Sadler, John, Culloden, the Last Charge of the Highland Clans 1746 (Tempus, 2006), 151Google Scholar. See also Black, Jeremy, “Could the Jacobites Have Won?History Today 45, no. 7 (July 1995): 25.Google Scholar

4 Black, Jeremy, “The ’Forty-Five Re-examined,” Royal Stuart Papers 34 (1990): 1.Google Scholar

5 The new visitor center at Culloden Moor near Inverness regards Derby as the pivotal moment of the campaign. The storyboard identifies four key decisions during the campaign but does not include Edinburgh among them. The four key decisions were chosen because their position on the storyboard coincided with the physical changes in direction made by visitors as they walked through the exhibition. The Edinburgh council was excluded because its position was in the middle of a corridor and not at a point when the visitor turned right or left. Important aspects of historical interpretation were dictated by the design of the building rather than by the evidence.

6 Winchester, Charles, ed., Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 3 vols. (Aberdeen, 1870–71), 1:32, 1:35Google Scholar. “Unaccountable” was how John Roy Stuart described the invasion and how John Watts described the delay in Edinburgh prior to invasion. See Tayler, Henrietta, Jacobite Epilogue (London, 1941), 252–54Google Scholar; Watts, John, Hugh MacDonald, Highlander, Jacobite and Bishop (Edinburgh, 2002), 114.Google Scholar

7 Garden, James, Reasons for appointing and observing a day of solemn fasting and humiliation, to be read from the pulpit after the end of divine service on the Lord's Day immediately preceeding, by the several ministers to whose hand this comes (n.p., 1715)Google Scholar.

8 Allardyce, James, ed., Historical Papers relating to the Jacobite Period, 1699–1750, 2 vols. (Aberdeen, 1895–96), 1:182–84.Google Scholar

9 Major attempts were in 1689–91, 1715, and 1745, with minor attempts in 1708 and 1719; plots took place in 1703, 1706, 1717, 1723, and 1753, and France planned invasions in 1744 and 1759.

10 Macinnes, Allan I., “Jacobitism in Scotland: Episodic Cause or National Movement?Scottish Historical Review 86, no. 222 (October 2007): 229.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

11 Apart from France, support was also forthcoming from Spain, Sweden, Russia, and the papacy.

12 Lenman, Bruce, The Jacobite Risings in Britain, 1689–1746 (London, 1980), 87Google Scholar; Devine, T. M., The Scottish Nation (London, 1999), 3637Google Scholar; Whatley, Christopher A., The Scots and the Union (Edinburgh, 2006), 1415, 323, 339–43CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Macinnes, “Jacobitism in Scotland,” 225–52, at 232 and 239.

13 Macray, William D., ed., Correspondence of Colonel N Hooke, agent from the Court of France to the Scottish Jacobites in the years 1703–1707, 2 vols. (London, 1870–71), 2:63Google Scholar; Garden, Reasons for appointing and observing a day of solemn fasting. For a discussion of the relationship between Scottish nationalism and Jacobitism, see Pittock, Murray G. H., The Myth of the Jacobite Clans (Edinburgh, 1995), 88110.Google Scholar

14 Initially, they moved to the Duchy of Lorraine, then Avignon, before eventually taking up residence in the Papal States in 1717.

15 Despite the lack of French support, the rising looked promising. It attracted greater support from a broader base than either 1689 or 1708. Mar led a force of around 9,000 compared to the 3,500-strong force led by John Campbell, 2nd Duke of Argyll. However, Mar was a cautious and indecisive military leader and failed to take advantage of his superior numbers. The Battle at Sherrifmuir on 13 November 1715 ended in stalemate, and the Jacobites lost the initiative. James's confidence was demonstrated by his arrival at Peterhead in December, but his triumphal entry into Dundee and Perth was followed by ignominious retreat back to France via Montrose. While the rising in Scotland petered out, in England it was crushed at Preston. Leading Jacobites in the south of England were arrested before Mar had even raised the standard, as a result of intelligence sent from France. The rising by Jacobites in the north of England ended when they surrendered on 14 November. For a detailed treatment of the 1715 rebellion, see Szechi, Daniel, 1715, The Great Jacobite Rebellion (New Haven, CT, 2006)Google Scholar.

16 Black, Jeremy, “Jacobitism and British Foreign Policy under the First Two Georges, 1714–1760,” Royal Stuart Papers 32 (1988): 7.Google Scholar For details of Jacobite fortunes in the years following the 1715 rebellion, see Szechi, Daniel, The Jacobites, Britain and Europe, 1688–1788 (Manchester, 1994), 85125.Google Scholar

17 Lenman, Bruce, “Colonial Wars and Imperial Instability, 1688–1793,” in The Oxford History of the British Empire: The Eighteenth Century, ed. Marshall, P. J. (Oxford, 1998), 151–68.Google Scholar

18 The Jacobites had recognized for some time, but particularly following the 1715 rising, what Daniel Szechi has called the “seminal truth” that lay at the heart of their defeat: that “in order to beat the established order in Britain they had to have the support of a major European power.” See Szechi, The Jacobites, Britain and Europe, 85; Blaikie, Walter B., ed., Origins of the Forty-Five, and Other Papers relating to That Rising (Edinburgh, 1916), xxxixxxii, xlvii–xlviiiGoogle Scholar; Wemyss, David, Elcho, Lord, A Short Account of the Affairs of Scotland in the Years 1744, 1745, 1746, ed. Hon. Charteris, Evan (Edinburgh, 1907), 302–5.Google Scholar

19 Charles was actively encouraged by John Murray of Broughton and Cardinal Pierre Guerin de Tencin. Murray insisted that it was better to go than to delay, and he assured the prince that his supporters would join him whether he came with men or not. Murray later claimed when interviewed in captivity that during conversations with the prince, he had told him that while he could not come soon enough, he should not come without a body of French troops, arms, and money. Confident that the prince could raise an army in Scotland, the cardinal told him what he wanted to hear, that “France will have to send you help.” See Maxwell, Narrative, 14–15; “Charles to John Murray before June 1745,” in The Stuart Papers at Windsor, ed. Alistair, and Tayler, Henrietta (London, 1939), 119–21Google Scholar; Elcho, A Short Account, 238; Bell, Memorials of John Murray of Broughton, 428; Lenman and Gibson, The Jacobite Threat, 201.

20 Alistair, and Tayler, Henrietta, eds., 1745 and After (London, 1938), 45Google Scholar; Tayler and Tayler, The Stuart Papers, 120.

21 In a letter written in June, the prince commented on Fontenoy, “It is not easy to forsee if it will prove good or bad for our affairs” (“Charles to Daniel O’Brien,” 16 June 1745, in Tayler and Tayler, The Stuart Papers, 129). He could capitalize on a moment of British weakness and French success. The French followed up their victory at Fontenoy with further victories at Ghent, Bruges, and Ostend, by which time Charles was already in Scotland, and news of the victories could only have quickened his confidence. However, British reverses prompted talk of a peace treaty between Britain and France, which would have damaged his interests. The prince was aware that any further delay would not just cost him his expedition but “perhaps a treaty set on foot, to facilitate which I should have been desired to take a trip to Rome” (Tayler and Tayler, The Stuart Papers, 120). See Black, Culloden and the ’45, 65.

22 John Murray to William Murray, 2 October 1745, and Lord George Murray to William Murray, 4, 9, and 11 October 1745, both in Lord George Murray and the ’45, ed. Duke, Winifred (Aberdeen, 1927), 100105Google Scholar; Mahon, Philip Henry Stanhope, History of England, 1713–83, 7 vols. (London, 1839–54), 3:app. xxxi–xxxii.Google Scholar

23 McLynn, F. J., France and the Jacobite Rising of 1745 (Edinburgh, 1981), 99.Google Scholar

24 Bell, Memorials of John Murray of Broughton, 220; Tayler and Tayler, 1745 and After, 90. For a detailed account of the French response, see McLynn, France and the Jacobite Rising, 57–74. McLynn argued that it was characterized by indecision and that Louis hesitated and opted to play for time by sending d’Eguilles on his fact-finding mission when an expedition should have been sent immediately to consolidate the prince's position. According to McLynn, the downfall of all subsequent French efforts can be traced to that decision.

25 McLynn, France and the Jacobite Rising, 78. France had been debating the possibility of an invasion of England prior to the prince leaving for Scotland; see McLynn, France and the Jacobite Rising, 57.

26 Duffy, The ’45, 369–79; Black, Culloden and the ’45, 119–27; Speck, W. A., The Butcher: The Duke of Cumberland and the Suppression of the 45 (Oxford, 1981), 100102.Google Scholar

27 “A Portion of the Diary of David Lord Elcho, 1721–1787,” in A Jacobite Miscellany: Eight Original Papers on the Rising of 1745–1746, ed. Tayler, Henrietta (Oxford, 1948), 149Google Scholar; Cameron, Donald of Lochiel, “Memoire d’un Ecossais,” in Lochiel of the ’45: The Jacobite Chief and the Prince, ed. Gibson, John S. (Edinburgh, 1994), 178–79.Google Scholar

28 Maxwell, Narrative, 54.

29 “Memoire d’un Ecossais,” 178–79; Winchester, Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 34.

30 Elcho later recalled that d’Eguilles privately opposed an invasion and backed the council with promises that Louis would help them secure their goal. The marquis led them to believe that “it was all one to France whether George or James was King of England but that, if the Scotch wished to have a King for themselves, then the King of France would help them to the utmost of their power” (“A Portion of the Diary of David Lord Elcho,” 148–49; Winchester, Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 32–33).

32 “Memoire d’un Ecossais,” 179. See also “A Portion of the Diary of David Lord Elcho,” 153; Maxwell, Narrative, 92.

33 Tayler, Jacobite Epilogue, 252–54.

34 Winchester, Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 66.

35 Tayler, Jacobite Epilogue, 252–54; Letter from John Roy Stuart to James Edgar, Boulogne, ca. 1747, Stuart Papers, Box 1/265, Windsor Castle Archives.

36 Pittock, Murray G. H., “Prince Charles Edward Stuart,” in The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography in Association with the British Academy from the Earliest Times to the Year 2000, ed. Matthew, H. C. G. and Harrison, Brian, 60 vols. (Oxford, 2004), 11:149.Google Scholar

37 Grant, William, Prestongrange, Lord, The Occasional Writer, Containing an Answer to the Second Manifesto of the Pretender's Eldest Son, Which Bears the Date at the Palace of Holy-Rood House the 10th day of October 1745, Containing Reflections Political and Historical, Upon the Late Revolution and the Progress of the Present Rebellion in Scotland (London, 1745), 25Google Scholar; Winchester, Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 35.

39 Elcho, A Short Account, 302–5; Tayler, Jacobite Epilogue, 252–54. The French were ready to sail in December; the south coast of England was very exposed. As Chancellor Hardwicke acknowledged, “had it not been for the accidental dispersion and driving many of the enemy's transports and barks on shore near Calais, the enterprise had probably been executed by now.” Only bad weather prevented the French from exploiting the situation. Yorke, Philip C., The Life and Correspondence of Philip Yorke, Earle of Hardwicke, Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain, 3 vols. (Cambridge, 1913), 2:489.Google Scholar

40 Blaikie, William B., Itinerary of Prince Charles Edward Stuart from His Landing in Scotland, July 1745, to His Departure in September 1746: Compiled from the Lyon in Mourning; Supplemented and Corrected from Other Contemporary Sources (Edinburgh, 1897), 7981.Google Scholar

41 Menary, George, Life and Letters of Duncan Forbes of Culloden (London, 1936), 195254Google Scholar; Adam, R. J., “The Northern Campaign of the 45: The Story of a Little War,” History Today 8, no. 6 (June 1958)Google Scholar; Scobie, Major I. H. Mackay, “The Highland Independent Companies of 1745–47,” Journal of the Society of Army Historical Research 20 (1941): 536Google Scholar; Simpson, Peter, The Independent Highland Companies, 1603–1760 (Edinburgh, 1996), 118–36.Google Scholar

42 Maxwell, Narrative, 92; Ray, A Compleat History of the Rebellion, 79.

43 Maxwell, Narrative, 92. The prince was aware from an early date of the significance of Forbes in Inverness and sanctioned a half-hearted attempt by a group from the Clan Fraser to kidnap him. The attempt took place on 15 October. See Forbes's account: Forbes to Tweeddale, 13 November 1745, The National Archives (TNA): Public Record Office (PRO), SP 54/26/78.

44 Carswell, Allan L., “The Most Despicable Army That Are: The Jacobite Army of the 45,” in 1745 Charles Edward Stuart and the Jacobites, ed. Woosnam-Savage, Robert C. (Edinburgh, 1995), 3435Google Scholar; Duffy, The ’45, 122–23, 426–30.

45 Maxwell, Narrative, 130–31.

46 Tayler, Jacobite Epilogue, 254; Letter from John Roy Stuart to James Edgar; Elcho, A Short Account, 302–5.

47 Winchester, Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 34; “Memoire d’un Ecossais,” 175.

48 See Blaikie, Origins of the Forty-Five, xxix.

49 Ibid., xxxviii.

50 “Memoire d’un Ecossais,” 175.

51 Zimmerman, Doron, The Jacobite Movement in Scotland and in Exile, 1746–1759 (Basingstoke, 2003), 5759.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

52 Ibid., 177.

53 Letter to Charles Edward Stuart from John Gordon of Glenbucket, Donald Cameron of Lochiel, John Roy Stuart, Hector Macleane, Donald MacDonell of Lochgarry, and MacDonell, Younger of Glengarry, ca. 1747, Stuart Papers, vol. 293/167, Windsor Castle Archives.

54 Letter to Charles Edward Stuart, unsigned and undated but believed to be from those who subscribed, Stuart Papers, vol. 293/167, Windsor Castle Archives.

55 Winchester, Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 32–33.

56 Elcho, A Short Account, 332–33.

57 “Memoire d’un Ecossais,” 178–79. According to Jeremy Black, “A move to the defensive did not generally prove the basis of a successful rebellion in this period” (“Jacobitism and British Foreign Policy,” 12).

58 Elcho, A Short Account, 339.

59 Quoted in Pittock, Murray G. H., “The Political Thought of Lord Forbes of Pitsligo,” Northern Scotland 16 (1996): 81Google Scholar; see also his “Jacobitism in the North East: The Pitsligo Papers in Aberdeen University Library,” in Aberdeen and the Enlightenment: Proceedings of a Conference Held at the University of Aberdeen, ed. Carter, Jennifer J. and Pittock, Joan H. (Aberdeen, 1987)Google Scholar.

60 Grant, The Occasional Writer, 32–33; Black, “Jacobitism and British Foreign Policy,” 12.

61 Winchester, Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 34. John Roy Stuart believed that entering England with a force of around three or four thousand men in the face of nearly thirty thousand regular troops, not to mention the militias and with no account of a French landing or any assurance of an English rising, was foolish in the extreme. See John Roy Stuart to James Edgar, 1747, Stuart Papers, Box 1/265, Windsor Castle Archives; Tayler, Jacobite Epilogue, 252–54; Livingstone, Alistair, Aikman, Christian W. H., and Hart, Betty Stuart, eds., No Quarter Given, Muster Rolls of Prince Charles Edward Stuart's Army, 1745–46 (Aberdeen, 1984), 215.Google Scholar Stuart's estimate of 30,000 Hanoverian troops in England, while an overestimate, was not far off the mark. According to Christopher Duffy, Wade's army totaled 10,950, Ligonier's 10,700, troops at Chester approximately 1,450, and around London can be estimated at between 5,000 and 6,000; the prince's confidence was attributed to the fact that he had been brought up in a court where it was an article of faith that the Hanoverians were cruel tyrants hated by everybody, who only kept possession of the crown because they had enslaved the people and that if the prince, “or any of his family were ever to appear in Britain they would flock to him as their deliverer and help him to chase away the Usurpers family” (Elcho, A Short Account, 301–2).

62 “Memoire d’un Ecossais,” 178–79.

63 Christie, Ian R., “The Tory Party, Jacobitism and the Forty-Five: A Note,” Historical Journal 30, no. 4 (December 1987): 922.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

64 Winchester, Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 35.

65 Cruickshanks, Political Untouchables, 86–87.

66 “A Portion of the Diary of David Lord Elcho,” 152; Tayler, Henrietta, “Jacobite Rumours,” Scottish Historical Review 30, no. 109 (April 1951): 165–66.Google Scholar

67 “The most distinctive sound emanating from Tory circles in England during the Forty-Five was silence” (Macinnes, Allan I., “Scottish Jacobitism: In Search of a Movement,” in Eighteenth Century Scotland, New Perspectives, ed. Devine, T. M. and Young, J. R. [East Linton, 1999], 72Google Scholar).

68 An Expostulatory Address to the Nobility and Freeholders of Scotland, Shewing the Monstrous Folly as Well as Ingratitude of the Present Unnatural Rebellion, and the Intended Dissolution of the Union, by Arguments drawn from the antient Constitution and present Situation of that Kingdom (London, 1745), 3536Google Scholar; Ray, A Compleat History of the Rebellion, 177–78.

69 For English objections to the invasion proposals following John Gordon of Glenbucket's initiative in 1738, see Blaikie, Origins of the Forty-Five, xxxi–xxxii.

70 Despite this, Maxwell believed his readers would think an invasion a “somewhat strange” step (McLynn, Frank, Charles Edward Stuart: A Tragedy in Many Acts [London, 1988], 172Google Scholar). Acknowledging that there is no record of the voting, McLynn attempted a reconstruction. Sheridan, O’Sullivan, Tullibardine, Kilmarnock, Murray of Broughton, Perth, Elcho, and Lord Nairne voted for the prince. Glenbucket, Lords Pitsligo, Ogilvy, and Lewis Gordon were recruiting in the north, and Lord George Murray, Lochiel, Clanranald, Keppoch, Ardshiel, Glencoe, and Lochgarry voted against. The prince secured the vote, 8–7. See also Tomasson, Katherine, The Jacobite General (Edinburgh, 1958), 66Google Scholar; Maxwell, Narrative, 53. Lord George recalled that on one occasion only was a vote called for in the council, and it went overwhelmingly in favor of the Scots; see “Some remarks upon a letter wrote the 10th of May 1746,” JAC. AI. 12, Blair Castle Archives.

71 Memorials of John Murray of Broughton, 231.

72 “A Portion of the Diary of David Lord Elcho,” 149; Memorials of John Murray of Broughton, 231–32; Elcho, A Short Account, 303–4; [Hooke, Nathaniel], The Secret History of Colonel Hooke's Negotiations in Scotland in Favour of the Pretender in 1707 (Dublin, 1760), 34Google Scholar; Macinnes, Allan I., Clanship, Commerce and the House of Stuart, 1603–1788 (East Linton, 1996), 200.Google Scholar

73 Murray, Lord George, “Marches of the Highland Army,” in Jacobite Memoirs of the Rebellion of 1745, ed. Chambers, Robert (Edinburgh, 1834), 47.Google Scholar

74 Ibid.; Memorials of John Murray of Broughton, 234.

75 Bruce P. Lenman, “The Place of Prince Charles and the ’45 in the Jacobite Tradition,” in Woosnam-Savage, 1745 Charles Edward Stuart and the Jacobites, 11.

76 Maxwell, Narrative, 59, 70.

77 Winchester, Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 39; “Marches of the Highland Army,” 48; Maxwell, Narrative, 67–70; “A Portion of the Diary of David Lord Elcho,” 150.

78 Elcho, A Short Account, 333.

79 Cruickshanks, Political Untouchables, 100–101; McLynn, Frank, The Jacobite Army in England (Edinburgh, 1983), 130–31Google Scholar; Black, Culloden and the ’45, 115. Black argues that Derby and not Culloden signaled the end of the ’45; Duffy, The ’45, 313; Pittock, Jacobitism, 102; Harrington, Culloden 1746, 17; Sadler, Culloden, the Last Charge, 151. Charles Sandford Terry (The Young Pretender [London, 1903], 72) argued that the chances of success were of the slightest, while Lenman (The Jacobite Risings in Britain, 258) suggested that an advance from Derby on London could only be justified on the idiotic assumption of the prince that all troops sent against him would run away.

80 Winchester, Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 48.

81 Blaikie, Itinerary of Prince Charles, 73–74.

82 According to Murray Pittock, who argued that invasion was the correct strategy, there were five variables: the reaction of the London populace, especially the mob and governing elite; the embarkation of French forces; the landing of the French; the morale of the British field army, particularly in a situation where their lines of supply and pay had been cut; and, finally, a general rising in England. See Pittock, Jacobitism, 104. For an assessment of what might have happened had they marched on, see Black, The ’Forty-Five Re-examined, 8–10.

83 Colley, Linda, Britons: Forging the Nation, 1707–1837 (New Haven, CT, 1992), 7279Google Scholar; Black, “Could the Jacobites Have Won?” 28.

84 Grant, The Occasional Writer, 28; see also An Expostulatory Address to the Nobility and Freeholders of Scotland, 30–31.

85 “A Portion of the Diary of David Lord Elcho,” 148.

86 McLynn, France and the Jacobite Rising, 89.

87 “Letter from Prince Charles to His Father after the Battle of Prestonpans,” September 1745, in Tayler and Tayler, The Stuart Papers, 163.

88 The statement of that day had been prompted by news that the British parliament was to meet on 17 October. Irritated by this, the prince responded by declaring it an unlawful assembly and attendance a treasonable act. He underlined his point with respect to Scottish members by declaring that the “pretended” union was “now at an end.”

89 Allardyce, Historical Papers, 1:187–88; Winchester, Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 32.

90 Allardyce, Historical Papers, 1:187–88.

91 Anti-Jacobite propaganda had consistently accused the Stuarts of being addicted to arbitrary government. In his manifesto, the prince complained, “Do not the Pulpits and Congregations of the Clergy, as well as your Weekly Papers, ring with the Dreadful threats of Popery, Slavery, Tyranny, and Arbitrary Power, which are now ready to be imposed upon you, by the formidable powers of France and Spain?” Sermons of the time typically contrasted the benefits, civil and religious liberties, and free government enjoyed under Hanover with the arbitrary and tyrannical government they would endure under the Stuarts. Richardson, Andrew, A free and arbitrary government compared in two sermons: The first preached in the church of Broughton, on Wednesday the 18th of December 1745; being the day appointed by the King for a general fast on account of the present rebellion and the second preached in the same place (Edinburgh, 1746)Google Scholar; Willison, John, Popery another Gospel; or, A Demonstration that the Romish Religion is not the Gospel that Christ hath left his Church, but what Antichrist hath since devised, to the Destruction of Christianity and the Souls of Men: In Six Sermons from Gal. I. 8. preached in time of the rebellion anno 1745, and Published to give Warning to all Protestants through Britain and Ireland of the damnable Errors and Cruelty of Popery, and of the dreadful Danger and Tendency of the present Insurrection in its favours, with A preface, relating to the Justice of the Revolution-Principles and present establishment and the unreasonableness of Jacobitism and Disloyalty (Edinburgh, 1746)Google Scholar; Cumming, Patrick, A Sermon preached in the Old Church of Edinburgh, December 18th, 1745, being the Fast Day appointed by the King for the rebellion (Edinburgh, 1746), 2829.Google Scholar

92 A loyal Address to the Citizens of Glasgow, Occasioned by the Present Rebellion (n.p., 1745), 1819.Google Scholar

93 Winchester, Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 32.

94 “A Seasonable warning and exhortation of the Commission of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, met at Edinburgh 15 November 1745,” Scots Magazine, 1745, 517–19.

95 Allardyce, Historical Papers, 1:187–88; The English Protestant's Answer to the Wicked Sophistry of Some Late Treasonable Papers: and Especially of the Pretender's Son's Declaration dated the 10th of October 1745 (London, 1745), 22.Google Scholar

96 Following the union of the crowns in 1603, all the Stuart monarchs with the exception of James VII and II sanctioned attempts at closer union between the kingdoms.

97 Allardyce, Historical Papers, 1:178.

98 A multikingdom monarchy consisted of “a series of at least nominally equal kingdoms held together by royal authority.” See Lenman, Bruce, Integration, Enlightenment and Industrialisation: Scotland, 1746–1832 (London, 1981), 57Google Scholar; Pittock, The Myth of the Jacobite Clans, 90–92. For a flavor of the pre-union debates, see Fletcher, Andrew, “Speeches by a Member of the Parliament which began at Edinburgh the 6th of May 1703,” in Selected Political Writings and Speeches, ed. Diaches, David (Edinburgh, 1979)Google Scholar; A Speech in Parliament by the Lord Belhaven (n.p., 1703)Google Scholar; Ridpath, George, An Account of the Proceedings of the Parliament of Scotland which met at Edinburgh, May 6, 1703 (Edinburgh, 1704)Google Scholar; Rose, George Henry, A Selection from the Papers of the Earls of Marchmont illustrative of the Events from 1685–1750, 3 vols. (Edinburgh, 1831), 3:275Google Scholar; A Speech intended to have been spoken in Parliament by a Member who was necessarily absent (n.p., 1705)Google Scholar; Hodges, James, The rights and interests of the two British monarchies, inquir’d into, and clear’d: with a special respect to an united or separate state; Treatise I, Shewing the different nature of an incorporating and federal union; the reasons why all designs of union have hitherto proved unsuccessful; and the inconsistency of an union by incorporation with the rights, liberties, national interest, and publick good of both kingdoms (London, 1703)Google Scholar; Ridpath, George, A discourse upon the union of Scotland and England, shewing among other things, the grievances of Scotland in relation to trade: and the advantage it shall receive by a freedom thereof, cannot compense the losses it will other ways suffer by the union; and how since the union of the crowns there has been a prevailing party in the court of England, who have been imposing upon Scotland both in relation to church and state, obliging the latter to comply with that which was worse in the constitution of the former, and barring them that which is better in their own etc (n.p., 1702)Google Scholar; A friendly return to a letter concerning Sir George MacKenzies and Sir John Nisbets Observation and response on the matter of the Union (n.p., 1706)Google Scholar.

99 Grant, The Occasional Writer, 6.

100 Letter to Charles Edward Stuart from John Gordon of Glenbucket, Donald Cameron of Lochiel, John Roy Stuart, Hector Macleane, Donald MacDonell of Lochgarry, and MacDonnell, Younger of Glengarry, ca. 1747, Stuart Papers, vol. 293/167, Windsor Castle Archives; Winchester, Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 33.

101 A Seasonable Warning by the Commission of the General Assembly Concerning the Danger of Popery (Edinburgh, 1713)Google Scholar. In 1713, following a series of perceived national grievances culminating in the Malt Tax, Scottish members of parliament narrowly failed to introduce a bill for dissolving the union. Calls for a dissolution of the union persisted in Scotland until the outbreak of rebellion in 1715. Reasons for Dissolving the Treaty of Union betwixt Scotland and England: in a Letter to a Scots Member of Parliament from one of his Electors (n.p., 1713)Google Scholar; Union and No Union: Being an Enquiry into the Grievances of the Scots; And how far they are right or wrong who alledge that the union is dissolved (London, 1713)Google Scholar; A letter from a Lover of his Country, Showing our present Duty, if we would live in Hopes of seeing the Union dissolved (Edinburgh, 1714)Google Scholar; The History of the National Address for Dissolving the Union: By a Scotchman. (London, 1715)Google Scholar; An Historical Account of the Union betwixt the Egyptians and Israelites (n.p., 1715)Google Scholar; A Discourse of the Necessity and Seasonableness of an unanimous Address for Dissolving the Union (n.p., 1715)Google Scholar; Erskine, Ralph, A Congratulatory Poem upon the Coronation of His Majesty King George with Dunfermline's Address to His Majesty for Redressing Scotland's Grievances (n.p., 1714)Google Scholar; The Declaration, Protestation and Testimony of a poor wasted, desolate, misrepresented and reproached remnant of the True Presbyterian Church of Christ in Scotland: Published against the Proclamation, accession and establishment of George D of Hanover to be the King in these lands (n.p., 1715)Google Scholar.

102 A letter from a Lover of his Country, 5.

103 The Malt Tax of 1713 initiated the first, last, and somewhat half-hearted attempt by Scottish politicians to dissolve the union. The tax was never enforced, but English resentment at the low tax yield from Scotland led to another Malt Tax in 1725. Just as unpopular, there was rioting in Glasgow, and, in Edinburgh, brewers threatened to halt brewing until the tax was removed. If the public reaction was the same as 1713, the political reaction was very different. There was no talk of dissolving the union. The duke of Roxburghe, secretary of state for Scotland, leader of the Squadrone and sympathetic to the protesters, was removed from office by Walpole. Lord Advocate Duncan Forbes of Culloden and Lord Ilay the Lord Justice General, political opponents of the Squadrone, brought the Glasgow Magistrates to trial for countenancing a breach of the peace and ordered the brewer's petition to be burnt at the Mercat Cross in Edinburgh by the hangman. The reaction never went as far as a rigorous enforcement of the tax.

104 Kidd, Colin, “North Britishness and the Nature of Eighteenth-Century British Patriotisms,” Historical Journal 39, no. 2 (June 1996): 364.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

105 Quoted in ibid., 371.

106 Devine, The Scottish Nation, 23. Argathelians was the name given to the political group led by John Campbell, 2nd Duke of Argyll, and his brother Archibald, Earl of Islay. Between 1715 and 1725, Scottish politics was characterized by the political rivalry between the Argathelians and the Squadrone Volante. For the next forty years, with the exception of an interlude between 1743 and 1746, the Argathelians dominated Scottish politics. According to Alexander Murdoch, the lasting legacy of the Argathelians was twofold: their association with the eventual triumph of Scottish unionism over Jacobitism and the promotion of a secular public culture and economic development after the last of the Jacobite risings. See Murdoch, Alexander, “Argathelians (act. 1705–c.1765),” in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, online ed. (Oxford, 2008)Google Scholar.

107 In April 1736, John Porteous, captain of the Edinburgh town guard, ordered his men to fire on the crowd at the public execution of a smuggler. Smuggling was extremely popular at this time and is regarded by some as a protest against the union. Porteous was condemned to death by the Court of Justiciary but granted a stay of execution by the regent, Queen Caroline. A mob stormed the Tolbooth and hanged Porteous at the Grassmarket. Parliamentary anger was expressed in a bill withdrawing the privileges of Edinburgh. Walpole supported the bill; Ilay argued against but did not oppose it, while Argyll vigorously opposed it. The opposition was enough to force the ministry to withdraw the bill. The division among the Argathelians that followed the affair weakened Walpole's position in Scotland and damaged Ilay's reputation. In the 1741 elections, Argyll fought against the ministry on a platform of political independence (by which was meant freedom from interference from London) and patriotic principles. The opposition that had coalesced around him secured over half of the Scottish seats, but at no time did their political grievances ever translate into anti-unionism. It was an indication of the weakness of the Jacobites in the 1720s and 1730s that they failed to exploit and make any political capital out of the Malt Tax or Porteous riots.

108 Devine, The Scottish Nation, 47. Devine argued that union was relevant but not central to Scottish economic development in the eighteenth century. In the longer term, it could be regarded as the basic influence on growth because Scots managed to turn a potentially hazardous arrangement to their advantage. See Devine, T. M., “The Anglo-Scottish Union of 1707 and Scottish Economic Development: The Case Re-opened,” Scotia: American Canadian Journal of Scottish Studies 8 (1984): 115Google Scholar; Campbell, R. H., “The Anglo-Scottish Union of 1707, II: The Economic Consequences,” Economic History Review, new ser. 16, no. 3 (1964): 468–77Google Scholar; Whatley, Christopher A., “Economic Causes and Consequences of the Union of 1707: A Survey,” Scottish Historical Review 68, no. 186 (October 1989): 150–81.Google Scholar

109 Colley, Britons, 84.

110 Macinnes, Allan I., “Jacobitism,” History Today 34, no. 10 (October 1984): 24.Google Scholar

111 Colley, Britons, 71–85.

112 Fifteen of the twenty-five articles of the treaty of union related to trade.

113 An Antidote against the Infectious Contagion of Popery and Tyranny, humbly offered in An Admonitory Letter from a Presbyterian Society in Edinburgh, to their Friends in Town and Country, touching the present Intestine War (Edinburgh, 1745)Google Scholar. The paper was probably written by members of the Associate Synod. The Synod had begun life in 1733 as a protest against patronage and doctrinal declension when four ministers led by Ebenezer Erskine seceded from the Church of Scotland and formed the Associate Presbytery. The denomination subscribed to the National Covenant and Solemn League and Covenant, which were renewed in 1743. They protested against the union as unlawful, inconsistent with the covenants, and detrimental to the spiritual health of the nation. Nevertheless, they upheld the government as lawful, acknowledged the civil authorities, and consistently supported the Hanoverian succession. They regarded the rebellion as an unwelcome attempt to overthrow their religious liberties but also an opportunity to demonstrate their loyalty to the government and the Crown.

114 Cumming, A Sermon preached in the Old Church of Edinburgh, 27.

115 Wishart, George, Being the substance of some Sermons preach’d in the Tron Church of Edinburgh in the month of November, 1745 on occasion of the Present Rebellion (London, 1745), 1213.Google Scholar

116 An Expostulatory Address to the Nobility and Freeholders of Scotland, 44–52; The English Protestant's Answer, 23.

117 Clerk, John, History of the Union of Scotland and England, ed. Duncan, Douglas (Edinburgh, 1993), 207.Google Scholar

118 An Antidote against the Infectious Contagion: An Answer to the Pretender's Declaration; Or a Calm Address to all Parties in religion, Whether Protestant or Catholick, on the Score of the Present Rebellion (Dublin, 1745)Google Scholar; Colley, Britons, 83–84.

119 An Expostulatory Address to the Nobility and Freeholders of Scotland, 33; Colley, Britons, 78–79.

120 Macinnes, “Jacobitism,” 22; An Expostulatory Address to the Nobility and Freeholders of Scotland, 33; Grant, The Occasional Writer, 6–7; An Antidote against the Infectious Contagion: An Answer to the Pretender's Declaration.

121 It was presented to French Minister Jean Frederic Phelypeaux, Comte de Maurepas; see McLynn, F., “An Eighteenth Century Scots Republic? An Unlikely Project from Absolutist France,” Scottish Historical Review 59, no. 168 (1980): 177–81.Google Scholar On the morning of the battle at Culloden, d’Eguilles begged the prince not to fight but to retreat into the Highlands to regroup. Once strengthened and supplied by France, he could march south and take London; the “capture of that great city should be made his one object.” This view was inconsistent with his memo and his views as reported by leading Jacobites. It seems likely that he used the argument more in an attempt to dissuade the prince from fighting than as a realistic goal. See Blaikie, Origins of the Forty-Five, lxix–lxx.

122 Winchester, Memoirs of the Chevalier Johnstone, 32–33.