Jennifer Roberson (54 page)

M
ost of the historical events portrayed in
Lady of the Glen,
particularly the tragic massacre itself, are documented, as are the portions of letters quoted within the text. With the exception of Cat Campbell and Jean Stewart, all of the primary people in this novel actually lived. Dair, known to history as Alasdair Og (Alexander the Younger) MacDonald, did indeed marry a Campbell of Glen Lyon, though her name was Sarah, and she was Glenlyon’s
niece,
not his daughter.

The Massacre of Glencoe itself is an obscure if bloody footnote in British history, but it did succeed in forcing the Glencoe MacDonalds —those who survived-into obedience to William and Mary, as well as persuading such holdouts as Ewan Cameron of Lochiel, Coll MacDonald of Keppoch, and young Robert Stewart of Appin to swear the oath.

In August of 1692, six months after the slaughter, John MacDonald —now the MacIain-brought the survivors down out of the mountains to take an oath of allegiance to the joint sovereigns. His stubborn younger brother, Alasdair Og, held out until October.

The growing public outcry against the slaughter, though noisy, was not enough initially to force an official Inquiry into the massacre until considerable time had passed. It wasn’t until June of 1695, three and one-half years after the massacre, that the Inquiry was held in Edinburgh and a full report sent to King William who, in the tradition of politicians and monarchs throughout the centuries, conveniently chose to overlook his own part in the proceedings and blamed the now-unpopular massacre on others, though he exonerated Sir John Dalrymple, Master of Stair and Secretary of Scotland; and Grey John Campbell, Earl of Breadalbane.

For some time the MacDonalds honored their oath to William and Mary. But Highlanders are Highlanders, most of them dedicated to the Jacobite cause. In the Rebellion of 1715, Alasdair Og MacDonald took a hundred swordsmen with him into battle. Thirty years later, at Culloden, John MacDonald’s son led the clan into battle in the name of Prince Charles Edward Stuart.

And so in 1746 the days of the clans, the pipes, the Gaelic—as well as kilts and plaids—ended. The MacDonalds, like thousands of other Highlanders, eventually were chased out of their glen by the Clearances and enclosure system, and the livestock that replaced their beloved cattle: sheep.

Twenty years ago, in a British History class taught at Northern Arizona University, my professor lectured about Scottish history prior to Culloden, speaking briefly of an “insignificant” little incident between Campbells and MacDonalds in 1692, a killing ordered by King William himself. It had become known as the Massacre of Glencoe, he said, and laid the foundation for a Highland hostility that exists to this day.

I believed then it would make a terrific tale, so much remarkable history commingled with the fascination of the Highlands as well as the romance of two individuals, but until I began researching the facts of the Massacre ten years ago I had no idea how much story there was to tell, nor how dramatic.

I am greatly indebted to reference works too numerous to list, but most particularly to the Penguin edition of John Prebble’s outstanding and invaluable reference work
Glencoe,
a detailed, incisive, yet highly readable and evocative recounting of the events leading to the massacre, the slaughter itself, and the aftermath. If readers are interested in learning more about this debacle, I strongly urge them to seek out this fascinating book.

As both reader and writer of historical fiction, I’m very much interested in maintaining accuracy whenever possible; however, I occasionally relied on personal suppositions and interpretations, and, where necessary, significantly compressed the time frame and chronology of events to improve the story’s pacing.

In March of 1985 I visited Glencoe. The valley itself is as I’ve described : surrounded on three sides by rugged, fall-broken mountains nearly always capped in clouds, skirted on the fourth by cold, deep Loch Linnhe, divided by the River Coe. Signal Rock, from which legend says a beacon fire was lighted to begin the massacre, stands in mid-glen. Sheep and cattle run free on the braes and tourists hike the mountains. But there is memory present as well, and a knowledge of tragedy.

In Glencoe today there stands a stone Celtic cross monument to the fallen MacDonalds. It is inscribed as follows:

 

 

 

The Principals:

 

In June of 1695, following the Inquiry, the aging earl was arrested on the charge of treason for drawing up Private Articles in agreement with the Highland chieftains at Achallader in which he promised terms he could neither offer nor authorize. Imprisoned in Edinburgh Castle until October, then released on the king’s authority, he retired to Loch Tay and lived quietly, though he sympathized with the Jacobite Rising of 1715 and was nearly arrested for it despite careful maneuverings so as not to be implicated. He pleaded old age and was left alone instead, dying later in the year at the age of eighty-one.

As the Earl of Breadalbane’s father detested him, so did Breadalbane detest his heir, Duncan. After Duncan eloped with Marjorie Campbell of Lawers, the earl petitioned the king to grant him the right to nominate another son as heir.

Two hundred years later descendants of Duncan and Marjorie came forward to lay claim to the disputed titles.

 

Throughout his political life, Stair made powerful enemies. Thus it became a simple matter for these enemies to lobby for the Commissioners to pin the genesis of the now-unpopular massacre on him. But Stair, having succeeded to his late father’s viscountcy, deprived his enemies of satisfaction by retiring from public life.

King William did not call for any action; in fact, he exonerated Stair by claiming that in London, so far from the Highlands, he could not have known anything of the barbarous method of execution. But William died, as did Mary, and Mary’s sister Anne became queen.

In Queen Anne’s reign Stair was welcomed back into public affairs, where he remained until his death in 1707.

 

In 1695, three years after the massacre, Glenlyon died a pauper in Bruges following a long illness and was later buried in an unknown grave. After departing the Highlands to fight with William in Flanders, he never again saw Scotland. He left behind piles of debts, few possessions, and no means to pay; even his eldest son, now Laird of Glenlyon, was forced to ask his kinsman Breadalbane for money to continue. It was granted, and the children of the ‘drukken man’ began a long attempt to restore their name.

This task proved nearly impossible. A story is told that Glenlyon’s grandson, called the Black Colonel, was ordered to carry out the execution of deserters, except that at the last moment he was to give them reprieve. As planned, the colonel pulled the reprieve from his pocket—but in so doing he dropped his handkerchief. The firing squad, responding to the customary signal, executed the men. The Campbell of Glen Lyon, seeing this, cried out it was the Curse of Glencoe.

He later resigned his commission. Unmarried, the Laird and his two childless brothers were the last of the direct line of Glenlyon Campbells.

 

Long a champion of the Highlanders and of Glencoe MacDonalds in particular, Colonel Hill was absolved of guilt by the Commissioners, who found that he had delayed acting on orders to kill the MacDonalds until left with no choice when identical orders were sent to his deputy governor, Lieutenant Colonel John Hamilton. Hill gave evidence against others, including Glenlyon, at the Inquiry and later returned to his duties at Fort William, where he did his best to speak on behalf of the surviving MacDonalds and other Lochaber men who were nearly broken by harsh taxes.

Governor Hill was eventually given a knighthood, but in 1698 his regiment was disbanded. He was discharged from the army at half pay, and died later in England.

 

Although when carried by stretcher to Fort William to swear he would take the oath, young Robert Stewart made no haste to do so. For several years after the massacre he proved an irritant to Governor Hill and his soldiers. Eventually Stewart was called to Edinburgh to explain his behavior; on the way he insulted one of Hill’s captains, and in Edinburgh got into a fight with two of the city’s officers. He was thrown into the Tolbooth until he swore the oath and agreed to apologize to Hill and his captain.

 

William was much annoyed by the aftermath of the massacre. His war in Flanders was going badly, and his primary advisors on the Scottish problem, Stair and Breadalbane, were under fire for their part in the massacre. Highly insulted by a Parliament that demanded specific royal action, William ignored continuing requests for an Inquiry and refused to accept any written reports.

It wasn’t until questions became so imperative that the king at last addressed them. William professed himself to be ignorant of the slaughter until eighteen months after it had occurred and claimed he was filled with horror by it. He pardoned all those involved save the soldiers and officers quartered on Glencoe. His wife, Queen Mary, had been so horrified she felt all those involved should be hanged, but Mary was dead.

William did nothing. He died of asthma complications in 1702.

 

Despite the support of the Jacobites, James lived out the remainder of his life in France, wholly oblivious to the political repercussions of his reign and exile. He had outlived his childless brother Charles II, from whom he inherited, and his sisters, Mary and Anne, who became queens because he could not be king. His son James Francis Edward grew up in exile and was denied the throne of England; there was also a persistent rumor that this child was not James’s son at all, but a servingwoman’s newborn smuggled into the queen’s bedchamber in a warming pan.

James II died in 1701; his son, called the Old Pretender and referred to in toasts as the “king over the water,” was proclaimed in Scotland as James III and briefly served as figurehead to the unsuccessful Jacobite Rebellion of 1715.

The Old Pretender sired Charles Edward Stuart, referred to as the Young Pretender, and it was this “bonnie prince” who, at the behest of Jacobites and the French, later sailed to Scotland to claim his inheritance.

This infamous attempt at restoring what James II had lost two generations before ended disastrously on the field of Culloden in 1746, when the Highlanders were slaughtered by English troops led by George II’s son, the Duke of Cumberland, later known as “Butcher” for his actions against the Scots.

KENSINGTON BOOKS are published by

 

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Copyright © 1996 by Jennifer Roberson

 

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ISBN: 978-0-7582-9220-9

 

ISBN-13: 978-0-7582-9223-0
ISBN-10: 0-7582-9223-6
First Kensington Electronic Edition: August 2013