Less than five miles east of Inverness, Scotland, lay the wind-swept, marshy, and undulating plain of Drummossie Moor. It was here on April 16, 1746, amongst the waving heather, aromatic cedar, and a noon-time rain that Jacobite forces—those who favored the restoration of the Catholic Stuart family line—met government “redcoat” forces loyal to the current English Hanoverian king, George II. Despite months of generally good success campaigning against government troops, Charles Edward Stuart’s Jacobite forces were in a compromised situation and spirit. In addition to being outmanned nearly three-to-two, the government troops under William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland were better equipped (especially with heavy artillery), rather well rested, and better provisioned in terms of rations and munitions. If the lack of men, firepower, and food weren’t enough concern for the largely Scottish Highlander forces that comprised “Bonnie Prince Charlie’s” Jacobite army, they would also be asked to fight on open, boggy terrain—terrain that likely would compromise their proven, winning fighting style: the feared and famed Highland charge. While surely armies throughout antiquity have faced similar grim situations and still prevailed, few of those armies have done so when encumbered by poor leadership and decision-making. Such would be the case for the Jacobite army of Scottish Highlanders at Culloden (pronounced CULL-aw-den) under the Bonnie Prince.
As the heavens began to open up and rain fell with an increasing intensity, the Duke of Cumberland’s lines moved forward steadily like a red-coated wrecking ball with drums sounding pace and time. The Duke’s better trained artillerists quickly silenced the Prince’s three batteries (12 cannon) of artillery. With the Prince’s artillery largely neutralized, the government cannon under the Duke switched to canister rounds—artillery rounds that acted like buckshot in a shotgun—and took aim directly at the Jacobite infantry. For the men along the Prince’s lines, it must have seemed like heaven and hell had concomitantly opened upon them as water and lead rained down with depressing and deadly intensity. With fight or flight quickly becoming the prevailing sentiment all along the Prince’s lines, the Scottish Highlanders of the Prince’s army broke ranks and began a disorderly forward rush toward the government lines.
While initially meeting with some success along the right, the attack ground to a halt and soon into a route. Because the lines between the Jacobite and government forces weren’t parallel, and because the ground in front of the Highlanders on the Jacobite left was much more marshy, the Jacobite attack on the left never fully reached Cumberland’s lines or kept pace with the right of the Jacobite line. The Duke capably and easily shifted his reserve troops to the left of his line to stem the onslaught of the Highlanders who had reached and broken his first line. With the attack broken and with Bonnie Prince Charlie having fled the field upon witnessing his forces in retreat, the Duke ordered his cavalry to pursue the fleeing Jacobites in an effort to destroy the Prince’s army once and for all. One period account by a government source stated it best: “Our light horse and Dragoons were speedily sent after them, and strew’d [sic] the road for 5 miles with dead bodies.” Thus ended the Battle of Culloden and with it all hope of future Jacobite resistance or political restoration of the Stuart family line to the thrones of England, Ireland, and Scotland. The Duke’s victory was as complete as it was lopsided, as Jacobite losses numbered fully eight times that of government forces. Beyond the clear victory, Cumberland’s success at Culloden remains notable because it marked the last pitched battle fought on British soil and also precipitated the decline of the Scottish clans.
Over the subsequent 12 months in the wake of the battle, the Duke of Cumberland launched a program of terror on Jacobite Scotland, especially in the heart of the Highlands. While the numbers of Jacobite Scots who experienced extreme pacification, to include murder and mutilation, range in estimates (according to which side does the telling), there is little disagreement regarding the message sent by government forces who wrought destruction of the Highlands in the wake of Culloden to all those within and beyond Scotland: armed resistance against the government and king would meet with swift, deadly action and reprisals. It would be a program pursued by the British crown and parliament on the continent of Europe, especially eastern Europe, and overseas throughout its growing empire, to include in Britain’s American colonies, as illustrated by the government’s response to the Boston Tea Party in 1775.
Dr. Chappo visited the Culloden Battlefield near Inverness, Scotland on June 30, 2017
DID YOU KNOW:
As part of the pacification of Scotland following the battle, the British passed an Act of Parliament in 1746 called the Proscription Act. Among other directives, the Act banned the wearing of the “Highland Dress” (the tartan or a kilt). While passed to further roll back Jacobite identity, it did more to harden the hearts of Scots than it did win them. The Act would eventually be repealed in 1782 in order to “bring great joy to every Highland Heart,” and, perhaps, to stem the potential loss of further British possessions in the wake of American independency which was all but totally affected by 1782.
DID YOU KNOW:
The 1776 Battle of Moore’s Creek Bridge in Currie (Pender County), North Carolina is still remembered as “America’s Culloden” because so many Scots fought on both sides, Loyalist and Patriot alike, and because Allan MacDonald, the husband of Flora MacDonald of Highland yore who aided Bonnie Prince Charlie’s escape after the Battle of Culloden, led Loyalist Highlander forces at the battle of Moore’s Creek Bridge as well.
Select considerations for further reading:
Bowditch, Lyndsey. Cύil Lodair, Culloden. Edinburgh, Scotland: GPS, 2017. (The official guidebook of Culloden Moor Battlefield for The National Trust for Scotland.)
Black, Jeremy. Culloden and the ‘45. New York, New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1990.
Prebble, John. Culloden. New York, New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1999.
