1745]

LETTER BY PRINCE CHARLES

215

prisoners in, I shall be obliged to release them upon their 21 Sept. parole. If they do not keep it I wish they may not fall into my hands again, for in that case it will not be in my power to protect them from the resentment of my Highlanders, who would be apt to kill them in cold blood, which (as I take no fol. 372. pleasure in revenge) would be extremely shocking to me. My haughty foe thinks it beneath him, I suppose, to settle a cartel. I wish for it as much for the sake of his men as my own. I hope ere long I shall make him glad to sue for it.

I hear there are six thousand Dutch troops arrived, and ten battalions of the English sent for. I wish they were all Dutch that I might not have the pain of shedding English blood. I hope I shall soon oblige them to bring over the rest, which in all events will be one piece of service done to my country in helping it out of a ruinous foreign war.

It is hard my victory should put me under new difficulties that I did not feel before, and yet this is the case. I am now charged with the care both of my friends and enemies. Those, who should bury the dead, are run away as if it was no business of theirs. My Highlanders think it beneath them to do it, and the country people are fled away. However, I am resolved to try if I can get people for money to undertake it, for I cannot bear the thoughts of snffering Englishmen to rot fol. 373. above ground.

I am in great difficulty how I shall dispose of my wounded prisoners. If I make an hospital of the church it will be looked upon as a great profanation, as having violated my manifesto in which I promised to violate no man's property. If the magistrates would act they would help me out of this difficulty. Come what will I am resolved I will not suffer the poor wounded men to lie in the streets, and if I can do no better I will make an hospital of the palace, and leave it to them.

I am so distracted with these cares, joined to those of my own people, that I have only time to add that I am, Sir, your Majesty's most dutiful son, and obedient servant,

CHARLES.

25 Aug.

fol. 374 Edinburgh, Tuesday, August 25th, in the forenoon, 1747. I visited Mrs. CAMERON, Dr. ARCHIBALD CAMERON'S lady,' who told me

1747

That it was a common practice amongst the red-coats after Culloden battle, dispersed up and down the Highlands, to raise the bodies of man, woman, and child out of the graves for greed of the linen, or whatever was wrapped about them, and after they had taken that off them to leave the bodies above ground. She herself had two children that died at that time, and she was advised to bury them privately in some remote heathy brae, to prevent their being taken up again; but she could not think of burying them in any other place than where their forefathers were laid, and therefore she was obliged to bribe a serjeant to keep the fellows from digging up the bodies again.

She and her poor children behoved to take to the hills, no houses being left in the whole country about them. Mrs. fol. 375. Cameron said she never saw the Prince in his skulking, nor knew not where he was.

ROBERT FORBES, A.M.

1747

25 Aug. Tuesday's Afternoon, August 25th, 1747, in Edinburgh, I had the favour of being introduced by Miss CAMERON (daughter of Allan Cameron, who died at Rome) to Mrs. ROBERTSON, LADY INCHES, who gave me the following particulars:

Some time before, and at the time of the battle, Lady Inches was living with her family in Inverness, her husband being in a dying condition, who was laid in his grave just as the

1 This lady was Jean Cameron, daughter of Archibald Cameron of Dungallon. See other narratives by her at ff. 547 and 566. An account of her husband's death is given at f. 1734 et seq.

1746]

ATROCITIES AFTER CULLODEN

217

cannonading began upon Drummossie Muir. On Friday after 18 April. the battle, April 18th, she went home to her house called the Lees, within a mile or so of the field of battle. Upon the road as she went along she saw heaps of dead bodies stript naked and lying above ground. When she came to the Lees she found sixteen dead bodies in the Closs and about the house, which as soon as possible she caused bury. When she came into the Closs some of the sogers came about her, calling her fol. 376. a rebel-bitch, and swearing, that certainly she behoved to be such, or else so many of these damned villains would not have come to get shelter about her house. Then pulling her by the sleeve they desired her to come along with them, and they would shew her a rare sight, which was two dead bodies lying in the Closs with a curtain laid over them. They took off the curtain and made her look upon the bodies, whose faces were so cut and mangled that they could not be discerned to be faces. They told her that the party who had been formerly there had cut and mangled these villains, and had left them in the house in their wounds; but when they themselves came there they could not endure to hear their cries and groans, and therefore they had dragged them out to the Closs and given them a fire to their hinder-end. For,' said they, we roasted and smoked them to death, and have cast this curtain taken down from the side of one of your rooms over them, to keep us from seeing the nauseous sight.' Lady Inches said she saw the ashes and remains of the extinguished fire.

6

The house of the Lees was all pillaged, the doors of the rooms and closets, the outer doors, the windows, and all the fol. 377. liming being broke down to pieces. The charter-chest was broke open, and the papers were scattered up and down the house; all her horses and cattle were taken away, though Inches was not in the least concerned in the affair, save only that he was a great Whig, and had a son out with the Duke of Cumberland.

When she complained to David Bruce, he told her to go through the camp and see if she could spy out any of her furniture or goods among the sogers; and if she did, the fellows should be seized upon, and she should have the satisfaction of having them hanged. But seeing she could have no

April. reparation of damages she did not chuse to follow Mr. Bruce's advice, and she declared she had never received one farthing for the losses sustained.

On the day of the battle when the chace happened, one of Inches's tenants and his son, who lived at the gate of the Lees, fol. 378. stept out at the door to see what was the fray, and were shot by the red-coats, and fell down in one another's arms, the son dying upon the spot; but the father did not die till the Friday, the 18th, when Lady Inches went to see him, and he was then expiring. Much about the same place they came into a house where a poor beggar woman was spinning, and they shot her dead upon the spot. In a word, Lady Inches said they were really mad; they were furious, and no check was given them in the least.1

Upon the day of the battle, about nineteen wounded men (but so as with proper care they might have been all cured) got into a barn. Upon the Thursday (the day after the battle) orders were issued out to put them to death. They were accordingly taken out, and set up at a park wall as so many marks to be sported with, and were shot dead upon the spot. In the barn there was one of the name of Shaw, whom a Presbyterian minister was going forwards to intercede for, because fol. 379. he was his particular acquaintance. But seeing the fury and madness of the sogers, he thought fit to draw back lest he had been set up amongst the poor wounded men as a mark to be sported with in this scene of cruelty. Lady Inches said she had forgot the minister's name, but she believed he was settled at Castle Stewart; but she would not be positive about the place of his abode, though she had got the particular story from a sister of that minister, a married woman in Inverness.2

To confirm this the more, it is to be remarked that when Provost Frazer and the other magistrates of Inverness (attended by Mr. Hossack, the late provost) went to pay their levee to Cumberland and his generals, the generals were employed in giving orders about slaying the foresaid men and other wounded persons. Mr. Hossack (the Sir Robert Walpole of the place, under the direction of President Forbes,

1 See ff. 421, 707, 1087, 1323, 1376.

2 See f. 1485.

1746]

THE HANOVERIANS AT INVERNESS

219 and a man of humanity) could not witness such a prodigy of fol. 380. April. intended wickedness without saying something, and therefore making a low bow to General Hawley or General Husk, he said, I hope your excellency will be so good as to mingle mercy with judgment.' Upon this Hawley or Husk cried out in a rage, 'Damn the rebel-dog. Kick him down stairs and throw him in prison directly. The orders were literally and instantly obeyed, and those who were most firmly attached to the Government were put in prison at the same time.

The country people durst not venture upon burying the dead, lest they should have been made to bear them company till particular orders should have been given for that purpose.

The meeting-house at Inverness [and all the bibles and prayer-books in it were]2 was burnt to ashes.

Lady Inches said it was really Loudon's piper that the stout blacksmith killed, and that MacIntosh's house is seven or eight miles from Inverness. When Lady MacIntosh was to be brought a prisoner into Inverness, a great body of men, consisting of several regiments, were sent upon the command, and when she was leaving her own house the dead-beat was used by the drummers. In the commands 3 marching from and to fol. 381. Inverness the horses trode many corpses under foot, and the generous-hearted Lady MacIntosh behoved to have the mortification of viewing this shocking scene.

ROBERT FORBES, A.M.

1 See ff. 259, 1320, 1378.

The passage in brackets is scored through as delete [ED.]

3 Here begins volume third of Bishop Forbes's Manuscript Collection. It is entitled: "THE LYON IN MOURNING, or a Collection (as exactly made as the iniquity of the times would permit) of Speeches, Letters, Journals, etc. relative to the affairs, but more particularly, the dangers and distresses of. . . . Vol. 3d. 1747.

Cui modo parebat subjecta Britannia Regi,

Jactatus terris, orbe vagatur inops !

On the inside of the front board of volume 3d are adhibited-1. Piece of the Prince's garter-ribbon. 2. Piece of red velvet, anent which on back of titlepage is as follows: (by Mr. Robert Chambers) The small piece of red velvet on the inside of the board was part of the ornaments of the Prince's sword-hilt. While on his march to England he rested on a bank at Faladam, near Blackshiels, where the young ladies of Whitburgh, sisters to his adherent, Robert Anderson, presented some refreshments to him and his men. On being requested by one of these gentlewomen for some keepsake, he took out his pen