Who were the Jacobites? A battleside chat.

Added: 2026-05-22

[00:00:15]So here in the rather beautiful Dunkeld Cathedral, a peaceful spot on the banks of the River Tay, just flowing down from the the wonderful Loch Tay and out towards Dundee.

[00:00:29]It was here in 1689 that a British Army regiment, newly formed as the Earl of Angus's, later the Cameronians, defended the town from Highlanders leading to the death of the commanders involved on the British government side, but ultimately their victory.

[00:00:50]And that was the pretty much the end of the first Jacobite rising.

[00:00:54]It's much overshadowed by the 1745, which culminated at Culloden and then the West Coast actions.

[00:01:02]However, to get from Culloden back from Charles II, who was the restored monarch, the king of bling, the people's party, >> [laughter] >> and then bring us to the Highlands where we have Scots on Scots fighting for the control of not just Scottish crown, but all of the British throne, there are other strange turn of events. So, why was James II popular and unpopular?

[00:01:37]So James II was, I think, popular in some circles for genuinely ahead of his time religious toleration.

[00:01:46]And you can read that one of two ways.

[00:01:47]He either wanted to make Britain religiously tolerant and therefore bring back his own personal Catholic faith, or he was is a man slightly ahead of his time.

[00:01:57]Either way, he was unpopular because he decided to circumvent Parliament in order to force these measures through.

[00:02:05]He'd also previously been the Lord High Admiral and had done a not terrible job in bringing the Royal Navy up to snuff after the restoration of his brother, Charles II. Cuz Charles II was a Protestant until his deathbed.

[00:02:17]Yes, Charles II converted to Catholicism on his deathbed and there was always a long-running suggestion that he had harbored very deep Catholic sympathies in the past. Very possible. Very possible and certainly converted on his deathbed, which then gave us a Catholic monarch in Britain, which there'd been suspicions about possibly because of the Gunpowder Plot, but at least since the Reformation, and a lot of bloodshed had been shed around the Reformation, fought against not just in England and Scotland, but actually in Europe the wars were actually far worse. And I think there was probably this fear of a religious war leading up I think there was more than that as well. I think in the minds of English and Scottish Protestants, Catholicism was a religion of tyranny and oppression and absolutism. And I think people who had come to really value what they saw as their personal liberty and their parliamentary rights.

[00:03:13]Now, Charles II obviously suspended some of those, but but Catholicism was inherently seen as as linked to absolutism and universal monarchy that was embodied by Louis XIV and the Habsburgs as well.

[00:03:25]Right, so James II is on the phone. He's trying to do some religious reforms.

[00:03:31]He's very sadly not had many children make it past infancy.

[00:03:37]Very young deaths and then has another son. Yes. And I hate the term fake news, so I would say there's a lot of propaganda about this son.

[00:03:47]The the baby being snuck in in the warming pan is one.

[00:03:51]>> Yeah.

[00:03:51]So there's an idea that that it wasn't actually his child, that it was a child of a maidservant or someone else that was was smuggled into the bedroom in a warming pan to oh, the queen's had a boy and he's going to live. And this is the era of official witnesses to a royal birth. A lot of old men sitting at the end of a bed giving watching the queen give birth. Yeah, I I I I don't have much faith in it myself, but but what it did was galvanize a response from from the kind of anti-James faction in Parliament because they weren't too worried if James didn't have any children, the crown would devolve on Mary who was a devout Protestant.

[00:04:27]Two daughters, Mary and Anne, both of whom were very staunch Protestants in in very different ways.

[00:04:32]Um And people probably know from The Favourite, the Olivia Colman film. Yes, but and Queen Anne's Revenge, Blackbeard's Revenge was a Blackbeard's ship, but we don't actually see that much about them in pop culture and British films these days. But his eldest daughter was married to a Dutchman. Yes, uh William of Orange, the Stadtholder, the kind of the president or the the kind of the prince elect of uh the United Provinces, so the Netherlands. I'm giving a battlefield tour here. I asked the Dutch officer cadets to summarize what a Stadtholder was to me and they even they struggled with prince, president, noble, and uh under king, but more than a mayor. Yeah. But uh certainly a a very Dutch title. Yeah, and he was um a very ruthless and experienced, quite still quite young politician. Um a very very committed Protestant. Uh an inveterate enemy of Louis the 14th of France who was James the II's ally-ish.

[00:05:32]Um and seven lords, who were called the Immortal Seven in the summer of 1688, send a um a petition to William to come and free them from the their looming fate of Catholic tyranny. Yes, strong words. And so he does, he sets sail. He sets sail, lands at Torbay.

[00:05:54]Um initially James is thinking maybe he'll try and stick it out. Uh interestingly the Royal Navy plays an a part. Uh Admiral Torrington I believe his name was.

[00:06:04]Um was ordered to sail to intercept and did so.

[00:06:09]Uh but in a sort of slightly slovenly manner you might say so that he could neither be accused of not following his orders nor could he if William won could he be accused of of trying to prevent him from winning. And very interestingly uh I think there was some genuine concern on the Dutch side that they might be beaten in a battle and William killed or captured. There was a lot of people who hedged their bets. Marlborough became a later great general, one of one of Britain's great he even he was hedging his bets quite early on. Yeah, so most sort of establishment figures you could say. Marlborough being a senior military officer sanction figure.

[00:06:43]Uh didn't want to come down too hard on one side or the other. Uh and interestingly James I think thought he was going to try and stick it out initially and there were some skirmishes around Reading in Berkshire.

[00:06:56]>> [snorts] >> Um but ultimately towards the end of 1688, I think it's November, he he gives up. And he flees to France. He flees to France. And then in the fleeing so on the Thames he either drops or he throws one of the great seals of state. Into the river. Yeah.

[00:07:13]Which is interpreted by some maybe as wishful thinking that he's abdicated. I don't think James saw it that way.

[00:07:19]>> I don't think James probably did. But it's certainly that between the propaganda that his son is illegitimate and the propaganda that he's either dropped or thrown his great seal of office which you know is used to stamp to make laws uh into effect with royal assent into the Thames he might have abdicated and therefore people can give legitimacy to the newly invited prince.

[00:07:45]>> So it's interesting a lot of them were very keen on only crowning Mary queen.

[00:07:50]Um the problem was William had a big army. He was an ambitious young man and decided that actually he'd quite like to be co-monarch. So they were crowned It's what It's why if you ever get one of those plastic wooden rulers of kings and queens of England, William and Mary.

[00:08:03]>> William and Mary. Yeah.

[00:08:04]>> Um Obviously, James still had quite a lot of supporters across uh England and certainly in Scotland and in Ireland.

[00:08:13]Uh and that cause would not necessarily go gently into the good night, as it were.

[00:08:19]>> No. And whilst Ireland's going to be the hotbed and the focus of most of actually James's campaigns of him fighting there in person, along the River Tay from here in the town of Dundee, there was James Claverhouse, who'd been an experienced general fighting often against the Covenanters, who in the what was known as the Killing Times. This is lots of Well, they were quite a religious extremist group in one sense and religious freedom in another sense off around in Scotland trying to have outdoor ministries and they're being hunted by the government and James Claverhouse is a cavalry commander for most of this, did a lot of the hunting.

[00:08:57]And there were actually some pitched battles. Uh Covenanters won one and lost a few.

[00:09:03]And he was then known as Bloody Claverhouse because of some of his actions. And he went outside of what's what was then Dundee city walls, what's now Dundee Law, very much within the modern city, raise a standard for James. This is early 1689.

[00:09:22]>> Very early 1689 and ironically, as he did so, the city actually barred him from re-entering.

[00:09:28]So it shows that split loyalties very early on cuz he was uh a big principal figure within the city, leaves for a couple of hours and they lock him out.

[00:09:37]There's a great line in the in the song about him, Bonnie Dundee, where they go the town is well rid of that devil Dundee.

[00:09:44]By uh made famous by the Corries, I think. Yeah.

[00:09:49]>> [music] [singing] [singing] [music] [music] [music] [singing] [music] [singing] >> And uh it's a he starts the uh rebellion, uprising, loyalist movements, depending on your uh tract, up here uh in uh just under what's the Highland fault line. Uh so, we're about as close to the Highlands as you can be without being geographically in the Highlands, which is a a source of a whole different debate.

[00:10:39]And uh he's moving around and he goes up towards Blair Atholl Castle.

[00:10:45]Uh uh up there.

[00:10:47]>> traditional Jacobite staging point it becomes, doesn't it?

[00:10:49]>> It's used time and time again. It is It's a beautiful castle, uh not very far from uh Dunkeld and on the main route if you people are doing the classic tourist route of 3 days in Scotland where they do Edinburgh, Inverness, Loch Ness, Skye, and back down, which is quite a few miles. Uh but Blair Atholl is worth a stop.

[00:11:08]And uh it's just off the the main A road.

[00:11:11]And it does see a couple of sieges later on as well.

[00:11:15]And he's moving back down whilst the Scottish army, as was, cuz we're pre-union. Yeah, so this is really important to note. This is not the British army. This is not the English army. Uh this is the Earl of Angus's regiment, as in the county of Angus, uh later becoming the Cameronians. So, this is very much a Scottish battle.

[00:11:35]>> It's a Scottish battle. They were, ironically, Covenanters that had been commissioned.

[00:11:42]And their commander, William Cleland, had actually been with uh William of Orange over in the mainland and had helped form part of the vanguard when he formed a beachhead uh in case they were going to come under fire. So, he's very loyal to the cause and also has real religious fervor. Also a poet. Yeah, I remember on his plaque.

[00:12:01]Yeah, I didn't know that.

[00:12:02]>> poet. No, so uh the title of his uh biography is not much of a soldier, which just seems a bit harsh. Uh but certainly known for his poetry and his religious fervor at the time.

[00:12:13]And Bonnie Dundee's killed at Killiecrankie. And so then for the ground behind us, after a bit of marching through the Highlands, uh becomes the final staging post at the latest stage of the battle. Bearing in mind that after Killiecrankie, the Highland army had actually grown because Dundee had won this famous victory at Killiecrankie and and completely smashed and I believe it's uh >> him his life.

[00:12:34]>> Yeah, yeah. So, smashed the the the mixed Anglo-Scottish force there.

[00:12:39]Uh and but it didn't cost him his life.

[00:12:40]But that his army swelled after his defeat um uh his his death, sorry. Under the command of an Irishman, Colonel Cannon, as in spelled spelled like the artillery piece. That's about as apt a name. Yeah.

[00:12:52]And uh so you have a lieutenant colonel battalion commander holding this uh area. And it's a small town, Dunkeld.

[00:12:59]About as pretty as they get, though.

[00:13:01]And we end up with this this final devastating street action, house by house, burning uh houses. They actually lock uh the Jacobites into some of the houses as they attack it and burn the roofs.

[00:13:15]Uh certainly, you know, no mercy really asked or given on either side. But it does lead us to the the last action of the Jacobites' first war.

[00:13:28]First war in in certainly in the mainland of Britain.

[00:13:30]>> mainland whilst Ireland's ongoing. So, it's it's really devastating and both sides have relatively large casualties for quite small armies.

[00:13:41]Uh and it doesn't feel like it today. You barely get the sense of it and because most of the town was destroyed in the fighting, there's only one of the original streets is still here. So, the the main house >> and the man's house of it is destroyed.

[00:13:53]Yeah, that so the the Cameronians end up sort of bolted up in the manor house.

[00:13:58]That's that's gone now. Pulling lead off the roof to make more musket >> Making musket balls as they go. And there's a hill just behind the cathedral which is sort of a 45° slope that some of the Highlanders launch a charge up and manage to chase a a redcoat company off of the top of the mound and you think, "God, going up there on the fire." It's very quite steep rise. It's it's not particularly short, either. No, and if you come here, the uh east-facing side of the cathedral actually has musket ball holes >> Yeah. on it as well saying how close they were with the fighting. Uh but ultimately, the Highlanders gave up. I think reading quite a few different sources, it was probably due to the high casualties within individual clans that had been leading the street fighting which meant that the family system was breaking down. And if you lose your uncle and your cousin and your brother, you then turn around to your clan chief and go, "I've got to go back and do all the work for the whole farm." Yeah. Uh and I think as well what you see in sort of risings like the '45 or um even in 1715 that you have a charismatic leader who can kind of after the army's taken a bit of a bloody nose, can kind of pick them back back up and get them moving again. Um but with Dundee dead, don't have that.

[00:15:09]>> With Viscount Dundee dead, you don't have that. And Colonel Cannon, you know, as much as he is a well-trained professional soldier, seems to do relatively well.

[00:15:17]He is an Irishman, it doesn't have that kind of repartee with the clan chiefs and they could feel they can probably overrule him. And there's some deep irony as well within the fighting that William Cleland's, the commander of the Cameronians, is killed quite early on.

[00:15:32]While mortally wounded, he takes he takes a musket ball to the abdomen and crawls off so that his men don't see him die, which is damn brave stuff. His second in command, Henderson, a major, is shot and killed.

[00:15:46]>> killed as well, doesn't he? So, yeah, we're left with company commanders, some of whom have next to no experience.

[00:15:52]They've only actually been fully armed for a matter of weeks, and there's different accounts. There's a beautiful painting of them all in red coats and wigs and white brimmed hats, but there's a reenactment group locally, and if you speak to them, they think they've got a source where they were classed as being naked, which means that they were either unissued uniforms, so they were wearing their own clothes, or they were issued in gray coats that had not been dyed in the famous red. So, this is the regiment that has very little experience, and they're digging their heels in against Highlanders that are coming in And they're not a full battalion, either. There's only about half strength, maybe just over half strength, 600 men.

[00:16:28]>> 600 to 700 is what the the sources say.

[00:16:31]So, they're certainly outnumbered, and actually the the Highlanders have captured some leather guns, some very light cannon from Killiecrankie, from their own side. So, And those are what they sound like, folks. They are cannons made out of lots of rolls of leather wrapped around a small copper tube.

[00:16:44]That's it. So, yes, it it becomes quite interesting fights swinging both ways.

[00:16:51]Uh but I I particularly like Dunkeld cuz It's a very, very beautiful town.

[00:16:54]>> It's a beautiful town. It's also got some good pubs. There's hotels. It's in a good point in Scotland to strike off north, south, east, and west cuz we're not far from the center point of the mainland of Scotland, uh but you end up with this really good battle tactically to study. Uh and we're not far from Killiecrankie, so you can kind of combine the visit, but I think kind of because of the the bloody elements here and the house-to-house fighting, Dunkeld was actually a really good visit. I think it's an interesting tactical action as well. It proves that warfare in this period is not all lines of people blazing away at each other in a field. It's not actually very interesting tactical problems commanders have to solve and and went about them in in interesting and and quite violent ways.

[00:17:33]>> I was going to say the pure violence of house-to-house fighting with some of the Highlanders of Lochaber axes, these two-handed axes with a hook on the end. You've got pikes that being used and and broadswords on both sides.

[00:17:44]>> bay plug bayonet. So a plug bayonet is basically a dagger that you shove down the muzzle of your musket because you don't have one of the the later ring bayonets. What it means is it's a great club with the the end and and a great spear because you've got the bayonet in it, but you can no longer really use it as a musket. You'd have to take the hammer and knock the bayonet out.

[00:18:01]>> You lose your ability to fire. Yeah. Uh and the the good thing about the ring bayonets is if you're wondering what that looks like, uh have a look at some of your light bulbs cuz there's two types. There's screw and bayonet fitting. Uh and that's where we get the name from.

[00:18:13]Uh but that is actually quite a lot of the the 1690 with actions up in the northeast of Scotland, uh Cromdale, uh Killiecrankie, and Dunkeld, not taking account to Ireland cuz that's worth of its own large campaign. Uh still famous today cuz of the Boyne, but there's actually bloodier battles than the Boyne.

[00:18:37]So, what happens to James?

[00:18:41]So, James stays in France after this. He's um So, he's in Ireland. He leaves.

[00:18:48]>> He He leaves Ireland. So so uh I I think there's a there's a nickname he has in Ireland which is Jimmy Caca which I won't translate into English, but I'm sure people can work out what that means. Um he leaves and leaves his command to to some of his subordinate officers and goes to France. Um and and always sort of of what tries to agitate for a return of his his descendants to the throne of England and and Scotland and Ireland. Um and it's what leads to the risings in 1715. It's what leads to the rising in 1745 and and even even subsequent uh attempts. So, as late as the 17 late 1750s, so we're looking at 1759 when the French are look and Spanish are looking to inv- just the French at the time actually, sorry. Are looking to invade as part of the Seven Years' War.

[00:19:34]So, his son is proclaimed king in exile. His son is proclaimed king in exile. Uh comes to be the old pretender.

[00:19:41]The old pretender. Who I believe is also called James confusingly.

[00:19:44]Uh and his son, so James II's grandson, is Bonnie Prince Charlie of of Culloden fame, the young pretender.

[00:19:53]Now, he doesn't have any legitimate children.

[00:19:55]>> No, certainly not.

[00:19:56]>> But they he has an illegitimate daughter who is later legitimized. Yes, so he has a a mistress called Clementina Walkinshaw, who I think he meets during his time in Scotland.

[00:20:06]>> he meets her in Scotland.

[00:20:07]>> Um and has a daughter Charlotte >> Charlotte >> with her.

[00:20:10]Out of wedlock.

[00:20:11]>> Well, he claims he married in secret Clementina. Which Okay. There's no evidence.

[00:20:17]>> There's no evidence one way or the other. Um >> We might take his word for it. Yeah. Uh and if that was the case, then they had a legitimate child, if not a another illegitimate child who is buried in the nave >> nave there.

[00:20:33]Whose name was Charles Edward Stuart, imaginative. Uh Count of Roehenstart, Roehenstart. Which is a combination of two names.

[00:20:42]>> Yeah, Roehen, who are one of the most famous aristocratic families in France, who was allegedly his father, so so Bonnie Prince Charlie's daughter had a an affair with a cardinal I believe, or he was certainly a senior cleric uh in the Roman Catholic Church. They had a child.

[00:20:58]He fled France during the revolutionary period and became a lieutenant colonel, although he later claimed to be a general.

[00:21:05]>> Claimed to be a general. Claimed to be a general in the in the Imperial Russian Army as a lot of uh French aristocrats did. And he died here in in the 1850s. Visiting the next Duke of Atholl up at Blair Atholl Castle.

[00:21:19]>> he maintained his grandfather's claim.

[00:21:22]Yeah. So he maintained that he was the rightful king of Great Britain and Ireland as it was then.

[00:21:28]Um And yeah, it's it's buried just behind us. So it was an accident in Dunkeld and The very beginning of of the Jacobite cause really in many ways. We're around it. We're in it. Uh and really while yes, there are there people like the the the Bavarian royal family claims some sort of tangential lineage. Really the very end of of the cause is is behind us as well. Well, that's fair enough, but there's some deep irony that he's sitting in the same burial ground as William Cleland. Yeah. Uh Probably not more than a few feet away from each other.

[00:22:00]>> feet away to that battle in 1689 to see off the Jacobite claim. Uh so history has nothing but a sense of irony and that kind of brings us full circle.

[00:22:11]Yeah.

[00:22:11]>> much.

[00:22:12]>> very much, Marcus. mentioned was clever as folk and the king's come down there and crowns to be broke. So which cavalier who loves honor and me and I'm follow the bonnet so bonny and neat.

[00:22:25]Come fill up my [music and singing] cup, come fill up my can, come saddle my horses and call [music and singing] it my men. Unheard of a spot, I'll let her keep free, >> [music and singing] >> but it's up with bonnet so bonny and neat.

[00:22:44]And neat is Montrose and he rides up the street. The bells they ring [music and singing] but where the drums they are beat. But the bravest of men says let it all be, but the turn is all the devil [music and singing] and neat.

[00:22:58]Come fill up my cup, come fill up my can, come saddle >> [music and singing] >> Come side of my ear, season, and call it mine, man.

[00:23:05]Unhitch the best part and let us get [singing] free.

[00:23:11]But, [music] it's up with it, but it's so bonny indeed.

[00:23:17]>> [music] >> There are hills beyond Pentland and lands beyond Forth, but there are lads in the south there and chiels in the north. [music] There are three pretty maidens three thousand times three for the bonnets so bonny indeed.

[00:23:30]>> [music and singing] >> Come fill up my cup, come fill up my can. Come side of my ear, season, [music] and call it mine, man. Unhitch the best part and let us get free.

[00:23:44]But, it's [music] up with it, but it's so bonny indeed. [singing]