THE VALLEY OF LOSS

Venture into the warm embrace of the Clachaig Inn near Ballachulish at the north end of Glencoe, and you’ll see a sign that reads “No Hawkers or Campbells”. Although general manager William Stewart assures that “these days it is very much tongue and cheek”, the roots of this local humour are anything but.

The story of the Glencoe Massacre, in which many Campbell troops brutally murdered families of the MacDonald clan, has haunted Scottish history – and school children, me included – for centuries. It’s a horrifying tale of one of the most shocking state-sanctioned atrocities to ever have occurred in Britain. Yet, while the action was swift, the seeds of the massacre were sown long before.

ENTER THE JACOBITES

In April 1685, the Stuart monarch of Scotland, England and Ireland, King James VII & II, son of King Charles I, was settling into his throne in London after the death of his heir-less brother, King Charles II.

But trouble was brewing: