The Battles of Bonnie Prince Charlie: The Young Chevalier at War

By Arran Johnston

Prince Charles Edward Stuart (1720-1788) was the grandson of Britain’s last Stuart king and the last of his line to fight for their right to the throne. Born in Rome and raised at his father’s cultured and cosmopolitan court-in-exile, the young prince grew up beneath a heavy weight of expectation and yearned for the chance to prove his worth. In 1745, just as it seemed his best opportunity had already passed, Charles threw caution to the wind and embarked on a secret and seemingly desperate expedition to Scotland. What followed is one of the most remarkable, famous, and often misrepresented episodes of Scottish history: the ’45.

This is the story of the last Jacobite rising and the charismatic but controversial prince who led it, presenting a human portrait of the Stuart prince through the words of those who served alongside him. The picture revealed is one of a humane and capable young man taking on a mission far greater than his experience had prepared him for, pushed to the limits of his abilities at a cost from which he never recovered.

Following Charles Edward Stuart over the battlefields of Prestonpans, Falkirk and Culloden, this book reveals the prince’s strengths and flaws as a commander, and the difficult relationships he had with the very people on whom his fortunes, and reputation, would depend. It is the story of how the prince faced conflicts both on and off the battlefield, weathered challenges posed by friends as well as foes, and left a legacy which remains hotly contested to this day.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Pen and Sword
• Release date: Jan 18, 2024
• ISBN: 9781399061162

Arran Johnston

Dr Arran Paul Johnston was born and raised in Derbyshire, where he first discovered the interest in the Jacobite Risings which would later lead him to Scotland. Arran graduated from the University of Edinburgh with an MA(hons) in Latin and Ancient History, and achieved his doctorate on the Scottish diaspora at the University of the West of Scotland. Arran is the founder and director of the Scottish Battlefields Trust, campaigning for greater understanding and protection for Scotland’s battlefield heritage. He lives with his wife and two children in Dunbar, where he is leading new interpretation and engagement initiatives raising the profile of the 1650 battlefield.

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Introduction

The Young Chevalier sits his horse with a straight back and firm shoulders, exuding both pride and resilience. Leaning just slightly forward in the saddle, he pushes his weight down through his booted legs and into his stirrups. A bonnet crowns his head, mounted with a cockade, covering his swept and powdered curls. Off the shoulder of the prince’s frockcoat a plaid of tartan is draped, and on his chest glimmers the star of the Order of the Garter. The broadsword at his hip has a fine and elaborate hilt. The overall effect of the image is one of elegant simplicity, authority without ostentation. The prince’s bearing is military, serious, but the hand-on-hip pose is not casual and his fist is clenched. Little emotion can be read on the soft features of his face, but the lips are pressed tight as if the expression is firmly controlled. The face looks to the south, large defiant eyes casting their gaze along the receding road. The horse, in contrast to its rider, displays a restless tension, its eyes wide and a hoof raised. Its head tugs to the north with an unheard jingle of bits.

This is how we encounter Prince Charles Edward Stuart today in the city of Derby, deep in the heart of England. The bronze figure gazes over our heads from its high stone plinth, capturing a critical moment in his story and in the city’s: the Stuart prince is taking his last look towards London before his horse turns north towards Scotland. At the end of that road lies defeat, exile and a bitterly contested legacy. This impressive statue by Anthony Stones was erected in Derby for the 250th anniversary of the last Jacobite rising, and it is – for the time being at least – the world’s only full statue of the famous ‘Bonnie Prince Charlie’. The only other contender, the figure surmounting the Glenfinnan Monument, has an ambiguous identity and is probably best interpreted as an idealised Highland chieftain. The identity of a standing bronze in Edinburgh’s City Chambers, recently theorised as being Charles Edward Stuart, remains unproven.

Charles Edward’s war of 1745–6 was a failure. His army was defeated and dispersed, and he would never lead another. After his fourteen-month visit, he would also never return to Scotland. Viewed from this perspective, the fact that there are so few statues of him may not seem that surprising. And yet his is one of the most recognisable faces in Scottish public history, visible within most of the country’s great galleries and museums, and used relentlessly for the promotion of tourism, tartan, shortbread and whisky. Artefacts connected to Charles Edward Stuart command consistently high prices in auction salerooms, and have the power to summon large and loyal audiences at exhibitions. For this, some of the credit must go to the royal Stuarts themselves as they understood the need to keep their faces familiar to their would-be subjects, even as they remained in distant exile. The portraits they commissioned, often by some of the greatest available talents, were copied, distributed and turned into more accessible engravings. Supporters had relics and likenesses worked into all manner of trinkets and talismans, creating the rich material culture that helps perpetuate so much interest in the Jacobite cause from behind so many glass cabinets today. But more than the fine and endearing character that was his father, or the crowned and anointed king that was his grandfather, it is Charles Edward Stuart who shines the brightest in our imaginations.

Of course, a large part of that is down to the inherent attraction of the story of The ‘45. The narrative reads today – as it ever has – like the most unlikely, desperate and high-spirited adventure. It has all the elements of the greatest heroic tales. From inauspicious beginnings, with intrigue and danger at every turn, the story develops against the stirring backdrop of the Scottish Highlands with a cast of big and contrasting personalities navigating unexpected successes and overcoming terrible obstacles, with ever-rising stakes. Even the final defeat of the Jacobites in the field does not end the tale, as it then becomes a romantic epilogue of loyalty in spite of all terrors, of a prince in the heather, and the bittersweet end of a beloved old song. And, as Sir Walter Scott acknowledged in his great nineteenth-century novel Waverley, it is a tale that took place in a world which was simultaneously both distant and near to us: in a bygone age, but one that is recognisable, only just beyond our reach.

The story of The ‘45 is also self-perpetuating. The more it is told, the more we want to tell it. To the contemporary portraits and battleplans we must add the grand tableaux of the Victorian artist; to the memoirs and news-sheets of the day, we must add Waverley and Kidnapped, Broster and Gabaldon. In their time came the silver-screen performances of Ivor Novello and then David Niven, contrasting in their romance with the bitter grit of Peter Watkins’ Culloden (1964). And across the generations of cultural representations and re-interpretations, fresh pilgrims have sought the real or imagined relics of the story’s heroes, walked the bitter ground of Culloden field, and nurtured the story as something they own and something that has made them.

The telling of the story has rarely been consistent. It has variously been understood as an Anglo-Scottish war, or as a Protestant-Catholic conflict: as a fight between modernity and feudalism, civilisation and savagery. Sometimes the redcoats are painted as a lesser enemy to the Highlanders than the callous aristos who led their brave but simple people to destruction for the cause of their own advancement, by order of their spoilt and petulant prince. The latter, for failing to lead the Highlanders to victory, is deemed as much at fault as those whose yoke he had promised to break. And it is always about the Highlanders, as the tale is far better told without the complexities of the Lowland Jacobites, or the Irish ones, and most certainly the English (who doomed their friends by their weakness and timidity). Red-coated soldiers have also been cast as the most despicable villains, regardless of their individual motives, gallantry or sympathies; pro-Union Scots have been damned as traitors for staying loyal to their own perceptions of their country’s best interests. As ever, there are always germs of a foundation in all such tropes: some Jacobites were Catholic; some British soldiers committed appalling atrocities; some Jacobites were motivated by self-interest or intrigue; and the rising’s failure became a catalyst (not a cause) of the collapse of the ancient clan system.

At the centre of this complex and shifting set of narrative fashions, enduring myths and simplified stereotypes is the persistently engaging figure of Charles Edward Stuart. Since the moment of his birth there have been two men of that name: the one who was reported by British agents as so weak and deformed that he would probably never walk; the other who was a strong and healthy boy whose arrival was celebrated by the appearance of a new star in the sky and a hurricane over Hanover. The two have remained largely apart ever since, and both have entered the popular imagination according to the recipients’ own instincts, prejudice or politics. Some of the criticism and caricature is lifted straight from Hanoverian propaganda; some is kept alive by more contemporary attitudes. One persistent paradox is that some of those who profess to be ardent modern ‘Jacobites’ are amongst the most assertively hostile critics of the prince. If he left parts of Scotland worse than he found them, it was not for wont of effort or for selfishness of design. Nor is it persuasive that the feudal and economic systems of the Highlands would have remained static had the last rising never occurred, or even that it was desirable they should do so.

In contrast to the Charles Edward as the uninvited angel of destruction, there is the Peter Pan-like figure of the eternal boy prince with his pursed red lips and cream-white skin. Born from the popularity of his adolescent portraits – the ones most readily at hand when the prince suddenly burst onto his Scottish stage – this prince is set up as a symbol of youthful innocence which contrasts powerfully with the burly characters of the Highland warriors whose faithful adoration he sought to earn with his charm and courage. To complete the effect of the contrast, the tall and athletic Charles of history becomes diminutive; the gifted sportsman becomes soft, pampered and effeminate. To the eyes of the nineteenth-century romantic, this was in no way incompatible with bravery and endurance. Thus, we inherit another Charles Edward Stuart, or rather a ‘Bonnie Prince Charlie’, a contrasting figure who is just as unreal as the other.

As Michele de Vezzosi’s translator remarked as early as 1748, ‘to clear up and rescue the character of this remarkable youth, as well from the too fulsome flatteries of his friends as from the mean and contemptuous notions of his enemies, is an attempt which I apprehend is not unworthy of the regard of the public.’ Alas Vezzosi, the prince’s valet, was not averse to flattery or fabrication himself. He places the prince within the French ranks at Dettingen, for example, gaining himself an imagined degree of experience in the field. Nevertheless, he has the credit of being one of the earliest biographers of the prince with his Young Juba, or the History of the Young Chevalier from his Birth to his Escape from Scotland.

Many others have followed in the quest to ‘clear up’ the prince’s true character. In the twentieth century the most important endeavours have come from: Andrew Lang (1903); Margaret Forster (1973); David Daiches (1973); Frank McLynn (1988); and the soldier and politician Fitzroy Maclean (1989). More recently, Hugh Douglas presented an analysis of the prince’s relationships with women (2016), and Peter Pininski’s Bonnie Prince Charlie (2010) has been revised and represented (2022). This list is not exclusive, nor does it include the great many more general texts on The ’45 or the wider Jacobite context, or the more focused works exploring other personalities, themes, trends, events or material culture. So it is not for a lack of accessible research or engaging writing that misunderstandings continue to find currency (indeed, some older works that are still widely available have helped to sustain them). Nor do all the studies emphasise the same traits or present the same conclusions, meaning that two individuals’ views of Charles Edward Stuart might be very different if they have met him through Forster, McLynn or Prebble.

The prince has always had his defenders as well as his critics. Some proclaimed his virtues from the scaffold before they made their final sacrifice for his cause; some had no love for his cause but felt obliged to concede that he was worthy of reluctant admiration. When British officers were merrily mocking the prince in Edinburgh, the Prince of Hesse-Kassel – George II’s son-in-law, no less – rose to speak in defence of his character. In fact, the government struggled to find enough material to provide effective attack lines, and so stuck to the old but effective anti-Catholic and anti-Gaelic tropes, given colour by the occasional salacious fabrication. But the government did not entirely control the media space, however, and there was no shortage of eyewitness testimony being shared and reported during the 1745–6 conflict. Positive perceptions found voice throughout, and many of the prince’s contemporaries did find it possible to both oppose and respect him simultaneously.

After the war, with the prince back in exile and living out of the public eye for extended periods, opinion comes to rely on gossip, speculation and the patchy evidence of brief encounters reported through a fog of distance, prejudice and disappointment. Getting a rounded picture of the later Charles becomes far more challenging, but the picture that emerges is of a man whose spirit had been broken by the events of 1746. Charles Edward’s story becomes one of unfulfilled potential, felt most keenly by the man himself. His detractors often point to these long, depressing decades as if they show that he was never fit to rule. These days, such a lack of understanding is indefensible. To seek explanations for negative behaviours – alcohol dependency, paranoia, domestic abuse – is not the same as to excuse them. But they should be seen as what they were: symptoms rather than proofs.

There are inconsistencies in his behaviour which catch our attention even during The ’45: he barely sleeps when things are going well, for example, but is dangerously lethargic in retreat. His fondness for alcohol, and his capacity to drink it, raised eyebrows even in an age accustomed to high consumption. He was persistently poor at managing relationships and controlling the expression of his emotions. During the conflict, it is possible to explain some of this as the result of the unprecedented pressures and stresses of a campaign for which he was physically but not mentally prepared. But the longer trends are more indicative. That the prince suffered post-traumatic stress as a result of the conflict is a real possibility, but he may already have been living with manic depression. This may have been an unhappy inheritance from his mother, Maria Clementina Sobieska. If this is the case, then we should assess Charles Edward differently. These days mental health is high in the public consciousness, but Charles is still commonly sneered at as a drunk rather than a man battling undiagnosed demons. If he were alive today, we might well feel uncomfortable with that attitude, and be more sympathetic in our treatment of such a man.

Other prejudices still creep into play as well, sometimes subconsciously. Sometimes it is shown by apparently innocent comments about accents and birthplace, a dislike of the prince’s apparent foreign-ness. But Charles Edward was not cosplaying when he donned the Highland habit: it was an expression of his own personal identity. Today he would be considered a cosmopolitan celebrity of the Scottish diaspora, well-dressed, good-looking and media savvy; just as fascinating and engaging to journalists and tourists as he was in his own time, with readers just as desperate to hear the latest gossip, scandal or fake news about his family. The prince had a multidimensional personality that has the power to engage people and to keep them engaged, polarising people’s opinions both politically and personally. It makes him a fascinating man to follow, especially during the course of the most famous incidents in his life.

Understanding Prince Charles is crucial to any understanding of what really happened in The ’45, and why. While fashion has moved away from focusing historical study too greatly on privileged elites, military campaigns remain theatres in which individual players can demonstrably direct the course of great events. All the people named within this book are worthy of study and understanding, as are the thousands whose names pass unmentioned or unknown. But there is no escaping the fact that without Charles Edward Stuart’s personal determination to make it happen, The ’45 would not have taken place. There were opportunities for others to prevent it, and there were many who facilitated it, but he was its driver. Then, somewhere along the road, he lost control of it. Just as the prince is accused of doing lasting damage by his actions, so the experience inflicted lasting damage on him.

The Jacobite rising of 1745–6 was a military and political conflict, and, on behalf of his father, Charles Edward Stuart was the military and political head of his cause. Rarely, though, is he given due credit for the performance of the army he commanded. His achievements are often credited to others, and he is often blamed for the shortcomings of others. The prince was not a military genius, but nor was he inept. He repeatedly demonstrated personal courage, tactical competence and an ability to lead. Most of all, he showed himself to have a sound strategic understanding of the conflict and how it might be won, often more so than those around him. Very significantly, but often underappreciated, Charles Edward Stuart undertook his conflict with a humanity and sensitivity which bordered sometimes on the naïve, but stands in proud contrast to the tenor of some of his opponents. The prince understood the power of appearances, the importance of public relations, and how to earn the admiration of his men. He had an instinct for what they needed him to say or do, and was an effective political performer. But while he could generally control his emotions in public, in private he could be passionate to the point of volatility. Often, he needed the reassurance of trusted friendship, which encouraged him to rely on a close circle. Like his father, he could hold to those relationships even if they alienated or aggravated others.

All this is demonstrated by the study of the prince’s military career, which, apart from a brief experience in his boyhood, was limited to the conflict of 1745–6. The purpose of this book, then, is to explore that career to gain a sense of who Charles Edward was and how substantial his contribution was to those great events. Its intention is not to provide a comprehensive narrative of the campaigns, for which there remains no greater volume than Christopher Duffy’s Fight for a Throne (2015), a revised edition of his earlier The ’45 (2003). The focus is on the main military engagements at which the prince was present, mainly the Battles of Prestonpans, Falkirk and Culloden. Decisions have necessarily been taken as to which elements of the wider campaigns to include and in what detail, and the criteria are based mainly on whether incidents provide insights into the prince’s own experience or others’ perceptions of it.

This book does not pretend to offer a deep academic analysis of the composition, motivation or capacity of the Jacobite cause, political or military. There is much excellent work being done in these fields, showing an ever more nuanced picture that cannot be given due justice here. Nor do these pages seek to provide the most detailed topographical or archaeological analyses of the relevant battlefields, although the accounts within them are, of course, informed by careful study of all the available, ever-expanding research. Even aspects of a battle which could not be seen or understood by the prince will be presented in that context, which might leave some readers wanting more. The main battles are covered individually elsewhere, as are the sieges thanks to Jonathan Oates’ recent work. Alas, our focus here does not help raise the profile of the smaller engagements of the conflict which deserve so much more attention: Highbridge, Clifton, Inverurie, Keith, Littleferry and the amphibious actions.

It is also important to accept before proceeding that the narrative in this book is deliberately presented solely from the Jacobite perspective. It seeks to understand the Jacobite army’s experience of the conflict, or rather Charles Edward’s, so the British army’s activities are only related in the detail relevant to that context. This should not be interpreted as a judgemental bias, but a narrative one.

This book’s presentation of Prince Charles Edward Stuart is the outcome of a persistent and protracted personal interest, and is distilled from a wide range of sources. In the main text, the most commonly cited are those whose accounts are considered the most revealing and reliable, or were at least written by those close enough to the events and characters to know of what they speak. None are without bias. John Sullivan’s wonderful narrative of the campaign is the most openly favourable to the prince, reflecting the closeness of their relationship and the intended audience of the account, King James. Lord George Murray’s main memoir is sometimes thorough, sometimes defensive, but always interesting. Both men occasionally offer contradictory evidence, and commonly gloss over less favourable incidents. This leaves an engaging challenge as we try to unpick the more probable truths, looking at what is left unsaid as well as what is revealed. John Murray of Broughton leaves us a detailed memoir of the campaign as far as Derby, and often provides valuable information. However, his reputation has never recovered from his actions after the conflict and, as with Sullivan, his evidence is occasionally neglected in favour of Murray’s. Lord Elcho, who leaves us two accounts, was well placed to know a great deal, but was tainted by a bitterness against the prince which emerged early in his exile. James Johnstone and Maxwell of Kirkconnell both served as aides to senior officers during the campaign so were in a position to hear more than many. These are the voices we will hear most frequently within these pages, supplemented and corroborated by others.

There are other parameters which limit the scope of this book. The first is that if it lacks the space to provide a comprehensive narrative of the whole fourteen-month conflict, there is even less room to offer a full biography of the prince’s sixty-eight-year life. While we will occasionally look both forward and back, our focus remains on the key military milestones of Charles Edward’s life. The fullest biographies have already been named above, while Edward Corp’s work on the Stuart court in exile provides an unrivalled understanding of the environment and community in which the prince and his family lived. There are a number of works devoted to the prince’s famous adventures as a fugitive, although nothing compares to the chaotic experience of delving into The Lyon in Mourning for insights into those escapades. In the present volume, we will meet Prince Charles in his early adolescence, on the cusp of his first experience of war, and we will leave him after the destruction of the last army he would ever lead.

In short, then, the purpose of these pages is essentially biographical: to relate how Charles Edward Stuart influenced the military campaigns which defined his life, and how these events influenced him. The decisions he made, or did not make, had the potential to affect the lives of thousands of people. For that reason alone, he is a subject worthy of our study. That he was a real man, with all the innate human frailties and capacities we all share, means he is deserving of our understanding.

A note on dates, names and spellings

Until 1752, Britain used a different calendar to most European countries. The two calendars in use at that time are most commonly referred to as Old Style and New Style, and they were eleven days apart. The dates used within this book are those appropriate to the events being described, so an event taking place in Italy or France is dated in the New Style, and events in Britain according to the Old. This can cause confusion when, for example, a ship might leave France on a New Style date and arrive in Britain on an Old Style one. In such circumstances it should be clear within the text which is being used.

In this book, James Francis Stuart will be commonly referred to as King James. This should not be interpreted as a bias in sympathy by the author. Nor should any reference to King George.

Charles Edward Stuart will be variously referred to as Prince Charles, Charles Edward, the prince and the Young Chevalier.

John William Sullivan’s name will be given as he himself writes it, although he is still frequently referred to elsewhere as O’Sullivan.

William Murray, Marquis of Tullibardine, will be referred to most commonly as Tullibardine, even though the Jacobites referred to him as the Duke of Atholl. This is to avoid any confusion with his brother, who was accepted by the Georgian government as Duke of Atholl. Titled lords will commonly be referred to by their territorial designation unless there is confusion with a geographic reference.

John Murray of Broughton, the prince’s Secretary of State, will be referred to as either Secretary Murray or simply Broughton. This is to distinguish him from Lord George Murray.

King Charles VII of Naples (Charles V of Sicily) will be referred to as the King of Naples, or as Parma, the dukedom he held prior to securing the crown.

In direct quotations, the original spellings and punctuation have been maintained. It is hoped the reader will endure the vagaries of non-standardised spelling as the price of being able to read the words as they were written. This is particularly rewarding in the case of the prince’s own words, and in the almost phonetic writing of Sullivan. Occasional interventions for clarity are made in parentheses.

Any direct quotations attributed to Sir John MacDonald are taken from the translation of his French account provided by A. & H. Taylor.

Chapter One

The Siege of Gaeta

On the evening of Tuesday 3 August 1734, two grandsons of a British king arrived at the headquarters of the Spanish king of Naples, who was besieging forces loyal to the Holy Roman Emperor within the fortified city of Gaeta, in central Italy, during the War of the Polish Succession. It was neither the first, last or bloodiest time that eighteenth-century Europe would be consumed by conflict due to a disputed royal succession; nor was it the last time that such a cause would be used as the pretext for settling older scores or seizing new advantages. It was an age of interconnected dynasties, multilateral alliances and global expansion.

The two men we are following – or rather, one man and one boy – passed out of the last warmth of the summer’s evening and into a shaded portico; behind came a very modest entourage, just a few gentlemen and a pair of friars. In the cool hall within the building, the visitors were greeted formally by the Spanish guards and directed to the main interior stair. Their heeled shoes clipped on the polished steps as they ascended, a formal welcome awaiting them at the landing.

The older of the two men, aged 38, was James Francis FitzJames Stuart, 2nd Duke