Jacobite Risings

1689 – 1746

Overview

In 1688 the Catholic King James II of England and VII of Scotland was driven from his thrones in the Glorious Revolution and replaced by his daughter Mary and her Dutch husband, William of Orange. His supporters were called Jacobites, from Jacobus, the Latin form of James. For more than half a century they tried to restore James and then his son and grandson. In Scotland the first rising came in 1689, when Viscount Dundee led a largely Highland army to victory at Killiecrankie on 27 July, though Dundee was killed and the rising faded after a check at Dunkeld. In Ireland the war lasted until 1691. After the union of England and Scotland in 1707 created Great Britain, a French invasion attempt in 1708 failed at sea. The largest rising came in 1715 under the Earl of Mar, who fought the indecisive Battle of Sheriffmuir on 13 November, while a separate Jacobite force surrendered at Preston. A small rising supported by Spanish troops was defeated at Glen Shiel in 1719. The last and most famous rising began in 1745, when Charles Edward Stuart landed in the Highlands, won at Prestonpans and Falkirk and marched as far as Derby before retreating. It ended at the Battle of Culloden on 16 April 1746.

Arms of the Jacobite Risings

The Jacobite armies drew heavily on the clans of the Highlands, described in Highland Clansmen, though Lowland Scots, English Catholics, and Irish and Scottish regulars in French service also fought for the cause. Their best-known tactic was the Highland charge: a volley from muskets or pistols at close range, followed by a rush with the basket-hilted broadsword, the Scottish Claymore. Clansmen carried the Targe on the left arm and the Highland Dirk, and some less well armed men carried axes such as the Lochaber Axe or improvised polearms. Muskets were always in short supply and were often shipped from France or Spain. Against them, government infantry carried the flintlock Brown Bess Musket and, from the early eighteenth century, the Socket Bayonet, which allowed a soldier to fire with his bayonet fixed. The charge could shatter raw or poorly led troops, as at Killiecrankie and Prestonpans, but it was costly against steady infantry supported by artillery.

Why It Mattered

The Jacobite cause had wide support at times, especially in Scotland, and in 1715 and 1745 it posed a real threat to the Hanoverian monarchy. Its failure secured the Protestant succession and the union of England and Scotland. The government answered the risings by building roads and forts in the Highlands, most notably under General George Wade after 1724, and by raising Highland companies loyal to the Crown.

Legacy

After Culloden the government set out to destroy the military power of the clans. The Disarming Act of 1746 banned Highland weapons and Highland dress, and the Heritable Jurisdictions Act of 1747 took away the chiefs' legal powers. Over the following decades many Highlanders emigrated or served in the new Highland regiments of the British Army. In the nineteenth century writers such as Sir Walter Scott gave the risings a romantic image that still shapes how they are remembered.

Improve this article