CHAPTER XVI

THE ‘FIFTEEN’ AND THE ‘FORTY-FIVE’

The efforts of the dispossessed Stuart dynasty to re-establish itself in the British Isles produced the last land invasions of England by way of Scotland. That of 1715 was insignificant. It cannot be said that either had the faintest chance of success unaided. Still, they were invasions in the true sense of the word and, as such, merit some notice.

Though the Stuart James II. had been expelled in 1688, the dynasty continued in a sense to reign in the female branch until 1702, though with a gap caused by the death of Queen Mary II. in 1695. But the male branch was now to all intents a foreign family with foreign ideas, and it was also Roman Catholic in its religion. It is unquestionable that the last Stuarts suffered for the misdeeds of their ancestors, but no one who studies impartially the record of the family as kings of Great Britain can well avoid the conclusion that the men who governed the country in 1714 were wise not to recall them.

It does not appear that there was any widespread Jacobite feeling in England. Certainly it assumed no practical form. That there was sympathy with the exiled family is probable, but it was largely the product of the chivalrous strain in the English national character which has so often impelled Englishmen to side with a losing cause.

In Scotland matters were somewhat different. There was a great deal of dislike to the Union of the two countries on the part of narrow Scottish patriots. At the same time the Presbyterian Lowlanders were thoroughly opposed to Stuart rule, and active Jacobite sympathy was practically confined to a few nobles and their tenants. That section of the Highlands which was at feud with the Campbells was the only part even of Scotland which sided with the exiled dynasty, and in this case self-interest had more to do with the action of the clans than loyalty.

On September 6, 1715, John Erskine, Earl of Mar, a shifty politician, nicknamed ‘Bobbing John’ by his contemporaries, raised the Stuart banner at Braemar. The ‘Royalist’ clans rose, and the Hanoverian general, John Campbell, Duke of Argyll, could only hold the line of the Forth and await reinforcements from England. The Hanoverian Government, ably directed by General Stanhope, was active to nip in the bud any Jacobite risings, and eventually the revolt broke out in the farthest corner of England.

It was not until October 6 that Mr. Thomas Forster, the son of a Cumberland landowner, rose in arms for the Stuart claimant, and was joined by Lords Derwentwater and Widdrington. They hoped to seize Newcastle and its coal-mines, but they were far too weak; and even when joined by the few Jacobite sympathizers in south-western Scotland, under Lords Kenmure, Nithsdale, Wintoun, and Carnwath, they mustered only 600 horsemen.

To assist this forlorn rising the Earl of Mar detached from the large force, now assembled at Perth, some 2,000 Highlanders under General MacIntosh. Covered by a very feebly executed feint upon Stirling made by Mar, MacIntosh crossed the Firth of Forth, cleverly evading the English cruisers which guarded the passage. He occupied Leith, and the terror in Edinburgh brought Argyll with a part of his scanty force back from Stirling, but in accordance with his orders MacIntosh passed on southward to join the Border Jacobites. He found them at Rothbury in Northumberland, and the united force now amounted to 2,500 men.

From the first the seeds of disaster were present in the little army. The one commander of any capacity was MacIntosh; but Forster, by virtue of a commission from James, was Commander-in-Chief. He had no military experience, and appears to have been hopelessly incapable. The Hanoverian commander in the north, General George Carpenter, had only four weak regiments of cavalry at his disposal; but he anticipated the Jacobites at Dumfries, which was found garrisoned. Thereupon it was resolved to invade England. Lancashire was supposed to be strongly Jacobite. Widdrington believed that 20,000 Lancashire men would join if a Jacobite force appeared among them.

The resolution at once increased the dissension. Many Highlanders deserted. Nevertheless the march began. On November 1 the Border was crossed. Lord Lonsdale had collected a mass of totally undisciplined and half-armed peasantry, some 6,000 strong, at Penrith, to oppose the invaders; but they dispersed in terror of the wild Highlanders, and the Jacobites pushed on into Lancashire. The advance was slow. Desertions were frequent, and there were very few recruits. General Carpenter had been diverted by news of an attack on Newcastle, but was returning on his tracks; and General Willes was in front with the Government troops in Lancashire. Not until they neared Preston did they acquire a respectable reinforcement of some 200 well-armed men. But it was noted that they were all Roman Catholics--an ominous fact. At Preston itself a number of ill-armed men appear to have joined. By this time the Jacobites were also possessed of six or seven guns. It was decided to halt at Preston for a few days to rally the expected Lancashire recruits, but on the 12th, before there had been time to erect proper defences, the Government troops attacked them.

General Willes had collected six regiments of cavalry and a battalion of infantry--all very weak--perhaps 1,800 men in all. The Jacobites were certainly as numerous, and occupied a town which was easily defensible, and might have been made very strong. The bridge over the Ribble to the south of Preston was guarded by 300 men. At each of the four main entrances to the town barricades were in course of construction, and three were armed each with two guns. But the lack of resolute or skilful leading was apparent. The garrison at the bridge evacuated its post almost without resistance--at Forster’s own order, so it was said. The Highlanders, however, fought gallantly, and repulsed several attacks made by dismounted cavalry. At nightfall the place was untaken; but early on the 13th Carpenter arrived on the north side of the town, and Forster tamely surrendered. He was indeed utterly unfit for his post. When accused of treachery by his associates he shed tears, and faltered out feeble excuses. But it cannot be said that he was much worse than the lords. Surely men of spirit and energy would have repudiated the cowardly surrender. Yet nothing was done. Even the Highlanders appear to have had enough of campaigning; probably they were too home-sick to care to fight when there was a chance of returning to their beloved hills.

The actual number of prisoners taken was 1,496, including six peers. The Government was guilty of outraging the most distinguished of the captives by parading them bound on horseback through the streets of London, but there was little bloodshed. The leaders, according to the ideas of the day, could hardly hope for mercy; but, as a matter of fact, only Lords Kenmure and Derwentwater suffered death. Lady Nithsdale heroically contrived her husband’s rescue from the Tower, and Forster and MacIntosh also escaped, Forster by the aid of his sister Dorothy. Certainly in this affair the female Jacobites showed to better advantage than their men. Of the other prisoners, 26 were executed, and some hundreds transported--a contrast to the awful butchery which had followed Sedgemoor only thirty years before.

Meanwhile the Jacobite rising in Scotland had come to an ignominious end. Though the claimant himself had appeared among his followers, the army, demoralized by dissension and poor leading, was melting fast away, and James soon left for the Continent. He was himself apparently the most estimable of the Stuarts--brave, regular in his life, and not devoid of ability, but he was not a man to inspire devotion. His son, Charles Edward, was of a different type, and, besides considerable capacity, possessed all the fascination of his ancestress, Mary. The influence which the memory of ‘Bonnie Prince Charlie’ exercised over the susceptible Highlanders is remarkable, and is, indeed, hardly extinct at the present day. In 1745 England was at war with France in the cause of the Empress Maria Theresia, and was faring badly. Prince Charles saw his chance. His father had no confidence of success, and his son’s action was taken against his wish; but the Prince raised a small sum of money, and with this and a slender supply of arms and ammunition landed on the west coast of Scotland in August, 1745.

The story of the brilliant campaign that followed lies without the bounds of this book. The success of the Highlanders was rapid and complete. Yet, in the midst of victory, the shadow of disaster lay upon the Jacobites.

It was but too obvious that nearly half the Highlands were hostile, and that clans which had once been Jacobite now held aloof. Charles’s noblest supporter, the chivalrous Cameron of Lochiel, had little hope of victory. There were differences in the Prince’s suite. His best, perhaps it should be said his only, general, Lord George Murray, was at variance with the Franco-Scottish nobles and gentlemen of the Prince’s entourage. Money and supplies were scanty, and not easily collected. Assistance was promised by France, but, such as it was, it was difficult to send it in face of the English fleet, and, even so, it probably did harm by giving a dynastic war the appearance of a foreign invasion. In England and the Scottish Lowlands a prosperous peace of thirty years had almost obliterated the memory of the Stuarts, and in neither country had educated men any reason to look back upon it with pride. The Hanoverians were not popular, but Jacobitism was already tending to recede into the region of dreams.

By the end of October Prince Charles had collected near Edinburgh some 7,000 men. They were nearly all Highland infantry; there were only four weak squadrons of cavalry and thirteen small field pieces, with very few trained gunners. Against this small force the English Government had in the field three armies, each some 10,000 strong. The first lay at Newcastle under the now aged and worn-out Marshal Wade, the constructor of the famous military roads of the Highlands. The second was in Staffordshire. It was commanded in succession by General Ligonier and the young Duke of Cumberland. The third force--royal guards, and London militia and volunteers--was at Finchley, under the personal command of George II., now advanced in years. London itself formed several volunteer corps, one composed entirely of lawyers and law-students. The military value of these corps does not affect the issue--the point is, that public sentiment was strongly anti-Jacobite. The Prince’s enterprise, in fact, was regarded as a foreign invasion.

Prince Charles and his advisers had resolved to enter England by way of Carlisle, thus avoiding Wade, who lay about Newcastle. On November 16 the Jacobite army reached Carlisle, which was practically defenceless, and on the next day it surrendered. A small garrison was left there, and the advance continued. The forlornness of the enterprise is to be gauged from the fact that already the Highlanders were deserting by hundreds. When, on the 28th, Charles entered Manchester, he probably had not more than 5,000 foot and 250 horse. Manchester welcomed him with an illumination, but the material results of the march through Lancashire were only 200 recruits and £2,000 in cash. The only favourable circumstances were that Wade was far in the rear, and that Cumberland, anxious that Charles should not enter Wales, where Jacobitism still retained some vitality, was moving north-westward by Stone, thus leaving the main road to London uncovered. Charles broke up from Manchester, slipped over the Peak, and came down the dales to Derby, which he entered on December 4. Cumberland was already falling back towards Coventry to regain the main road, but Charles had fairly outmanœuvred him. He was rather less than 130 miles from London by road, and might perhaps have covered the distance in a week had he continued his advance. But the heart was beaten out of his staff, and they would go no farther. They saw the hopelessly meagre results of the daring march, and they insisted upon a retreat. There were reinforcements awaiting them in Scotland which would double their strength; substantial aid might be obtained from France, and the line of the Forth defended against the Hanoverians. As is well known, even this modest programme could not be carried out. Indeed, Edinburgh and most of the Lowlands had returned to their allegiance as soon as the Jacobite army marched southward. The hostility of Scotland, except the Central Highlands, to the Stuart cause was apparent.

Would Charles have succeeded had he pressed on? It is more than doubtful. The fact that there was considerable panic in London on December 6, and a run upon the Bank of England, proves nothing. Englishmen have a most remarkable capacity for such panics, and also for seeing their enemies double on every possible occasion. King George had at Finchley some 4,000 highly trained and mainly veteran troops, a powerful artillery, and at least 5,000 militia and volunteers, who were hardly likely to be entirely useless, especially in street fighting. They show a somewhat robust faith who believe that Charles’s 5,000 men or less, almost destitute of cavalry and artillery, would have gained the day, and have been able to capture London before the arrival of Cumberland. From the military point of view, Murray and the staff were perfectly right in advising retreat. Politically, perhaps Charles was correct in his contention that he must push on, but it was a gambler’s chance. If one thing is more certain than another, it is that Jacobitism, everywhere in Great Britain except part of Scotland, was already moribund.

The Jacobite army evacuated Derby on the night of December 6. Its retreat was disorderly. The hopes which had buoyed up the chiefs were dying away, and they had to face a gloomy prospect of overthrow and ruin. The men, too, could not fail to see the depression of their leaders, and drifted out of hand. Straggling and pillage became general. The villagers began to cut off those who strayed from the line of march. The people of Manchester, friendly on the advance, now broke into rioting, and were mulcted in a fine of £5,000. At Wigan an attempt was made to shoot the Prince. He was disheartened and depressed, and made little attempt to restrain his men, who streamed along the road with scarcely any discipline. Only the rearguard under Murray still closed the march in good order, and brought along with it the artillery and baggage which would otherwise have been abandoned.

Cumberland was near Coventry when he heard of Charles’s retreat. He at once began to pursue with his cavalry, while the country gentry supplied 1,000 horses to mount part of his infantry. He hurried northward through Cheshire and Lancashire, but the Highlanders had a long start, and were well in advance. At Preston General Oglethorpe joined with some of Wade’s cavalry. That weak old commander was still drifting ‘in the air,’ and Cumberland acted wisely in superseding him, though his own choice, Sir John Hawley, was hardly a success. On December 18 Charles was at Penrith, while Murray with the rearguard was strongly posted in enclosures at Clifton, two miles to the south. Here he was overtaken by Cumberland’s mounted infantry, and a brisk skirmish ensued. The fire of the infantry made little impression upon the well-posted Highlanders, and Murray, making a fine charge with the MacPhersons, drove them back with the loss of 100 men. By the morning Cumberland had his whole mounted force in hand, but Murray had already retired, and on the 20th joined the Prince at Carlisle. There the English sympathizers were left as a garrison, to surrender, as was inevitable, a few days later. Charles crossed the Border on the 20th, and continued his march to Glasgow, which he reoccupied on the 26th.

So ended the bold adventure. The small Jacobite army, partly by good fortune, partly by skilful strategy, had penetrated to within a week’s march of London, and had returned to its advanced base in safety indeed, but without success, and with scarce an English recruit to swell its ranks. General Hawley’s stupidity was to give it one more victory, and then Jacobitism as a political factor was to be trampled out of existence on the bleak moor of Culloden.