When was the last Highland Charge?
Which clan was involved?
Who were they up against?
...and how did it relate to the death of Jacobite hopes at Culloden?
That s what I m talking about today,
so if you re interested in the people,
places and events in Scottish history then click the subscribe button at the bottom
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In the meantime, let me tell you a story.
Today this is beautiful parkland. It
doesn t feel like a battlefield.
The thought of a mass of Highlanders
charging, swords drawn would fairly shake tourists and locals alike...
yet that s what you would have seen if you d been here
in September 1759.
You ll know from that date that
Culloden had come and gone.
...and in that bitter defeat
the 300 men of Clan Fraser
had breached the front line
of red coated soldiers
only to be viciously repulsed
by the second line defence.
They hadn t been led by the elderly
clan chief, nor by his son.
If you re thinking they were
led by Jamie Fraser...
Shut it
They were led by Charles Fraser of Inverallochy
It was as they retreated in haste towards
Inverness, they met young Simon Fraser
their chieftain s son on his way to the battle
They advised him to turn back.
He spent several weeks on the run
before his surrender to the crown
and a period of imprisonment in Edinburgh Castle
before being pardoned in 1750.
His was a better fate than his father
the clan chief and Eleventh Lord Lovat.
Also named Simon he was known as The Fox.
He met his death on the gallows in London as punishment for calling out the clan
in support of Bonnie Prince Charlie.
In fact,
he was the last man to be executed by beheading in Britain,
though not the last person beheaded.
If that seems strange then come back
and click the link top right for a video I made on that very subject.
Now the aide-de-camp to the British cavalry commander at Culloden was a
young officer called James Wolfe.
There s a story that he refused orders to
execute wounded clansmen after the battle.
However conflicted he was and
whether that tale is true or not,
he was definitely a leader in the post
Culloden suppression of the Highlands.
Fourteen years later Wolfe and the Fraser
Highlanders found themselves here,
sharing a battlefield once again...
This time they were on the same side.
You see as part of his
rehabilitation, Young Simon Fraser,
who d hid in the hills after Culloden raised
a regiment from his forfeited clan lands...
This time over 1000 men
to fight for the British army in North America during the Seven Years War...
what the Americans will call The French and Indian War.
This regiment became known as the 78th Fraser Highlanders.
They carried broadswords as well as muskets
They wore highland dress and
clan symbols in their bonnets.
Many, if not most, would be Jacobite at heart.
Some would have been in that charge at Culloden fourteen years earlier,
but that was a flame had been all but smothered.
Although the 1745 was still
clearly in James Wolfe s mind.
Before this battle he complimented the toughness
and martial prowess of his Highland troops...
adding that what s more it s no
great mischief if they fall.
Quite the leader of men....
The Fraser Highlanders were integral to the
defeat of the French here in in North America.
Ironically a war that probably would never have
happened if the Jacobite cause had succeeded.
If you doubt that then check out the
thoughts of expert historian Murray Pittock
in my interview with him and
Chris Whatley in my video on
What if The Jacobites Had Won at Culloden.
But the 78th Frasers found themselves here
on the Plains of Abraham outside Quebec City.
Here s an interesting factoid.
Plains of Abraham was named after one
of the first settlers from France
Abraham Martain, who was
awarded 32 acres in 1635
with his French wife Marguerite Langlois.
I say French wife, because he was referred to as
Abraham Martain dit l Ecossais.
Abraham Martin The Scotsman.
The last Highland Charge would
be by Fraser Highlanders
on a continent, an ocean away from home,
but on land owned by a Scotsman.
Now recently you may have heard me advertising
my 60th birthday tour in September.
I ve been saying that the tour
will end with a ceilidh for my 60th birthday in Ghillie Dhu Edinburgh.
Now here s an opportunity for a small number of folks who aren t coming on the tour
to join us at the ceilidh for your dinner drinks and a cracking ceilidh band.
If you fancy one of the small number of tickets available to share this night
with the tour group, me and my family
then email alexis@scotlandhistorytours.co.uk
Now I don t for a minute claim to be an expert on this campaign.
In fact, anyone who thinks I m an expert on anything needs tae tak a look at themsel.
I m indebted to local man Ewan Booth,
married to a Franco Scot descended
from a Fraser Highlander.
He showed me around and he tells me he
ll be starting his own YouTube channel
about the history of Scots
Qubequoi, so look out for that.
So General Wolfe and the British were on the
other side of the St Lawrence River there.
He was confident that his British regulars could
beat the French mix of regulars, militia,
Canadian woodsmen and natives.
He d tried to draw the French out to open battle but they weren t that stupid.
Something dramatic had to be done.
Wolfe looked for ways to make an amphibious
landing on this northern shore,
but whilst there were places much
further upriver to do that, it would give the French too much time to prepare.
Indeed, as the British spent several days going up and down the river on landing craft,
the French sent around 3000 regular troops, militia and cavalry upstream to stop them.
Then, overnight on 12th September General Wolfe had a barge drift down the river
so his men could disembark at the bottom of a 53 m cliff
with a gun battery on top.
Nobody would be expecting this madness.
A small unit clambered up the cliffs
and overcame the small force
of defenders at the top,
so that the main force could climb
the steep slope to the plain.
Between 3 and 8 in the morning the
British troops formed in battle lines.
The main body of French now had to
come out of the city and march west
whilst those that had been sent
upriver had to make their way back.
The French sent some auxiliary
Canadians, sharp shooters and natives
to hide in cover to the north
In a book of letters from Robert MacPherson, the minister attached to the 78th Highlanders,
he tells us that as the French approached the British lines from the town
Both made a Stop looking on another for 2 or 3 minutes,
the one desirous that the other would give the first fire.
At last the Enemy began and made 2 most furious Discharges.
When ours were ordered to fire, which they did to such purpose
that the Body of the Enemy were put in great Confusion by the Slaughter made among them...
This was when Brigadier James Murray gave the order for the Frasers to charge.
Our correspondent continues...
The Highlanders Rushed on Sword in hand and soon
other Regiments with Screwed Bayonets followed.
In a moment the Rout was general,
your Countrymen, Led on by Brigadier Murray, were interspersed among the thick of them,
Cutting and Slashing everywhere about them
They Pursued them to the very Sally Port
of the Town... and might have Entered.
He tells us that the reason
they didn t enter the city
was the host of Canadians and
Indians I told you about
hidden on their flank in this direction.
The Highlanders had to regroup and attack that body.
We re told we suffered great loss both in Officers and Men but at last
Drove them under Cover of their Cannon
which like ways did us Considerable harm.
The Fraser Highlanders suffered the heaviest casualties of the day.
A bitter man might say It was no great mischief
that General Wolfe himself also fell that day.
On our side of the Atlantic, if we don t know much about the Seven Years War in North America
the one thing we have heard of is this Battle on the Plaines of Abraham.
It was a victory for the British, Hurrah!
Most of the French army retreated,
leaving a small garrison in the town of Quebec that was easily besieged and surrendered,
as autumn turned to winter... but the war wasn t over.
When the ice retreated in spring, the French would be back...
and the roles would be reversed.
On our side of the Atlantic, winter
off the French coast arrives later
I ve also said before that the Jacobite
conflict that we obsess over in Scotland
was just one small cog in the
bigger wheel of machinations
between Britain, France and
their respective allies.
For the French, Jacobites marching south
to Derby had been a welcome distraction,
luring British troops from mainland Europe
back to Britain to protect their rear.
I ve also explained elsewhere in my video
Culloden Wasn t the Last Jacobite Hurrah
that.... Culloden wasn t
the last Jacobite hurrah.
I suggested that the last Jacobite hurrah was
at Quiberon bay off the coast of France.
Now I did a whole video about that, so
I m not going to cover all the details here,
but you can come back and click the link
top right to watch that video in full.
The point is that, as battle was
raging here on the Plains of Abraham,
in Europe the British were
blockading French ports.
The French were massing a
force on their Brittany coast
and planned a breakout so that they could
land an invasion force on the British Isles,
place James Stewart on the British
throne, and end the war in Europe.
It would also allow French supply ships
to get out of port, cross the Atlantic
and resupply their troops here in North America.
The battle here on the Plains of Abraham was September 1759.
Back home, the final Battle at Quiberon Bay was November...
With the thaw of a Canadian spring,
April saw the French approach Quebec
City from Montreal in the west.
They met at The Battle of Sainte-Foy about
two and a half miles in that direction.
In this battle outside Quebec
City roles were reversed.
It was the French who won with over
a thousand British casualties.
Maybe that s why the previous battles
the one we always hear about back home.
Now it was the French turn to
besiege the British in Quebec.
The British did have some advantages.
They d had time to rebuild the walls over winter....
but more importantly, the French struggled with the siege
because they were low on munitions and supplies they hoped for from France.
Munitions and supplies that should have arrived...,
but the failure to break the blockade at the Battle of Quiberon Bay in November
meant they never came...
It turns out that the last Jacobite Hurrah
was also the last French bravo in North America.
Here outside 18th century Quebec City was
where French hopes really came to an end...,
not at the Battle of the Plains of
Abraham, but the following spring.
The French and the Stuart Jacobite
cause were intertwined...
and they fell together.
Here in this beautiful park, east into the city,
is where the last Highland Charge took place,
by a regiment of officers and men who in sympathy were probably Jacobite,
who s allies fourteen years earlier had been the French,
a regiment raised by the son of last man executed by beheading in Britain,
for his role in the 1745 uprising,
his clansmen now subsumed into the British army,
led by the British officer who was their scourge after Culloden,
and saw no mischief if they fell.
There may have seemed no
way back after Culloden,
but the Jacobite cause truly came to an end
with the last Highland charge here on the Plains of Abraham
in what we call French Canada.
That video about the Jacobite last Hurrah
at Quiberon Bay is proper interesting.
You should watch it.
Just click the link coming up on screen now
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