Summary

The Jacobite insurrection of 1745 affected the territory of Great Britain between 1745 and 1746 and was the last episode of the Jacobite insurrections as well as the last attempt to restore to the throne of the Kingdom of Great Britain the House of Stuart, ousted in the early 18th century in favor of the House of Hanover. Because of its start date, the insurrection is also known in the United Kingdom as "the Forty-Five" (English: The Forty-Five).

The insurrection began in August 1745: taking advantage of the Kingdom of Great Britain's involvement in the War of the Austrian Succession, Charles Edward Stuart, the last pretender to the throne for the House of Stuart, landed in Scotland with the support of his French allies, giving new life to the "Jacobite" movement; a vast army soon rallied under his banner thanks to the massive support of the Scottish clans in the Highlands region, and with the bulk of the troops loyal to the Hanoverians engaged on the European continent the Jacobite forces were soon able to achieve several victories against the improvised local militias, raising the whole of Scotland and pushing into the interior of England itself by advancing as far as Derby.

The recall home of some experienced units of regular British troops under the command of William, Duke of Cumberland, decided the outcome of the revolt: the Battle of Culloden on April 16, 1746, saw the disciplined regiments of "redcoats" completely rout the semi-medieval highlander army, and within days Charles Edward had to flee Scotland. In addition to decreeing the end of the Jacobite movement, the insurrection also signaled the demise of the Scottish clan system and the subjugation of Scotland to British rule.

The Jacobite cause

The policy of openness toward the Catholic Church undertaken by King James II of England (at the same time King of Scotland as James VII) in the late 17th century provoked strong discontent among the English political and religious classes loyal to Anglicanism; the possibility that James II's son, educated in the Catholic religion, might succeed his father and thus also become head of the Anglican Church prompted Whig circles in the Parliament of England to organize the ascent to the throne of London of a Protestant: the choice fell on William III of Orange, Statolder of the United Provinces, grandson of James II and husband of his daughter Mary, a supporter of Anglicanism. In November 1688, the bloodless "Glorious Revolution" thus saw the triumphal entry of William and Mary into London while at the same time James fled with his son to France under the protection of King Louis XIV.

Under the reign of William and Mary, the Parliament of London saw its powers greatly strengthened through the passage of the Bill of Rights in 1689. Given the lack of direct heirs to the reigning couple, to avoid any Catholic claim to the throne, the English Parliament imposed through the Act of Settlement of 1701 the succession to the crowns of England, Scotland and Ireland by a Protestant member of the House of Hanover; pressure from the English Parliament for the Parliament of Scotland to also approve the Act of Settlement then led to the drafting in 1707 of the Act of Union between the two countries: England and Scotland were united under one state, the Kingdom of Great Britain, with a single Parliament. After passing into the hands of Mary's sister Anne, the crown of Great Britain then came in 1714 to the Elector Prince Georg Ludwig von Hannover, who ascended the throne of London as George I of Great Britain.

The "Glorious Revolution" and William III's accession to the throne had not been unanimously well received throughout the British Isles: in England the new ruler was opposed by Tory political circles and schismatic elements in the Anglican Church, while Catholic Ireland had always been a staunch supporter of the House of Stuart; the ousted James II could count on many supporters in Scotland as well, both among the gentry of the Lowlands, mostly Catholic and hostile to the advance of Presbyterianism in the country, and among the belligerent clans of the Highlands, traditionally on good terms with the Stuart monarch (who had respected their administrative autonomy) and concerned about the expansionist policy undertaken by the powerful Campbell Clan of Argyll, Presbyterian and allied with the English crown. The supporters of the Stuart dynasty then gave themselves the name "Jacobites" (from Jacobus, the Latin form of James II's name), and for the next half-century launched several attempts to oust by force of arms the Hanoverian dynasty established on the throne of Britain.

The first insurrectionary attempts undertaken by the Jacobites proved unsuccessful: despite the military support of France, England's traditional enemy, the attempt led by James II himself to raise Ireland was defeated by the forces of William III during the so-called "Williamite War" of 1689-1691, while the Jacobite insurrection organized simultaneously in Scotland by John Graham was suppressed by the Presbyterian Covenanters loyal to the new dynasty after their victory at the Battle of Dunkeld on August 21, 1689, although the north of the country always remained hostile to the Williamites and was pacified only with great difficulty between 1690 and 1692. After the death of James II in 1701, the claims of the Stuart dynasty were pursued by his son James Francis Edward Stuart, later known as "the Old Pretender" (The Old Pretender): in 1708 an attempt by him to re-enter Scotland in command of a small force escorted by French ships was cancelled due to the tight surveillance of Scottish waters by the Royal Navy, but soon after the first representative of the Hanoverian dynasty, George I, took the throne, the "Old Pretender" initiated a new insurrectionary attempt.

The Jacobite insurrection of 1715, known as "the Fifteen" (the Fifteen), took hold in Scotland in September 1715 by John Erskine, XXIII Earl of Mar, a Wigh left without power after the advent of the new king, later spreading to other parts of Britain: a Scottish army crossed the border and met in Lancashire with English Jacobite insurgents led by Member of Parliament Thomas Forster but was defeated at the Battle of Preston in early November, while other insurrectionary attempts in Wales and Cornwallis were nipped in the bud by government forces. Neither the Earl of Mar nor James Edward, who landed in Scotland in December, were experienced military commanders, and the rebels thus squandered their initial advantage by allowing the government forces to retaliate: after the inconclusive Battle of Sheriffmuir, the Jacobite army soon found itself numerically outnumbered by the Hanoverians, and in early February 1716 James Edward had to admit defeat and flee back to France. After the conclusion of a peace treaty between France and Britain in 1716, the "old pretender" had to seek new allies at the court of the Kingdom of Spain: a massive Spanish invasion force of 5,000 men that had sailed for Scotland in March 1719 was dispersed by storms before it even arrived and only a small force was able to land, later rejoining a force of Jacobite highlanders but subsequently defeated by the government at the Battle of Glen Shiel the following June 10. Improved relations between Spain and the United Kingdom again left the Jacobites without allies: James Edward, in exile in Rome, continued to formulate plans and designs for a new insurrection, but short of funds and with his movement infiltrated and decimated by British spies, he was unable to accomplish anything, and the Jacobite cause gradually seemed to wane.

The "young suitor"

However, the international situation again became favorable for the Jacobites' plans: the outbreak of the War of the Austrian Succession in 1740 reignited the state of hostility between France and Britain once again, and Jacobite agents went to the court in Paris to ask for aid; after some promising contacts with Tory politicians in England, who lent their support to a new uprising, King Louis XV of France was supportive of the enterprise provided that James Edward abdicated in favor of his son Charles Edward Stuart, known in European courts as the "Handsome Prince Charles" (Bonnie Prince Charlie) and later as "the Young Pretender" (the Young Pretender): a special declaration was signed on December 23, 1743, making Charles Edward the leader of the Jacobite movement. On February 8, 1744, Charles arrived in Paris while meanwhile an army of 10-15. 000 French soldiers under the command of General Maurice of Saxony was assembling at Dunkirk with a view to a landing on the English coast to be carried out near Maldon in Essex; the action, however, ended in failure again: after news about the planned invasion had reached the Secretary of State for the Department of the South Thomas Pelham-Holles, Duke of Newcastle, through spies and informants, a wave of arrests hit the English Jacobite movement while at the same time on February 24 a violent storm caused very serious damage to the French fleet anchored in Dunkirk leading to the cancellation of the planned invasion.

French interest in the Stuart restoration soon began to wane, prompting Charles Edward to move on his own: after obtaining a loan of 40. 000 livres from the Parisian banker George Walters, Charles was helped by the commander of the French army's Brigade irlandaise, Charles O'Brien, to make contacts with Irish shipowners to plan his landing on the Scottish coast; Antony Walsh, a notorious Irish pirate and smuggler, put his 16-gun frigate Du Teillay at the Jacobites' disposal, and Walsh himself later managed to charter the Elisabeth, a 64-gun Royal Navy vessel previously captured by the French. On May 11, 1745, the British army engaged against the French in Flanders suffered a defeat at the Battle of Fontenoy, reporting harsh losses; taking advantage of the favorable moment, Charles Edward initiated the expedition, and on June 22, 1745, the Du Tellay sailed from Nantes with the "young pretender," a handful of companions, a cargo of arms and 4. 000 gold louis, then meeting on July 4 off Brittany with the Elisabeth on which more arms as well as a hundred volunteers drawn from the Irish brigade had been loaded; on July 9, off Cape Lizard in Cornwall, the two ships were intercepted by the 64-gun vessel HMS Lion of the Royal Navy: in the ensuing clash the Elisabeth was heavily damaged and had to turn course for Brest, but the Du Teillay managed to slip away and continue her voyage northward to Scotland.

The Lion's commander believed that the two ships were French units on their way to North America and sent no warning signals to the government in London, allowing the Du Teillay to arrive undisturbed on July 23 at the island of Eriskay in the Hebrides. On July 25 Charles Edorado and his small retinue reached the Scottish mainland near Arisaig, beginning to make initial contacts with the leaders of the local MacDonald clans of Keppoch and Macdonald of Clanranald, part of the larger Clan Donald; on August 18 Charles Edorado went on a rendezvous with various clan chieftains near the village of Glenfinnan, and the next day he raised his banner on a nearby hill and made known James Edward's proclamation appointing him prince regent in his own name, officially starting the insurrection.

Charles lord of Scotland

The first rumors of Charles Edward's expedition to Scotland had begun to circulate as early as early June, only to become persistent in July; on July 28 Prince William, Duke of Cumberland, third son of King George II of Great Britain and commander-in-chief of the British regular army, wrote a letter to the Duke of Newcastle saying he was ready to interrupt the ongoing campaign in Flanders against the French in order to return home and face a possible Jacobite insurrection: George II himself, however, declined the request. On August 3, The London Gazette published a proclamation from the court of justice placing a bounty of £30,000 for the capture of Charles Edorado; when informed of this on August 20, Charles Edward himself replied by offering a bounty of the same amount for the capture of King George II.

On August 14 two companies of the Royal Scots regiment left Fort Augustus to go and reinforce the government garrison at Fort William further west. On August 16 the detachment ran into a small contingent of Keppoch's MacDonalds guarding the Highbridge: after a brief skirmish the government troops attempted to retreat along the road they had just traveled, but they soon found themselves surrounded by other groups of Jacobites who had rushed to the scene and had to surrender. The skirmish at Highbridge thus marked the beginning of hostilities: on August 31 King George II returned to London from Hanover, while on September 4 a concerned Duke of Newcastle sent a request to the Duke of Cumberland to send ten battalions of British regulars immediately home from Flanders to meet the unexpected threat, fearing the danger of a Jacobite march on London.

Until the end of August, Charles Edward remained at Glenfinnan to gather troops and allies; before long the "young pretender" managed to assemble an army of 1,200 men, half highlanders from the MacDonald clan and half from the Cameron clan. The highlander army was the last medieval-style army still present in Western Europe: the Scottish clans were extended families who considered themselves descendants of an ancient common ancestor, and all the land where the clan was settled was owned by the clan leader who granted it in management to the other members on condition that they would follow him in case of war; within the clan every man was a warrior and all warriors owed absolute loyalty to the clan leader. Although by now firearms were in common use even in Scotland, highlanders still preferred to fight with white weapons such as Lochaber axes or claymore-type basket hilt swords, protecting themselves with small wooden plate-type shields covered with leather; the only known tactic was the frontal charge: men discharged their firearms at the enemy, either to cause casualties or to raise a curtain of smoke, and then sprinted toward the opposing array to get to the hand-to-hand confrontation, where the physical strength and courage of individuals decided the fight.

In early September, Charles Edward set out for the Badenoch region to the east, gathering more allies as he went, and moving quickly thanks to the network of paved roads built by the British themselves in the Highlands after the 1715 insurrection to facilitate troop movements. In command of the government forces in Scotland was General John Cope, who had just under 4,000 mostly inexperienced and poorly armed soldiers under his orders; leaving Fort Augustus, Cope rode into the central Highlands hoping to intercept the Jacobite army before it could get too strong, but without finding any sign of the enemy he then directed on Inverness to the northeast leaving the southern route open. On September 4, Charles Edward reached Perth unchallenged, where he was greeted by other supporters led by Lord George Murray, an able veteran of the previous insurrection who was immediately appointed lieutenant general and commander of the Jacobite army; after the few government troops barring his way had fled southward without resistance, the Jacobite army reached Edinburgh on September 15, and after some negotiations, Charles Edorado entered the city on September 17: the crowd welcomed the "young pretender" who was then allowed to settle in Holyrood Palace, the official residence of the Scottish monarchs, although the government garrison under the orders of General Joshua Guest managed to barricade themselves in Edinburgh Castle where they remained besieged. On September 18 James Edward was formally proclaimed king of Scotland as James VIII, with Charles Edward as his temporary regent.

After discovering that he had been outwitted, Cope took his army to Aberdeen, had it embarked and then transported by sea to Dunbar from where he marched to Edinburgh; informed, Charles Edward led the Jacobite army out of the Scottish capital and marched to Prestonpans to meet Cope's government men. The battle of Prestonpans, fought on September 21, lasted only about ten minutes: the violent charge of the Highlanders overwhelmed Cope's inexperienced army, which ended up completely annihilated, with only light losses for the Jacobites. News of Prestonpans reached London on September 24, triggering panic: Cope was relieved of command after a court-martial verdict, while outbreaks of anti-Catholic violence by the populace occurred in various parts of England; on October 19, the Duke of Cumberland formally received a letter of recall from King George II, and British forces in Flanders began to re-embark to return home beginning October 28.

Virtually master of the whole of Scotland, Charles Edward established his own court in Edinburgh and began to administer his new kingdom. Money supply became a priority: the 4,000 gold louis brought from France had largely already been spent and, although the capture at Prestonpans of the Cope army chest had yielded another 3. 000 pounds, the monetary reserves of the Bank of Scotland and the Royal Bank of Scotland had been taken to Edinburgh Castle and were still in government hands; letters were sent to all the boroughs of Scotland and to all the local tax collectors to favor their books and pay the balances due, while from the citizenry of Glasgow, mostly of Wigh sympathies, £5,000 in money and £500 in goods were obtained after negotiations. France hired four smugglers to deliver £5,000 in gold, 2,500 muskets, six light cannons and a dozen French artillerymen to the Jacobites under the supervision of James Grant, a Franco-Scottish lieutenant colonel: all these supplies were successfully landed on Oct. 9 at Montrose and on Oct. 19 at Peterhead; Louis XV's personal representative, Alexander de Boyer marquis d'Eguilles, reached Charles Edward's court in Edinburgh on Oct. 14.

The invasion of England

On October 30, Charles Edward convened a council to decide on his next move: the "pretender's" intention was to invade England as soon as possible by way of the southeast, since only a complete conquest of the region would allow a full restoration of the Stuart dynasty to the throne, but Lord Murray and many of the chieftains proposed keeping the Jacobite forces in Scotland to consolidate the position, eliminate the remaining government garrisons, and await further aid from the French; in the end, by only one dissenting vote the council decided on the invasion, although Murray managed to convince Charles to lead the action by passing through Lancashire to the southwest, where landings of French troops on the coast of Wales or western England could bring additional reinforcements to the Jacobites. The Jacobite army then left Edinburgh in early November with a force of 5,000 infantrymen and 500 cavalrymen

On Nov. 8, 1745, the vanguard of the Jacobite army crossed the border between Scotland and England, reaching Carlisle the following day; the garrison of Carlisle Castle decided to resist, and the siege lasted until Nov. 15, when the government troops capitulated under very favorable conditions (the men were let free after surrendering their arms and signing a pledge not to resume hostilities against the Jacobites for at least a year): the capture of Carlise earned the Jacobites a good haul including 1. 500 muskets, 160 barrels of gunpowder and 120 horses. A government army under the command of General George Wade had been assembled at Newcastle upon Tyne to bar the way for an invasion along the east coast of England, but the Jacobites advanced south along the west coast penetrating Lancashire and forcing Wade to pursue them; on November 23 Manchester was abandoned by Eduard Stanley, Lord Lieutenant of Lancashire, and the government garrison, and the Jacobites occupied it without a fight on November 28.

On December 4, Charles Edward's army reached Derby, only 127 miles from London, where a war council of the Jacobites met the following day at Exeter House residence. The meeting set off contrasts within the rebel high command: Charles Edward was in favor of continuing the advance on London decisively, taking advantage of the favorable position gained and the high morale of the Jacobite troops, but Lord Murray and many of the other officers spoke out against further advances into England. Three government armies were maneuvering around the Jacobites' position (General Wade's army coming in from the northeast, the Duke of Cumberland's army coming in from the south, and a third represented by the London garrison troops), and Lord Murray estimated that facing and winning one of them would cause heavy losses to the Jacobites, making them vulnerable to attack by the other two, while in the event of defeat, retreat to Scotland would be impossible; in the lieutenant-general's opinion, the conquest of London was feasible only by an uprising of the English Jacobites or a landing of French troops in Essex, and neither of the one nor the other was presently in sight: even if the capital had been captured in an assault by the Jacobite army, it would have been promptly besieged by the combined armies of Wade and the Duke of Cumberland. To further complicate the picture, the Irish adventurer Dudley Bradstreet, attached to the Jacobite army but actually in the pay of the government as a spy, spread false reports about the presence of an additional British army of 9,000 men deployed between Derby and London, while a thousand highlanders took advantage of the confusion to flee and return to Scotland; finally, there was nothing left for Charles Edward to do but reluctantly order a retreat back to Scotland.

The retreat to Scotland

On December 6, the Jacobites left Derby by marching compactly northward; the retreat took place without too many problems: on December 18, the Jacobite rearguard was engaged by the vanguard cavalry of the Duke of Cumberland's army in the course of the so-called Clifton Moor skirmish, but managed to disengage without problems. The Jacobites left a small garrison of 400 men in Carlisle Castle, which was besieged by the Duke of Cumberland's army starting on December 21 and finally forced to surrender the following December 30; the Duke immediately gave a first taste of how he would conduct the suppression of the insurrection: all captured officers were hanged as traitors and the privates deported to the West Indies. On December 25, Charles Edward's army reached Glasgow, but the city proved hostile and provided the supplies the Jacobites desperately needed only under threat of being sacked; the militia of the Independent Highland Companies, units recruited by the government from among the Scottish clans that remained loyal to the Hanoverian dynasty, were causing problems for the Jacobite forces in the north of Scotland, although Jacobite Lewis Gordon was able to inflict a defeat on them at the Battle of Inverurie on December 23.

On January 3, 1746, Charles Edward left Glasgow with his forces, marching eastward toward Edinburgh; the army reached Stirling on January 5 and once again the citizenry proved hostile, reluctantly opening the city gates while the castle remained in the hands of the government garrison and had to be besieged. Lieutenant General Henry Hawley had replaced Wade at the head of the British army deployed along the east coast, and in early January he left Newcastle for Edinburgh; after reaching Linlithgow on Jan. 13, Hawley detached a contingent to attempt to liberate Stirling Castle from siege, and Charles Edward hurried to confront him in a pitched battle: the Battle of Falkirk on January 17 ended in another victory for the Jacobites, and Hawley's forces had to fall back after suffering several losses. The victory was poorly capitalized on by the Jacobites, however: Charles Edward's army remained to besiege Stirling Castle, but despite the arrival of a contingent of French artillery landed at Montrose the post was not taken. The Jacobites had to register a crescendo of desertions among their own ranks just as the Duke of Cumberland's army was approaching Stirling, and eventually Charles Edward accepted Lord Murray's advice to head north to the Highlands to winter and gather additional troops for the spring campaign; on February 1 the Jacobites therefore left Stirling and, fording the Firth of Forth, headed for Inverness: the government garrison at Fort George, northeast of Inverness, put up brief resistance before capitulating on Feb. 21, and Charles Edward established his winter headquarters in the city .

Meanwhile, the Duke of Cumberland's forces had reached Edinburgh on Jan. 30 where they joined the remnants of General Hawley's army that had escaped defeat at Falkirk; now in command of all government units stationed in Scotland, the Duke decided to continue the march northward by advancing along the east coast where his army could be easily resupplied by sea: on February 27, the government units reached Aberdeen where they established their winter quarters, training for the resumption of the campaign in the spring and receiving an additional reinforcement of 5. 000 German mercenary soldiers. Taking advantage of the government army's immobility and emboldened by the easy occupation of Fort George, the Jacobites carried out a series of attacks on the remaining fortified positions in the Glen Albyn area, which were of strategic importance for control of the Highlands: Fort Augustus was invested on March 3 and, thanks to a lucky mortar strike that hit its ammunition depot in full, blowing it up, capitulated as early as the following March 5; the subsequent siege of Fort William, which began on March 20, dragged on instead for several days because of the determined resistance of the government garrison (a mixture of British regulars and Scottish militiamen from the Campbell of Argyll Militia), until on April 3 Charles Edward recalled the besieging force to Inverness. A Jacobite contingent sent to besiege Blair Castle on March 17 was similarly recalled back on April 2 without having succeeded in seizing the position.

The defeat of Culloden

After waiting for the weather to improve, the Duke of Cumberland left his Aberdeen encampments on April 8, advancing northward at the turn of the Moray Firth and then bending westward, still following the coast; on April 11 the government troops reached the course of the Spey River, where a Jacobite force was stationed: the government men successfully forded the river on April 12 while the Jacobites fell back first to Elgin and then to Nairn, which in turn was evacuated and occupied by the government men on April 14. The Duke of Cumberland then established his army's encampment near Balblair, just west of Nairn, while that same April 14 Charles Edward left Inverness with the bulk of his army: the Jacobite forces included 5,000 infantrymen and 400 cavalry accompanied by a dozen light guns, while the Duke of Cumberland could dispose of 6,500 infantrymen between British regulars and Scottish militiamen in addition to 2,600 mounted dragoons and 16 pieces of artillery. The Jacobites arrived within sight of the government encampment on April 15, but the British troops were not inclined to give battle: April 15 was the Duke of Cumberland's birthday, and the British soldiers remained in their camp to celebrate with an extraordinary distribution of brandy. The situation could have turned to the Jacobites' advantage, but once again the rebels squandered their advantage by engaging in discussions within the high command: Lord Murray was displeased with the choice of ground for the battle, a stretch of flat moorland near the village of Culloden, which in contrast Charles Edward and his aide-de-camp Sir John O'Sullivan thought more than adequate. The Jacobite army remained deployed in the cold and without food for several hours, until finally the commanders agreed on a night attack on the government camp: despite the celebrations, however, the Duke of Cumberland's soldiers were on their toes, and the Jacobite action soon degenerated into utter confusion due to darkness and lack of coordination; after a brief skirmish, the Jacobite army retraced its steps, dispersing in search of food and shelter for the night.

The action resumed the next morning, when both armies deployed to the Culloden plain for the final confrontation. The Battle of Culloden ended in a disastrous defeat for the Jacobites: the Duke of Cumberland's troops, regular troop soldiers trained in the standards of European warfare of the time, were decidedly in a different league from the provincial militia faced by the Jacobites at Prestonpans and Falkirk, and the highlanders' frontal charge was shattered against the rifle discharges and firm ranks of the government units; as the Argyll militia maneuvered to take the Jacobite army on its flank, the British regulars charged the disheveled Highlanders frontally at the bayonet, driving them back and putting them on the rout. The pursuit by the British dragoons turned the defeat of the Jacobites into a rout: by direct order of the Duke of Cumberland no quarter was given to the wounded or taken prisoners of the enemy, who were then slaughtered in large numbers, earning the Duke the nickname by the Scots of "Billy the butcher." The Jacobite army ended up largely annihilated with the loss of 1,500 to 2,000 men dead and wounded, while in contrast the government men suffered just 50 dead and just over 250 wounded.

While most of the Highlanders were fleeing to their homelands, Lord Murray managed to round up about 1. 500 survivors of the battle at the Ruthven Barracks fort near Ruthven, but Charles Edward, having narrowly escaped capture at Culloden, gave orders to disband the army on April 18: the Frenchmen still in the Jacobite force reached Inverness where they surrendered themselves to the government on April 19 as prisoners of war, while the Scots dispersed returning to their homes. A group of leading members of the Jacobite command comprising chieftains Lochiel, Lochgarry, Clanranald and Barisdale fled west to the Sound of Arisaig, not far from the point where Charles Edward had landed on the Scottish mainland at the beginning of the insurrection: here, on April 30, the Jacobites were joined by two French frigates, the Mars and the Bellone, which brought ashore various supplies as well as 35. 000 pounds in gold; two days later the French ships were engaged in a violent six-hour naval battle by three Royal Navy sloops-of-war before managing to retreat. Invigorated by the supplies they had received and the tangible evidence that the French allies had not deserted them, the Highland clan chiefs decided to attempt to carry on the insurrection: after meeting on May 8 in the vicinity of Murlagan, the chiefs made a rendezvous at Invermallie for the following May 18 with the intention of rejoining the remaining forces of Keppoch's MacDonalds and the Macpherson regiment, which had not taken part in the Battle of Culloden. This attempt soon foundered: after a month of substantial inactivity, the Duke of Cumberland moved his army inside the Highlands, and on May 17 the government forces reoccupied Fort Augustus; that same day the Macpherson clan offered its surrender. At the meeting on May 18 the Lochiel, Lochgarry and Barisdale chiefs (Clanranald did not show up) managed to assemble only about 600 men-at-arms, some of whom immediately dispersed in search of food; the next morning a government contingent approached the meeting place and the Jacobite forces fled without offering the slightest resistance, disintegrating completely.

After his successful escape from the battlefield of Culloden, Charles Edward traveled north accompanied by a small group of followers to the Hebrides; on April 20 the "pretender" reached Arisaig from where a few days later he embarked for the island of Benbecula from where he then moved to Scalpay and then Stornoway. For five months Charles Edward moved continually through the Hebrides, constantly sought by supporters of the Hanoverians and with a bounty of £30,000 on his head; the noblewoman Flora MacDonald offered him hospitality and protection, eventually causing him to escape adventurously to Skye disguised as a woman. Finally, on September 19, Charles Edward returned to Arisaig, where with a small retinue he managed to embark on two French ships that took him back to France; his departure definitely marked the end of the insurrection.

The defeat of the 1745 insurrection marked the end of the Stuart dynasty's attempts to regain the throne of London. Charles Edward repaired to France, but one of the clauses of the 1748 Treaty of Aachen, concluding the War of the Austrian Succession, forced his expulsion from the country and the prince had to return to exile in Rome; Charles Edward was soon left without any political or financial support, rendering some of his further plans to spark a new insurrection futile. A brief interest in the Jacobite cause returned to France after the outbreak of the Seven Years' War, when the French began to lay out preparations for a massive invasion of Britain-Charles Edward was recalled to Paris but was now a shadow of his former self and was soon sidelined; the defeat of the French fleet at the Battle of Quiberon Bay then shelved any plans for an invasion of the British Isles, and with it any remaining hopes of a Stuart restoration. Charles Edward died in 1788 without direct heirs, and the role of pretender to the Jacobites then passed to his brother Henry Benedict Stuart, a cardinal; Henry then died in 1807, and with him the last instances of the Stuart dynasty died out.

The repression of the remaining Jacobite movement in Scotland by the Duke of Cumberland was brutal. Scottish prisons were filled with supporters of the Stuarts or presumed supporters, many of whom were later sent to England to stand trial for high treason: almost all of the leading elements who had been captured were sentenced to death, while low-ranking men were largely sentenced to deportation to the British colonies or exile; others, such as Lord Murray, although escaping capture had to leave the country forever. The British government took several measures to eliminate the Highland clan autonomy regime and incorporate Scotland into the rest of Britain: the Heritable Jurisdictions (Scotland) Act 1746 ended the hereditary rights of Scottish landowners in the administration of justice over their property, eliminating the power of tribal chiefs and destroying their feudal authority over clansmen; clansmen who remained loyal to the House of Hanover received ample monetary compensation for the loss of their autonomy, but Jacobite clan chiefs saw their land confiscated by the government and sold for a few pounds to English entrepreneurs who drove out the peasants and introduced large flocks of sheep into the Highlands to feed England's woolen industry. In an effort to eliminate any reference to Scottish identity, the Act of Proscription 1746 made it illegal to wear traditional Scottish clothing such as kilts and tartan cloth outside British Army regiments recruited in Scotland; other measures made the use of bagpipes illegal, while traditional literature and poetry and even the use of the Scottish Gaelic language were heavily opposed. The defeat in the 1745 revolt thus marked the full integration of Scotland into the nascent United Kingdom

Sources

1. Jacobite rising of 1745
2. Insurrezione giacobita del 1745
3. ^ a b c d e (EN) Scottish History - The Jacobites, su biggrowl.co.uk. URL consultato il 23 aprile 2016 (archiviato dall'url originale il 1º marzo 2010).
4. ^ Summarised in a British intelligence report of 1755; "...'tis not in the interest of France that the House of Stuart should ever be restored, as it would only unite the three Kingdoms against Them; England would have no exterior [threat] to mind, and [...] prevent any of its Descendants (the Stuarts) attempting anything against the Libertys or Religion of the People.
5. ^ Scots made up less than five percent of the Jacobite court in 1696 and 1709: by far the largest element were English, followed by Irish and French.
6. Eveline Cruickshanks, Political Untouchables. The Tories and the '45, σελ.38-44 (Duckworth, 1979)
7. Christopher Duffy, The '45, σελ. 44-46 (Cassell, 2003)
8. Cruickshanks, σελ. 50 και 52
9. Cruickshanks, σελ. 47
10. Somerset, Anne (2012). Queen Anne; the Politics of Passion. Harper Press. pp. 532-535. ISBN 0007203764.
11. Evelyn, 2004, pp. 131-136.