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| The last battle to be fought
on British soil - and the bastards beat us |
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The last battle to be fought on British
soil, Culloden was to be the catalyst for the destruction
of the highland way of life and the dismantling of the Clan
system once and for all.
Today, it is known as ethnic cleansing.
To the British Government of the day,
however, it was nothing more than the rebellious highlanders
and their Chiefs deserved. They saw their actions as being
necessary to prevent any repeat of such defiance.
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Culloden today
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The battle itself took place on the
16th April 1746 on a bleak, windswept moor just to the south
of Inverness.
It must be remembered that this was
no Scotland V England match though, but a full-scale British
Civil War with many Scots families deeply divided and even
with sons in both camps.
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King George II
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Stuart wanted to reclaim the Crown he believed
had been wrongfully taken from the Stuart Dynasty by the "illegal"
coup d'etat against his Grandfather, King James VII in 1688,
and which led to the Hanoverian succession.
King George II wasn't about to give
it back.
In the Blue corner then, Bonnie Prince
Charlie and the remnants of an exhausted and unfed highland
army.
In the Red Corner, William Duke of Cumberland,
son of King George, and his army of mainly seasoned and trained
professional troops, outnumbering their foes by 2 to 1.
It was no contest.
Rather, it was a massacre.
Not content with winning the battle,
Cumberland unleashed his troops upon the survivors and the
wounded, ordering their wholesale slaughter with "no
quarter to be given."
Even innocent spectators to the battle
were savagely murdered.
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Dog Shit
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Butcher Cumberland
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It was just the beginning.
There followed a ruthless and brutal
reduction of the highland clans, a deliberate assault on an
ancient way of life. Chiefs were stripped of all their powers.
Homes were burned to the ground. People were jailed and transported
often for no other reason than belonging to certain clans.
Crops and stock were appropriated. Even the wearing of tartan
and the playing of bagpipes was forbidden.
After 9 months backpacking around the
highlands and islands, Charles eventually escaped back to
Rome, and he lived for another 43 years, a broken and squalid
alcoholic who never ceased to berate the brave highlanders
who literally gave up everything and suffered so greatly in
his cause.
The effectively finished what "Butcher"
Cumberland started and by the middle of the 19th century,
the highlands had become a deserted wasteland.
Cumberland's name is still remembered
with obvious affection in Scotland and the flower named as
"Sweet William" in his honour is otherwise known
as "Stinking Billy" north of Stirling.
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