Lord George Murray / Military
- Name : Murray
- Born : 1694
- Died : 1760
- Category : Military
- Finest Moment : Battle of Prestonpans, 1745
Murray was born on 4 October 1694, at Huntingtower, Perth, the son of John Murray, 1st Duke of Atholl. He joined the first Jacobite Rebellion in 1715 and the 1719 landing which ended at Glenshiel, went into exile in Sardinia to return when pardoned in the late 1720s.
Like many Scots of the day, he had to make a major and difficult decision in 1745; whether or not to support Prince Charles Edward Stewart. He eventually joined the Young Pretender at Perth, and was appointed Lieutenant-General of the Jacobite forces. He is reckoned to have been easily the best Jacobite general, but a proud, hot-tempered and outspoken character, he was frequently at loggerheads with the Prince and his Irish advisers. The Irish advisers had the ear of Stewart, and also had their own agenda. Their influence would prove to be a significant factor in the ultimate defeat of the Jacobite rising.
Victory for the Jacobites at Prestonpans in September was mainly due to the superb tactics of Murray, as was the masterful retreat from Derby back to Scotland in December. The Irish advisors had pushed Stewart into the invasion of England, against Murray's advice. Stewart had dismissed Murray. The Scots troops would not follow any other general however, and Murray was reinstated. In January 1746, Murray defeated the English at Falkirk.
He was unhappy with the Prince's decision to make a stand at Culloden, not liking the terrain, and following the disastrous outcome of the battle, the last to be fought on British soil, his wing of the Jacobite army came out in the best order. He reached Ruthven Barracks, was ordered to disband, and retired to France. He eventually settled in Holland, where he died at Medemblik on 1 October 1760, never having been able to return to Scotland.
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You are here: Heritage | Timelines | Lords of the Isles
Lords of the Isles
They were proud, warlike and fiercely independent - and they kept their own firm grip on a large chunk of present day Scotland for hundreds of years.
The Lords of the Isles were so powerful that they managed to maintain control of much of the highlands and islands as a separate kingdom right up until the year 1493.
They built a tough but civilised and largely democratic society where people used sailing ships much as we use cars today.
The hardy islanders traded not only with each other, but also with places as far away as the continent - teaching the Europeans, for instance, about the delights of smoked salmon by selling it to them.
In return, they received fine French wines. The notion that the kingdom of the isles is the place where whisky first became popular is largely a myth - because most folk enjoyed swilling this claret instead!
The Lordship of the isles is often perceived today by many lowlanders and non-Scots as being something which was remote, empty, heathen and practically barbarian.
Certainly the people could - and would - fight if they had to. But by and large built a fair and just society where the king of the Isles was answerable to his nobles and where the population was probably actually larger than it is today.
There is considerable debate about when the lordship of the isles actually began, though it is generally reckoned by historians to have been around 1330. In the centuries before then, the islands and much of the western fringe of Scotland had been ruled by the Vikings.
The isles were reclaimed for the Gaels in the 12th century by a strong but probably relatively low status warrior from Argyll called Somerled - the name means summer traveller - who mounted an assault on the Norse kingdom. In 1156, his fleet, which was said to number 80 galleys, won a great victory off Islay and captured the nearby islands, including Mull and Jura.
When Somerled died in 1165 - he became too ambitious and was killed while mounting an unsuccessful raid on Glasgow - his lands were split between his three sons Donald, Dougal and Rauri. Interestingly, these men and their followers each became responsible for the formation of three of Scotland's greatest clans - McDonald, McDougal and McRory.
Over the next 200 years or so, the McDonalds gradually grew in strength through battle and inter-marriage while the McDougal lands became reduced to an area round Oban. The McRorys ruled the small isles such as Rhum, Muck and Eigg and a slice of the mainland in what is present day Knoydart and Moydart.
The start of the Lordship of the Isles is generally dated to the period around 1330 when the so-called Good King John of Islay - a McDonald - started to use the title of Lord and later married his distant cousin Amie McRauri. With this marriage, he reclaimed the lands which had originally belonged to the Rauri side of the Somerled family.
By then, the lordship extended to the southern Hebrides, the current Lochaber area around Fort William and Lewis as well as islands of Jura, Islay, Mull, Coll and Tiree - though not Skye, which was part of the earldom of Ross and didn't become part of the kingdom until 1450.
John based his kingdom or lordship - the two terms are really interchangeable - around Finlaggan on Islay where his parliament met on an island in the middle of a loch. It was a sophisticated gathering, passing its own laws and acts, and by the standards of the time, was about as democratic as you were likely to get.
The parliament, or council, was made up of 16 men representing the different classes of society at that time - four lords, four sub-lords, four squires and four freemen. Appeals of decisions made by judges in the different territories of the lordship could also be made to this body.
Alex Woolf, a lecturer in Celtic and early Scottish history at the University of Edinburgh, explains how it would have worked. "People would have gathered at Finlaggan from all parts of the kingdom. The parliament would have been democratic in that it would have operated by consensus.
"The king's vote would obviously have counted more than any other individual, but if everyone else was against him, he'd have backed down. If had hadn't have done, he'd simply have been murdered, which was the usual way of solving political disputes in those days."
Although the population of the area then was almost certainly greater than it is today - there were perhaps as many as 150,000 people living there at the time - there would be no towns or urban settlements. No single centre of population would have been bigger than about 200 people.
Some of the bigger communities would have been gathered around the walls of castles owned by the richest men in the region. Many of these structures, such as Tobermory on Mull and Dunstaffnage in Argyll, can still be seen today.
The kingdom was almost completely independent of the rest of Scotland. The two sides clashed with some regularity in battle - the most famous of which was a score draw at Harlaw near Inverurie in 1411 - but generally they left each other to govern themselves.
Alex Woolf says: "The lords of the isles would have had a large degree of autonomy from Scotland. They'd have looked after their own defence and foreign affairs, for instance. Technically, the lord would have been a vassal of the king of Scots and there was a vague recognition of Scotland's overlordship, but the royal officials of Scotland such as sheriffs wouldn't go into the territory, and it was very much self governing.
"The kings of Scots probably thought it was their territory but basically left the lords to get on with it. Soldiers from the kingdom would occasionally turn up alongside the Scots to bash the English. The Scots kings would have seen this as a submission to their authority, but in reality it was probably just an opportunity to get hold of some booty."
The poor, scrubby land of most of the kingdom held by the lords of the isles made it difficult for its inhabitants to support themselves off the land, so they had to turn to some of their other natural advantages in order to trade and survive.
What were these? Well, for a start, they were consummate sailors, and a spot of piracy now and then would doubtless have helped keep the coffers topped up. They also made a reasonable living selling mercenaries to Irish chiefs who were constantly fighting each other and the English at the time.
And then, of course, there was international trade. "They'd smoke salmon, which was plentiful in Scottish waters at the time, and sell it in the Mediterranean", says Woolf. "It was a luxury even then. They'd bring back wine in return. Whisky was really the drink of the lowlander. Claret, however, became associated with the islands because of this trade and was even sold under the name Gaelic wine in England as late as the 18th century."
The kingdom finally came to an end in 1493 with its forced absorption into mainland Scotland. The heir to the Lordship Angus the Young - Angus Og - was murdered in 1490 while trying to gain control of the Ross lands nearby, which had been historically linked to the Lordship and which were once again being claimed by it. His nephew Alexander of Lochalsh then took over the campaign but was also killed.
The Scots king, James IV, had become tired of the constant struggles which had taken place, especially in Ross, He felt this was too close to Inverness - which he controlled - for comfort, and decided to settle the matter once and for all.
James moved in, took advantage much greater political and military power, and declared that the lands of the lordship had to be forfeited to him. He got his way. John died in 1503 without ever getting his kingdom back, which by then had passed to Scotland forever.
Various sporadic rebellions took place to try and re-establish the kingdom, and hopes that it would rise again persisted as long as the Jacobite rebellion in 1745. It never happened. But the end of the lordship did mark the beginning of another uniquely Scottish institution - the system of the clans.
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Lord Joseph Lister / Medical Pioneers
- Name : Lister
- Born : 1827
- Died : 1912
- Category : Medical Pioneers
- Finest Moment : Demonstration of the benefits of antiseptic methods in surgery
English by birth (Lyme Regis, Essex, 5 April 1827), Lister married a Scot, spent most of his professional life in Scotland, and carried out almost all of his medical research in Scottish hospitals. His father was an amateur scientist, and was elected a fellow of the Royal Society for work which led to the modern achromatic microscope.
His parents were Quakers, and sent him to Quaker institutions which emphasised teaching in natural history and other sciences. Before he was 16 he decided on a surgical career. He qualified as a doctor at University College, London, in 1852. The following year he arrived in Edinburgh, to gain experience under Professor James Syme. Fate played its hand here, when a young surgeon was killed in the Crimea in 1854, leaving medical vacancies in Edinburgh. Lister obtained both, and also married Syme's daughter in 1856. They had a happy and childless marriage.
In 1860 he became Regius Professor of Surgery at Glasgow University, and a year later surgeon at the Royal Infirmary in Glasgow. Lister was in charge of the new surgical block, where, despite the best of care during and after surgery, a horrifying 45-50% of surgical patients died from sepsis following amputations. This was between 1861 and 1865.
Lister theorised that infected wounds were caused by a pollen-like dust, too small to be seen with the naked eye. Accordingly, he attempted to protect the operation site by setting up a barrier between the surgeon's hands and instruments. He began by using carbolic acid, by soaking lint or calico and applying it to the wound.
At some point Lister must have become aware of the experiments being done by Louis Pasteur in France; when Pasteur showed that the fermentation of wine, for example, was cause by minute living organisms in the air. In fact, most of the organisms were to be found on the surgeon's hands and instruments, as well as any other material coming into contact with an open wound. The silk use for stitching then did not absorb much carbolic acid, so that Lister switched to using catgut which did. Between 1865 and 1869, surgical mortality in Lister's Male Accident Ward fell from 45% to 15%.
Lister succeeded Syme in the chair of Clinical Surgery at Edinburgh University in 1869, to stay for seven years. He toured Germany to great acclaim, and America to less, though Boston and New York appreciated his findings. He made his final move in 1877, when he became Professor of Surgery at King's College Hospital, London.
His wife died in 1892, and Lister retired the following year. He died on 10 February 1912, at Walmer, Kent.
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- Name : MacBeth
- Born : c.1005
- Died : 1057
- Category : Kings and Queens
- Finest Moment : Roman Holiday, 1050
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Mary Queen of Scots
When Mary Queen of Scots returned to her native land after spending her childhood in France, she hoped she would bring peace to Scotland and win huge popularity for herself in the process.
But she also secretly cherished another aim - to claim, and eventually to take, the throne of England.
However, it was not to be. Her reign turned into a disaster so astonishing that if you made a television drama of her life story today, it would be dismissed as too fanciful for words.
Intrigue, murders, explosions, rape, disastrous marriages and religious strife were all hallmarks of Mary's short but eventful rule over Scotland.
When she returned home as an 18-year-old in 1561, it was very much a journey she would rather not have undertaken. She really wanted to be Queen of France. But her husband, the French king Francois II, had died of a septic ear, and so there was no future for her there.
Mary also had Tudor blood through her grandmother, who was a sister of Henry VIII, which gave her a claim to the throne of England. But there was just one small problem - it was already taken by Elizabeth. That left Scotland as her third choice, but as the only realistic option.
Although young, Mary was shrewd and highly political. She felt that her claim to the English throne was legitimate and one day it could pass to her, but she knew that in order to try and secure it, she would need a power base - the Scottish nobility.
Here, though, lay another immediate problem. Mary was a Catholic, while Scotland was now firmly Protestant. She realised she would have to reach an accommodation with the Reformers if she was to build support for the future.
Unfortunately, she started off on the wrong foot. The very first Mass she held at her private chapel in Holyrood provoked riots in the streets outside. The Protestant leaders, including the powerful John Knox, wanted a monarch who would fight for Calvinism, not Catholicism. They saw Mary, with her strong religious views and enjoyment of good living, as little more than a pagan.
Nevertheless, a compromise was reached. Mary did not seek to convert the Protestant Scots back to Catholicism, and she was left alone and allowed to celebrate Mass in private. However, another problem loomed. She realised that, as a young widow, she needed a new husband who, by providing her with children, would strengthen her claim to the English throne.
Mary chose Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, a Yorkshireman and also a cousin - a family link which further strengthened her own claim to the English throne - as a suitor. The couple married in 1565, but the relationship turned out to be a disaster. Darnley, who offered so much promise, turned out to be a debauched, stupid playboy.
The marriage was also politically unwise because it alienated those Mary needed most to keep on board. The nobles of Scotland were angry because she had married a Catholic, while Elizabeth disapproved of the marriage because she knew it strengthened Mary's claim to her own throne. Mary's own half-brother James, who had been her most trusted adviser, became jealous of Darnley and walked out.
Mary became pregnant, but her relationship with her husband broke down and, less than a year after they married, she fell into the company of David Rizzio, an Italian singer and musician. However, the friendship angered a jealous Darnley, who thought that Rizzio was the real father of Mary's child.
Along with a number of Scottish earls, Darnley plotted to kill the Italian and frighten Mary into submission at the same time. He and the others broke into Mary's dining room when she was eating with Rizzio, dragged him out and stabbed him to death. Mary herself was jostled and threatened at gunpoint - the conspirators hoped this might make her lose her unborn child.
When her son - the future James VI - was born, it did nothing to bring the unhappy couple back together. But it did give the young Queen the security of having an heir. Mary then fell into a new relationship with James Hepburn, the fourth Earl of Bothwell, who was both a noble and a Protestant.
The Queen seriously considered divorcing Darnley but eventually ruled the idea out because it carried the risk of rendering her son illegitimate. So another way of getting rid of him had to be found. By 1567, he had fallen ill with a serious disease - some say smallpox, others syphilis.
Estranged from Mary, Darnley was living in a house at Kirk o'Field on the outskirts of Edinburgh. One night, only hours after Mary had paid him a visit, there was a huge explosion. Darnley was injured by the bast and thrown naked from the house into the street. But he was later found strangled.
Exactly who killed him is one of the great remaining unsolved mysteries of Scottish history. Mary had originally intended to stay at Darnley's house for the night before deciding to change her plans and attend a ball, which suggests that she may have been a target as well.
Other possibilities are that Darnley wanted to kill the Queen and became caught up in his own trap, that her half brother James, who had mysteriously left for France beforehand, was involved - or, of course, that the plot was hatched by Bothwell, who was seen having gunpowder delivered to his own house before the explosion.
The Scottish public were in no doubt that it was Bothwell, and he was brought to trial. But the hearing was a judicial farce. Bothwell managed to pack the city and the courtroom with his supporters who were armed to the teeth, and the chief prosecutor was accosted on his way to court. Unsurprisingly, no-one came forward to speak against Bothwell and the jury acquitted him.
Bothwell then asked Mary to marry him. She declined his proposal and went to join her son at Stirling. However, he tricked her by persuading her to go with him to Dunbar castle, claiming that a rebellion was being plotted against her in Edinburgh, and then raped her.
Terrified that she might be pregnant, Mary felt she had no choice but to consent to the marriage. She authorised Bothwell's divorce from his previous wife and then tied the knot with him herself only days later - and only three months after Darnley's death.
Despite the fact it was a Protestant marriage, the nobles of Scotland were furious. They felt Mary was behaving like a whore and making a fool of them, herself, and the country. There was an almost immediate rebellion, and the couple were forced to escape and raise an army to defend themselves.
The two sides met at Carberry Hill in June 1567, but Mary's army was so small that neither side had the stomach for a fight. However, it was effectively the end of Mary's rule over Scotland. Bothwell fled and, after spending a time in Orkney, made for Scandinavia, where he spent the rest of his days.
Mary was taken to Edinburgh and then to Loch Leven castle in Fife. She realised the game was up and quickly renounced her throne. Her son was crowned James VI at Stirling in Scotland's first ever Protestant coronation.
However, there was another twist to the story. The following year, Mary was helped to escape by a group of nobles loyal to her cause. She then faced a loyalist force under her half-brother James - appointed Regent of Scotland, since the new king was still only a child - at Langside, outside Glasgow.
Mary's 6000 strong army was roundly defeated in the battle, and she fled to the country's remote south west. The fight was over and there seemed only one course of action left to take. Mary felt she would have to cross the border and appeal to the goodwill of Elizabeth, Queen of England?..
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- Name : Mary, Queen of Scots
- Born : 1542
- Died : 1587
- Category : Kings and Queens
- Finest Moment : Returning to Scotland, on 19 August 1561
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- Name : Mary of Guise
- Born : 1515
- Died : 1560
- Category : Famous Historical Figures
- Finest Moment : Regent of Scotland, 1544-60
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It is still one of the most shameful moments in Scotland's history - the awful day when Highlander turned on Highlander in a dreadful and unforgivable act of murder and treachery.
Many people still believe that the massacre which took place at Glencoe in 1692 occurred because the Campbells decided to settle old scores by butchering their great rivals the MacDonalds in cold blood.
Yet the truth is that the Campbells - ruthless and bloodthirsty though they undoubtedly were - were only the pawns in a sinister and evil game which was sanctioned by the king himself.
The massacre was meant to be an act of punishment against the lawless MacDonalds for their failure to accept the monarch's authority. But it turned into a bloodthirsty excuse for some of the most powerful people in Scotland to settle old scores against the rebellious Highland clans.
By 1691, William of Orange was firmly on the throne of both Scotland and England, with the last Stewart monarch, James VII and II, driven to exile in France.
However, William still had a problem. The traditionally unruly clans of the Highlands had sworn an oath of allegiance to James, and so could not be trusted. The king decided it was time for a showdown - and he was determined it was one he should win.
He decided to offer an amnesty to the clans who had gone into battle for James, provided they were prepared to swear an oath of allegiance to him before 1 January 1692. if they failed to meet the deadline, they would be liable for execution.
However, William realised that this oath would have no meaning unless James was prepared to release the clans from their fealty to him. So he asked the exiled former king to agree to this.
James finally accepted the offer - but by the time the ambassador got back to Edinburgh with his approval and word went out to the Highland chiefs, it was December 29 - just three days before the deadline.
The MacDonalds were one of the proudest of the Highland clans and had fiercely supported James' Jacobite cause, but their leader Alexander MacDonald, also known as McIain, realised he had no real choice but to take the oath.
Unfortunately, his attempts to do so turned into a comedy of errors. He set off for Fort William to swear his loyalty but when he arrived there just hours before the deadline on December 31, he found that the local governor, Colonel John Hill, wasn't empowered to receive it.
Hill told McIain that only the civil magistrate of the district could take the oath - and he was 74 miles away in Inveraray. McIain set off south immediately though deep snow but, unfortunately, was arrested by a group of Grenadiers on the way and locked up for 24 hours.
By the time he arrived at Inveraray, it was January 2. The sheriff, Sir Colin Campbell, didn't return to work until the 5th and initially refused to accept the oath as the deadline had passed, though he later relented.
McIain felt sure that the problem was over, and that his people were safe. What he didn't know, however, was that his troubles were only just beginning.
The certificate testifying that the MacDonalds had taken the oath was sent to Edinburgh to the Sheriff Clerk, who ironically was also called Colin Campbell. This Campbell, however, disliked both the MacDonalds and any form of irregular practice, and he saw an opportunity to get his own back.
Campbell scrubbed MacDonald's name off the certificate and passed it to the Scottish Secretary, Sir John Dalrymple, the Master of Stair. Dalrymple's hatred of the Highland clans was at least as intense as Campbell's, and he saw a golden opportunity for vengeance in the making.
Dalrymple quickly decided that the MacDonalds were to be made an example of. On January 7 he sent a letter to Sir Thomas Livingston, the Commander in Chief of the King's forces in Scotland, saying that he wanted action and adding darkly: "I hope the soldiers will not trouble the government with prisoners."
The order was passed to King William, who duly signed it. Two companies of Argyle's regiment totalling 120 men were ordered to proceed to Glencoe, where they were to await further orders.
The officer commanding them was another Campbell - Captain Robert Campbell of Glenlyon, an alcoholic who had a particular grudge against the MacDonalds of Glencoe since two years before, they had left a trail of destruction as they passed through his estate on the way back from a battle.
When the troops arrived in the glen, they told the unsuspecting MacDonalds that they were there to collect tax arrears in the area, and they carried false papers to justify their cover story.
The clan reacted in true Highland tradition. Its members offered their hospitality, giving the troops free board and lodging in the villages scattered along the glen.
For 12 days, the troops stayed with the clan, enjoying their company. Glenlyon's own niece was married to one of the clan members, and he regularly visited the pair for a drink and a chat.
The order to attack, which came directly from Dalrymple through Livingston, was passed through to the regiment. Glenlyon's orders were both brutal and clear. They said: "You are hereby ordered to fall upon the rebels, the MacDonalds of Glencoe, and put all to the sword under seventy. You are to have a special care that the old fox and his sons do upon no account escape your hands. You are to secure all the avenues that no man escape."
Glenlyon's deceit and treachery held to the last. The evening before the attack, he played cards with the sons of the chief, Alexander and John MacDonald, and accepted an invitation from McIain himself to dine with him the following day.
The assault took place as the orders stipulated at 5am on the morning of Saturday February 13th. Men, women and children were slaughtered as they lay in their beds.
The attack took almost all of the clan by surprise. McIain himself was shot twice as he clambered from his bed. He fell dead in front of his wife, who was stripped naked and thrown out of the house into a piercing snowstorm. She died of exposure the following day.
The solders were not content simply to kill as many of the MacDonalds as they could. They then set light to the houses, forcing those who had not been murdered to flee into the hills.
Their plan was simple, and it worked. In the bitter weather, those who escaped from the bullet and the sword could not survive in the outdoors for long. One by one, they died of tiredness and exposure in the mountains before they could reach the safety of shelter.
In total, 38 people were murdered in their homes, with an unknown additional number dying in the snow. Some 1500 cows and 500 horses are also thought to have perished.
As far as Dalrymple was concerned, the massacre was a job well done. Three weeks later, he described the slaughter as a "great work of charity" and said that his only regret was that any of the MacDonalds had got away.
However, it soon became clear that the Scottish Secretary's view was very much a minority one. All over the country, people reacted to news of the attack with horror and anger.
As fury mounted, the king realised a major blunder had been made. William tried to extricate himself from the mess by claiming that he had only signed the order because it was buried in a mass of other state papers and he hadn't read it.
Dalrymple couldn't get off the hook so easily. He was sacked from his post and a commission of enquiry was established to investigate the whole affair. He took the brunt of the blame for the affair, though he was never tried because his accusers knew he would cite the king's complicity in his defence.
Those who were involved in the whole shameful business tried to deflect public opinion by claiming that the attack was a straightforward clan feud between the Campbells and the MacDonalds.
To an extent, they were successful. To this day, many Scots believe it was simply a battle between two rival groups which got out of hand. Yet the real story of what happened in the wilds of Glencoe that dreadful February morning is much more sinister.
From then on, the MacDonalds and other clans harboured a grudge towards the king and those who carried out actions in his name. Their resentment would simmer until the Jacobite risings of the 18th century caused it to boil over in full-scale rebellion against the Crown.
Meanwhile...
- 1691 The first directory of addresses is published in France
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