Published in Scotland Magazine Issue 28 on 20/09/2006.

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Britain's last battle

This year marks the 260th anniversary of the Battle of Culloden, a pivotal point in British Civil War. Sally Toms looks at how events unfolded

On April 16, 1746 the last Jacobite army was bloodily defeated on Culloden Moor – bringing to an end not just eight months of rising, but also 100 years of religious and political debate.

Culloden was not a fight between the English and Scots, rather the forces of the Jacobites, who supported the claim of Charles Edward Stuart to the throne (aka Bonnie Prince Charlie, grandson of the Catholic James VII and II); and the Royal Army which supported the Protestant Hanoverian sovereign, King George II.

The result of the battle was not a foregone conclusion. Both armies consisted of professional as well as non-professional soldiers, and until Culloden the Jacobite army had gone undefeated.

During the 17th and 18th centuries there was growing political unrest amongst the powers of Europe. Within Britain itself, there had been a series of dramatic struggles for power. The Stuart King, Charles I was executed in 1649. The Glorious Revolution of 1688 put an end the Stuart line of succession and, on the death of Queen Ann in 1714, the Elector of Hanover, great-grandson of James VI and I, took the throne.

Jacobites believed that the Stuarts, of whom Queen Ann was the last in the direct line, were the “god-given” ruling family and they were prepared to use military might to win the Stuart throne back.

From the Jacobite Court in France, Prince Charles, without the support of his exiled father, James, or the French King, Louis XV, was encouraged to plan an expedition to Scotland to star.....

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By Sally Toms

Section : Scotland battles

Page number : 24