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When Charles's resolution to march into England was finally
agreed to by his officers, the next thing to be determined was the route to be taken.
After some deliberation the council advised the Prince to march straight to Berwick, of which town they thought he
could easily make himself master, and thence to Newcastle and give battle to Marshal Wade,
who had collected a force in the neighbourhood of that town. If victorious, the prince was
to march to London, by the east coast, so as to favour the disembarkation of any troops
that France might send over destined to land on that coast. But this plan, though
unanimously approved of, was overturned by Lord George Murray, who was of a very different
opinion from the rest of the council. In presence of several of the principal officers of
the army he represented the plan of a march along the east coast as an affair of great
difficulty, and that its advantages, if it really had any, would be more than compensated
by the loss of time it would occasion, which at the present juncture was very precious. He
therefore proposed that the army should march into England by the western road, and that
to conceal its route it should march in two columns, one by Kelso and the other column by Moffat, so that both columns could
easily join near Carlisle, on a day to be appointed. Finding that Lord George's arguments
had prevailed with most of his officers, Charles agreed to his scheme, though he
considered the route by Berwick as the better of the two.
Preparatory to their march the insurgents removed their camp to a strong position to the
west of Dalkeith, six miles south of Edinburgh,
having that town on their left, the South Esk in front, the North Esk in their rear, with
an opening on their right towards Polton. From this camp a detachment was
sent with three pieces of cannon to secure the pass of the Forth above Stirling, lest Lord
Loudon should march south with the independent companies he was forming, and attempt to
force the passage.
On the evening of Thursday the 31st of October, Prince Charles finally left Holyrood House
accompanied by his life-guards, and several of the clan-regiments, amid the regrets of a
vast concourse of spectators, most of whom were never to see him again. He slept that
night at Pinkie House, and went next morning to Dalkeith, and took up his quarters in
Dalkeith House, the seat of the Duke of Buccleuch. On that day he was joined by the clan
Pherson, under the command of their chief, Macpherson of Cluny, by Menzies of Shien and
his men, and some small parties of Highlanders, amounting altogether to between 900 and
1,000 men.
At this period the state of the insurgent army was as follows. Of cavalry, the first troop
of horse-guards, which was commanded by Lord Elcho, consisted of 62 gentlemen with their
servants, under 5 officers. It amounted in all to 120. The second troop, which was
commanded by the honourable Arthur Elphinstone, afterwards Lord Balmerino, was not
complete, and did not exceed 40 horse. A small squadron, called the horse-grenadiers, was
commanded by the Earl of Kilmarnock, with which were incorporated some Perthshire
gentlemen, in absence of Lord Strathallan their commander, who had been appointed governor
of Perth and commander of the Jacobite forces in Scotland during the stay of the Highland
army in England. These last united, amounted to nearly 100. Lord Pitsligo was at the head
of the Aberdeen and Banffshire gentlemen, who, with their servants, amounted to about 120;
and besides those enumerated, there was a party of between 70 and 80 husars, under the
nominal command of Secretary Murray as colonel, but in reality under the direction of one
Baggot, an Irish officer, who had lately arrived from France. The infantry, all of whom
wore the Highland garb, consisted of thirteen battalions or regiments, six of which,
consisted of the clans, properly so called; of these six regiments, three were of the
Macdonalds, and the other three were each composed of the Camerons, the Stewarts of Appin,
and the Macphersons. Three regiments of Athole men, commonly called the Athole brigade,
the regiments of the Duke of Perth, Lord Ogilvy, Glenbucket, and Roy Stewart, made up the
thirteen regiments. Of the infantry, which amounted to about 5,000 men, about 4,000 were
real Highlanders. Thus the total amount of the army did not exceed 6,000 men.
The clan-regiments, according to custom, were commanded by their respective chiefs; but in
some instances, in the absence of the chief, the regiment of the clan was commanded by his
son, and failing both, by the nearest kinsman of the chief. In these regiments every
company had two captains, two lieutenants, and two ensigns, all of whom were generally
related, by ties of blood, to the chief. The pay of a captain in the army was half-a-crown
per diem; that of a lieutenant two shillings; and of an ensign one shilling and sixpence.
The front rank of each clan-regiment was composed of persons who were considered gentlemen
by birth, though without fortune or means. The pay of these was one shilling per diem. The
gentlemen in the front rank were better armed than the men in the rear rank. All the
former had targets, which many of the latter had not. When fully armed, as was generally
the case, every gentleman of the front rank carried a musket and broadsword, with a pair
of pistols and a dirk stuck in the belt which surrounded his body. In some rare instances
another dagger was stuck within the garter of the right leg, to be used in cases of
emergency. A target, formed of wood and leather thickly studded with nails, covered the
left arm, and enabled the wearer to parry and protect himself from the shots or blows of
an assailant.
Thus armed, the success of a Highland army depended more upon individual bravery than upon
combined efforts, and their manner of fighting was, as the Chevalier Johnstone observes,
adapted for brave but undisciplined troops. "They advance", says that writer,
"with rapidity, discharge their pieces when within musket length of the enemy, and
then, throwing them down, draw their swords, and holding a dirk in their left hand with
their target, they dart with fury on the enemy through the smoke of their fire. When
within reach of the enemy's bayonets, bending their left knee, they, by their attitude,
cover their bodies with their targets that receive their thrusts of the bayonets, which
they contrive to parry, while at the same time they raise their sword-arm, and strike
their adversary. Having once got within the bayonets, and into the ranks of the enemy, the
soldiers have no longer any means of defending themselves, the fate of the battle is
decided in an instant, and the carnage follows; the Highlanders bringing down two men at a
time, one with their dirk in the left hand, and another with the sword. The reason
assigned by the Highlanders for their custom of throwing their muskets on the ground is
not without its force. They say they embarrass them in their operations, even when sling
behind them, and on gaining a battle they can pick them up along with the arms of their
enemies; but if they should be beaten, they have no occasion for muskets. They themselves
proved that bravery may supply the place of discipline at times, as discipline supplies
the place of bravery. The attack is so terrible, that the best troops in Europe would with
difficulty sustain the first shock if it; and if the swords of the Highlanders once come
in contact with them, their defeat is inevitable".
In entering upon such a desperate enterprise as the invasion of England with the handful
of men he had mustered, Charles certainly must have calculated on being supported by a
large party in that country. Indeed, his chief reason for urging such a step was the
numerous assurances he alleged he had received from his friends in that kingdom, that he
would be joined by a very considerable body of the people; but there seems reason to
believe, that, in his expectations of support, he was guided almost solely by the reports
of his agents, and that he had very little communication with any of the parties on whose
support he relied. In a memoir which the prince presented to the King of France on his
return from Scotland, he states, that, if after the battle of Preston he had had 3,000
regular troops under his command, in addition to his other forces, he could have
penetrated into England, and marched to London, without opposition, as none of the English
troops which were on the continent had arrived; but the case was now widely different, and
without a general rising, it was next to impossible to succeed in the face of a large
regular army, which was assembling at different points, supported by a numerous militia. |
