Culloden (1964) Movie Script
Wednesday, April 16th 1746.
This is the advance battalion
of an English Government army
of 9,000 men.
Their objective: Culloden Moor,
four and a half miles southeast
of the Highland town of Inverness.
Their purpose: the destruction of the
Highland Jacobite army of rebellion,
a tired, ill-administered force
of less than 5,000 men
who wait just beyond
the top of this ridge.
Sir Thomas Sheridan,
Jacobite military secretary.
Suffering advanced debility
and loss of memory.
Former military engagement
56 years ago.
Sir John MacDonald,
Jacobite captain of cavalry.
Aged, frequently intoxicated,
"described as " a man
of the most limited capacities.
John William O'Sullivan,
Jacobite quartermaster general.
"Described as " an Irishman
whose vanity is superseded
only by his lack of wisdom."
Prince Charles Edward Stuart,
Jacobite commander in chief.
Former military experience:
10 days at a siege at the age of 13.
You must understand, without
putting too fine a point on it,
that the army here is
in a total shambles.
I've got half my company missing.
I just can't find them.
They've gone off somewhere to sleep.
Your Royal Highness,
why exactly are Mr Sheridan,
Sir John MacDonald and Mr O'Sullivan
handling the administration
of your army?
Because I chose them.
I consider those gentlemen to be
utterly trustworthy and competent.
The first thing my men will find
when they do awake
is the enemy on them,
cutting their throats.
James MacDonald, taxman.
Senior officer
in a ruthless clan system,
who's brought with him
on to the moor
men whose land he controls.
Alistair McVurrich,
subtenant of a taxman.
Owns one eighth of an acre
of soggy ground and two cows.
Alan MacColl,
subtenant of a subtenant.
Owns half-share in a small
potato patch measuring 30 feet.
Angus MacDonald,
servant of a subtenant.
He owns nothing.
Lowest in the clan structure,
he is called a cotter.
This man is totally dependent on
the men above him in the clan system.
They, in their tum, on the taxman.
They, in their tum, on this one man,
the man who has brought them all
onto the moor.
Alexander MacDonald,
called, in Gaelic, MacDhomhnuill,
chief of the MacDonald's of Keppoch.
The owner of all his tenants' land,
the rem he has charged them
is to fight with him as clan warriors
whenever he decrees.
This is the system
of the Highland clan: human rent.
I hold my land from MacCruachan,
as my father did,
by bringing him 20 fighting men
from amongst my tenants.
These I have brought.
To this man, who is rent,
today's battle is a matter of honour.
I fight today because it is an honour
to be with my chief, MacDhomhnuill,
and because my father
fought beside his father.
To this man, who is rem,
the battle is a matter of revenge.
I fight first for MacDhomhnuill,
then for Charlie.
Then because the Campbells,
who did steal my cows,
are with the enemy.
I have also raised
over 100 men from Rannoch.
Some were unwilling.
With these, I used force.
Alistair McVurrich, told by
his taxman that if he did not fight
he would have his cattle taken
and his roof burnt.
This is the system of the clan,
a system that has brought
on to the moor over 4,000 men,
men from Argyll and Inverness,
from Moidart, Appin and the isles,
Catholics, Episcopalians,
Presbyterians,
the MacDonalds, the MacLeans,
the Chisholms, the Camerons,
the Farquharsons, the Frasers,
men of 14 major Highland clans.
Men like this.
Donald Cameron of Loch Eil,
chief of the powerful clan Cameron,
fearing for the survival of
the ancient and ruthless society
to which he belongs.
Because he is here on the moor,
most of the other chiefs are here.
Because he is here, Keppoch is here.
Because I feel that
the Act of Union with England
is a betrayal.
Because Prince Charles is a Catholic
and I am a Catholic.
And the king in London
is a Protestant.
Because Charles is part Scot
and I am a Scot.
And the king in London is a German.
Prince Charles Edward Stuart,
the centre of all these men's hopes,
himself half-Polish.
Age 25 and four months,
son of the exiled
James the Pretender,
he landed in Scotland
nine months ago,
raised the clan army
on a Highland surge of nationalism,
marched to Derby and came within an ace
of toppling the Hanoverian dynasty
and regaining the throne
for his father.
Though since forced
to retreat back into the Highlands
and despite
all evidence to the contrary,
Charles remains supremely confident
both of victory and
his welcome by the English people.
King George ll is both
a usurper and a tyrant.
He's kept my father's crown
by enslaving all the people
of this island.
He's deemed unpopular
and I know that once victory is mine
the people of England
will welcome me.
Lord George Murray, age 51.
Lieutenant General in the clan army.
As their commanding officer,
this man forged
the undisciplined Highlanders
into an army that not only
almost reached London
but that also twice reduced
superior English forces
into a panic-stricken rout,
first at Prestonpans,
then at Falkirk.
Blunt, imperious, this man has
bitterly quarreled with Charles
over the chaos
in the army administration
and over the choice
of this battlefield,
chosen by John William O'Sullivan.
Flat, treeless, devoid of shelter,
ideal for the employment
by the British army
of its cannon and cavalry.
And from behind the shelter
of these walls,
which O'Sullivan
has refused to pull down,
Lord George Murray also fears
both crossfire and outflanking.
Mr O'Sullivan,
in view of what Lord George
feels about the battlefield,
have you inspected
the ground yourself?
- No, I have not.
- Why not?
Because I don't deem it necessary.
It is a large, plain moor
and, as such, it's a fair field
for the enemy horse and cannon
against which the
Highlanders will be defenceless.
I have informed His Royal Highness
that it is a good field
which I believe it to be.
I have told the Prince
I do not like it.
Your Highness,
why are you fighting today,
when the ground here has been
criticized by some of your officers?
Because God is on our side
and I am convinced that my duty
to my people lies in fighting today.
It's my opinion that the choice
of the field for us is suicidal.
9,000 men, 16 battalions of infantry,
12 squadrons of cavalry,
8 companies of militia,
220,000 rounds of musket ammunition,
10 three-pounder battalion cannons,
800 three-pound cannonballs,
500 bags of cannon grapeshot.
This man's name is Fraser.
A deserter from the Government army,
he still wears its uniform
but now stands
in the ranks of the Prince's army,
amongst the men
of his own clan and name.
He knows that,
if he is captured as a deserter,
he will be immediately court-martialled
to a sentence of death by throttling.
These are the Wild Geese,
150 exiled Irishmen
sewing in the army
of His Most Christian Majesty,
Louis XV of France, the most
powerful ally of the Stuart cause.
Brigadier General Walter Stapleton,
commander, Irish pickets
of the French army.
Yes, we're here because
Prince Charles is a Catholic.
It will be a fine thing
for all Catholics
when Charlie's on the throne
and German George is off it.
If we had a Catholic king
on the throne in this country,
then we could get back
to living in our own.
You must remember that
your Protestant king in London
is passing penal laws
against the Catholics in Ireland.
I'm from County Tipperary.
Now I've got to live in Boulogne.
You won't find a Catholic Irishman
with much cause to love George ll.
William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland,
third son of King George ll.
Age 25 and one day.
Commander in chief
of the Government army in Scotland.
Salary 15,000 per year.
Alexander Laing, private.
Salary sixpence a day.
Patrick McColman,
three days ago a sergeant,
two days ago 800 lashes for looting,
today a private.
John Mallaby, private.
Pressed into service.
William Roach, private.
Two years of his pay would not
buy even the wig and hat
of the officer marching
in from of him.
Joshua Ward,
lieutenant, British army,
a fraternity where
the least pretension to learning,
to piety or to common morals
would endanger
the owner to be cashiered.
I will now pass...
in the middle of the second line.
Your Highness.
Give me a battery
in the centre of the front line.
Alexander Laing
carries a .753 musket,
firing a ball of
one ounce and a third weight
an effective distance of 60 paces.
He carries sufficient ball, paper
and black powder for 24 cartridges.
He carries at his hip
a brass-hiked sword
and a bayonet
with 18 inches of uted steel.
Alistair McVurrich
carries in his right hand
an outdated dragoon pistol
for which he has
no further ammunition.
What's the gun you're sewing?
It's a three-pounder.
Right now, it's downright useless.
Why's that?
We've only got 4 lb ammunition for it.
I tell you, it's chaos.
Half the ammunition's with the food.
That's still back in Inverness.
I haven't eaten for...
I don't know how long.
Ah, well now... that really
is not my responsibility.
But, Mr O'Sullivan, you are
the quartermaster general
and, as such, surely you're responsible
for the distribution of food.
In normal circumstances, yes
but now, as I am much pressed
by other affairs,
I have given that responsibility
to someone else.
When was the last time you ate?
Two days ago.
The day before yesterday.
This morning he killed a pig
but wasn't allowed time to eat it.
I can't remember.
Andrew Henderson, Whig historian,
biographer of Cumberland,
eyewitness of the Battle of Culloden.
The time is 12:15.
Now this wall,
behind which we're sheltering,
is at approximately right angles
to the rebel lines.
I've drawn a rough sketch map here.
The rebel lines are here.
We are here.
And the Duke of Cumberland's army
is here.
9,000 men in 16 infantry battalions
three of which are themselves Scot,
a total of 1,300 regular soldiers
from the Lowlands,
plus, in reserve,
the volunteer militias
of Stirling, Edinburgh,
Dumfries and Glasgow,
a further 8,000 men.
Charles Edward Stuart,
regent claimant to the thrones
of England and Scotland,
has more Scots-in-arms
against him than for him.
And, ranged against him
in the Highlands,
he has the Whig clans
siding with the Government,
the Munros, the Rosses,
the MacKenzies,
the McLeods of Skye, the Sutherlands,
and here on the moor,
the Campbells of the Argyll militia.
Here to fight Charles and his
rebellion, here to take clan revenge,
Angus Ian Campbell,
wife murdered by the MacDonalds.
Alistair MacDonald, brother
killed by Campbells in a cattle raid.
For him, loyalties to Charlie
mean little.
For him,
today's battle is a clan battle.
The swords those bastards use
can cut a man in half.
Well, I reckon
we'll have them this time.
- Why do you say that?
- We've got a new bayonet drill, see.
You don't poke
at the man in front of you.
You poke at the man
coming at your chum on the right.
That means,
as he's lifting his sword arm,
you get him underneath, like.
What do you think about the rebels?
Well... I ain't taken me clothes off
for six weeks.
I reckon till we lay
them bastards out I won't, neither.
I'll tell you one thing.
I know a lot of the boys
make fun of our Billy Cumberland
but I reckon he's all right.
He's a tough bastard
but at least he feeds you
which is more than some of them do.
I've heard said the rebels want to cut
him as small as herbs for the pot.
Well... I don't reckon that.
They're a lot of friggin' savages.
Donald Gram, a farmer,
forced a month ago
into the Highland army,
twice has deserted
back to farm and family,
twice has been captured
and forced to return.
Euan MacDonald, farmer,
forced into the Highland army
the day before yesterday.
With him his son,
John Angus MacDonald,
the day before yesterday a ploughboy,
today a rebel in arms.
His age, 13.
I can't just make out
what's happening in the rebel lines.
There's much confusion of movement.
Large numbers of men are moving about,
changing their position...
and there are large gaps
in the centre.
It seems to me as though
the entire line is completely askew.
Why is this?
We are all MacDonalds and, as such,
we are entitled to stand
on the right in the line of battle.
This is an ancient
MacDonald privilege
and yet Mr O'Sullivan
has thought fit to place
Lord George Murray's men
in that position.
The main reason is that
yesterday the Prince had an idea
for a surprise march by night
on the camp of Cumberland.
This we attempted. It failed.
But it meant that we were
all up marching the entire night.
Consequently, the men are exhausted
and are still stumbling
into their positions.
What effect has this had
on your men?
Look at them.
When did you last sleep?
As far as I am concerned,
we are now putting an end
to a bad affair.
The Scots are fair fighters
until a crisis is reached
and it's my opinion
we've now reached that crisis.
With all these things amiss
in our army,
it would have been better had the
Prince made some plan for retreat.
Bu! Charles
has made no plans for retreat.
He says that only those who are
afraid can doubt his coming victory.
He puts from his mind
the discontent of the MacDonalds,
the fatigue and hunger of his men,
the total outnumbering of his army,
the thinning of ranks by desertion,
the ill choice of battlefield,
convinced as he is
of the invincibility of his men.
God is on our side.
Our cause is just
and we will triumph this day.
The soldiers in the Elector's army
know me to be their lawful Prince.
And so I'm convinced
they'll break in panic,
for they will never dare fight me.
Battalion, fix your bayonets.
Fix.
This man's name is Chisholm,
James Chisholm.
A private in the Government army,
he is also a Highland Scot.
This man's name too is Chisholm,
Roderick Og Chisholm.
Fifth son of the clan chief,
he stands before his men
in the Prince's army.
The Chisholm 500 yards away
is this man's brother.
Charles Edward Stuart's war
is a civil war.
They've started.
The rebel cannon have opened fire.
The cannon have opened
from the rebels' centre
and they're over-elevated.
Fire!
Batteries...
from open sights...
at will... fire!
Pull!
Fire!
Fire!
That's the Duke of Cumberland's
cannons.
Cannonades all around me!
I'm going to have to shout
to make myself heard!
The smoke
is beginning to thicken.
It's going to be very difficult
to see what effect our cannon
is having on the rebel lines.
A cast-iron ball of three pounds'
weight, fired from open sights.
This is roundshot.
This is what it does.
Pull!
Alistair McInnes, age 20.
Right leg severed below knee joint.
Malcolm Angus Chisholm, age 24.
Disembowelled.
Ian MacDonald, age 13. Shot.
1:12.
Dazed, indecisive, Charles
has moved to behind
the right ank of the Jacobite lines
and is now unable to see
what is happening to his army.
Ordered by O'Sullivan
to stand in the ranks six-deep,
the men on the Highland right
make a clear and tight-packed target
for the English gunners.
Pull!
The rebels' artillery
have stopped firing altogether
and, before they did, we counted...
How many?
We counted 15 to 20 shots
fired by our artillery
for every one fired by the rebels.
1:17.
The second result of
O'Sullivan's administration.
The Prince's artillery, iii-fed
by a sporadic ammunition supply,
ill-served by untrained amateurs,
ceases fire.
Pull!
Have you had orders to attack, sir?
- No, I've had none!
- Well, why not?
The Prince hasn't given any!
If he doesn't give them soon,
he'll lose the entire army!
We're being shelled to pieces!
Pull!
Reload!
Pull!
Reload!
- What's the Prince doing?
- I don't know!
Nobody knows what he's doing!
1:22. Prince Charles Stuart,
paralyzed with indecision,
still has given no order,
either to advance or to retreat.
1:22. Clan Cameron,
200 men, shot to pieces.
Clan Stewart,
180 men, shot to pieces.
This is fantastic!
If this keeps up much longer,
our gunners will have
finished the whole affair.
The cannonade... The cannonade
has given our men infinite spirits.
Clan Chisholm casualties,
47 killed or maimed.
This is incredible! Those men have
been standing there for 22 minutes!
They're just lining the ranks!
The rebels are being
literally blown apart!
Why are they standing there?
Why in God's name don't they run?
1:30. Still no order to advance.
Clan army casualties,
700 dead or maimed.
Charles Stuart hopes
that by not advancing
he will tempt the Government army
out of its battle lines to attack him.
1:32 pm. Cumberland orders a move
but not the one
his cousin is expecting.
I want Wolfe's battalion
to advance inside on the left!
Your Highness!
At 1:32, Cumberland places a battalion
behind one of the walls
O'Sullivan has refused to pull down,
to fire into the side
of the clan army
when it charges
the Government front.
This is the crossfire
O'Sullivan said would never happen.
Oh, yes, yes... Units of the Argyll...
the Campbell-Argyll militia, yes?
And there are squadrons
of dragoons with them.
Yes, it's obvious that
His Royal Highness has decided
to have units of the Campbell-Argyll
militia and some squadrons of dragoons
to go down behind
the south side of this wall,
out of sight of the enemy,
to take them in the rear
and outflank the rebels.
Thus, also at 1:32 pm,
begins the outanking movement
that O'Sullivan
said would never happen.
29 minutes too late,
Charles Stuart orders an advance
along the entire from
of the Jacobite army.
And you make the right side advance!
Bu! The message
fails to reach the right wing.
Casualties, 850.
Have you still had
no orders to attack?
No! I've had no orders!
I had a message from Mr O'Sullivan,
which, as ever,
I failed to comprehend!
- The line's broken up!
- What?
They're charging,
they're coming straight at us!
Sir, the right has broken forward!
The walls will hold them.
- They're going straight!
- Get down behing the wall there!
After 28 minutes of cannonfire!
What sort of men are these?
- Right! Change from ball to grape.
- Change from ball to grape!
A cylindrical canvas bag
eight inches in length,
packed with musketballs
and pieces of jagged iron.
This is grapeshot.
This is what it does.
Pull!
Pull!
It must be the grape! The centre
has collided with the right.
There's great confusion,
bodies flying!
They must be going to receive fire
from our centre battalions!
Charge! Charge!
Fire!
Bastards!
God, they're almost upon us!
They're firing from this side
and from this side.
They're been cut to pieces!
It must be chaos behind those walls!
Chaos!
Barrell's!
Towards this one regiment,
Barrell's Fourth of Foot,
heads the entire right
of the clan army,
800 men in a solid clump,
running with a collision speed
of over 12 miles an hour.
Alternate... firing!
Battalion, take care.
Fall in by rank. Take aim!
Rear rank, present!
Rear rank, fire!
Fire!
Front rank, take aim!
Front rank, fire!
Rear rank, present.
Fire!
Centre rank, present.
Front rank, present.
Remember, Barrell's,
off to the right!
They've broken through Barrell's!
General Huske, advance Bligh's
and Semphill's, support on the left.
Your Highness.
1:57 and the Duke of Cumberland
sees the men of his second line,
placed there for just such an
emergency, fire with crippling effect
into the Highlanders
who broke through the from line.
1:57. Charles Stuart,
who has made no battle plan at all,
sees, on the right wing, his men run
from this concentrated musketfire
and sees, on his left wing,
the MacDonalds, tired, hungry,
rebellious at not being given their
rightful battle position by O'Sullivan,
hold back from charging
the royal army right.
Instead, they stand and taunt,
trying to tempt the royal army lines
forward in disorder.
Battalion Pulteney's, make ready!
They're stopping to pick up stones!
Shoot!
1:58. The MacDonalds, dismayed at
the sight of the advancing cavalry,
themselves draw back.
Keppoch, one of their leaders,
runs forward with other clan officers
to encourage them
and is shot through twice
by musketball.
About him, his men tum and run.
Time 1:59 pm.
The rout of the Highland army begins.
Christ, they're running.
They're leaving the field
except for two small units,
the French and the Irish.
Let them through. Stand your ground.
Guard, forward!
Oh, Jesus!
Front rank, present. Fire!
Re-form! Re-form!
Stand and aim! Fire!
Walter Stapleton,
commander, Irish pickets,
cut down with 100 of his men
as the Scots about them run.
Where are you going, you?
Charles Stuart
tries to rally his men.
"Pray stand with me, your Prince,"
he cries.
"Pray stand with me but a moment,
otherwise you ruin me,
"your country and yourselves
and God forgive you.".
But it is too late.
At one minute past two
in the afternoon,
his cause in ruins,
Charles Edward Stuart
is led from the battlefield
by the man most responsible
for his defeat.
As Charles leaves, a senior
clan officer screams after him,
"Run, you cowardly Italian."
- Mr Fossett.
- Your Highness?
- You will order a general ceasefire.
- Your Highness.
Of the 9,000 men of the royal army
who advanced this morning from Naim
with Private Laing,
an estimated 50 are dead.
Bu! For every one corpse
in the royal army
there are 24 in the clan army.
Piled in layers, dead or dying,
are 1,200 men...
including the brother
of Private James Chisholm.
There was scarce a soldier or officer
of Barrell's Fourth of Foot
who did not kill one or two men each
with their bayonets or spontoons.
Not a bayonet but was bent
and stained with blood
to the muzzles of their muskets.
All witnesses agreed that, if
grapeshot were the king of battles,
the bayonet was now
the queen of weapons.
"It is mine and everybody': opinion,"
boasts a trooper,
"that no history can brag
of so singular a victory."
How do you feel?
Don't feel nothing, really.
I feel all right!
Well, now it's over.
Battalion, take care!
Halt!
2:14pm. The battalions
of Cumberland
halt at the lines held by the rebels
one hour and eight minutes ago.
Battalion, shoulder your firelocks!
Three cheers for His Royal Highness!
- Hip, hip!
- Hurrah!
Thus has ended the last battle
to be fought in Britain
and the last armed attempt
to overthrow its king.
The Establishment has been saved,
peace restored,
Church, Crown,
trade and commerce safeguarded.
Thus the Duke of Cumberland
won his only victory
and Charles suffered his only defeat.
His advisers are shortly to urge
his instructions for reassembly.
"He is to reply, " Do as you wish.
Only, for God's sake, let us go.
Charles Edward Stuart,
his cause now in ruins,
has given one order too many.
Charles pitted these men against
the modem musket and bayonet,
against cavalry and cannon.
Thus, in one hour, eight minutes,
he has reduced
the ower of the Highland clans
to twitching, limbless corpses.
2:30 pm and His Royal Highness,
the Duke of Cumberland,
orders rum and brandy, cheese
and biscuits for his brave boys.
For the wounded and dying clansmen
on the moor,
there is to be different treatment.
All over the battlefield, whilst the
Duke of Cumberland eats his lunch,
any clansmen seen to be still alive
is either slit in the throat,
pistolled through the head
or bayonetted and trampled on
until, in the words of an eyewitness,
"the moor was covered with blood"
"and our British soldiers
looked less like Christian men"
"than so many butchers."
What about some grub?
This rebel host has been
most deeply indebted to the public
for all the rapine,
murder and cruelty
and our men are heartily determined
to give them receipt in full.
Cut him!
Cut him, you bastard!
Take him to the shoulder!
I'm letting my regiments of horse
loose after the battle
in order they may have some sweets
with all their fatigue.
Thus nearly 100 people
are to be butchered or maimed
on the road to Inverness.
Butchered whether or not
they took any part in the battle.
They took my baby.
He's only two weeks old.
And one of them
whirled him around by his leg...
and threw him on to the ground.
This is Jean Clark, aged 28.
Cut about the face and body
by sabres,
she was left lying for dead
on the road to Inverness.
The soldiers came in and caught him,
and Daddy too
but I got away
through a hole in the wall.
- How old was your brother?
- Lachlan was nine.
I don't... I don't know
where he and Daddy are now.
Come on, you!
4 pm. Inverness.
James Rae: trooper,
Kingston's Light Horse,
the first man of Cumberland': army
to enter the Highland capital,
the first man to show its inhabitants
what is to be expected
from an Englishman
protecting his liberty
and his Protestant religion.
There was these two men,
shouting and screaming.
And then he came out
and there was blood on his hands.
These troopers from the Duke
of Kingston's Light Horse Regiment
are later to be commended
by Cumberland
for their "zeal in the pursuit."
Each of them comes from Nottingham.
Each of them by trade is a butcher.
James Rae himself, who, like the other
troopers of Kingston's Light Horse,
played his pan in the battle
when it was over,
is later to return to Nottingham,
where his regimental colours
are to be laid to rest
with great pomp and ceremony.
"To the perpetual fame
and immortal memory
"of the Duke of Kingston's
Light Horse,
"where, amongst others,
on the 16th day of April 1746,
"they performed
many and glorious exploits
"in routing and entirely subduing
the perfidious rebels.".
"Long may
the county of Nottingham ourish."
"God save our ever august King."
April 16th. 10:30 pm. Inverness.
For William Augustus,
Duke of Cumberland,
third son of King George ll,
an evening of immense
satisfaction and triumph.
At the age of 25,
he has saved his father's kingdom
and redeemed the reputation
of the British army.
At his table, older officers drink
his toast and declare him to be
one of the greatest English captains
since Marlborough.
His cousin Charles, until today the
heroic leader of an armed rebellion,
is now a fugitive in the heather.
If further proof were needed
of this young man's prowess,
it is here,
unheeded by him,
four and a half miles away.
This is Lachlan MacDonald
of Lochaber,
right leg severed
below the knee joint.
He's been lying on the moor
untended for 13 hours.
For most of the time,
it has been raining.
This is Mrs Anne Hossack
of Inverness.
Somewhere on the moor,
amidst 1,200 dead and dying,
is her husband.
I don't know...
where he is.
For Alexander Laing, private,
Barrell's Fourth Regiment of Foot,
this evening is also
one of immense satisfaction.
His regiment has acquitted itself
with honour on the field of battle.
He himself has despatched
three of the rebels
and, above all, he himself
has escaped death and maiming.
Lucky bastard!
Battalion will take care
while the casualty lists are read.
It's all right for you, my lord!
This is Mrs Anne Walker,
wife of Private Andrew Walker, who
was wounded in the ranks of Barrell's
and taken to the surgeons' lines.
This woman, also, has no idea
whether her husband is alive or dead.
It is given out this morning
of Thursday 17th April
that the following officers
and other ranks
of Major General William Barrell's
Regiment of Foot
were either killed
or have since died from wounds
resulting from the glorious victory
inflicted yesterday
over the rebel army.
Killed: Captain Lord Robert Kerr.
Other ranks: Sergeant Pullman,
Privates Baker, Barstow, Dyke,
Finch, Lowell,
Lawson, Meecham, Napper, Osbourne,
Smart, Williamson.
Wounded and since died
in the surgeons' lines:
Corporal Lockhart,
Privates Davis, Pollock and Walker.
Battalion, take care.
Battalion will dismiss,
save for the duty picket.
Battalion, dismiss.
You treated Private Walker
a short while ago, Doctor?
Yes... Yes, I did.
What did he die of?
This one? He died of shock,
if I remember correctly.
Why was that?
He was an amputee.
I had to take his arm off.
Do you know what...
what is our young Billy's pleasure
because we fought
with such gallantry?
His Royal Highness thanks
all ye officers and men
for their gallant behaviour.
Get out of it! Leave off!
His Royal Highness releases
all ye military prisoners
who were this day
in custody of the provost.
- Have you heard about the wounded?
- Well, yeh, some talk about it.
They're gonna pay 12 guineas
out of the Duke's own purse
for all those wounded in the battle.
For Lachlan MacDonald,
who's been now lying on the moor
two days with a severed right leg,
there'll be no 12 guineas.
Orders for Friday 18th April 1746.
"A captain and 40 foot
to march directly"
"and visit all the cottages"
"in the neighbourhood
of the field of battle."
"The officers and men
will take notice"
"that the public order of the rebels
on the day of battle"
"was to give us no quarter."
Line up the bodies, men.
Come on, quick as you can.
There's another one over there.
The public orders of the rebels
to give no mercy to the royal army
do not exist in any other form
than a crude forgery
alleged to have been found
on the field of battle.
All right, lad.
We're only taking you to hospital.
Bu! Whether he knows this
public order is a forgery or not,
Cumberland makes it his excuse
to authorize what now happens.
Battalion, present your firelock...
at the man in front of you.
Fire!
The officer in charge
of this execution squad
is himself a Scotsman.
Captain Scott, are many of the rebels
being killed in this fashion?
As many as we can find.
I don't know how many men
have been killed in this fashion.
I fear to think.
But just this morning I heard
a Campbell officer saying that,
in just one area, he himself
saw 72 wounded rebels
shot or clubbed on the head.
Yes, I saw what was done.
Did you agree with it?
No, of course I didn't.
I will always thank God that I had
nothing to do with the black work.
You must try to remember that
this is a most difficult problem.
I have talked much with officers
from Lowland Scots regiments
and they undoubtedly feel
that these Highlanders
are threatening their culture,
their Protestant religion.
They're threatening to disrupt
their peace and their commerce.
There's a great feeling of insecurity
in the Lowlands.
These people still remember
the Highland host.
They still remember the years
of cattle thieves and murder,
men coming down at night
from the hills
and extorting blackmail
under pain of being robbed.
You see, the Highlander
talks a different language.
He wears different clothes...
and he undoubtedly has
some uncouth and barbaric practices.
For all these reasons,
I think you'll find most Lowlanders
hold the man
from this part of the country
in contempt and hatred.
Much more so
even than the English do.
Why is your army treating the
prisoners and the wounded like this?
Of yourself, it's been said you're
keeping the prisoners in Inverness
without warmth, food and water.
And that you're even withholding
medical dressings from them.
Surely this is against
all bounds of humanity.
Look, I think the point
somewhat eludes you.
These men are rebels and barbarians
and as such are to be rated as cattle
and treated as cattle.
Get that thing
back out the way, please.
For three days and nights
since the battle,
these men, many of them
stripped of their clothes,
many of them dying
from gaping wounds,
have been lying in cold attics
and clamp cellars,
awaiting removal to the prison ships
anchored in the firth.
The British army authorities
have withheld from them
even medical dressings,
thus hoping to solve
the acute lack of prison space
by ensuring
the mortality rate remains high.
They get no food, no light,
no medical dressing.
Get their headgear
while you're about it.
The belt here, too.
The smell in here is terrible.
This man next to me...
I think he's dead.
The way they are treating us,
you'd think we were just animals.
Robert MacLean, salmon fisher.
To be tried without defence
at an English trial,
of which he is able to understand
not a word spoken.
His sentence, execution at York
by being hanged, drawn and quartered.
Check these shackles
while you're about it.
Ranald MacDonald, farmer.
To wait in prison 14 months
for a trial.
Then sentenced at Brampton to be
pulled through its streets on a sled
and hanged, drawn and quartered.
Charles Edward Stuart, believing
the Scots to have betrayed him,
refuses to listen
to last-minute pleas
to stay and fight in the mountains.
Curtly and without a word of thanks
he dismisses the Highland army.
In his saddlebags
the last of the Jacobite funds,
which he has now decided
to keep for himself,
his need, he estimates,
being greater.
Alistair John Stewart,
to lie 10 days in prison, untended,
with a broken leg.
To die on the 11th day of gangrene.
John William O'Sullivan,
soon to be safely in Rome.
To tell King James of the good part
he has played in the rising
and to promptly receive
first a knighthood
and then a baronetcy.
Alexander Sutherland,
never brought to trial.
Disposal unknown.
Lord George Murray,
who to the end blamed Prince Charles
and his Irish administration
for the defeat at Culloden,
is soon to leave Scotland forever,
forced to seek exile in Europe.
Prince Charles refuses to see him
again and never forgives him,
blaming his opposition
to his administration
for the downfall
of the Stuart cause.
Bad day for us all, this.
Lord George Murray, estimated by some
as one of the most brilliant generals
of the 18th century,
who, if left to his own counsel,
could perhaps
have turned Culloden into a victory.
Keep in step, now!
May 23rd. The British army moves
to Fort Augustus in the Great Glen.
From here, the centre link
in a chain of forts and garrisons
stretching from Inverness in the east
to Tobermory in the west,
from Bernera in the north
to Dumbarton in the south,
the Duke of Cumberland mounts
what he terms,
"the pacification of the Highlands."
Patrol of Bligh's,
you will proceed on police action
to Lochaber,
with sufficient rations for two days.
All right, lads. Fall out
and pick up your firelocks.
Move it!
Lord Sackville, what is the function
of these patrols.
Their function is to march
deep into the glens
occupied by the rebels
and their families
and there, by vigorous police action,
ensure that never again will these
people disturb the peace of our land.
May 30th. A military patrol
under Lord George Sackville
strikes deep into a corrie
in Lochaber,
searching for
fugitive rebel families.
This is one of them,
sheltering from the rain 1,500 feet
up the side of a hill face.
Andrew McEachan, aged 25,
who stood at Culloden,
and who now, because of the patrols,
has to hide in the hills
like an animal.
This is his wife, child
and a friend called Mrs MacInnis.
They have each been out in the open
for the past eight days.
This girl is suffering from
severe ux
as a result of damp clothes.
The last meal this baby ate
was a small fish caught yesterday
and shared between the children.
This little girl, forced
to leave her home suddenly,
has only a thin dress,
a damp shawl and no shoes.
At approximately 12 noon, May 30th,
the family is sighted by the patrol.
This is what happens.
Right, then!
NO! No!
I dunno.
All these officers keep telling us
these people up here
are a load of savages, but...
I dunno, they looked like ordinary
women and children up there to me.
I didn't like it, what We did.
I didn't like it at all.
Look, let me tell you something.
I had a mate at Falkirk.
He had his head split open.
Like that.
So don't try and make me
go all weeping, like,
over what happens
to these bastards. Eh?
Just don't try it!
Well satisfied with the result
of his military occupation,
Cumberland is to leave
Scotland on July 18th.
He leaves behind him, to finish
the destruction of the rebel clans,
not only an immense concentration
of English and Lowland troops,
not only the zealous help
of all the Whig clans,
but even the help of the chief
of a rebel clan, Ludovick Grant,
son of the Gram clan chief,
who has hastily
reorganized his loyalties
and just delivered 82 of his own
rebel clansmen to Cumberland
for transportation to the Barbados,
as proof of his unswerving allegiance
to the Crown.
Cumberland himself is to receive
from London a tumultuous welcome.
From the Government,
a raise in salary of 25,000.
From George Frederick Handel
a choral work,
See The Conquering Hero Comes.
From the public,
his name for a ower, Sweet William.
From the Scots,
his name for a weed, Stinking Billy.
Month after month,
the British army patrols
scour every hill range and glen
of northern Scotland
in an attempt, as Cumberland puts it,
"to wear down this generation
until there be peace in the land.".
The patrols leave behind them
a trail of brutality and suffering
that is to earn for their commander
undying loathing
and the epithet
Cumberland the Butcher.
These three of his officers have
already burnt, smashed, raped,
looted and bayonetted their way
from Glenurquhart to Moidart,
committing,
in the name of pacification,
the worst atrocities
in the history of the British army.
Captain Caroline Frederick Scott,
Lowlander.
I agree with
the senior staff officer,
who has proposed that 5 be paid
for the head of every rebel
brought to Fort Augustus.
Major lain Lockhart, Lowlander.
Those found in arms are ordered
to be immediately put to death
and the houses of those who abscond
are plundered and burned,
their cattle drove, their ploughs
and other tackle destroyed.
Lord George Sackville, Englishman,
third son of the Duke of Dorset.
We have detachments
in all parts of the Highlands.
The people are deservedly
in a most deplorable way
and must perish,
either by famine or by the sword.
A just reward for traitors.
We hang or shoot everyone that
is known to conceal the Pretender,
burn their houses, take their cattle.
The Pretender, Charles Edward Stuart,
object of the largest single manhunt
in British history,
now disguised
as an ordinary clansman,
much addicted to the little bottle
he carries in his hip pocket,
suffering from dysentery,
is to spend the next five months
scrambling amidst the rocks and hills
of the Western Highlands,
sheltered by its people, who remain
loyal to him and never betray him,
until, in September, he takes a ship
for France and security,
leaving behind him nothing,
nothing but a legend,
"Bonnie Prince Charlie."
My bonnie moorhen
My bonnie moorhen.
Up in the grey hill
Down in the glen.
Charles Edward Stuart,
the bonnie moorhen,
is to walk out of the lives of the people
he has led into so much suffering
with scarcely a backward look
in their direction.
The year of the Prince had ended
but for the English Government,
this was just the beginning.
Systematically and with
clue parliamentary legislation,
they proceeded to eliminate ail
the things that made this man unique
and that gave him
the strength they so feared.
They penalized the wearing
of his Highland dress,
penalized the weaving
of his Highland tartan,
penalized the worshipping
at his Church,
penalized the carrying
of his weapons,
penalized the playing of his music.
They removed
the authority of his chief
and, in one blow, smashed forever
the system of his clan.
They then encouraged his chief
to lose interest in him,
to evict him and to replace him
by the more profitable sheep.
Thus they reduced him
to a homeless, unwanted oddity
and finally forced him,
in his hundreds of thousands,
to leave the land of his birth
for the canning industries
of the North,
for the disease-ridden slums
of the South,
for the lumber camps of Canada
and the stockyards of Australia.
And wherever he went,
he took with him
his music, his poetry,
his language and his children.
"On an April morning.
"I no longer hear birdsongs
"or the lowing of cattle on the moor.
"I hear the noise of sheep
and the English language,
"dogs barking
and frightening the deer.".
Thus, within a century from Culloden,
the English
and the Scottish Lowlanders
had made secure forever
their religion, their commerce,
their culture, their ruling dynasty
and, in so doing,
had destroyed a race of people.
They have created a desert
and have called it "peace."
This is the advance battalion
of an English Government army
of 9,000 men.
Their objective: Culloden Moor,
four and a half miles southeast
of the Highland town of Inverness.
Their purpose: the destruction of the
Highland Jacobite army of rebellion,
a tired, ill-administered force
of less than 5,000 men
who wait just beyond
the top of this ridge.
Sir Thomas Sheridan,
Jacobite military secretary.
Suffering advanced debility
and loss of memory.
Former military engagement
56 years ago.
Sir John MacDonald,
Jacobite captain of cavalry.
Aged, frequently intoxicated,
"described as " a man
of the most limited capacities.
John William O'Sullivan,
Jacobite quartermaster general.
"Described as " an Irishman
whose vanity is superseded
only by his lack of wisdom."
Prince Charles Edward Stuart,
Jacobite commander in chief.
Former military experience:
10 days at a siege at the age of 13.
You must understand, without
putting too fine a point on it,
that the army here is
in a total shambles.
I've got half my company missing.
I just can't find them.
They've gone off somewhere to sleep.
Your Royal Highness,
why exactly are Mr Sheridan,
Sir John MacDonald and Mr O'Sullivan
handling the administration
of your army?
Because I chose them.
I consider those gentlemen to be
utterly trustworthy and competent.
The first thing my men will find
when they do awake
is the enemy on them,
cutting their throats.
James MacDonald, taxman.
Senior officer
in a ruthless clan system,
who's brought with him
on to the moor
men whose land he controls.
Alistair McVurrich,
subtenant of a taxman.
Owns one eighth of an acre
of soggy ground and two cows.
Alan MacColl,
subtenant of a subtenant.
Owns half-share in a small
potato patch measuring 30 feet.
Angus MacDonald,
servant of a subtenant.
He owns nothing.
Lowest in the clan structure,
he is called a cotter.
This man is totally dependent on
the men above him in the clan system.
They, in their tum, on the taxman.
They, in their tum, on this one man,
the man who has brought them all
onto the moor.
Alexander MacDonald,
called, in Gaelic, MacDhomhnuill,
chief of the MacDonald's of Keppoch.
The owner of all his tenants' land,
the rem he has charged them
is to fight with him as clan warriors
whenever he decrees.
This is the system
of the Highland clan: human rent.
I hold my land from MacCruachan,
as my father did,
by bringing him 20 fighting men
from amongst my tenants.
These I have brought.
To this man, who is rent,
today's battle is a matter of honour.
I fight today because it is an honour
to be with my chief, MacDhomhnuill,
and because my father
fought beside his father.
To this man, who is rem,
the battle is a matter of revenge.
I fight first for MacDhomhnuill,
then for Charlie.
Then because the Campbells,
who did steal my cows,
are with the enemy.
I have also raised
over 100 men from Rannoch.
Some were unwilling.
With these, I used force.
Alistair McVurrich, told by
his taxman that if he did not fight
he would have his cattle taken
and his roof burnt.
This is the system of the clan,
a system that has brought
on to the moor over 4,000 men,
men from Argyll and Inverness,
from Moidart, Appin and the isles,
Catholics, Episcopalians,
Presbyterians,
the MacDonalds, the MacLeans,
the Chisholms, the Camerons,
the Farquharsons, the Frasers,
men of 14 major Highland clans.
Men like this.
Donald Cameron of Loch Eil,
chief of the powerful clan Cameron,
fearing for the survival of
the ancient and ruthless society
to which he belongs.
Because he is here on the moor,
most of the other chiefs are here.
Because he is here, Keppoch is here.
Because I feel that
the Act of Union with England
is a betrayal.
Because Prince Charles is a Catholic
and I am a Catholic.
And the king in London
is a Protestant.
Because Charles is part Scot
and I am a Scot.
And the king in London is a German.
Prince Charles Edward Stuart,
the centre of all these men's hopes,
himself half-Polish.
Age 25 and four months,
son of the exiled
James the Pretender,
he landed in Scotland
nine months ago,
raised the clan army
on a Highland surge of nationalism,
marched to Derby and came within an ace
of toppling the Hanoverian dynasty
and regaining the throne
for his father.
Though since forced
to retreat back into the Highlands
and despite
all evidence to the contrary,
Charles remains supremely confident
both of victory and
his welcome by the English people.
King George ll is both
a usurper and a tyrant.
He's kept my father's crown
by enslaving all the people
of this island.
He's deemed unpopular
and I know that once victory is mine
the people of England
will welcome me.
Lord George Murray, age 51.
Lieutenant General in the clan army.
As their commanding officer,
this man forged
the undisciplined Highlanders
into an army that not only
almost reached London
but that also twice reduced
superior English forces
into a panic-stricken rout,
first at Prestonpans,
then at Falkirk.
Blunt, imperious, this man has
bitterly quarreled with Charles
over the chaos
in the army administration
and over the choice
of this battlefield,
chosen by John William O'Sullivan.
Flat, treeless, devoid of shelter,
ideal for the employment
by the British army
of its cannon and cavalry.
And from behind the shelter
of these walls,
which O'Sullivan
has refused to pull down,
Lord George Murray also fears
both crossfire and outflanking.
Mr O'Sullivan,
in view of what Lord George
feels about the battlefield,
have you inspected
the ground yourself?
- No, I have not.
- Why not?
Because I don't deem it necessary.
It is a large, plain moor
and, as such, it's a fair field
for the enemy horse and cannon
against which the
Highlanders will be defenceless.
I have informed His Royal Highness
that it is a good field
which I believe it to be.
I have told the Prince
I do not like it.
Your Highness,
why are you fighting today,
when the ground here has been
criticized by some of your officers?
Because God is on our side
and I am convinced that my duty
to my people lies in fighting today.
It's my opinion that the choice
of the field for us is suicidal.
9,000 men, 16 battalions of infantry,
12 squadrons of cavalry,
8 companies of militia,
220,000 rounds of musket ammunition,
10 three-pounder battalion cannons,
800 three-pound cannonballs,
500 bags of cannon grapeshot.
This man's name is Fraser.
A deserter from the Government army,
he still wears its uniform
but now stands
in the ranks of the Prince's army,
amongst the men
of his own clan and name.
He knows that,
if he is captured as a deserter,
he will be immediately court-martialled
to a sentence of death by throttling.
These are the Wild Geese,
150 exiled Irishmen
sewing in the army
of His Most Christian Majesty,
Louis XV of France, the most
powerful ally of the Stuart cause.
Brigadier General Walter Stapleton,
commander, Irish pickets
of the French army.
Yes, we're here because
Prince Charles is a Catholic.
It will be a fine thing
for all Catholics
when Charlie's on the throne
and German George is off it.
If we had a Catholic king
on the throne in this country,
then we could get back
to living in our own.
You must remember that
your Protestant king in London
is passing penal laws
against the Catholics in Ireland.
I'm from County Tipperary.
Now I've got to live in Boulogne.
You won't find a Catholic Irishman
with much cause to love George ll.
William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland,
third son of King George ll.
Age 25 and one day.
Commander in chief
of the Government army in Scotland.
Salary 15,000 per year.
Alexander Laing, private.
Salary sixpence a day.
Patrick McColman,
three days ago a sergeant,
two days ago 800 lashes for looting,
today a private.
John Mallaby, private.
Pressed into service.
William Roach, private.
Two years of his pay would not
buy even the wig and hat
of the officer marching
in from of him.
Joshua Ward,
lieutenant, British army,
a fraternity where
the least pretension to learning,
to piety or to common morals
would endanger
the owner to be cashiered.
I will now pass...
in the middle of the second line.
Your Highness.
Give me a battery
in the centre of the front line.
Alexander Laing
carries a .753 musket,
firing a ball of
one ounce and a third weight
an effective distance of 60 paces.
He carries sufficient ball, paper
and black powder for 24 cartridges.
He carries at his hip
a brass-hiked sword
and a bayonet
with 18 inches of uted steel.
Alistair McVurrich
carries in his right hand
an outdated dragoon pistol
for which he has
no further ammunition.
What's the gun you're sewing?
It's a three-pounder.
Right now, it's downright useless.
Why's that?
We've only got 4 lb ammunition for it.
I tell you, it's chaos.
Half the ammunition's with the food.
That's still back in Inverness.
I haven't eaten for...
I don't know how long.
Ah, well now... that really
is not my responsibility.
But, Mr O'Sullivan, you are
the quartermaster general
and, as such, surely you're responsible
for the distribution of food.
In normal circumstances, yes
but now, as I am much pressed
by other affairs,
I have given that responsibility
to someone else.
When was the last time you ate?
Two days ago.
The day before yesterday.
This morning he killed a pig
but wasn't allowed time to eat it.
I can't remember.
Andrew Henderson, Whig historian,
biographer of Cumberland,
eyewitness of the Battle of Culloden.
The time is 12:15.
Now this wall,
behind which we're sheltering,
is at approximately right angles
to the rebel lines.
I've drawn a rough sketch map here.
The rebel lines are here.
We are here.
And the Duke of Cumberland's army
is here.
9,000 men in 16 infantry battalions
three of which are themselves Scot,
a total of 1,300 regular soldiers
from the Lowlands,
plus, in reserve,
the volunteer militias
of Stirling, Edinburgh,
Dumfries and Glasgow,
a further 8,000 men.
Charles Edward Stuart,
regent claimant to the thrones
of England and Scotland,
has more Scots-in-arms
against him than for him.
And, ranged against him
in the Highlands,
he has the Whig clans
siding with the Government,
the Munros, the Rosses,
the MacKenzies,
the McLeods of Skye, the Sutherlands,
and here on the moor,
the Campbells of the Argyll militia.
Here to fight Charles and his
rebellion, here to take clan revenge,
Angus Ian Campbell,
wife murdered by the MacDonalds.
Alistair MacDonald, brother
killed by Campbells in a cattle raid.
For him, loyalties to Charlie
mean little.
For him,
today's battle is a clan battle.
The swords those bastards use
can cut a man in half.
Well, I reckon
we'll have them this time.
- Why do you say that?
- We've got a new bayonet drill, see.
You don't poke
at the man in front of you.
You poke at the man
coming at your chum on the right.
That means,
as he's lifting his sword arm,
you get him underneath, like.
What do you think about the rebels?
Well... I ain't taken me clothes off
for six weeks.
I reckon till we lay
them bastards out I won't, neither.
I'll tell you one thing.
I know a lot of the boys
make fun of our Billy Cumberland
but I reckon he's all right.
He's a tough bastard
but at least he feeds you
which is more than some of them do.
I've heard said the rebels want to cut
him as small as herbs for the pot.
Well... I don't reckon that.
They're a lot of friggin' savages.
Donald Gram, a farmer,
forced a month ago
into the Highland army,
twice has deserted
back to farm and family,
twice has been captured
and forced to return.
Euan MacDonald, farmer,
forced into the Highland army
the day before yesterday.
With him his son,
John Angus MacDonald,
the day before yesterday a ploughboy,
today a rebel in arms.
His age, 13.
I can't just make out
what's happening in the rebel lines.
There's much confusion of movement.
Large numbers of men are moving about,
changing their position...
and there are large gaps
in the centre.
It seems to me as though
the entire line is completely askew.
Why is this?
We are all MacDonalds and, as such,
we are entitled to stand
on the right in the line of battle.
This is an ancient
MacDonald privilege
and yet Mr O'Sullivan
has thought fit to place
Lord George Murray's men
in that position.
The main reason is that
yesterday the Prince had an idea
for a surprise march by night
on the camp of Cumberland.
This we attempted. It failed.
But it meant that we were
all up marching the entire night.
Consequently, the men are exhausted
and are still stumbling
into their positions.
What effect has this had
on your men?
Look at them.
When did you last sleep?
As far as I am concerned,
we are now putting an end
to a bad affair.
The Scots are fair fighters
until a crisis is reached
and it's my opinion
we've now reached that crisis.
With all these things amiss
in our army,
it would have been better had the
Prince made some plan for retreat.
Bu! Charles
has made no plans for retreat.
He says that only those who are
afraid can doubt his coming victory.
He puts from his mind
the discontent of the MacDonalds,
the fatigue and hunger of his men,
the total outnumbering of his army,
the thinning of ranks by desertion,
the ill choice of battlefield,
convinced as he is
of the invincibility of his men.
God is on our side.
Our cause is just
and we will triumph this day.
The soldiers in the Elector's army
know me to be their lawful Prince.
And so I'm convinced
they'll break in panic,
for they will never dare fight me.
Battalion, fix your bayonets.
Fix.
This man's name is Chisholm,
James Chisholm.
A private in the Government army,
he is also a Highland Scot.
This man's name too is Chisholm,
Roderick Og Chisholm.
Fifth son of the clan chief,
he stands before his men
in the Prince's army.
The Chisholm 500 yards away
is this man's brother.
Charles Edward Stuart's war
is a civil war.
They've started.
The rebel cannon have opened fire.
The cannon have opened
from the rebels' centre
and they're over-elevated.
Fire!
Batteries...
from open sights...
at will... fire!
Pull!
Fire!
Fire!
That's the Duke of Cumberland's
cannons.
Cannonades all around me!
I'm going to have to shout
to make myself heard!
The smoke
is beginning to thicken.
It's going to be very difficult
to see what effect our cannon
is having on the rebel lines.
A cast-iron ball of three pounds'
weight, fired from open sights.
This is roundshot.
This is what it does.
Pull!
Alistair McInnes, age 20.
Right leg severed below knee joint.
Malcolm Angus Chisholm, age 24.
Disembowelled.
Ian MacDonald, age 13. Shot.
1:12.
Dazed, indecisive, Charles
has moved to behind
the right ank of the Jacobite lines
and is now unable to see
what is happening to his army.
Ordered by O'Sullivan
to stand in the ranks six-deep,
the men on the Highland right
make a clear and tight-packed target
for the English gunners.
Pull!
The rebels' artillery
have stopped firing altogether
and, before they did, we counted...
How many?
We counted 15 to 20 shots
fired by our artillery
for every one fired by the rebels.
1:17.
The second result of
O'Sullivan's administration.
The Prince's artillery, iii-fed
by a sporadic ammunition supply,
ill-served by untrained amateurs,
ceases fire.
Pull!
Have you had orders to attack, sir?
- No, I've had none!
- Well, why not?
The Prince hasn't given any!
If he doesn't give them soon,
he'll lose the entire army!
We're being shelled to pieces!
Pull!
Reload!
Pull!
Reload!
- What's the Prince doing?
- I don't know!
Nobody knows what he's doing!
1:22. Prince Charles Stuart,
paralyzed with indecision,
still has given no order,
either to advance or to retreat.
1:22. Clan Cameron,
200 men, shot to pieces.
Clan Stewart,
180 men, shot to pieces.
This is fantastic!
If this keeps up much longer,
our gunners will have
finished the whole affair.
The cannonade... The cannonade
has given our men infinite spirits.
Clan Chisholm casualties,
47 killed or maimed.
This is incredible! Those men have
been standing there for 22 minutes!
They're just lining the ranks!
The rebels are being
literally blown apart!
Why are they standing there?
Why in God's name don't they run?
1:30. Still no order to advance.
Clan army casualties,
700 dead or maimed.
Charles Stuart hopes
that by not advancing
he will tempt the Government army
out of its battle lines to attack him.
1:32 pm. Cumberland orders a move
but not the one
his cousin is expecting.
I want Wolfe's battalion
to advance inside on the left!
Your Highness!
At 1:32, Cumberland places a battalion
behind one of the walls
O'Sullivan has refused to pull down,
to fire into the side
of the clan army
when it charges
the Government front.
This is the crossfire
O'Sullivan said would never happen.
Oh, yes, yes... Units of the Argyll...
the Campbell-Argyll militia, yes?
And there are squadrons
of dragoons with them.
Yes, it's obvious that
His Royal Highness has decided
to have units of the Campbell-Argyll
militia and some squadrons of dragoons
to go down behind
the south side of this wall,
out of sight of the enemy,
to take them in the rear
and outflank the rebels.
Thus, also at 1:32 pm,
begins the outanking movement
that O'Sullivan
said would never happen.
29 minutes too late,
Charles Stuart orders an advance
along the entire from
of the Jacobite army.
And you make the right side advance!
Bu! The message
fails to reach the right wing.
Casualties, 850.
Have you still had
no orders to attack?
No! I've had no orders!
I had a message from Mr O'Sullivan,
which, as ever,
I failed to comprehend!
- The line's broken up!
- What?
They're charging,
they're coming straight at us!
Sir, the right has broken forward!
The walls will hold them.
- They're going straight!
- Get down behing the wall there!
After 28 minutes of cannonfire!
What sort of men are these?
- Right! Change from ball to grape.
- Change from ball to grape!
A cylindrical canvas bag
eight inches in length,
packed with musketballs
and pieces of jagged iron.
This is grapeshot.
This is what it does.
Pull!
Pull!
It must be the grape! The centre
has collided with the right.
There's great confusion,
bodies flying!
They must be going to receive fire
from our centre battalions!
Charge! Charge!
Fire!
Bastards!
God, they're almost upon us!
They're firing from this side
and from this side.
They're been cut to pieces!
It must be chaos behind those walls!
Chaos!
Barrell's!
Towards this one regiment,
Barrell's Fourth of Foot,
heads the entire right
of the clan army,
800 men in a solid clump,
running with a collision speed
of over 12 miles an hour.
Alternate... firing!
Battalion, take care.
Fall in by rank. Take aim!
Rear rank, present!
Rear rank, fire!
Fire!
Front rank, take aim!
Front rank, fire!
Rear rank, present.
Fire!
Centre rank, present.
Front rank, present.
Remember, Barrell's,
off to the right!
They've broken through Barrell's!
General Huske, advance Bligh's
and Semphill's, support on the left.
Your Highness.
1:57 and the Duke of Cumberland
sees the men of his second line,
placed there for just such an
emergency, fire with crippling effect
into the Highlanders
who broke through the from line.
1:57. Charles Stuart,
who has made no battle plan at all,
sees, on the right wing, his men run
from this concentrated musketfire
and sees, on his left wing,
the MacDonalds, tired, hungry,
rebellious at not being given their
rightful battle position by O'Sullivan,
hold back from charging
the royal army right.
Instead, they stand and taunt,
trying to tempt the royal army lines
forward in disorder.
Battalion Pulteney's, make ready!
They're stopping to pick up stones!
Shoot!
1:58. The MacDonalds, dismayed at
the sight of the advancing cavalry,
themselves draw back.
Keppoch, one of their leaders,
runs forward with other clan officers
to encourage them
and is shot through twice
by musketball.
About him, his men tum and run.
Time 1:59 pm.
The rout of the Highland army begins.
Christ, they're running.
They're leaving the field
except for two small units,
the French and the Irish.
Let them through. Stand your ground.
Guard, forward!
Oh, Jesus!
Front rank, present. Fire!
Re-form! Re-form!
Stand and aim! Fire!
Walter Stapleton,
commander, Irish pickets,
cut down with 100 of his men
as the Scots about them run.
Where are you going, you?
Charles Stuart
tries to rally his men.
"Pray stand with me, your Prince,"
he cries.
"Pray stand with me but a moment,
otherwise you ruin me,
"your country and yourselves
and God forgive you.".
But it is too late.
At one minute past two
in the afternoon,
his cause in ruins,
Charles Edward Stuart
is led from the battlefield
by the man most responsible
for his defeat.
As Charles leaves, a senior
clan officer screams after him,
"Run, you cowardly Italian."
- Mr Fossett.
- Your Highness?
- You will order a general ceasefire.
- Your Highness.
Of the 9,000 men of the royal army
who advanced this morning from Naim
with Private Laing,
an estimated 50 are dead.
Bu! For every one corpse
in the royal army
there are 24 in the clan army.
Piled in layers, dead or dying,
are 1,200 men...
including the brother
of Private James Chisholm.
There was scarce a soldier or officer
of Barrell's Fourth of Foot
who did not kill one or two men each
with their bayonets or spontoons.
Not a bayonet but was bent
and stained with blood
to the muzzles of their muskets.
All witnesses agreed that, if
grapeshot were the king of battles,
the bayonet was now
the queen of weapons.
"It is mine and everybody': opinion,"
boasts a trooper,
"that no history can brag
of so singular a victory."
How do you feel?
Don't feel nothing, really.
I feel all right!
Well, now it's over.
Battalion, take care!
Halt!
2:14pm. The battalions
of Cumberland
halt at the lines held by the rebels
one hour and eight minutes ago.
Battalion, shoulder your firelocks!
Three cheers for His Royal Highness!
- Hip, hip!
- Hurrah!
Thus has ended the last battle
to be fought in Britain
and the last armed attempt
to overthrow its king.
The Establishment has been saved,
peace restored,
Church, Crown,
trade and commerce safeguarded.
Thus the Duke of Cumberland
won his only victory
and Charles suffered his only defeat.
His advisers are shortly to urge
his instructions for reassembly.
"He is to reply, " Do as you wish.
Only, for God's sake, let us go.
Charles Edward Stuart,
his cause now in ruins,
has given one order too many.
Charles pitted these men against
the modem musket and bayonet,
against cavalry and cannon.
Thus, in one hour, eight minutes,
he has reduced
the ower of the Highland clans
to twitching, limbless corpses.
2:30 pm and His Royal Highness,
the Duke of Cumberland,
orders rum and brandy, cheese
and biscuits for his brave boys.
For the wounded and dying clansmen
on the moor,
there is to be different treatment.
All over the battlefield, whilst the
Duke of Cumberland eats his lunch,
any clansmen seen to be still alive
is either slit in the throat,
pistolled through the head
or bayonetted and trampled on
until, in the words of an eyewitness,
"the moor was covered with blood"
"and our British soldiers
looked less like Christian men"
"than so many butchers."
What about some grub?
This rebel host has been
most deeply indebted to the public
for all the rapine,
murder and cruelty
and our men are heartily determined
to give them receipt in full.
Cut him!
Cut him, you bastard!
Take him to the shoulder!
I'm letting my regiments of horse
loose after the battle
in order they may have some sweets
with all their fatigue.
Thus nearly 100 people
are to be butchered or maimed
on the road to Inverness.
Butchered whether or not
they took any part in the battle.
They took my baby.
He's only two weeks old.
And one of them
whirled him around by his leg...
and threw him on to the ground.
This is Jean Clark, aged 28.
Cut about the face and body
by sabres,
she was left lying for dead
on the road to Inverness.
The soldiers came in and caught him,
and Daddy too
but I got away
through a hole in the wall.
- How old was your brother?
- Lachlan was nine.
I don't... I don't know
where he and Daddy are now.
Come on, you!
4 pm. Inverness.
James Rae: trooper,
Kingston's Light Horse,
the first man of Cumberland': army
to enter the Highland capital,
the first man to show its inhabitants
what is to be expected
from an Englishman
protecting his liberty
and his Protestant religion.
There was these two men,
shouting and screaming.
And then he came out
and there was blood on his hands.
These troopers from the Duke
of Kingston's Light Horse Regiment
are later to be commended
by Cumberland
for their "zeal in the pursuit."
Each of them comes from Nottingham.
Each of them by trade is a butcher.
James Rae himself, who, like the other
troopers of Kingston's Light Horse,
played his pan in the battle
when it was over,
is later to return to Nottingham,
where his regimental colours
are to be laid to rest
with great pomp and ceremony.
"To the perpetual fame
and immortal memory
"of the Duke of Kingston's
Light Horse,
"where, amongst others,
on the 16th day of April 1746,
"they performed
many and glorious exploits
"in routing and entirely subduing
the perfidious rebels.".
"Long may
the county of Nottingham ourish."
"God save our ever august King."
April 16th. 10:30 pm. Inverness.
For William Augustus,
Duke of Cumberland,
third son of King George ll,
an evening of immense
satisfaction and triumph.
At the age of 25,
he has saved his father's kingdom
and redeemed the reputation
of the British army.
At his table, older officers drink
his toast and declare him to be
one of the greatest English captains
since Marlborough.
His cousin Charles, until today the
heroic leader of an armed rebellion,
is now a fugitive in the heather.
If further proof were needed
of this young man's prowess,
it is here,
unheeded by him,
four and a half miles away.
This is Lachlan MacDonald
of Lochaber,
right leg severed
below the knee joint.
He's been lying on the moor
untended for 13 hours.
For most of the time,
it has been raining.
This is Mrs Anne Hossack
of Inverness.
Somewhere on the moor,
amidst 1,200 dead and dying,
is her husband.
I don't know...
where he is.
For Alexander Laing, private,
Barrell's Fourth Regiment of Foot,
this evening is also
one of immense satisfaction.
His regiment has acquitted itself
with honour on the field of battle.
He himself has despatched
three of the rebels
and, above all, he himself
has escaped death and maiming.
Lucky bastard!
Battalion will take care
while the casualty lists are read.
It's all right for you, my lord!
This is Mrs Anne Walker,
wife of Private Andrew Walker, who
was wounded in the ranks of Barrell's
and taken to the surgeons' lines.
This woman, also, has no idea
whether her husband is alive or dead.
It is given out this morning
of Thursday 17th April
that the following officers
and other ranks
of Major General William Barrell's
Regiment of Foot
were either killed
or have since died from wounds
resulting from the glorious victory
inflicted yesterday
over the rebel army.
Killed: Captain Lord Robert Kerr.
Other ranks: Sergeant Pullman,
Privates Baker, Barstow, Dyke,
Finch, Lowell,
Lawson, Meecham, Napper, Osbourne,
Smart, Williamson.
Wounded and since died
in the surgeons' lines:
Corporal Lockhart,
Privates Davis, Pollock and Walker.
Battalion, take care.
Battalion will dismiss,
save for the duty picket.
Battalion, dismiss.
You treated Private Walker
a short while ago, Doctor?
Yes... Yes, I did.
What did he die of?
This one? He died of shock,
if I remember correctly.
Why was that?
He was an amputee.
I had to take his arm off.
Do you know what...
what is our young Billy's pleasure
because we fought
with such gallantry?
His Royal Highness thanks
all ye officers and men
for their gallant behaviour.
Get out of it! Leave off!
His Royal Highness releases
all ye military prisoners
who were this day
in custody of the provost.
- Have you heard about the wounded?
- Well, yeh, some talk about it.
They're gonna pay 12 guineas
out of the Duke's own purse
for all those wounded in the battle.
For Lachlan MacDonald,
who's been now lying on the moor
two days with a severed right leg,
there'll be no 12 guineas.
Orders for Friday 18th April 1746.
"A captain and 40 foot
to march directly"
"and visit all the cottages"
"in the neighbourhood
of the field of battle."
"The officers and men
will take notice"
"that the public order of the rebels
on the day of battle"
"was to give us no quarter."
Line up the bodies, men.
Come on, quick as you can.
There's another one over there.
The public orders of the rebels
to give no mercy to the royal army
do not exist in any other form
than a crude forgery
alleged to have been found
on the field of battle.
All right, lad.
We're only taking you to hospital.
Bu! Whether he knows this
public order is a forgery or not,
Cumberland makes it his excuse
to authorize what now happens.
Battalion, present your firelock...
at the man in front of you.
Fire!
The officer in charge
of this execution squad
is himself a Scotsman.
Captain Scott, are many of the rebels
being killed in this fashion?
As many as we can find.
I don't know how many men
have been killed in this fashion.
I fear to think.
But just this morning I heard
a Campbell officer saying that,
in just one area, he himself
saw 72 wounded rebels
shot or clubbed on the head.
Yes, I saw what was done.
Did you agree with it?
No, of course I didn't.
I will always thank God that I had
nothing to do with the black work.
You must try to remember that
this is a most difficult problem.
I have talked much with officers
from Lowland Scots regiments
and they undoubtedly feel
that these Highlanders
are threatening their culture,
their Protestant religion.
They're threatening to disrupt
their peace and their commerce.
There's a great feeling of insecurity
in the Lowlands.
These people still remember
the Highland host.
They still remember the years
of cattle thieves and murder,
men coming down at night
from the hills
and extorting blackmail
under pain of being robbed.
You see, the Highlander
talks a different language.
He wears different clothes...
and he undoubtedly has
some uncouth and barbaric practices.
For all these reasons,
I think you'll find most Lowlanders
hold the man
from this part of the country
in contempt and hatred.
Much more so
even than the English do.
Why is your army treating the
prisoners and the wounded like this?
Of yourself, it's been said you're
keeping the prisoners in Inverness
without warmth, food and water.
And that you're even withholding
medical dressings from them.
Surely this is against
all bounds of humanity.
Look, I think the point
somewhat eludes you.
These men are rebels and barbarians
and as such are to be rated as cattle
and treated as cattle.
Get that thing
back out the way, please.
For three days and nights
since the battle,
these men, many of them
stripped of their clothes,
many of them dying
from gaping wounds,
have been lying in cold attics
and clamp cellars,
awaiting removal to the prison ships
anchored in the firth.
The British army authorities
have withheld from them
even medical dressings,
thus hoping to solve
the acute lack of prison space
by ensuring
the mortality rate remains high.
They get no food, no light,
no medical dressing.
Get their headgear
while you're about it.
The belt here, too.
The smell in here is terrible.
This man next to me...
I think he's dead.
The way they are treating us,
you'd think we were just animals.
Robert MacLean, salmon fisher.
To be tried without defence
at an English trial,
of which he is able to understand
not a word spoken.
His sentence, execution at York
by being hanged, drawn and quartered.
Check these shackles
while you're about it.
Ranald MacDonald, farmer.
To wait in prison 14 months
for a trial.
Then sentenced at Brampton to be
pulled through its streets on a sled
and hanged, drawn and quartered.
Charles Edward Stuart, believing
the Scots to have betrayed him,
refuses to listen
to last-minute pleas
to stay and fight in the mountains.
Curtly and without a word of thanks
he dismisses the Highland army.
In his saddlebags
the last of the Jacobite funds,
which he has now decided
to keep for himself,
his need, he estimates,
being greater.
Alistair John Stewart,
to lie 10 days in prison, untended,
with a broken leg.
To die on the 11th day of gangrene.
John William O'Sullivan,
soon to be safely in Rome.
To tell King James of the good part
he has played in the rising
and to promptly receive
first a knighthood
and then a baronetcy.
Alexander Sutherland,
never brought to trial.
Disposal unknown.
Lord George Murray,
who to the end blamed Prince Charles
and his Irish administration
for the defeat at Culloden,
is soon to leave Scotland forever,
forced to seek exile in Europe.
Prince Charles refuses to see him
again and never forgives him,
blaming his opposition
to his administration
for the downfall
of the Stuart cause.
Bad day for us all, this.
Lord George Murray, estimated by some
as one of the most brilliant generals
of the 18th century,
who, if left to his own counsel,
could perhaps
have turned Culloden into a victory.
Keep in step, now!
May 23rd. The British army moves
to Fort Augustus in the Great Glen.
From here, the centre link
in a chain of forts and garrisons
stretching from Inverness in the east
to Tobermory in the west,
from Bernera in the north
to Dumbarton in the south,
the Duke of Cumberland mounts
what he terms,
"the pacification of the Highlands."
Patrol of Bligh's,
you will proceed on police action
to Lochaber,
with sufficient rations for two days.
All right, lads. Fall out
and pick up your firelocks.
Move it!
Lord Sackville, what is the function
of these patrols.
Their function is to march
deep into the glens
occupied by the rebels
and their families
and there, by vigorous police action,
ensure that never again will these
people disturb the peace of our land.
May 30th. A military patrol
under Lord George Sackville
strikes deep into a corrie
in Lochaber,
searching for
fugitive rebel families.
This is one of them,
sheltering from the rain 1,500 feet
up the side of a hill face.
Andrew McEachan, aged 25,
who stood at Culloden,
and who now, because of the patrols,
has to hide in the hills
like an animal.
This is his wife, child
and a friend called Mrs MacInnis.
They have each been out in the open
for the past eight days.
This girl is suffering from
severe ux
as a result of damp clothes.
The last meal this baby ate
was a small fish caught yesterday
and shared between the children.
This little girl, forced
to leave her home suddenly,
has only a thin dress,
a damp shawl and no shoes.
At approximately 12 noon, May 30th,
the family is sighted by the patrol.
This is what happens.
Right, then!
NO! No!
I dunno.
All these officers keep telling us
these people up here
are a load of savages, but...
I dunno, they looked like ordinary
women and children up there to me.
I didn't like it, what We did.
I didn't like it at all.
Look, let me tell you something.
I had a mate at Falkirk.
He had his head split open.
Like that.
So don't try and make me
go all weeping, like,
over what happens
to these bastards. Eh?
Just don't try it!
Well satisfied with the result
of his military occupation,
Cumberland is to leave
Scotland on July 18th.
He leaves behind him, to finish
the destruction of the rebel clans,
not only an immense concentration
of English and Lowland troops,
not only the zealous help
of all the Whig clans,
but even the help of the chief
of a rebel clan, Ludovick Grant,
son of the Gram clan chief,
who has hastily
reorganized his loyalties
and just delivered 82 of his own
rebel clansmen to Cumberland
for transportation to the Barbados,
as proof of his unswerving allegiance
to the Crown.
Cumberland himself is to receive
from London a tumultuous welcome.
From the Government,
a raise in salary of 25,000.
From George Frederick Handel
a choral work,
See The Conquering Hero Comes.
From the public,
his name for a ower, Sweet William.
From the Scots,
his name for a weed, Stinking Billy.
Month after month,
the British army patrols
scour every hill range and glen
of northern Scotland
in an attempt, as Cumberland puts it,
"to wear down this generation
until there be peace in the land.".
The patrols leave behind them
a trail of brutality and suffering
that is to earn for their commander
undying loathing
and the epithet
Cumberland the Butcher.
These three of his officers have
already burnt, smashed, raped,
looted and bayonetted their way
from Glenurquhart to Moidart,
committing,
in the name of pacification,
the worst atrocities
in the history of the British army.
Captain Caroline Frederick Scott,
Lowlander.
I agree with
the senior staff officer,
who has proposed that 5 be paid
for the head of every rebel
brought to Fort Augustus.
Major lain Lockhart, Lowlander.
Those found in arms are ordered
to be immediately put to death
and the houses of those who abscond
are plundered and burned,
their cattle drove, their ploughs
and other tackle destroyed.
Lord George Sackville, Englishman,
third son of the Duke of Dorset.
We have detachments
in all parts of the Highlands.
The people are deservedly
in a most deplorable way
and must perish,
either by famine or by the sword.
A just reward for traitors.
We hang or shoot everyone that
is known to conceal the Pretender,
burn their houses, take their cattle.
The Pretender, Charles Edward Stuart,
object of the largest single manhunt
in British history,
now disguised
as an ordinary clansman,
much addicted to the little bottle
he carries in his hip pocket,
suffering from dysentery,
is to spend the next five months
scrambling amidst the rocks and hills
of the Western Highlands,
sheltered by its people, who remain
loyal to him and never betray him,
until, in September, he takes a ship
for France and security,
leaving behind him nothing,
nothing but a legend,
"Bonnie Prince Charlie."
My bonnie moorhen
My bonnie moorhen.
Up in the grey hill
Down in the glen.
Charles Edward Stuart,
the bonnie moorhen,
is to walk out of the lives of the people
he has led into so much suffering
with scarcely a backward look
in their direction.
The year of the Prince had ended
but for the English Government,
this was just the beginning.
Systematically and with
clue parliamentary legislation,
they proceeded to eliminate ail
the things that made this man unique
and that gave him
the strength they so feared.
They penalized the wearing
of his Highland dress,
penalized the weaving
of his Highland tartan,
penalized the worshipping
at his Church,
penalized the carrying
of his weapons,
penalized the playing of his music.
They removed
the authority of his chief
and, in one blow, smashed forever
the system of his clan.
They then encouraged his chief
to lose interest in him,
to evict him and to replace him
by the more profitable sheep.
Thus they reduced him
to a homeless, unwanted oddity
and finally forced him,
in his hundreds of thousands,
to leave the land of his birth
for the canning industries
of the North,
for the disease-ridden slums
of the South,
for the lumber camps of Canada
and the stockyards of Australia.
And wherever he went,
he took with him
his music, his poetry,
his language and his children.
"On an April morning.
"I no longer hear birdsongs
"or the lowing of cattle on the moor.
"I hear the noise of sheep
and the English language,
"dogs barking
and frightening the deer.".
Thus, within a century from Culloden,
the English
and the Scottish Lowlanders
had made secure forever
their religion, their commerce,
their culture, their ruling dynasty
and, in so doing,
had destroyed a race of people.
They have created a desert
and have called it "peace."