No enemy had molested the troops after they left Penrith; and it appeared evident that, at that time, the Duke of Cumberland had no intention of coming to a pitched battle, but intended only to take advantage of the disorder which he might suppose would have attended the retreat of an army of militia.
On arriving at Carlisle, a council of war was held. Lord George Murray was in favour of evacuating Carlisle, but his influence was overruled. "I had been so much fatigued," he remarks, "for some days before, that I was very little at the Prince's quarters that day." It was, however, determined to leave a garrison in Carlisle, for Prince Charles had set his heart upon returning to England. He, therefore, placed in the castle Mr. Hamilton, whilst the unfortunate Mr. Townley commanded the town.
"This," remarks Mr Maxwell,[155] "was perhaps the worst resolution that the Prince had taken hitherto. I cannot help condemning it, though there were specious pretexts for it." It would, indeed, have been highly advantageous for the Prince to have retained one of the keys of England; and he might have hoped to return before the place could be retaken. Of this, however, he could not be certain; and he was undoubtedly wrong in exposing the lives of the garrison without an indispensable necessity, which, according to Maxwell, did not exist; for "blowing up the castle, and the gates of the town might equally have given him an entry into England."
The day after the Prince had arrived in Carlisle, he left it, and proceeded northwards. One cause of this, apparently, needless haste was, the state of the river Esk, about seven miles from Carlisle; it was, by a nearer road, impassable. This stream, it was argued, might be swollen by a few hours rain, and then it could not be forded. The Prince might thus be detained at Carlisle; and he had now become extremely impatient to know the exact state of his affairs in Scotland; to collect his forces, in order to return to England. Letters from Lord John Drummond had re-assured him of the good will of the Court of France—that delusive hope was not even then extinct. Advice from Viscount Strathallan had imparted excellent accounts of the army in Scotland. Under these circumstances, Charles hastened forward, and encountered the difficult passage over the Esk. Hope again gladdened the heart of one for whose errors, when we consider the stake for which he fought, and the cherished wishes of his youth, too little allowance has been made. But, in the eyes of others, the prospect of the young Chevalier's return to England was regarded as wholly visionary; and the planting a garrison in the dilapidated fortress of Carlisle, was deemed indifference to the fate of his adherents who remained, unwillingly, and certain of their doom. "The retreat from Derby was considered throughout England," observes Sir Walter Scott, "as the close of the rebellion: as a physician regards a distemper to be nearly overcome, when he can drive it from the stomach and nobler parts, into the extremities of the body."[156]
The army, after marching from three o'clock in the morning until two in the afternoon, arrived on the borders of the Esk. This river, which is usually shallow, had already been swollen by an incessant rain of several days, to the depth of four feet. It was, therefore, necessary to cross it instantly, for fear of a continuation of the rain, and an increase of the danger. The passage over the Esk was admirably contrived; it could only have been effected by Highlanders. The cavalry formed in the river, to break the force of the current, about twenty-five paces above the ford where the infantry were to pass. Then the Highlanders plunged into the water, arranging themselves into ranks of ten or twelve a-breast, with their arms locked in such a manner as to support one another against the rapidity of the river, leaving sufficient intervals between their ranks for the passage of the water. "We were nearly a hundred men a-breast," writes Lord George Murray;[157] "and it was a very fine show. The water was big, and most of the men breast-high. When I was near across the river, I believe there were two thousand men in the water at once: there was nothing seen but their heads and shoulders; but there was no danger, for we had crossed many waters, and the ford was good; and Highlanders will pass a water where horses will not, which I have often seen. They hold by one another, by the neck of the coat, so that if one should fall, he is in no danger, being supported by the others, so all went down, or none."
The scene must have been extremely singular. "The interval between the cavalry," remarks an eyewitness, "appeared like a paved street through the river, the heads of the Highlanders being generally all that was seen above the water. Cavalry were also placed beneath the ford, to pick up all those who might be carried away by the current. In an hour's time the whole army had passed the river Esk; and the boundary between England and Scotland was again passed."[158]
Lord George Murray had, on this occasion, assumed the national dress. "I was this day," he says "in my philibeg." Well might he, in after times, when reviewing the events of the memorable campaign of 1745, dwell with pride on the hardihood of those countrymen from whom he was for ever an exile when he composed his journal. "All the bridges that were thrown down in England," he remarks, "to prevent their advancing in their march forwards, never retarded them a moment." Nor was the philibeg assumed merely for the convenience of the passage over the Esk. "I did not know," writes Lord George, "but the enemy might have come from Penrith by Brampton, so shunned the water of Eden, to have attacked us in passing this water of Esk; and nothing encouraged the men more, than seeing their officers dressed like themselves, and ready to share their fate."
Some ladies had forded the river on horseback immediately before the Highland regiments. These fair, and bold equestrians might have given intelligence; but luckily they did not. The General who had provided so carefully and admirably for the safety of his troops, knew well how to temper discipline with indulgence. Fires were instantly kindled to dry the men as they quitted the water. The poor Highlanders, when they found themselves on Scottish ground, forgot all the vexation of their retreat, and broke out into expressions of joy;—of short lived continuance among a slaughtered and hunted people. It was near night; yet the bagpipes struck up a national air as the last of the Highland host passed the river: and the Highlanders began dancing reels, "which," relates Lord George, "in a moment dried them, for they had held up the tails of their short coats in passing the river; so when their legs were dry, all was right." This day, forming an epoch in the sorrowful narrative of the insurrection of 1745, was the birthday of Prince Charles, who then attained his twenty-fifth year. Many mercies had marked the expedition into England, fruitless as it had proved. After six weeks' march, and sojourn, in England, amid innumerable enemies, threatened by two formidable armies in different directions, the Jacobite forces, entering England on the eighth of November, and quitting it on the twentieth of December, had returned without losing more than forty men, including the twelve killed at Clifton Wall. They had traversed a country well-peopled with English peasantry, without any attacks except upon such marauders as strayed from their main body.
As soon as the army had passed the river, the Prince formed it into two columns, which separated; the one, conducted by Charles Edward, took the road to Ecclefechan; the other, under the command of Lord George Murray, marched to Annan. In the disposition of these routes, the principal object was to keep the English in a state of uncertainty as to the direction in which the Jacobite army intended to go, and the towns which they purposed to occupy: and the end was answered; for no just notion was given of the movements of the Highlanders until after the subsequent junction of the two columns; and time was thus gained.
There being no town within eight or ten miles from the river Esk, the army were obliged to march nearly all night. The column conducted by the Prince had to cross mossy ground, under a pouring rain, which had continued ever since the skirmish at Clifton Wall. The guides who conducted Lord George's division led them off the road; this was, however, a necessary precaution in order to shun houses, the lights from which might have tempted the drenched and hungry soldiers to stray, and take shelter. Then the hardy and energetic general of his matchless forces first felt the effects of this laborious march in unusual debility, and fever.