“After having crossed the line of posts, Glenaladale, thinking the West Highlands a very unsafe place for Charles, resolved to conduct him to the Ross-shire Highlands, amongst those Mackenzies who remained loyal, and therefore were not visited with troops. These Mackenzies, Glenaladale thought, would not betray Charles; and the person whom he had pitched upon to confide in was Sir Alexander Mackenzie of Coul. Charles and his attendants, setting out for Ross-shire on foot, suffered greatly in their journey from want of provisions; and when they came to the Braes of Kintail, inhabited by the Macraws, a barbarous people, among whom there are but few gentlemen, necessity obliged them to call at the house of one Christopher Macraw. Glenaladale, leaving Charles and the French officer at some distance, went to Macraw’s house, and told him that he and two of his friends were like to perish for want of food, and desired him to furnish them with some victuals, for which they would pay. Macraw insisted upon knowing who his two friends were, which Glenaladale seemed unwilling to tell. Macraw still insisted, and Glenaladale told him at last that it was young Clan Ronald and a relation of his. Notwithstanding the consequence of the persons, Macraw, though rich for an ordinary Highlander, made Glenaladale pay very dear for some provisions he gave him. Having received the money, he grew better humoured, and desired Glenaladale and the other two to pass the night in his house, which they did. In the course of the conversation they talked of the times, and Macraw exclaimed against the Highlanders who had taken arms with Charles, and said that they and those who still protected him were fools and madmen; that they ought to deliver themselves and their country from distress by giving him up, and taking the reward which government had offered. That night a Macdonald who had been in the rebel army came to Macraw’s house. At first sight he knew Charles, and took an opportunity of warning Glenaladale to take care that Christopher should not discover the quality of his guest.”
[1277] Kirkconnel MS.
[1278] Chisholm was at Edinburgh many years after the rebellion, and was visited by several persons out of curiosity, some of whom gave him money. In shaking hands with his benefactors he always gave the left hand, and excused himself for offering that hand by stating that as he had shaken hands at parting with the prince, he was resolved never to give his right hand to any man till he saw the prince again.
[1279] Chambers’s Rebellion. Stewart’s Sketches, i. 59.
[1280] The party in question consisted of about two hundred of Lord Loudon’s Highlanders, under Captain Grant of Knockando, Strathspey.
[1281] Appendix to Home’s Works, vol. iii. No. 46. Cluny himself had several places of concealment on his estate. “He lived for nine years chiefly in a cave, at a short distance from his house, which was burnt to the ground by the king’s troops. This cave was in the front of a woody precipice, the trees and shelving rocks completely concealing the entrance. It was dug out by his own people, who worked by night, and conveyed the stones and rubbish into a lake in the neighbourhood, in order that no vestige of their labour might betray the retreat of their master. In this sanctuary he lived secure, occasionally visiting his friends by night, or when time had slackened the rigour of the search. Upwards of one hundred persons knew where he was concealed, and a reward of £1,000 was offered to any one who should give information against him; and as it was known that he was concealed on his estate, eighty men were constantly stationed there, besides the parties occasionally marching into the country to intimidate his tenantry, and induce them to disclose the place of his concealment. But though the soldiers were animated with the hope of the reward, and though a step of promotion to the officer who should apprehend him was superadded, yet so true were his people, so strict to their promise of secrecy, and so dexterous in conveying to him the necessaries he required, in his long confinement, that not a trace of him could be discovered, nor an individual found base enough to give a hint to his detriment. At length, wearied out with this dreary and hopeless state of existence, and taught to despair of pardon, he escaped to France in 1755, and died there the following year.”—Stewart’s Sketches, 3d Edition, vol. i. p. 62.
“The late Sir Hector Munro, then a lieutenant in the 34th regiment, and from his zeal and knowledge of the country and the people, intrusted with the command of a large party, continued two whole years in Badenoch, for the purpose of discovering the chief’s retreat. The unwearied vigilance of the clan could alone have saved him from the diligence of this party. At night Cluny came from his retreat to vary the monotony of his existence, by spending a few of the dark hours convivially with his friends. On one occasion he had been suspected, and got out by a back window just as the military were breaking open the door. At another time, seeing the windows of a house kept close, and several persons going to visit the family after dark, the commander broke in at the window of the suspected chamber, with two loaded pistols, and thus endangered the life of a lady newly delivered of a child, on account of whose confinement these suspicious circumstances had taken place. This shows that there was no want of diligence on the part of the pursuers. Cluny himself became so cautious, while living the life of an outlaw, that on parting with his wife, or his most attached friends, he never told them to which of his concealments he was going, or suffered any one to accompany him,—thus enabling them, when questioned, to answer, that they knew not where he was.”—Idem.
It may be here stated en passant that Cluny did not leave Scotland from his “dreary and hopeless state of existence,” but in compliance with a special request made to him by Prince Charles. See a letter from the prince to Cluny, of 4th Sept., 1754, among the Stuart Papers.
[1282] Vide several letters from Colonel Warren to the Chevalier de St. George and others, among Stuart Papers.