MacGregor

Chapter 11

  Loch Arklet - Saturday September 7, 1745

  Rob crouched among the oak and birch scrub as he surveyed the clachan. There were five occupied houses, each with out-buildings which formed rough squares. Gaps of several hundred paces separated them. They lay along the twisting dyke where the levels of the loch-side gave way to the rocky hill. The hillside above rose bare and almost sheer. Though it was past dawn, the sun would not be seen on this side of the loch for quite some time yet. Soon it would shine on the peak opposite and thereafter, if the skies remained clear, its rays would fall on his own farm just out of sight beyond the ridge that separated Glen Arklet from Loch Katrine. He gazed distractedly, misgivings crowding into his mind about this venture. Highland society was changing fast, too fast. Once, clansmen had followed their chiefs without question. Today some demonstrated very little enthusiasm for the venture in hand. Hence this "recruiting" which his father had sent him on. He was tired. For two days they had ranged along Loch Lomond-side. The raising of the clan had met with but indifferent success. James Mòr had been far from gentle. In one case he had actually carried out his threats. The door of the recalcitrant recruit’s house was blocked up with stones. Pine torches were kindled ready to set fire to the thatch. At the very last moment, the cottar cried out for mercy and agreed to come with them. It seemed almost funny at the time. Should a leader behave in this way towards his kindred?

  The work of today was at hand. He had sent three of the men given him by Glengyle round the east end of Loch Arklet, while he and six others had followed the western shore. He watched for the signal that they were ready to block any flight by the tenants of Coireachan. His men were armed with broadswords, pistols and modern muskets, superior to any that might be found in these houses. In any case these were either Gregarach or small people, normally in sympathy with them. There should be no trouble.

  Barely visible in the morning shadows, Rob saw the signal flag waving from a spit of land beyond the township. He jumped to his feet and lifted his own flag, a six foot long piece of tablecloth liberated from the fort at Inversnaid and tied to a long birch sapling. He waved it vigorously until the other group had clearly seen him. Their duty now was to block any escape by their intended recruits.

  Rob moved forward towards the first house. He left one of his men to block escape to the west, sent three to cover flight up the hillside and ap­proached the door with the remaining two. They had been seen and the tenant stood at his door nervously. He recognised Rob. Although, clearly, this was not a stock raid, the tenant clutched nervously at the pitchfork in his hands.

  "Well then, Duncan.” Rob began. "It’s a fine morning in it today. Have you all of your harvest home yet?"

  "Aye, "Duncan MacCondochie responded. "It has been a better harvest than last year. But what is it that you are at with weapons at your side and armed men behind you. We are poor people here and have little gear that you would want. We have been good neighbours to you and yours and there is no feud between us."

  Rob spoke, with more enthusiasm than he felt. "Have you not heard then, Duncan, the Prince has arrived from France and is in need of aid to regain the throne of his ancestors. He will reward any that support him with the lands and gear of his enemies. This time he will triumph. Glengyle commands a regiment in the Prince's service and it is ordered that you and your neigh­bours are to join with us."

  "Ah, so that's the way of it." Duncan responded unhappily. His eldest son peered out of the door behind him. "We do not have all of our harvest in yet ... and the cattle are still on the hill, ... and the factor will surely evict us if his Grace the Duke should he hear of this ... and ... and my wife is not well .... " His protestations tailed off.

  "Well, Duncan, the way of it is that you can come with us as a proud volunteer, or you can come as a pressed man. If you give your loyalty to our cause you shall not regret it, but if not, then I am commanded to take you, whatever."

  "Rob," responded Duncan, angrily. "Never did I believe the day would come when my good neighbour would hold a gun to my head and seek my approval. What does my wife tell the factor when he looks for his rents at Martinmas?"

  "She can tell him that you are lurking on the hill to avoid being pressed, or any other excuse she wishes. Glengyle requires that you follow him, willingly or not. How you order your affairs is your concern. Now, come with us, we have debated over long. What weapons have you to hand?"

  "There are no weapons here," Duncan declared, quickly.

  "Not so,” Rob replied. "You were seen taking a stag last month with a musket. If you have no broadsword or pike then a scythe blade on a shaft should suit. Bring it now or we pull your thatch down to find that which you have hidden."

  Duncan looked at Rob, changing emotions in his eyes. He recognised that his choices were few. Reluctantly he turned back to the house and stooped as he entered the low door. Rob moved to a position from where he could look in and see him removing some of the smaller pieces of bog timber that had been positioned between the main roof supports to strengthen the thatch. Just above the top of the thick wall there was a gap be­tween the inner and outer walls. Duncan reached in and pulled out a bundle wrapped in oiled cloth. He laid it down on the floor and kneeling before it unpicked the knots in the coarse fibres that bound it. As he opened the wrappings, Rob could see a battered flintlock musket, two rusting broad­swords and a dirk. Duncan belted on a broadsword and tied the dirk to his belt. Briefly bidding farewell to his wife, he emerged from the house, musket in hand.

  "Wait, Duncan,” Rob said. "What about Seamus here? He looks fit enough to carry the other broadsword."

  "In the name of all the saints, he is but a boy," Duncan cried. "You cannot take him."

  "He looks well enough grown to me, sixteen or seventeen. Were you not in the company in the year that Glengyle first took me on the Watch? That was 1729 if I remember aright, when I was eighteen. I recall that you complained, the whole time of being taken from your wife and her firstborn. In any event, you have four more to keep their mother and tend the cattle while you are away. Bring him and let him have that other broadsword."

  Glengyle had been careful in selecting the men who would accompany Rob. These were among the most trustworthy of his followers, men who would follow Glengyle to the end of the world if need be. Duncan knew this well. In the conflict between his obliga­tions to his Chief, in this case Glengyle for want of a better, and the call through the Clan Gregor blood inherited from his mother and his landlord the powerful Whig Duke of Montrose, his heart could follow Glengyle, but in his rational thoughts he feared for the safety of his family if he did. Duncan knew that the men before him were deadly serious and there might be time enough to look to his own self-interest when the opportunity arose.

  "Seamus," Duncan said, "tell your mother that you are going with me and strap on that broadsword and your dirk."

  Rob, clearly relieved that he had not had to use any more compulsion, clapped the older man on his back. "I am grateful to you Duncan. I well remem­ber how I admired you when out on duty with Glengyle's Watch. I am glad that you and Seamus will be with us."

  Nevertheless, Rob and his men kept close to their two recruits as they moved on to the next house in the township. Before they reached it. Alasdair Roy, one of Rob's own subtenants from Stronachlachar, came through the patch of woodland escorting two men. "These thought to go over the hill and lurk until we had left. They thought better of it when I showed them my musket."

  "Well done, Alasdair," Rob responded. "They have been thoughtful enough to arm themselves before they left the house.”

  “Well met Iain Dubh,” he said addressing the two men Alasdair had brought to him. “You were enjoying a walk this fine morning. We would be glad of your company. We had thought of a trot over to Callander to meet with some friends. Glengyle was wanting a fine tail of Gregarach behind him."

  Iain Dubh and his son Ranald were well aware of the reason for Rob's expedition. Iain Dubh chose to quietly a
ccept the position for the moment and joined Rob's party.

  Onward they proceeded to the next house. Children could be heard crying. A woman's voice was raised in anger, berating her man. The door opened, and a short, untidy looking man came out. He had buckled on an old sword, and carried an even older rusty Lochaber axe. He looked at Rob, almost pleased to see him as he recognised him. "Ha, Rob, it is, and on a ploy I don't doubt..." The wife appeared at the door, her complaints drowning any further conversation.

  Rob wisely, kept quiet and kept his party moving, five recruits so far, and this one Robert MacGregor, his namesake, looked more than willing to leave his hearth.

  They moved on, Duncan, pointing to the next house, a run-down half-ruin, "widow Ishbel lives here with a daughter, there is nothing for you."

  Finally, through a patch of woodland and over a rocky knoll they came to the last house in the township. This was a more prosperous farm with several outbuildings around it. The remainder of Rob’s party surrounded the house. A furious altercation was in progress with the tenant. This man was a Buchanan who had been placed here some years before by the Duke's factor and therefore he would feel no loyalty towards Glengyle. Still, numbers were needed and in the press he could be controlled. Better to keep him with Glengyle than running away to the Duke telling tales.

  "Bind him, if he will not listen to your sweet words, Calum," Rob called. "Take his two brats too. I doubt if he has a weapon in the house. Alasdair, you take a look at the thatch, in case."

  "Woman, stop that caterwauling," Rob thundered, almost as surprised himself as his men were. Buchanan's wife abruptly stopped her keening.

  Finally, after a fruitless search of the house and outbuildings, Rob got his party together. Three of his men formed the van of his group, with two at the flanks and four at the tail, in between were his eight recruits. Off they marched eastwards along Loch Arclet and then southeast to Loch Chon and the next township.

  Rob reflected to himself that if the other parties sent out by his father had encountered as much reluctance as he had, then the Glengyle regiment would melt away like morning dew in the sun, just as soon as the opportunity arose. Other doubts were crowding into his consciousness. Ardgartan's militia company was a poor one and bored by garrison duties and roadwork. Even so they had a lot of luck in capturing the militia so easily. The militia companies were largely drawn from the Highlands, from what the Whigs termed "loyal clans.” These compa­nies were made up of men from particular localities and officered largely by their own gentlemen. Though the officers were usually in favour of the Hanoverian govern­ment, their men were not so committed. How would professional soldiers fight? Rob could remember the stories of the '15, when the left wing of the Earl of Mar's army had swept all before it, but Argyll's only professional regiments had not only held their ground but had routed the Jacobite right. From all accounts, the Earl, known as Red John of the Battles, had mainly indifferent garrison troops and militiamen to draw on. Mar had the best of the Highland clans and leading Lowland families too. Far fewer were expected to rise this time.

  He thought back to that long ago day in August 1719, when Great Uncle Rob Roy had returned from the fiasco at Glen Shiel. He remembered that Rob Roy had said the Jacobite clans and the Whig militias - Sutherlands and Munros mainly - would have been equally matched. It had been the artillery and the skill of Colonel Wightman's professional gunners that had ruined the day for King James.

  James Mòr had said that though the Highlander was hard to match for fighting spirit he did not have the discipline of the regular soldier and would not stand and face artillery, nor would he submit to commands by other than his own chief. The chiefs and their pride was perhaps the greatest problem, some would not fight unless they had the place and status that their honour demand­ed, while others would not join an army when a rival clan was on the same side. Camp discipline, with so many proud men, was immensely difficult.

  “MacPherson,” Rob thought aloud. That sergeant who had been captured with Ardgartan's militia company, the one he had duelled with. He was down at Inversnaid just now, and had expressed his willingness to join the Jacobites. He had served with Am Freicadan Dubh at the battle of Fontenoy. By all ac­counts they had done well. They had been despatched by trickery to Flanders, despite being promised that they would not be required to serve outside Scot­land. Indeed there had been a mutiny, and some of the mutineers had been hanged for it. Was one of those not called MacPherson, too? Well then, I must seek him out when I return and ask him about this. Even so, it appeared that they had defeated the French onslaught in the very moment when they seemed about to secure victory over the Allied army, and had impressed every one that had seen them. Surely, though, a Highlander following his natural chief was loyal unto death; while the professional soldier had no such loyalty, only the threat of the scourge or rope to drive him on.

  Late in the day, Rob's party neared the fort at Inversnaid. They had visited three more townships on their circuitous route. Despite their best efforts, more than a few men had escaped into the hills. Though some had been willing, enthusias­tic indeed, to come out with Glengyle, most had been reluctant. Threats of burning and worse had had to be used to gather his company together. Although more than thirty men now followed him, Rob considered that almost half were unreliable and would desert at the first opportunity. It was clear that atti­tudes in the Highlands were changing. His father had told of the days, only thirty years before, when it would have been beyond belief for a man not to have come out at the command of his Chief. Well, perhaps, it was not as black and white as Father claimed. But, in the old days, the parchment lords, like Montrose, who claimed to own the land by feudal charters and lawyer’s deeds, could not claim the loyalty of the people that lived on it, if they followed a chief of their own. Much of the unrest and conflict in the Highlands had originated in exactly that kind of situation. With new roads and garrisons, the landlords were gaining an advantage. When tenants would not follow their landlords, the law and military force could be called on to enforce their rights. Already Montrose had been planting tenants such as Buchanan back there. He would be sure to run, telltale, back to the factor at Drymen at the first opportunity that presented.

  The shadows were long when Rob reached the fort. It was a busy scene. On a flattish area of scrub and rock, Glengyle had established an encampment. His loyal followers were camped outside, as there was insufficient room in the fort for captives and recruits. The more dubious of the new recruits were to be kept in a protected area where they could be watched. There must be well over a hundred men inside and around the fort excluding the prisoners. Rob recognised many who would follow Glengyle to the end of the earth, but others would be very doubtful. Glengyle's guards would need to be watchful of these until the regiment marched out of the district. Glengyle himself was not there. James Mòr said that he had returned to Glengyle after receiving a message, but would meet them for the march tomorrow.