The second Jacobite uprising began in 1745 when the Young Pretender Charles Edward Stuart – Bonnie Prince Charlie – landed in the Hebrides and began gathering support for his rebellion against George II. One of the great Highland lords that Charlie wanted to be sure was onside was Simon Fraser, Lord Lovat. Fraser, otherwise known as ‘the fox’, was – in a crowded field – possibly the most untrusted man in Scotland. He eventually became the 11th Lord Lovat in 1733 after decades of villainy, including kidnapping and forcing a (latter annulled) marriage on his cousin. He had converted to Catholicism before the first Jacobite Rising in 1715, in which he skillfully avoided taking sides until it was clear the Jacobites would lose, after which he helped himself to their lands.
In 1739, Lovat had promised his support to Charlie if the French would join in, but when French ships were spotted off the Firth of Forth, he instead took to his bed. After the Jacobite victory at Prestonpans, the old rogue mustered men at last for Charlie, telling loyalists it was all his son’s doing. Several reference sources still assert that Lovat was present when the Jacobites were finally beaten at Culloden, but this was not so. His own judgment on the battle cannot be improved upon: ‘none but a mad fool would have fought that day’.
Charlie and Lovat finally met as Charlie retreated, when Lovat took him in for a fast-food dinner and some fatherly advice, and with a straight face recommended the ‘try again’ example of Bruce and the spider to the Prince. Charlie’s response is not recorded, but one was not needed; Lovat was just making one last attempt at diplomatic reconciliation in his usual duplicitous manner. Both men were well aware that the rising was a close-run thing, and both also knew full well that if Lovat had put his weight behind the campaign it might have succeeded. Long presented in popular mythology as an England-Scotland game, the ‘Forty-Five’ was a more complex affair: for many Scottish Protestants, the rising brought the threat of Catholic domination, while many English Tories still regarded the Hanoverians as usurpers. It was not to be, and the game was up for both the young prince and the old fox. Charlie fled and eventually escaped to France while Lovat, realising he could not scheme his way out of this one, also fled and was caught hiding in a tree trunk.
What Happened Next
The great artist William Hogarth – an old acquaintance of Lovat, who was as equally at home in London as in Inverness – drew a much-admired portrait of Lovat on his way to the Tower, a portrait which catches the charm and menace of the man. Found guilty by his peers, after a trial in which he conducted his defence with lordly panache, his closing words were ‘I wish you an eternal farewell. We shall not meet again in the same place; I am sure of that’. In 1747, the 80-year-old rebel became the last man to be publicly beheaded in Britain. He died well, quoting Horace’s ‘Dulce et Decorum’ ode, ‘It is sweet and fitting to die for one’s country’. His death was preceded by that of several spectators who were crushed when a stand collapsed. The no-longer Bonnie Prince Charlie died 41 years later aged 68. And in 1944, the 15th Lord Lovat (and his piper) led the British commandos ashore on D-day. See also 1746: Flora MacDonald helps Bonnie Prince Charlie escape