On August 23, 1305, Sir William Wallace was hanged, kept alive, then disemboweled, his entrails burned before his eyes. His body was then decapitated and quartered, his head impaled on a spike and displayed on London Bridge.
The barbarism of Wallace's execution made him a martyr to the Scots and gave Robert the Bruce the momentum he needed to lead another uprising. In 1306, the triumphant Bruce was crowned King of Scotland.
Bruce's army would defeat the English in 1314 in the battle of Bannockburn. Twice he invaded England before finally accepting a truce with Longshanks's son, King Edward II. Peace between Scotland and England lasted thirteen years before another war broke out. The Scots were again victorious, and in 1328, Bruce secured a treaty recognizing Scotland's independence. A year later, the king would die of leprosy, leaving the crown to his son, David II.
In 1390, David II died, and Bruce's nephew, John Stewart (Stuart), Earl of Carrick, was crowned King Robert II.
Thus began what is known in Scotland as the Stuart Monarchy.
The next three centuries of rule would be marred by internal strife, conflicts of commerce, and marriages manipulated between Scotland's and England's royal houses. More bloodshed followed, as brother fought brother and religion battled religion in the age-old nonsense of settling whose method of worship was holiest to our Creator, who, for all our murderous efforts, most likely despises the lot of us.
Religious differences would lead to the House of Stuart's undoing.
In 1603, King James VI of Scotland, son of Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots, cousin to Elizabeth I, Queen of England, also became King James I of England in the Union of the Crowns. By succeeding to the throne of England, he thus united Scotland and England as one kingdom — Great Britain — believing the English would accept his Scottish brethren just as they accepted him. But centuries of bloodshed are not so easily forgotten, and England's parliament quickly voted against the proposal.
The King's successor, James VII of Scotland (James II of England), openly supported Roman Catholicism, Scotland's traditional religion. England's parliament forced James VII out, and rather than fight for his crown, he went into exile in France. England offered the crown to his son-in-law, William of Orange, who became known as King William III of Great Britain.
James VII and the House of Stuart were gone, but they still had support from many Catholic Highlanders, who considered the Stuarts Scotland's true bloodline. These Stuart supporters became known as the Jacobites.
When James VII died in France in 1701, the Jacobites felt his son, James VIII, the old Pretender, was rightful heir to the crown. When King William III of Great Britain died a year later, the crown fell to his daughter, Queen Anne, who had no heirs.
Back in France, James VIII's son, Charles Edward Stuart, also known as Bonnie Prince Charlie, decided it was time to lay claim to the Scottish crown. Supported by France (or so he believed), he journeyed to Scotland's Highlands and recruited an army of Jacobite followers. The first Jacobite uprising had taken place years earlier, ending in defeat. The second uprising gained more support, and soon Bonnie Prince Charlie and his followers were marching south to Edinburgh, where his troops easily defeated Britain's opposing forces.
News spread quickly in England that, once again, an army of Highlanders was on the march. The British King, George II, sent British, Dutch, and German troops to intercept, under the command of General Wade and William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland.
Meanwhile, the French decided not to back Charlie, leaving him to fight these masses with only his Jacobite troops. The prince closed within 120 miles of London, then retreated when he heard (false) rumors that Cumberland had amassed a force of thirty thousand men and was heading his way.
Fearing a massacre, Charlie led his rebels on a long, exhausting retreat back through snow-covered hills and up through the Highlands. Upon reaching Inverness, the Jacobites learned that Cumberland's army had made camp in Nairn, fifteen miles away.
On April 16th, 1746, Bonnie Prince Charlie and his exhausted Jacobites faced Cumberland's heavily armed veteran force on Drummossie Moor, near Culloden.
The massacre took a mere thirty minutes.
Upwards of two thousand Jacobites died that day, some Highlanders losing entire clans. But the worst was yet to come.
After the fight, the Duke of Cumberland rode into Inverness, brandishing his bloody sword, shouting out orders, "No quarter given," meaning none should live. By the end of the day, the bloodied bodies of men, women, and children lined the roads into town. Hundreds of innocent Highlanders were butchered, and for months, Cumberland's forces continued to search the countryside for Jacobites, refusing to stop until the ethnic cleansing was completed.
Bonnie Prince Charlie managed to escape, but England was far from done with the Highlanders. Fearing the ancient crofting way and the fighting men it yielded, the "Highland Clearances" were put into law, intended to destroy the clans' very culture. The speaking or writing of Gaelic and the wearing of tartan were made hanging offenses. Entire communities were "encouraged" to emigrate to the New World, while other Highlanders were sold off as slaves, their land stolen and used to raise sheep.
More than two centuries have passed since the dark days of Culloden. Those Scots who fled long ago have seeded great generations that have flourished the world over. George Washington claimed Scottish ancestry, and more than thirty other American presidents bear the Scot credentials as well.
Today, a new kind of invasion is under way. Italians and Pakistanis, Asians and Africans, and many other nationals have settled in Scotland, calling it home. Though they may not share our turbulent history, they, too, are Scots, and now they are part of our heritage.
Still, there are those of pure Gael blood, those like my father, who swear they'll never forget what the English did to their ancestors on the moors of Culloden so long ago.
That John Cialino hailed from London did not surprise me in the least.
Dawn blinded me, the sun's rays striking my sleep-deprived eyes beneath the partially drawn window shade. We were circling Gatwick Airport, the long night finally over. In just a few short hours I would be back in the Highlands, reunited with my father, and though I had no inkling about what lay ahead, if history was any teacher, then I knew my stay in Scotland would be filled with turmoil.
Chapter 6
A country having species, genera, and whole families peculiar to it, will be the necessary result of its having been isolated for a long period, sufficient for many series of species to have been created on the type of pre-existing ones, which, as well as many of the earlier-formed species, have become extinct, and thus made the groups appear isolated. If in any case the antitype had an extensive range, two or more groups of species might have been formed, each varying from it in a different manner, and thus producing several representative or analogous groups.
As I have no doubt you are aware, some animal or fish of an unusual kind has found its way into Loch Ness. I think I can say the evidence of its presence can be taken as undoubted. Far too many people have seen something abnormal to question its existence… I have indeed been asked to bring a Bill into Parliament for its protection.