The Battle of Culloden took place on April 16, 1746 between the Jacobites and the British Army. This battle was the last one fought on the British mainland and ended the Jacobite Uprising. In order to understand the significance of this battle, you do need to have some background regarding the politics of the time. The Act of Settlement of 1701 meant that Roman Catholics could not be King or Queen of Britain. The only Protestant heir was George I, a great grandson of James I. George I was born in Germany, could not speak English and knew nothing about the way England was governed. A group of people, called the Jacobites, opposed the crowning of George I and wanted to restore the Roman Catholic Stuarts to the throne. Bonnie Prince Charlie, the son of James Stuart (the Old Pretender) came back to Scotland to lead the forces.
The Jacobites believed that James was the rightful heir and called him James III of England and James VIII of Scotland. In Scotland, Charlie, called the Young Pretender, raised an army made up of the various Scottish clans and took control of Edinburgh. Throughout the fall and winter if 1745, this army advanced to a point where they were poised to attack London. The British army under the command of the Duke of Cumberland reached Nairn by April 14, 1746. From there, they set out to attack the Jacobites. Prince Charles mustered his troops at Drummossie Moor, a short distance from the walls of Culloden. He disagreed with Lord George Murray about the suitability of the area and refused to consider guerrilla tactics as a way of defeating the British. They tried to carry out a night attack, but the Jacobites were almost starving and many of them lay exhausted at Culloden House.
The next day the British forces faced the Jacobites. The Prince ordered the clansmen to fire at the troops, but this had little effect. His artillery was outnumbered three to one. After twenty minutes of fierce fighting, Prince Charlie could sense the coming defeat and actually moved out of the way of the fighting. When he finally issued the order to charge the MacDonalds refused and the Clan Chattan was forced to veer to the right because of the boggy ground. Some of them did reach the government lines, but the small Campbell militia had managed to circle around to fire at the right flank of the Jacobites. Finally, the Jacobite forces surrendered, but only after 1250 were killed, about the same number wounded and almost 600 taken prisoner. This battle, which went down in history as the Battle of Culloden, lasted about an hour. The Duke of Cumberland ordered all the injured and the prisoners to be executed, earning him the nickname of "The Butcher". Prince Charlie managed to escape and survived for 5 months in Scotland. Disguised as "Flora MacDonald" he escaped to France.
