It's one of the darkest and most divisive events in Scottish history.
In this episode, we'll tell the story of the Glencoe Massacre, and learn that it is slightly more complicated than the Campbells and the MacDonalds.
[00:00:05] Hello, hello hello, and welcome to English Learning for Curious Minds, by Leonardo English.
[00:00:12] The show where you can listen to fascinating stories, and learn weird and wonderful things about the world at the same time as improving your English.
[00:00:20] I'm Alastair Budge, and today is part four, the finale, of our four-part series on the theme of Scotland.
[00:00:29] In case you missed them, part one was on “weird Scotland”, where we looked at some unusual Scottish facts and traditions.
[00:00:36] Part two was on Donald Trump’s battle against Scottish villagers to build a golf course.
[00:00:41] Part three was on Scottish independence and part four, today’s episode, is going to be about one of the most brutal and divisive events in Scottish history: the Glencoe Massacre.
[00:00:54] It’s a story of politics, division, kings, religion, revolution, treachery and murder.
[00:01:02] So, let’s not waste a minute, and get right into it.
[00:01:06] There is a pub in Scotland called The Clachaig Inn. It’s a popular spot for hikers and locals alike, it has 25 bedrooms, and even boasts a selection of 150 Scottish distilled gins.
[00:01:23] But on the door to the pub is a perhaps confusing sign.
[00:01:30] It reads “No hawkers or Campbells”.
[00:01:35] To a non-native speaker, the word “hawker” might be unknown. It means someone who goes from place to place trying to sell something.
[00:01:46] But you might know that Campbell is a surname, and it is a relatively popular one at that.
[00:01:54] You might have heard of Naomi Campbell, the supermodel, Alastair Campbell, the journalist, or even Sol Campbell, the former footballer.
[00:02:03] A ban on hawkers might seem understandable, but on anyone with the surname Campbell?
[00:02:11] A clue as to the reason why will come when I tell you that The Clachaig Inn is in Glencoe, the site of the most atrocious and treacherous massacre in Scottish history, a crime for which some people hold the Campbells responsible.
[00:02:28] Now, before we get into the details of what actually happened, let me paint you a picture of the lead up to this event.
[00:02:37] Scotland and England had historically been completely separate countries, but like most European powers, had closely linked royal families, with sons and daughters married to one another to maintain alliances.
[00:02:54] And in 1603, when Queen Elizabeth I of England died, she left no direct descendants to inherit the English throne, so it went to her cousin James, who was the King of Scotland at that time.
[00:03:11] So James VI of Scotland became James I of England as well.
[00:03:19] Scotland and England remained two separate countries, with their own parliaments and laws, but they were both ruled by the same king.
[00:03:28] This was called “The Union Of The Crowns”.
[00:03:32] Now we must talk about religion.
[00:03:35] James I was Protestant, but James II, who became king, both of England and Scotland, in 1685, was Catholic.
[00:03:47] And Catholics by this point were a minority in Britain.
[00:03:53] Initially, there was general public goodwill towards James II, the new Catholic king, but as he started to implement pro-Catholic policies, his popularity started to wane, and plots started to be hatched.
[00:04:11] What happened next was the so-called “Glorious Revolution” of 1688, when James II was kicked off the throne and a protestant Dutch prince called William of Orange was invited to sail over to Britain and become king.
[00:04:30] And so he did, becoming William III of England, with James II going into exile.
[00:04:38] The majority protestant population was happy with this, as there had been fears that James II was going to impose greater restrictions on protestants, and turn the country back towards Catholicism.
[00:04:54] But there was still a section of the population, in England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland, that professed its loyalty to James.
[00:05:03] These were the so-called Jacobites, coming from the Latin word for James, “Jacobus”.
[00:05:10] Now, they weren’t all supporters of James for religious reasons, they weren’t all Catholics.
[00:05:17] Some supported him because they felt that he was the true king, appointed by God, and what was the monarchy if some Dutchman could hop across the water and proclaim himself king?
[00:05:31] Others were supporters of James because they felt that he would treat them better than William would, and give back land that had been taken from them.
[00:05:41] And outside Britain, the Jacobite movement was supported by Britain’s rivals for strategic reasons.
[00:05:48] The movement was supported by European powers like the French, who believed it would be politically and strategically useful to have William fighting threats on various sides.
[00:06:01] And it wasn’t just a theoretical movement.
[00:06:04] James and the Jacobites were a real military threat, which culminated in the Battle of The Boyne in Ireland in 1690, when forces loyal to William of Orange defeated forces loyal to James, the exiled king.
[00:06:20] James fled to France, but this was not the end of Jacobitism; he still had supporters, in particular, in the Highlands of Scotland.
[00:06:31] Now, as you may remember, the Highlands are in the northern part of Scotland, the mountainous region that starts shortly north of Glasgow and Edinburgh and covers the north west of the country.
[00:06:44] It is an absolutely beautiful part of the British Isles, in my opinion nothing beats it. There are mountains, rivers, forests and lakes, or “lochs”, as they are known in Scotland.
[00:06:57] There are also valleys, or to give them their Scottish term, “glens”.
[00:07:04] And at the time that we’re talking about now, the late 17th century, these glens would typically be inhabited and ruled by a particular “clan”.
[00:07:16] A clan is a group of people, similar to a tribe.
[00:07:21] Clans are thought to have existed in Scotland from the 12th century or so, and were typically structured with a clan chief, who would make decisions for the clan, and if the king or queen of the country needed something, the clan chief was the person who would enact their orders and speak for the clan.
[00:07:41] Now, many of these clans were Jacobites, and for various reasons.
[00:07:48] A minority were Catholics, but most supported James returning to the throne for political, economic or cultural reasons, believing that life would be better under James than William, and that James was the rightful heir to the throne, ordained by God.
[00:08:07] Fortunately for William, these Highland clans were relatively out of the way, right to the north of the country, and they did not have the military might or finances to pose a significant threat on their own.
[00:08:23] But still, they were there, biding their time.
[00:08:28] If a French, let’s say, army landed on the west coast of Scotland, it knew that it could quickly raise an army of loyal highlanders, and march south towards government outposts and ultimately the capital.
[00:08:45] What William wanted was to quash this resistance once and for all, to put an end to support for the previous king.
[00:08:55] So he offered the clans a deal. Money.
[00:09:00] In March of 1690, William offered the Scottish clans a cash payment of £12,000 in exchange for pledging their allegiance to him as king.
[00:09:14] It’s hard to get an exact conversion for £12,000 to today’s money, but it would have been in the millions of Euros, a considerable amount of money, and a sum large enough to test anyone’s loyalty.
[00:09:29] The clans took a while to decide, and then wrote to their exiled king, James I, asking for permission to take the deal if he wasn’t going to mount an invasion before January 1st of 1692.
[00:09:46] This was an important date, because the Scottish government had said that anyone who pledged allegiance to William before that date would be pardoned for any historic rebellion.
[00:09:59] And for those who hadn’t pledged alliance by then, well, the consequences would be serious.
[00:10:08] Most clans did sign the agreement, but not all.
[00:10:13] Once such a clan that missed the deadline was the MacDonalds of Glencoe.
[00:10:20] In fact, the MacDonald clan chief had tried to take the oath.
[00:10:25] He had gone to Fort William, where the Scottish government forces were garrisoned, to take the oath, but when he arrived the military governor said that he was not authorised to accept the oath, so the clan chief was sent elsewhere.
[00:10:41] In any case, the MacDonald clan missed the deadline.
[00:10:46] In fact, secretly, even before this deadline was missed, government officials had been planning to make an example of the MacDonalds, to show what happens when you resist the king.
[00:11:00] There are letters from the Secretary of State where he wrote to the military commander of Scotland expressing his wish that the MacDonalds were wiped out, destroyed entirely.
[00:11:13] They had chosen the MacDonalds, reportedly, because they were a bit of a troublesome bunch. They were big drinkers, minor criminals, not particularly well-liked by the neighbouring clans, and poor.
[00:11:27] They wouldn’t be missed.
[00:11:29] In the lead up to the fateful events that would unfold, a group of around 120 Scottish soldiers were sent to stay with the MacDonalds, in Glencoe.
[00:11:39] There was nothing particularly unusual about this. Indeed, it was a form of tax that all clans would pay. Instead of making cash payments, clans would provide food and shelter for government forces, a sort of payment in kind.
[00:11:56] This group of soldiers had been with the MacDonalds for almost two weeks.
[00:12:02] They had eaten together, slept together, drank together, joked together, they had spent two weeks together in the harsh Scottish winter. They would have grown close. And neither the soldiers on the ground nor the MacDonalds had any idea about the true reason they had been sent there.
[00:12:21] Then on the evening of February 12th, 1692, the commander of the forces, a minor Scottish lord called Captain Robert Campbell of Glenlyon, received orders from above.
[00:12:35] Kill every member of the MacDonalds. Exterminate them.
[00:12:41] In fact, the word used in the directive that had come all the way from the top, signed by King William III, was “extirpate”, meaning to completely eradicate, or destroy.
[00:12:56] The plan was as follows: the men would use the natural landscape to their advantage. One group of soldiers would block the northern exit of the valley, or glen, while another group would come up from the south. In the valley, the soldiers, commanded by Captain Campbell, would kill every man, woman and child and burn all property belonging to the MacDonalds.
[00:13:24] It was a massacre.
[00:13:27] It all started early, at 5am on February 13th.
[00:13:33] The soldiers went into the hut of the chief, Alasdair MacIain, yes, a man with the same name as me, albeit a slightly different spelling.
[00:13:43] The chief was not alarmed. He thought that the government soldiers were coming to greet him, perhaps they were leaving, and they had come to bid him farewell.
[00:13:53] After all, he had welcomed them with open arms 12 days beforehand, he had broken bread with them, joked with them, his family had provided them with warm hospitality, in the Highland tradition.
[00:14:06] They woke him up and shot him at point blank range four times.
[00:14:12] The choice of weapon was deliberate. If they had liked, they could have killed him with a knife, or silently.
[00:14:19] But no, they wanted to wake everyone up, to announce what was about to happen.
[00:14:25] Now, was this because they wanted to strike fear into their enemies hearts, or was it because they wanted to warn them?
[00:14:34] The soldiers then went through the glen, massacring anyone that got in their way, shooting them and stabbing them with their bayonets.
[00:14:44] Now, the final death toll is unknown and debated, thought to be at least 38 people, mostly women and young children, but it could be much higher, with others dying from exposure after running away and sheltering in the sub-zero temperatures.
[00:15:03] Many of the MacDonalds did manage to flee, and there are historians who believe that many of the government soldiers who were tasked with carrying out this gruesome mission would have been happy to let the MacDonalds escape.
[00:15:17] After all, they had little issue with them personally, and would have been fed and cared for by them for the best part of the previous two weeks.
[00:15:27] There are records of a couple of low-ranking soldiers who threw down their swords and refused to take part in the massacre, but no record of how many soldiers might have turned a blind eye to the mother and her children fleeing to the hills.
[00:15:44] Despite the number that might have got away, it was a massacre, with at least 30 lifeless bodies lying in the glen, their blood turning the February snow red.
[00:15:57] It was an atrocious event in British history, but for many years, it was painted as a local rivalry between two clans, the MacDonalds and the Campbells.
[00:16:08] As I hope will be clear by now, it was much more than this.
[00:16:13] A Campbell might have been in command of the government forces, but he was acting on the orders of his king.
[00:16:20] Now, this is not to excuse his actions, but to paint the Glencoe Massacre as a crime masterminded and committed by the Campbells against the MacDonalds is to greatly misunderstand the background to it, and who was really pulling the strings.
[00:16:39] Nevertheless, that does makes a better story, and is the one that came to be popularised starting with British poets in the 19th century, with the revival of the Highland myth.
[00:16:52] And this myth even appears in the excellent TV series Mad Men.
[00:16:57] In fact, I’m going to play you a clip from this scene, where one of the characters is going to meet the principal of an elite New York school to find out why his daughter has been rejected.
[00:17:10] One man, the one whose daughter has been rejected, is called Campbell, and the principal of the school is called MacDonald. And, bear in mind, this is set in the 1970s, so almost 300 years since the event happened.
[00:17:26] – Would you like to step outside?
[00:17:28] Are you sure you wouldn't rather get me while I'm sleeping, like a real Campbell?
[00:17:32] Are you kidding me?
[00:17:34] No McDonald will ever mix with a Campbell.
[00:17:36] What are you talking about?
[00:17:39] It's some stupid story. It's 300 years old. He's obviously nuts.
[00:17:43] You should know that his clan took advantage of the gift of hospitality and murdered my ancestors while they slept.
[00:17:48] The king ordered it.
[00:17:51] Now, it makes for a good addition to a TV series, but to suggest that there is huge animosity between anyone named MacDonald towards anyone named Campbell is to overstate the truth.
[00:18:04] Campbell is the 6th most common surname in Scotland, and MacDonald is the 11th, and put together, there are more Campbells and MacDonalds than any other single surname.
[00:18:16] So if this group was still at war with one another, well Scotland wouldn’t be a particularly functional country.
[00:18:24] Fortunately, it is an urban myth, something that makes for a good pub sign, and something that is more likely to be believed in the US than anywhere in Scotland.
[00:18:36] But the Glencoe Massacre is no myth.
[00:18:39] It has gone down in history as a heinous crime, and even gave rise to a legal definition of a crime greater than murder, and that’s something called “murder under trust”, murdering someone who has placed their trust in you.
[00:18:56] Popular history remembers the Campbells as being responsible for this terrible act, but the reality is that, although they didn’t wield the sword or pull the trigger, the responsibility must lie with those who gave the orders: the senior government officials, and ultimately the true butcher of the glen must be the man who signed off on it all: King William III of England.
[00:19:24] OK then, that is it for today's episode on The Glencoe Massacre.
[00:19:29] I know it isn’t the most uplifting of stories, but it is one that helps you understand Scottish history, and its strained relationship with England.
[00:19:38] And with this comes the end of this four-part mini-series, our first four-parter I should add.
[00:19:44] In case you missed them, part one was on unusual Scottish facts and traditions, part two was on Donald Trump’s quest to build a Scottish golf course, and part three was on whether Scotland will ever be an independent country.
[00:19:56] As always, I would love to know what you thought about this episode, and of this mini-series in general.
[00:20:02] Have you been to Scotland? If so, where did you go, and what did you see?
[00:20:06] I would love to know, so let’s get this discussion started.
[00:20:09] You can head right into our community forum, which is at community.leonardoenglish.com and get chatting away to other curious minds.
[00:20:18] You've been listening to English Learning for Curious Minds, by Leonardo English.
[00:20:24] I'm Alastair Budge, you stay safe, and I'll catch you in the next episode.
[END OF EPISODE]
[00:00:05] Hello, hello hello, and welcome to English Learning for Curious Minds, by Leonardo English.
[00:00:12] The show where you can listen to fascinating stories, and learn weird and wonderful things about the world at the same time as improving your English.
[00:00:20] I'm Alastair Budge, and today is part four, the finale, of our four-part series on the theme of Scotland.
[00:00:29] In case you missed them, part one was on “weird Scotland”, where we looked at some unusual Scottish facts and traditions.
[00:00:36] Part two was on Donald Trump’s battle against Scottish villagers to build a golf course.
[00:00:41] Part three was on Scottish independence and part four, today’s episode, is going to be about one of the most brutal and divisive events in Scottish history: the Glencoe Massacre.
[00:00:54] It’s a story of politics, division, kings, religion, revolution, treachery and murder.
[00:01:02] So, let’s not waste a minute, and get right into it.
[00:01:06] There is a pub in Scotland called The Clachaig Inn. It’s a popular spot for hikers and locals alike, it has 25 bedrooms, and even boasts a selection of 150 Scottish distilled gins.
[00:01:23] But on the door to the pub is a perhaps confusing sign.
[00:01:30] It reads “No hawkers or Campbells”.
[00:01:35] To a non-native speaker, the word “hawker” might be unknown. It means someone who goes from place to place trying to sell something.
[00:01:46] But you might know that Campbell is a surname, and it is a relatively popular one at that.
[00:01:54] You might have heard of Naomi Campbell, the supermodel, Alastair Campbell, the journalist, or even Sol Campbell, the former footballer.
[00:02:03] A ban on hawkers might seem understandable, but on anyone with the surname Campbell?
[00:02:11] A clue as to the reason why will come when I tell you that The Clachaig Inn is in Glencoe, the site of the most atrocious and treacherous massacre in Scottish history, a crime for which some people hold the Campbells responsible.
[00:02:28] Now, before we get into the details of what actually happened, let me paint you a picture of the lead up to this event.
[00:02:37] Scotland and England had historically been completely separate countries, but like most European powers, had closely linked royal families, with sons and daughters married to one another to maintain alliances.
[00:02:54] And in 1603, when Queen Elizabeth I of England died, she left no direct descendants to inherit the English throne, so it went to her cousin James, who was the King of Scotland at that time.
[00:03:11] So James VI of Scotland became James I of England as well.
[00:03:19] Scotland and England remained two separate countries, with their own parliaments and laws, but they were both ruled by the same king.
[00:03:28] This was called “The Union Of The Crowns”.
[00:03:32] Now we must talk about religion.
[00:03:35] James I was Protestant, but James II, who became king, both of England and Scotland, in 1685, was Catholic.
[00:03:47] And Catholics by this point were a minority in Britain.
[00:03:53] Initially, there was general public goodwill towards James II, the new Catholic king, but as he started to implement pro-Catholic policies, his popularity started to wane, and plots started to be hatched.
[00:04:11] What happened next was the so-called “Glorious Revolution” of 1688, when James II was kicked off the throne and a protestant Dutch prince called William of Orange was invited to sail over to Britain and become king.
[00:04:30] And so he did, becoming William III of England, with James II going into exile.
[00:04:38] The majority protestant population was happy with this, as there had been fears that James II was going to impose greater restrictions on protestants, and turn the country back towards Catholicism.
[00:04:54] But there was still a section of the population, in England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland, that professed its loyalty to James.
[00:05:03] These were the so-called Jacobites, coming from the Latin word for James, “Jacobus”.
[00:05:10] Now, they weren’t all supporters of James for religious reasons, they weren’t all Catholics.
[00:05:17] Some supported him because they felt that he was the true king, appointed by God, and what was the monarchy if some Dutchman could hop across the water and proclaim himself king?
[00:05:31] Others were supporters of James because they felt that he would treat them better than William would, and give back land that had been taken from them.
[00:05:41] And outside Britain, the Jacobite movement was supported by Britain’s rivals for strategic reasons.
[00:05:48] The movement was supported by European powers like the French, who believed it would be politically and strategically useful to have William fighting threats on various sides.
[00:06:01] And it wasn’t just a theoretical movement.
[00:06:04] James and the Jacobites were a real military threat, which culminated in the Battle of The Boyne in Ireland in 1690, when forces loyal to William of Orange defeated forces loyal to James, the exiled king.
[00:06:20] James fled to France, but this was not the end of Jacobitism; he still had supporters, in particular, in the Highlands of Scotland.
[00:06:31] Now, as you may remember, the Highlands are in the northern part of Scotland, the mountainous region that starts shortly north of Glasgow and Edinburgh and covers the north west of the country.
[00:06:44] It is an absolutely beautiful part of the British Isles, in my opinion nothing beats it. There are mountains, rivers, forests and lakes, or “lochs”, as they are known in Scotland.
[00:06:57] There are also valleys, or to give them their Scottish term, “glens”.
[00:07:04] And at the time that we’re talking about now, the late 17th century, these glens would typically be inhabited and ruled by a particular “clan”.
[00:07:16] A clan is a group of people, similar to a tribe.
[00:07:21] Clans are thought to have existed in Scotland from the 12th century or so, and were typically structured with a clan chief, who would make decisions for the clan, and if the king or queen of the country needed something, the clan chief was the person who would enact their orders and speak for the clan.
[00:07:41] Now, many of these clans were Jacobites, and for various reasons.
[00:07:48] A minority were Catholics, but most supported James returning to the throne for political, economic or cultural reasons, believing that life would be better under James than William, and that James was the rightful heir to the throne, ordained by God.
[00:08:07] Fortunately for William, these Highland clans were relatively out of the way, right to the north of the country, and they did not have the military might or finances to pose a significant threat on their own.
[00:08:23] But still, they were there, biding their time.
[00:08:28] If a French, let’s say, army landed on the west coast of Scotland, it knew that it could quickly raise an army of loyal highlanders, and march south towards government outposts and ultimately the capital.
[00:08:45] What William wanted was to quash this resistance once and for all, to put an end to support for the previous king.
[00:08:55] So he offered the clans a deal. Money.
[00:09:00] In March of 1690, William offered the Scottish clans a cash payment of £12,000 in exchange for pledging their allegiance to him as king.
[00:09:14] It’s hard to get an exact conversion for £12,000 to today’s money, but it would have been in the millions of Euros, a considerable amount of money, and a sum large enough to test anyone’s loyalty.
[00:09:29] The clans took a while to decide, and then wrote to their exiled king, James I, asking for permission to take the deal if he wasn’t going to mount an invasion before January 1st of 1692.
[00:09:46] This was an important date, because the Scottish government had said that anyone who pledged allegiance to William before that date would be pardoned for any historic rebellion.
[00:09:59] And for those who hadn’t pledged alliance by then, well, the consequences would be serious.
[00:10:08] Most clans did sign the agreement, but not all.
[00:10:13] Once such a clan that missed the deadline was the MacDonalds of Glencoe.
[00:10:20] In fact, the MacDonald clan chief had tried to take the oath.
[00:10:25] He had gone to Fort William, where the Scottish government forces were garrisoned, to take the oath, but when he arrived the military governor said that he was not authorised to accept the oath, so the clan chief was sent elsewhere.
[00:10:41] In any case, the MacDonald clan missed the deadline.
[00:10:46] In fact, secretly, even before this deadline was missed, government officials had been planning to make an example of the MacDonalds, to show what happens when you resist the king.
[00:11:00] There are letters from the Secretary of State where he wrote to the military commander of Scotland expressing his wish that the MacDonalds were wiped out, destroyed entirely.
[00:11:13] They had chosen the MacDonalds, reportedly, because they were a bit of a troublesome bunch. They were big drinkers, minor criminals, not particularly well-liked by the neighbouring clans, and poor.
[00:11:27] They wouldn’t be missed.
[00:11:29] In the lead up to the fateful events that would unfold, a group of around 120 Scottish soldiers were sent to stay with the MacDonalds, in Glencoe.
[00:11:39] There was nothing particularly unusual about this. Indeed, it was a form of tax that all clans would pay. Instead of making cash payments, clans would provide food and shelter for government forces, a sort of payment in kind.
[00:11:56] This group of soldiers had been with the MacDonalds for almost two weeks.
[00:12:02] They had eaten together, slept together, drank together, joked together, they had spent two weeks together in the harsh Scottish winter. They would have grown close. And neither the soldiers on the ground nor the MacDonalds had any idea about the true reason they had been sent there.
[00:12:21] Then on the evening of February 12th, 1692, the commander of the forces, a minor Scottish lord called Captain Robert Campbell of Glenlyon, received orders from above.
[00:12:35] Kill every member of the MacDonalds. Exterminate them.
[00:12:41] In fact, the word used in the directive that had come all the way from the top, signed by King William III, was “extirpate”, meaning to completely eradicate, or destroy.
[00:12:56] The plan was as follows: the men would use the natural landscape to their advantage. One group of soldiers would block the northern exit of the valley, or glen, while another group would come up from the south. In the valley, the soldiers, commanded by Captain Campbell, would kill every man, woman and child and burn all property belonging to the MacDonalds.
[00:13:24] It was a massacre.
[00:13:27] It all started early, at 5am on February 13th.
[00:13:33] The soldiers went into the hut of the chief, Alasdair MacIain, yes, a man with the same name as me, albeit a slightly different spelling.
[00:13:43] The chief was not alarmed. He thought that the government soldiers were coming to greet him, perhaps they were leaving, and they had come to bid him farewell.
[00:13:53] After all, he had welcomed them with open arms 12 days beforehand, he had broken bread with them, joked with them, his family had provided them with warm hospitality, in the Highland tradition.
[00:14:06] They woke him up and shot him at point blank range four times.
[00:14:12] The choice of weapon was deliberate. If they had liked, they could have killed him with a knife, or silently.
[00:14:19] But no, they wanted to wake everyone up, to announce what was about to happen.
[00:14:25] Now, was this because they wanted to strike fear into their enemies hearts, or was it because they wanted to warn them?
[00:14:34] The soldiers then went through the glen, massacring anyone that got in their way, shooting them and stabbing them with their bayonets.
[00:14:44] Now, the final death toll is unknown and debated, thought to be at least 38 people, mostly women and young children, but it could be much higher, with others dying from exposure after running away and sheltering in the sub-zero temperatures.
[00:15:03] Many of the MacDonalds did manage to flee, and there are historians who believe that many of the government soldiers who were tasked with carrying out this gruesome mission would have been happy to let the MacDonalds escape.
[00:15:17] After all, they had little issue with them personally, and would have been fed and cared for by them for the best part of the previous two weeks.
[00:15:27] There are records of a couple of low-ranking soldiers who threw down their swords and refused to take part in the massacre, but no record of how many soldiers might have turned a blind eye to the mother and her children fleeing to the hills.
[00:15:44] Despite the number that might have got away, it was a massacre, with at least 30 lifeless bodies lying in the glen, their blood turning the February snow red.
[00:15:57] It was an atrocious event in British history, but for many years, it was painted as a local rivalry between two clans, the MacDonalds and the Campbells.
[00:16:08] As I hope will be clear by now, it was much more than this.
[00:16:13] A Campbell might have been in command of the government forces, but he was acting on the orders of his king.
[00:16:20] Now, this is not to excuse his actions, but to paint the Glencoe Massacre as a crime masterminded and committed by the Campbells against the MacDonalds is to greatly misunderstand the background to it, and who was really pulling the strings.
[00:16:39] Nevertheless, that does makes a better story, and is the one that came to be popularised starting with British poets in the 19th century, with the revival of the Highland myth.
[00:16:52] And this myth even appears in the excellent TV series Mad Men.
[00:16:57] In fact, I’m going to play you a clip from this scene, where one of the characters is going to meet the principal of an elite New York school to find out why his daughter has been rejected.
[00:17:10] One man, the one whose daughter has been rejected, is called Campbell, and the principal of the school is called MacDonald. And, bear in mind, this is set in the 1970s, so almost 300 years since the event happened.
[00:17:26] – Would you like to step outside?
[00:17:28] Are you sure you wouldn't rather get me while I'm sleeping, like a real Campbell?
[00:17:32] Are you kidding me?
[00:17:34] No McDonald will ever mix with a Campbell.
[00:17:36] What are you talking about?
[00:17:39] It's some stupid story. It's 300 years old. He's obviously nuts.
[00:17:43] You should know that his clan took advantage of the gift of hospitality and murdered my ancestors while they slept.
[00:17:48] The king ordered it.
[00:17:51] Now, it makes for a good addition to a TV series, but to suggest that there is huge animosity between anyone named MacDonald towards anyone named Campbell is to overstate the truth.
[00:18:04] Campbell is the 6th most common surname in Scotland, and MacDonald is the 11th, and put together, there are more Campbells and MacDonalds than any other single surname.
[00:18:16] So if this group was still at war with one another, well Scotland wouldn’t be a particularly functional country.
[00:18:24] Fortunately, it is an urban myth, something that makes for a good pub sign, and something that is more likely to be believed in the US than anywhere in Scotland.
[00:18:36] But the Glencoe Massacre is no myth.
[00:18:39] It has gone down in history as a heinous crime, and even gave rise to a legal definition of a crime greater than murder, and that’s something called “murder under trust”, murdering someone who has placed their trust in you.
[00:18:56] Popular history remembers the Campbells as being responsible for this terrible act, but the reality is that, although they didn’t wield the sword or pull the trigger, the responsibility must lie with those who gave the orders: the senior government officials, and ultimately the true butcher of the glen must be the man who signed off on it all: King William III of England.
[00:19:24] OK then, that is it for today's episode on The Glencoe Massacre.
[00:19:29] I know it isn’t the most uplifting of stories, but it is one that helps you understand Scottish history, and its strained relationship with England.
[00:19:38] And with this comes the end of this four-part mini-series, our first four-parter I should add.
[00:19:44] In case you missed them, part one was on unusual Scottish facts and traditions, part two was on Donald Trump’s quest to build a Scottish golf course, and part three was on whether Scotland will ever be an independent country.
[00:19:56] As always, I would love to know what you thought about this episode, and of this mini-series in general.
[00:20:02] Have you been to Scotland? If so, where did you go, and what did you see?
[00:20:06] I would love to know, so let’s get this discussion started.
[00:20:09] You can head right into our community forum, which is at community.leonardoenglish.com and get chatting away to other curious minds.
[00:20:18] You've been listening to English Learning for Curious Minds, by Leonardo English.
[00:20:24] I'm Alastair Budge, you stay safe, and I'll catch you in the next episode.
[END OF EPISODE]
[00:00:05] Hello, hello hello, and welcome to English Learning for Curious Minds, by Leonardo English.
[00:00:12] The show where you can listen to fascinating stories, and learn weird and wonderful things about the world at the same time as improving your English.
[00:00:20] I'm Alastair Budge, and today is part four, the finale, of our four-part series on the theme of Scotland.
[00:00:29] In case you missed them, part one was on “weird Scotland”, where we looked at some unusual Scottish facts and traditions.
[00:00:36] Part two was on Donald Trump’s battle against Scottish villagers to build a golf course.
[00:00:41] Part three was on Scottish independence and part four, today’s episode, is going to be about one of the most brutal and divisive events in Scottish history: the Glencoe Massacre.
[00:00:54] It’s a story of politics, division, kings, religion, revolution, treachery and murder.
[00:01:02] So, let’s not waste a minute, and get right into it.
[00:01:06] There is a pub in Scotland called The Clachaig Inn. It’s a popular spot for hikers and locals alike, it has 25 bedrooms, and even boasts a selection of 150 Scottish distilled gins.
[00:01:23] But on the door to the pub is a perhaps confusing sign.
[00:01:30] It reads “No hawkers or Campbells”.
[00:01:35] To a non-native speaker, the word “hawker” might be unknown. It means someone who goes from place to place trying to sell something.
[00:01:46] But you might know that Campbell is a surname, and it is a relatively popular one at that.
[00:01:54] You might have heard of Naomi Campbell, the supermodel, Alastair Campbell, the journalist, or even Sol Campbell, the former footballer.
[00:02:03] A ban on hawkers might seem understandable, but on anyone with the surname Campbell?
[00:02:11] A clue as to the reason why will come when I tell you that The Clachaig Inn is in Glencoe, the site of the most atrocious and treacherous massacre in Scottish history, a crime for which some people hold the Campbells responsible.
[00:02:28] Now, before we get into the details of what actually happened, let me paint you a picture of the lead up to this event.
[00:02:37] Scotland and England had historically been completely separate countries, but like most European powers, had closely linked royal families, with sons and daughters married to one another to maintain alliances.
[00:02:54] And in 1603, when Queen Elizabeth I of England died, she left no direct descendants to inherit the English throne, so it went to her cousin James, who was the King of Scotland at that time.
[00:03:11] So James VI of Scotland became James I of England as well.
[00:03:19] Scotland and England remained two separate countries, with their own parliaments and laws, but they were both ruled by the same king.
[00:03:28] This was called “The Union Of The Crowns”.
[00:03:32] Now we must talk about religion.
[00:03:35] James I was Protestant, but James II, who became king, both of England and Scotland, in 1685, was Catholic.
[00:03:47] And Catholics by this point were a minority in Britain.
[00:03:53] Initially, there was general public goodwill towards James II, the new Catholic king, but as he started to implement pro-Catholic policies, his popularity started to wane, and plots started to be hatched.
[00:04:11] What happened next was the so-called “Glorious Revolution” of 1688, when James II was kicked off the throne and a protestant Dutch prince called William of Orange was invited to sail over to Britain and become king.
[00:04:30] And so he did, becoming William III of England, with James II going into exile.
[00:04:38] The majority protestant population was happy with this, as there had been fears that James II was going to impose greater restrictions on protestants, and turn the country back towards Catholicism.
[00:04:54] But there was still a section of the population, in England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland, that professed its loyalty to James.
[00:05:03] These were the so-called Jacobites, coming from the Latin word for James, “Jacobus”.
[00:05:10] Now, they weren’t all supporters of James for religious reasons, they weren’t all Catholics.
[00:05:17] Some supported him because they felt that he was the true king, appointed by God, and what was the monarchy if some Dutchman could hop across the water and proclaim himself king?
[00:05:31] Others were supporters of James because they felt that he would treat them better than William would, and give back land that had been taken from them.
[00:05:41] And outside Britain, the Jacobite movement was supported by Britain’s rivals for strategic reasons.
[00:05:48] The movement was supported by European powers like the French, who believed it would be politically and strategically useful to have William fighting threats on various sides.
[00:06:01] And it wasn’t just a theoretical movement.
[00:06:04] James and the Jacobites were a real military threat, which culminated in the Battle of The Boyne in Ireland in 1690, when forces loyal to William of Orange defeated forces loyal to James, the exiled king.
[00:06:20] James fled to France, but this was not the end of Jacobitism; he still had supporters, in particular, in the Highlands of Scotland.
[00:06:31] Now, as you may remember, the Highlands are in the northern part of Scotland, the mountainous region that starts shortly north of Glasgow and Edinburgh and covers the north west of the country.
[00:06:44] It is an absolutely beautiful part of the British Isles, in my opinion nothing beats it. There are mountains, rivers, forests and lakes, or “lochs”, as they are known in Scotland.
[00:06:57] There are also valleys, or to give them their Scottish term, “glens”.
[00:07:04] And at the time that we’re talking about now, the late 17th century, these glens would typically be inhabited and ruled by a particular “clan”.
[00:07:16] A clan is a group of people, similar to a tribe.
[00:07:21] Clans are thought to have existed in Scotland from the 12th century or so, and were typically structured with a clan chief, who would make decisions for the clan, and if the king or queen of the country needed something, the clan chief was the person who would enact their orders and speak for the clan.
[00:07:41] Now, many of these clans were Jacobites, and for various reasons.
[00:07:48] A minority were Catholics, but most supported James returning to the throne for political, economic or cultural reasons, believing that life would be better under James than William, and that James was the rightful heir to the throne, ordained by God.
[00:08:07] Fortunately for William, these Highland clans were relatively out of the way, right to the north of the country, and they did not have the military might or finances to pose a significant threat on their own.
[00:08:23] But still, they were there, biding their time.
[00:08:28] If a French, let’s say, army landed on the west coast of Scotland, it knew that it could quickly raise an army of loyal highlanders, and march south towards government outposts and ultimately the capital.
[00:08:45] What William wanted was to quash this resistance once and for all, to put an end to support for the previous king.
[00:08:55] So he offered the clans a deal. Money.
[00:09:00] In March of 1690, William offered the Scottish clans a cash payment of £12,000 in exchange for pledging their allegiance to him as king.
[00:09:14] It’s hard to get an exact conversion for £12,000 to today’s money, but it would have been in the millions of Euros, a considerable amount of money, and a sum large enough to test anyone’s loyalty.
[00:09:29] The clans took a while to decide, and then wrote to their exiled king, James I, asking for permission to take the deal if he wasn’t going to mount an invasion before January 1st of 1692.
[00:09:46] This was an important date, because the Scottish government had said that anyone who pledged allegiance to William before that date would be pardoned for any historic rebellion.
[00:09:59] And for those who hadn’t pledged alliance by then, well, the consequences would be serious.
[00:10:08] Most clans did sign the agreement, but not all.
[00:10:13] Once such a clan that missed the deadline was the MacDonalds of Glencoe.
[00:10:20] In fact, the MacDonald clan chief had tried to take the oath.
[00:10:25] He had gone to Fort William, where the Scottish government forces were garrisoned, to take the oath, but when he arrived the military governor said that he was not authorised to accept the oath, so the clan chief was sent elsewhere.
[00:10:41] In any case, the MacDonald clan missed the deadline.
[00:10:46] In fact, secretly, even before this deadline was missed, government officials had been planning to make an example of the MacDonalds, to show what happens when you resist the king.
[00:11:00] There are letters from the Secretary of State where he wrote to the military commander of Scotland expressing his wish that the MacDonalds were wiped out, destroyed entirely.
[00:11:13] They had chosen the MacDonalds, reportedly, because they were a bit of a troublesome bunch. They were big drinkers, minor criminals, not particularly well-liked by the neighbouring clans, and poor.
[00:11:27] They wouldn’t be missed.
[00:11:29] In the lead up to the fateful events that would unfold, a group of around 120 Scottish soldiers were sent to stay with the MacDonalds, in Glencoe.
[00:11:39] There was nothing particularly unusual about this. Indeed, it was a form of tax that all clans would pay. Instead of making cash payments, clans would provide food and shelter for government forces, a sort of payment in kind.
[00:11:56] This group of soldiers had been with the MacDonalds for almost two weeks.
[00:12:02] They had eaten together, slept together, drank together, joked together, they had spent two weeks together in the harsh Scottish winter. They would have grown close. And neither the soldiers on the ground nor the MacDonalds had any idea about the true reason they had been sent there.
[00:12:21] Then on the evening of February 12th, 1692, the commander of the forces, a minor Scottish lord called Captain Robert Campbell of Glenlyon, received orders from above.
[00:12:35] Kill every member of the MacDonalds. Exterminate them.
[00:12:41] In fact, the word used in the directive that had come all the way from the top, signed by King William III, was “extirpate”, meaning to completely eradicate, or destroy.
[00:12:56] The plan was as follows: the men would use the natural landscape to their advantage. One group of soldiers would block the northern exit of the valley, or glen, while another group would come up from the south. In the valley, the soldiers, commanded by Captain Campbell, would kill every man, woman and child and burn all property belonging to the MacDonalds.
[00:13:24] It was a massacre.
[00:13:27] It all started early, at 5am on February 13th.
[00:13:33] The soldiers went into the hut of the chief, Alasdair MacIain, yes, a man with the same name as me, albeit a slightly different spelling.
[00:13:43] The chief was not alarmed. He thought that the government soldiers were coming to greet him, perhaps they were leaving, and they had come to bid him farewell.
[00:13:53] After all, he had welcomed them with open arms 12 days beforehand, he had broken bread with them, joked with them, his family had provided them with warm hospitality, in the Highland tradition.
[00:14:06] They woke him up and shot him at point blank range four times.
[00:14:12] The choice of weapon was deliberate. If they had liked, they could have killed him with a knife, or silently.
[00:14:19] But no, they wanted to wake everyone up, to announce what was about to happen.
[00:14:25] Now, was this because they wanted to strike fear into their enemies hearts, or was it because they wanted to warn them?
[00:14:34] The soldiers then went through the glen, massacring anyone that got in their way, shooting them and stabbing them with their bayonets.
[00:14:44] Now, the final death toll is unknown and debated, thought to be at least 38 people, mostly women and young children, but it could be much higher, with others dying from exposure after running away and sheltering in the sub-zero temperatures.
[00:15:03] Many of the MacDonalds did manage to flee, and there are historians who believe that many of the government soldiers who were tasked with carrying out this gruesome mission would have been happy to let the MacDonalds escape.
[00:15:17] After all, they had little issue with them personally, and would have been fed and cared for by them for the best part of the previous two weeks.
[00:15:27] There are records of a couple of low-ranking soldiers who threw down their swords and refused to take part in the massacre, but no record of how many soldiers might have turned a blind eye to the mother and her children fleeing to the hills.
[00:15:44] Despite the number that might have got away, it was a massacre, with at least 30 lifeless bodies lying in the glen, their blood turning the February snow red.
[00:15:57] It was an atrocious event in British history, but for many years, it was painted as a local rivalry between two clans, the MacDonalds and the Campbells.
[00:16:08] As I hope will be clear by now, it was much more than this.
[00:16:13] A Campbell might have been in command of the government forces, but he was acting on the orders of his king.
[00:16:20] Now, this is not to excuse his actions, but to paint the Glencoe Massacre as a crime masterminded and committed by the Campbells against the MacDonalds is to greatly misunderstand the background to it, and who was really pulling the strings.
[00:16:39] Nevertheless, that does makes a better story, and is the one that came to be popularised starting with British poets in the 19th century, with the revival of the Highland myth.
[00:16:52] And this myth even appears in the excellent TV series Mad Men.
[00:16:57] In fact, I’m going to play you a clip from this scene, where one of the characters is going to meet the principal of an elite New York school to find out why his daughter has been rejected.
[00:17:10] One man, the one whose daughter has been rejected, is called Campbell, and the principal of the school is called MacDonald. And, bear in mind, this is set in the 1970s, so almost 300 years since the event happened.
[00:17:26] – Would you like to step outside?
[00:17:28] Are you sure you wouldn't rather get me while I'm sleeping, like a real Campbell?
[00:17:32] Are you kidding me?
[00:17:34] No McDonald will ever mix with a Campbell.
[00:17:36] What are you talking about?
[00:17:39] It's some stupid story. It's 300 years old. He's obviously nuts.
[00:17:43] You should know that his clan took advantage of the gift of hospitality and murdered my ancestors while they slept.
[00:17:48] The king ordered it.
[00:17:51] Now, it makes for a good addition to a TV series, but to suggest that there is huge animosity between anyone named MacDonald towards anyone named Campbell is to overstate the truth.
[00:18:04] Campbell is the 6th most common surname in Scotland, and MacDonald is the 11th, and put together, there are more Campbells and MacDonalds than any other single surname.
[00:18:16] So if this group was still at war with one another, well Scotland wouldn’t be a particularly functional country.
[00:18:24] Fortunately, it is an urban myth, something that makes for a good pub sign, and something that is more likely to be believed in the US than anywhere in Scotland.
[00:18:36] But the Glencoe Massacre is no myth.
[00:18:39] It has gone down in history as a heinous crime, and even gave rise to a legal definition of a crime greater than murder, and that’s something called “murder under trust”, murdering someone who has placed their trust in you.
[00:18:56] Popular history remembers the Campbells as being responsible for this terrible act, but the reality is that, although they didn’t wield the sword or pull the trigger, the responsibility must lie with those who gave the orders: the senior government officials, and ultimately the true butcher of the glen must be the man who signed off on it all: King William III of England.
[00:19:24] OK then, that is it for today's episode on The Glencoe Massacre.
[00:19:29] I know it isn’t the most uplifting of stories, but it is one that helps you understand Scottish history, and its strained relationship with England.
[00:19:38] And with this comes the end of this four-part mini-series, our first four-parter I should add.
[00:19:44] In case you missed them, part one was on unusual Scottish facts and traditions, part two was on Donald Trump’s quest to build a Scottish golf course, and part three was on whether Scotland will ever be an independent country.
[00:19:56] As always, I would love to know what you thought about this episode, and of this mini-series in general.
[00:20:02] Have you been to Scotland? If so, where did you go, and what did you see?
[00:20:06] I would love to know, so let’s get this discussion started.
[00:20:09] You can head right into our community forum, which is at community.leonardoenglish.com and get chatting away to other curious minds.
[00:20:18] You've been listening to English Learning for Curious Minds, by Leonardo English.
[00:20:24] I'm Alastair Budge, you stay safe, and I'll catch you in the next episode.
[END OF EPISODE]
