THE “BONNIE PRINCE”

Te Aroha News, Volume XLI, Issue 6543, 13 November 1924, Page 7

THE “BONNIE PRINCE”

.UNLUCKY HOUSE OF STUART. HONOUR TO CHARLES EDWARD One hundred a and seventy-nine years have passed since Prince Charles Edward embarked on one of the saddest and most ill-advised expeditions known to history. Not only was the cause for which he fought a hopeless one, but it was a cause which almost cost him his life. Even his enemies could not but admit that Charles Stuart was one of the bravest and most gallant of men. It may seem curious, says a writer in the Weekly Scotsman, that a lhonument should be necessary to keep fragrant the memory of such a man, yet such a memorial exists. Far from the signs of civilisation in the Western Highlands of Scotland, lies Loch Shiel. This part of the country is peculiarly associated with the Prince, for it was on the rugged coast of In-verness-shire that he landed in 1745, and it was on August. 19th of that year that he raised his standard on the gra -grown haughs at ’the head of Loch Shiel. >

It is not hard to imagine the gathering which took place there —the rugged mountains dipping to the loch the solitary grandeur of Glenfinnan, the purple heather. Down the glens came the highlanders fully arrayed with their targets and broad-swords and bringing enthusiasm and hope, the latter so swiftly to be dashed to pieces. Approaching the glen by the road from Fort Williams to Arisaig, one passes Loch ’Eil. This loch can be seen front a distance; not so Loch Shiel, for it is quite hidden until the traveller, rounding one of those rightangled corners so characteristic of Highland roads, about 20 miles from Fort William, looks upon a scene of surpassing beauty. The suddenness of approach is all the more impressive in its solemnity and grandeur. The road taking a further bend, the eye alights on the monument erected in 1815 to commemorate the raising of Prince Charlie’s standard. The monument takes the form of a slender tower, some 60ft high, surmounted by a figure of the Prince in Highland dress, looking up Glenfinnan. The ground around the monument is enclosed by a wall in which are set three large metal tablets bearing inscriptions, one of which reads as follows:—“On the spot where Prince Charles Edward first ! raised his standard, on the 19th August, 1745, when he made the daring and romantic attempt to recover a throne .lost by the imprudence of his ancestors, this column was erected by Alexander Macdonald, Esq., of Glenaladale, to commemorate the generous zeal, the undaunted bravery and the inviolable fidelity of his forefathers and the rest of those who fought and bled in that unfortunate enterprise. This pillar is now, alas! become the memorial of its amiable and aecomjplished founder, who, before it was finished, died in Edinburgh on the 4th day of January, 1815, at the early age of 28 years.”

At the foot of each of these tablets are two figures of clansmen in full fighting gear. It is sad to relate that the heads of all these figures have been broken off and removed. Countless are the hair-raising tales told of the escapes which the Prince had, and of the heroic sacrifices made for such a desperate caufee by the ancestors of the loyal Highlander who erected the monument as a memorial of the illfated house of Stuart.