considerable danger. He was several times covered with earth thrown up
by the bullets; he made repeated attempts to rally his troops, and
according to the testimony of most of those who witnessed his conduct,
he showed himself a brave and efficient commander. On quitting the field
of battle he dismissed, under various pretexts, the greater number of
the gentlemen who followed him--doubting, possibly, their fidelity--and
kept with him only a few Irish officers, on whom he thought he could
count. He directed his flight at first towards the residence of Lord
Lovat, thinking, perhaps, that this person, who was renowned for his
sagacity, could advise him as to his future course, and, perhaps, even
give him some material help; for his son, the Master of Lovat, and Cluny
MacPherson, another relative, had both raised considerable
reinforcements, and they were on the march to join the prince’s army,
when the battle took place. Charles and Lovat met for the first and last
time, both of them a prey to the fears and embarrassments of a desperate
situation. Charles spoke only of the distress into which Scotland was
plunged, Lovat occupied himself solely with his personal dangers. The
prince soon perceived that he had neither advice nor help to expect from
his host, and he went away after hastily taking some refreshment. The
place was dangerous, on account of the proximity of the victorious army;
and, perhaps, even the fidelity of Lovat was to be suspected. Charles
next halted at Invergarry--a castle belonging to the laird of
Glengarry, where he was served with an excellent repast of fresh-caught
salmon. As a punishment for this isolated act of hospitality, the
English soldiers shortly afterwards pillaged and sacked the castle.
From Invergarry the fugitive made his way to a village in the western
mountains, near the place where he had disembarked on coming from
France. He there resolved to abandon his enterprise, and he accordingly
sent a message to the chiefs and the soldiers assembled at Ruthven,
thanking them for their services, and urging them to provide for their
own safety, since no other course was left to him but to try to make his
escape to France. His partisans in vain implored him to suffer them to
expose themselves to new dangers for his sake. Charles saw too clearly
that all was lost, and he refused to be the means of sacrificing the
lives of brave men, who he knew were only taking counsel of their own
devotion and despair.
Separated from his faithful supporters and friends, Charles wandered
about the Hebrides in the hope of finding a ship for France. But the
very elements seemed to have declared against him; no ship appeared; and
his daily life was fast becoming almost purposeless. He at length
arrived at the spot where he had formerly disembarked. He was met by
Clanronald, who had been the first to declare for him, and who remained
faithful to him in this his dire distress. The prince was lodged in a
miserable hut belonging to a woodcutter named Corradale, and situated
upon the rugged mountain which bears the same name.
Meanwhile the agents of the English government were making a keen search
for the fugitive in every place that seemed to offer him the possibility
of an asylum. General Campbell went to the very extremity of the isle of
St. Kilda, which might be termed the boundary of the habitable world,
and from thence passing to the other extremity of the Hebrides, he found
the chiefs of Skye and of MacLeod engaged in a similar search. Two
thousand men in all were employed in this undertaking, while the coasts
of the island were constantly watched by ships of war. It seemed
absolutely impossible for the prince to escape; yet he was saved by the
courage of a woman.
That woman was Flora Macdonald, and her name is still honoured in the
land of her birth. She was a relative of Clanronald, and she was at the
time visiting that chief. Her father-in-law, who was of the clan of Sir
Alexander MacDonald, was consequently an enemy of the Pretender, and he
commanded the militia of the name of MacDonald, which was then exploring
South Uist.
Having hastily formed a plan for saving the prince, Flora had sufficient
address to obtain from her father-in-law permission to engage a male
attendant and a servant girl, whom she named Betty Burke. The part of
Betty was to be played by the prince dressed as a woman. Charles did in
fact assume this disguise, and after having been several times in danger
of capture, he arrived at Kilbride, in the Isle of Skye. But he was
still in Sir Alexander MacDonald’s county, and he ran almost as great
risks as before. Here, however, the courage and presence of mind of
Flora were displayed anew in favour of the man thus so strangely placed
under the protection of a young girl. She resolved to confide her secret
to Lady Margaret MacDonald, wife of Sir Alexander, and to trust to the
natural compassion of the sex, and to that enthusiasm for the Jacobite
cause then common among nearly all the women of the Highlands.
This undertaking was the more dangerous, as the husband of Lady
Margaret was already suspected of having at first offered his services
to the prince. Lady Margaret was alarmed at Flora’s revelation. Her
husband was absent, and her house was full of officers of militia. She
could think of no other way of providing for the safety of the prince
than to confide him to the care of MacDonald of Kingsburgh, a brave and
intelligent man, who acted as agent or steward to Sir Alexander. Flora
undertook to conduct the prince to MacDonald’s house; and the prince was
fortunate enough to avoid recognition on the road, although the
awkwardness of his air, dressed as he was like a woman, more than once
excited suspicion.
From Kingsburgh he went to Raasay, where he was in the greatest
distress; the isle having been pillaged because the laird had taken part
in the insurrection. During this period of his flight he passed for the
servant of his guide. He then took refuge for a time in the country of
the laird of MacKinnon; but notwithstanding all the efforts of this
chief in his favour, he could find neither rest nor safety in that part
of the Isle of Skye, and was obliged to return once more to the mainland
of Scotland, on the borders of Loch Nevis. He was there exposed to new
dangers, and was very nearly taken. A great number of soldiers were
overrunning the district which was the cradle of the insurrection, the
country of Lochiel, of Keppoch, of Glengarry, and of other Jacobite
chiefs. The prince and his guide soon found themselves in the midst of a
circle of sentinels, and were scarcely able to move for fear of
detection. After having passed two days surrounded by enemies, and
without daring to light a fire to cook their food, they at length
avoided the threatened danger by passing through a narrow defile, which
separated the posts of two sentinels. Living thus in misery and
nakedness, often without food, without fire, and without shelter, the
unfortunate prince, sustained alone by the hope of learning that some
French vessel was approaching the coast, arrived at length at the
mountains of Strath-glass; And with Glen Allandale, who was then his
only companion, was obliged to take shelter in a cavern which was shared
by seven robbers. These men, however, were not ordinary outcasts; but
like Charles himself, they had been obliged to hide because they had
taken part in the insurrection. They willingly granted shelter to the
fugitive, and recognising the prince for whom they had so often exposed
their lives, they renewed to him their oaths of devotion. Among his most
obedient and attached subjects, Charles Edward never found more zeal,
fidelity, and effective help, than he met with at the hands of these men
who had become the enemies of the world and of its laws. Wishing to give
him all the assistance in their power, they undertook to procure him a
suit of clothes, a change of linen, some provisions, and news. They
executed their design with a strange mixture of that simplicity and
ferocity which then formed the basis of the Highland character. Two of
them lay in ambush for the servant of an officer who was going to Fort
Augustine with his master’s baggage, and killed him. This was the means
of furnishing the prince with clothes. Then another, in disguise,
ventured to enter Fort Augustine, managed to obtain valuable information
as to the movement of troops, and wishing to fulfil his mission of aid
in all its integrity, brought away for the unfortunate prince a small
piece of spiced bread of the value of a halfpenny. Charles Edward passed
more than three weeks in this cave, and it was with great reluctance
that his hosts suffered him to depart. “Stay with us,” they said. “The
mountains of gold which the government has promised for your head will
perhaps lead some gentleman to betray you; for it will be easy for him
to go in a distant land, and live upon the price of his infamy. But we
are under no such temptation. We know no other language but our own; we
cannot live in any other country; and if we were to harm a hair of your
head, our own mountains would fall upon us and crush us.” Another
remarkable example of enthusiasm and devotion aided at about this time
the escape of the prince. The son of a goldsmith of Edinburgh, named
Robert Mackenzie, who had been an officer in the Jacobite army, was then
hidden in the country of Glen Moriston. He was of about the same height
as Charles, and he resembled him very much, both in face and figure. He
was discovered by a party of soldiers, and attacked. He defended himself
bravely; and wishing by a last effort of heroism to render his death
useful to the cause he had served, he cried as he fell mortally wounded,
“Oh, wretches, you have killed your prince!” His generous plan
succeeded. He was taken for Charles Edward, and his head was sent to
London. Some time elapsed before the deception was discovered; and as
most persons believed that the real prince was killed, the government
began to relax the rigour of its search. Profiting by this momentary
respite, Charles Edward sought an interview with Lochiel, Cluny
MacPherson, and some others of his faithful partisans said to be hidden
in a neighbouring district. He therefore bid farewell to his faithful
banditti, two of whom, however, he kept with him to serve as guides and
as an escort. He at length succeeded in reaching Lochiel and MacPherson,
though not without running very great risks. They lived for some time in
a hut called the cage, sheltered by a very thick copse on the slope of
the mountain Benalder. But they were in the midst of abundance; and for
the first time since his flight the prince had enough to eat.
Towards the middle of September, Charles Edward learned that two French
frigates had arrived at Loch Lannagh to convey him to France. He
embarked on the twentieth, with a hundred of his partisans, and touched
the coast of Brittany on the twenty-ninth, at a spot near Morlaix. For
five months he had wandered a fugitive; leading a precarious life in the
midst of fatigues and of dangers surpassing anything recorded in
history. During this time his secret had been confided to hundreds of
persons of both sexes, of all ages, and of all conditions, without one
of them, even among the thieves who lived at the risk of their lives,
having for a moment thought of enriching himself with the wages of the
informer.
_STANISLAUS LECZINSKI._
1734.
Stanislaus Leczinski was besieged by the Russians in the city of
Dantzic, and having no hope of relief, and knowing that the enemy wished
to capture him rather than the city, the unfortunate king of Poland
resolved to subserve the interests of his country in providing for his
own safety. Several means of escape were presented to him. Some wished
him to place himself at the head of a hundred determined men, and to
pierce the Russian lines, but the project was too impracticable to be
entertained. He then adopted the plan of the ambassador of
France--that, namely, of flying in the disguise of a peasant.
“I left the house of the ambassador,” says the king, “in partial
disguise. I had not gone far when I wished to return to reassure him,
for he was greatly alarmed for my safety, and to dry the tears which I
had seen him shed. I therefore walked up again to his apartments and
tapped at the door, which he had gently closed. I found him prostrate on
the ground, and offering up fervent prayers to God to guide me in my
dangerous journey. ‘I come,’ said I, ‘to embrace you once more, and to
beg of you to resign yourself, as I do, to Providence.’”
Accompanied by General Steinflycht, disguised like himself as a peasant,
and by another officer who was engaged to assist him, the king crossed
the ditch in a boat, intending to enter Prussia, but he was obliged to
pass a post commanded by a serjeant, who interrogated the party so
closely that they judged it most prudent to declare themselves. The
serjeant then made a profound salute to the king, and allowed him to
pass. The king’s guides did not belong to the most honourable portion of
society, two of them being mere vagabonds; but that was of no great
moment as they were perfectly acquainted with the roads, and were above
all faithful. They began, however, by detaining the unfortunate king all
one night and the following day in a miserable cabin in the midst of a
marsh, about a quarter of a league from Dantzic. They assured him this
was necessary for his safety, and Stanislaus soon discovered that the
trusty fellows thought too little of his rank to make it worth his while
to expostulate with them. On the following night they took to their
boat, and rowed slowly and with difficulty along a sluggish river
covered with weeds. Towards midnight the guides separated in two
parties, one of which led the general by the road bordering the river,
while the other continued with the king in the boat. At daybreak they
again hid themselves in a peasant’s hut, and the king slept on a truss
of straw. He had not lain there long when some Cossacks entered with a
great uproar, and he gave himself up for lost till he discovered that
they had merely come in to breakfast. They remained at table two mortal
hours, but at last they went away, and the peasant’s wife came to
reassure Stanislaus with the news, though she was wholly unable to
understand why he wished to avoid the Cossacks instead of drinking with
them. At nightfall they again took to the boat, and passed over a great
tract of country which had been flooded, and then after a long and
fatiguing march arrived at a house, the owner of which uttered a loud
cry at seeing the king. “He is merely one of our comrades,” said the
guides; “what has alarmed you?” “No, I am not deceived,” said the
peasant; “it is the king, Stanislaus.” “Yes, my friend,” said the king
firmly and confidently; “it is myself; but you are too honest a man to
refuse me help in the condition in which you see me.” The king’s
confidence was not misplaced; the man promised to take him across the
Vistula, and he kept his word.
This part of the journey, however, was not effected without the king
being exposed to very great dangers. The Cossacks had possession of the
roads, and they examined every person with the greatest care whose
appearance resembled that of the king. The fugitives were often seen,
and on one occasion the guides were preparing to abandon Stanislaus,
telling him that they did not wish to be hanged without having the least
chance of saving his life. But he made them remain by threatening that
if they left him he would at once call the Cossacks, although they all
perished together. At another time he had to reanimate their courage by
a liberal supply of beer and of brandy. He had already learned that
Steinflycht had been misled and probably taken. At length they reached
the shores of the Vistula, and the peasant, hiding the king in some
bushes, went to look for a boat. When he was ready to embark, the king
wished to recompense the brave fellow by a present of a considerable sum
of money, but he could only induce him to accept two ducats, which the
worthy man said he would regard “As a souvenir of the happiness he had
known in seeing and knowing his sovereign.” “He took the ducats out of
my hand,” says Stanislaus, “in a manner and with expressions not easily
to be described.”
All danger was not at an end even when they had passed the Vistula. On
one occasion one of the two vagabonds who had guided the king, got
drunk, and in the midst of a village openly demanded the price of
services he had rendered at the risk of his life. The chief guide had
happily the presence of mind to ridicule him before the villagers, and
to represent him as a kind of madman, who whenever he had too much to
drink mistook every one around him for a prince. Stanislaus at length
succeeded in passing the Nogat, and got rid at the same time of his
fears and of his vagabond companions, who though they had not betrayed
him, had added no little by their indiscretions to the discomforts and
miseries of his journey.
_BARON TRENCK._
1746-1763.
Frederic Baron Trenck, born at Königsberg in 1726, was the son of a
superior officer in the Prussian army, and cousin-german of the famous
Trenck, colonel of the Pandours in the service of Maria Theresa. At the
age of eighteen he became an officer in the body-guard of Frederic II.,
and he was high in the favour of that prince. But the intelligence, the
bravery, and the brilliant exploits to which he owed that favour had
also procured him many enemies, who knew how to take advantage of the
indiscretions of a high-spirited young man. Trenck was presumptuous
enough to aspire to the regard of the Princess Amelia, sister of the
king; and this was undoubtedly the main cause of his disgrace, though
not the only one. In the campaign of 1744 the enemy’s foragers captured
the young officer’s groom, with two of his horses. The king at once
supplied him with another horse from the royal stables; but the next
morning the groom and the captured horses were brought back again by a
trumpeter of the enemy, who, on returning them to Trenck, placed in his
hands the following letter from the chief of the Pandours:--
“Trenck the Austrian is not at war with his cousin Trenck the Prussian.
He is delighted to have been able to get the two horses out of the
clutches of his hussars, and to return them to his cousin, to whom they
belong.”
The young officer at once took the letter to the king, who, regarding
him with a frown, said: “Since your cousin has sent back your horses,
you have no need of mine.”
Some months passed, and Trenck seemed perfectly restored to the favour
of his sovereign, when, the blow with which the king had long menaced
him fell suddenly upon his head.
Some time previously, Trenck had been imprudent enough to write to his
cousin in the Austrian service; and, though his letter contained only
general expressions of compliment and regard, it was none the less a
grave breach of discipline. The affair of the captured horses had
afterwards happened, and Trenck had very nearly forgotten his letter,
when he one day received what purported to be a reply to it, though
there is every reason to believe that it was the work of some person in
the Prussian service plotting his ruin. Trenck was, however, arrested,
with the letter in his possession, and was taken to the castle of Glatz,
where he was placed in one of the rooms allotted to the officers of the
guard, and allowed the liberty of the fortress. He committed the error
of writing a very haughty letter to Frederic, which gave great offence.
He had remained five months in confinement; the king had vouchsafed no
reply to his demand to be brought before a military tribunal; peace had
been made; his post in the guards had been given to another; it was then
that he began to think of making his escape.
During his imprisonment at Glatz he had made many friends among the
officers who had charge of him, by freely supplying them with money,
with which he was well provided. Two of these officers volunteered to
aid him in his escape, and to accompany him; and in addition to this
they all three undertook, from feelings of pity, to deliver another
officer, who had been condemned to ten years’ imprisonment in the same
fortress. After he had learned all their plans, this wretch, whom Trenck
had loaded with benefits, betrayed them, and earned his own liberty as
the reward of his treachery. One of the confederates, warned in time,
was enabled to save himself; the other, thanks to Trenck, who had bribed
his judge, escaped with a year’s imprisonment. But Trenck himself was
from that day watched more closely than before. Some years after, the
wretch who had so basely sold him received his reward: Trenck met him at
Warsaw, insulted him publicly, and killed him in a duel.
The king was greatly incensed at this attempted escape, the more so as
he had already promised, at the earnest entreaty of Trenck’s mother, to
release him in a year. But Trenck had, unfortunately, been kept in
ignorance of this latter circumstance. He was not long, however, before
he made another effort to recover his liberty, of which he gives an
account in the following terms:--
“My window looked towards the city, and was ninety feet from the ground,
in the tower of the citadel, out of which I dared not get before finding
a place of refuge in the city. This an officer undertook to procure me,
and prevailed on an honest soap-boiler to grant me a hiding-place. I
then notched my penknife and sawed through three iron bars; but this
mode was too tedious, it being necessary to file away eight bars from my
window before I could pass through. Another officer, therefore, procured
me a file, which I was obliged to use with caution, lest I should be
overheard by the sentinels.
“Having ended this labour, I cut my leather portmanteau into thongs,
sewed them end to end, added the sheets of my bed, and descended safely
from this tremendous height.
“It rained, the night was dark, and all seemed fortunate; but I had to
wade through moats full of mud before I could enter the city--a
circumstance I had never once considered. I sank up to the knees, and
after long struggling and incredible efforts to extricate myself, I was
obliged to call the sentinel and desire him to go and tell the governor
Trenck was stuck fast in the moat.
“My misfortune was the greater on this occasion as General Fouquet was
then governor of Glatz. He was one of the cruellest of men. He had been
wounded by my father in a duel, and the Austrian Trenck had taken his
baggage in 1744, and had also laid the country of Glatz under
contribution. He was, therefore, an enemy to the very name of Trenck;
nor did he lose any opportunity of giving proofs of his sentiments, and
especially on the present occasion, when he left me standing in the mire
till noon, the sport of the soldiers. I was then drawn out, half dead,
only to be again imprisoned and shut up the whole day, without water to
wash myself. No one can imagine how I looked--exhausted and dirty, my
long hair having fallen into the mud, with which, by my struggling, it
was loaded. I remained in this condition till the next day, when two
fellow-prisoners were sent to assist and clean me.
“My imprisonment now became intolerable. I had still eighty louis d’ors
in my purse, which had not been taken from me at my removal into another
dungeon, and these afterwards did me good service.
“Eight days had not elapsed since my last fruitless attempt to escape
when an event happened which would appear incredible were I, the
principal actor in the scene, not alive to attest its truth, and might
not all Glatz and the Prussian garrison be produced as eye and
ear-witnesses. This incident will prove that adventurous and even rash
daring will render the most improbable undertakings possible, and that
desperate attempts may often make a general more fortunate and famous
than the wisest and best concerted plans.
“Major Doo came to visit me, accompanied by an officer of the guard and
an adjutant. After examining every corner of my chamber, he addressed
me, taxing me with a second crime in endeavouring to obtain my liberty,
adding that this must certainly increase the anger of the king.
“My blood boiled at the word crime; he talked of patience, I asked how
long the king had condemned me to imprisonment. He answered, a traitor
to his country who has correspondence with the enemy, cannot be
condemned for a certain time, but must depend for grace and pardon on
the king.