Jacobite Flag Question

[Frog]

Ran across a reference a few days ago that John Roy Stewart’s Regiment (aka the Edinburgh Regiment) carried the “Green Flag of Kincardine” at Culloden. The trouble is, I can’t find anything about the flag’s appearance.

 

(I did find the modern “version” of it, with targe and pistols, but it’s not the one that was carried in 1746.)

 

So, does anybody know what the Green Flag of Kincardine carried at Culloden in 1746 looked like, or better yet have a link to a description or drawing?

 

TIA.

Bunch of monkeys on your ceiling, sir!

[iain McDonald]

I haven’t seen anything about it before or suggestion as to what it might have looked like.

[Cameronian]

Fascinating, I’d never heard of this.  Did a bit of digging and got plenty of references to the green flag but of course no description.  From what I could get the flag was kept by the man who bore it at Culloden who gave it to another at his death.  The flag was presented to the Duke of Gordon ‘much holed by bullets and cut by swords and the colour very faded’ in the late 1800s. Maybe it’s still in the Gordon collections?  I was unable to find any heraldry for the Barony of Kincardine, but maybe the flag’s design came from this as it was the custom to make reference to the Colonel’s arms? There was a family connection to the Barony of Kincardine in Fife, John Roy being the grandson of the last Baron.  John Roy himself apparently was born in Speyside, which gives the Pityoulish and Gordon connection. This quote is interesting;
http://www.electricscotland.com/history/inverness/chapter28.htm
<p align=”justify”><span style=”font-family: Arial; font-size: small;”>”…”So much has been written about Colonel John Roy Stuart that there is not much new to say ; but though somewhat lengthy, relating as they do to the ‘Forty-five, events of never-dying interest to Highlanders, I give certain extracts from the collections of the late Mr John Anderson, W.S., made from personal researches and observations, written down about seventy years ago—</span></p>
<p align=”justify”><span style=”font-family: Arial; font-size: small;”>”On the morning of the battle of Culloden, John Roy was exceedingly anxious that the army should take up a position at Dalmagarrie, several miles to the south of the River Nairn, and beyond a pass where cavalry and artillery of the enemy would be useless. Lord Elcho, who commanded a party of Life Guards, even went to the Prince to solicit that the command on that day be conceded to John Roy Stuart, and that his plans should guide them. The Prince’s answer was to this purport—’ He had given his word that he would fight where he was, and it could not be violated; moreover, he had promised Lord George Murray that he should lead the battle, and he had too many men, besides ten pieces of cannon, to cause him to be slighted. Stuart himself asked that nobleman what was to be the upshot of opposing the English to such disadvantage. His words were—’You’ll soon see Stuart, we’ll make short work of it,’ a reply which subsequent events led the Highlanders, and especially John Roy, to believe smacked of treachery. Lord Elcho afterwards found the Prince in a cabin beside the river Nairn, surrounded by Irishmen, and deaf to his entreaties to rally the fugitives and again to make head. Hence the muster at Ruthven on the 18th and 19th of 9000 Highlanders came to nought. John Roy Stuart took refuge in a wild cave near Rothiemurchus. A natural son of his, by name Charles Stuart (afterwards an officer in the English army) brought him his victuals daily to the cave, in front of which ran a mountain stream. Coming on one occasion early in the morning on his usual errand, he met a party of soldiers, headed by a Lieutenant, making for his father’s p1-ice of concealmeat. With instinctive sagacity he at once guessed their purpose, and picking up acquaintance with a little drummer, who could hardly drag his weary limbs along under the weight of his drum, he offered the boy some of the food which, he said, he was carrying to the hills for his own breakfast whilst he tended his master’s cattle if he would tell him what sort of an instrument that was he carried. The poor lad, glad to relieve his hunger at so cheap a rate, twisted round his drum and beat two or three flourishes on it. This was all young Stuart wanted. The officer in command in a hasty tone chid the little musician, and said he had spoiled their labour, for the game was scared! And so it was : on the first stroke John Roy leapt at one bound out of the cave to the opposite side of the burn; there crouching under a tree whilst he firmly grasped his broadsword he awaited the soldiers’ approach. But they had turned back, rightly conjecturing that the cave was empty. Stuart dislocated his ankle in the leap, but with great personal strength and acute pain reset it tearing off his shirt to make a bandage. Then crawling through the water he ascended to his erie. It was whilst lying under a tree, his wounded foot dangling in the water, that he composed the prayer in Gaelic, so much admired in the Highlands in the last age, which goes by his name.”</span></p>
<p align=”justify”><span style=”font-family: Arial; font-size: small;”>Other localities, it is right to say, claim the spot of John Roy’s concealment. I follow Mr Anderson, who was a careful observer with trained intellect, who wrote at a comparatively recent date and free from bias, whether as regarded peoples or localities. Another recent Collector says “Upon another occasion word was brought to this gallant soldier that his mother had died in Rannoch. Bent on personally beholding the last rites paid to her remains, he assumed the long gown and the limping gait of one of the privileged Bedesmen who then roamed from place to place. As he came through the forest of Drimochter he encountered two English officers. With a feigned tale of distress he demanded charity of them, the better to keep up his assumed character. One of them cursed him for a Highland rascal and passed on ; but the other gave him a trifle, which he was in the act of pocketing when his gown, raised too high, disclosed part of his broadsword. ‘We have got a rebel here,’ shouted the officer to his companion in advance, ‘let us take the villan.’ ‘That you never shall,’ retorted Stuart, as drawing a pistol from his belt he shot the speaker dead. His friend hastened to revenge him, but he met more than his match and called for mercy, which Roy granted on condition that he reported to the Duke of Cumberland he owed his life to him.”</span></p>
<p align=”justify”><span style=”font-family: Arial; font-size: small;”>”John Roy was a famous poet and composer of music, much of both being repeated and sung at the time, and the reel ‘John Roy Stuart’ is one of the finest reels which is now played. He added much to the music of Strathspey, and gave it such a character that it will now stand for ages.” (Farr .MS. collections, 1834.)</span></p>

'The time has come" The walrus said. "To talk of many things: Of shoes--and ships--and sealing-wax--Of cabbages--and kings--And why the sea is boiling hot--And whether pigs have wings."

[Cameronian]

No idea why this is showing the HTML, simply broken perhaps?

'The time has come" The walrus said. "To talk of many things: Of shoes--and ships--and sealing-wax--Of cabbages--and kings--And why the sea is boiling hot--And whether pigs have wings."

[Cameronian]

Well got that wrong, the Barony of Kincardine is around Boat of Garten.  Too many Kincardines in Scotland!

From: http://www.boatofgarten.com/community/kincardine-church/

‘Perhaps the most interesting of the gravestones is that near the Kirk door dedicated to the Stewarts, Barons of Kincardine, who held that Barony from 1374 until 1683 (the Barony itself encompassed the whole of Glenmore and the Kincardine Hills).’  Still no heraldry mind you.

'The time has come" The walrus said. "To talk of many things: Of shoes--and ships--and sealing-wax--Of cabbages--and kings--And why the sea is boiling hot--And whether pigs have wings."

[Author]

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