Act of Parliament | |
Long title | An act for the more effectual securing the peace of the highlands in Scotland. |
---|---|
Citation | 1 Geo. 1 St. 2. c. 54 |
Dates | |
Commencement | 1 November 1716 |
Text of statute as originally enacted |
The Highlands Services Act 1715 also known as the Disarming Act 1715 (1 Geo. 1 St. 2. c. 54) was an 18th-century Act of Parliament of Great Britain that was enacted to curtail Jacobitism among the Scottish clans in the Scottish Highlands after the Jacobite rising of 1715. The new law, which came into effect on 1 November 1716, aimed at "securing the peace of the highlands in Scotland". It outlawed anyone in defined parts of Scotland from having "in his or their custody, use, or bear, broad sword, poignard, whinger, or durk, side pistol, gun, or other warlike weapon" unless authorised. [1]
However, the act proved ineffectual at enforcing the ban. In 1725 a new act was passed that for "disarming the highlands in that part of Great Britain called Scotland; and for the better securing the peace and quiet of that part of the kingdom". This new law was enforced by Major-General George Wade, who used it to successfully confiscate a significant number of weapons. Wade's efforts to confiscate weapons of war from was proven by the number of antiquated weapons brandished by the Highlanders who answered the call when Bonnie Prince Charlie began the Jacobite rising at Glenfinnan in 1745. Nevertheless, the Jacobite forces quickly acquired many of the latest British Army-issued government Land Pattern Muskets and bayonets after their resounding victory at Prestonpans. [1]
The main articles of the Disarming Act were further strengthened in the Act of Proscription 1746 following the defeat of Bonnie Prince Charlie at the Battle of Culloden in 1746.
Jacobitism was a political movement that supported the restoration of the senior line of the House of Stuart to the British throne. The name derives from the first name of James II and VII, which in Latin translates as Jacobus. When James went into exile after the November 1688 Glorious Revolution, the Parliament of England argued that he had abandoned the English throne, which they offered to his Protestant daughter Mary II, and her husband William III. In April, the Scottish Convention held that he "forfeited" the throne of Scotland by his actions, listed in the Articles of Grievances.
The Battle of Culloden was the final confrontation of the Jacobite rising of 1745. On 16 April 1746, the Jacobite army of Charles Edward Stuart was decisively defeated by a British government force under Prince William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland, on Drummossie Moor near Inverness in the Scottish Highlands. It was the last pitched battle fought on British soil.
The Dress Act 1746, also known as the Disclothing Act, was part of the Act of Proscription which came into force on 1 August 1746 and made wearing "the Highland Dress" — including the kilt — by men and boys illegal in Scotland, as well as reiterating the Disarming Act 1715. The Jacobite risings between 1689 and 1746 found their most effective support amongst the Scottish clans, and this act was part of a series of measures attempting to bring the clans under government control. An exemption allowed the kilt to be worn in the army's Highland regiments along with its veterans who had served in the military. The landed gentry were also exempt, being exempt from the entire Act of Proscription.
The Act of Proscription, also called the Act of Proscription 1746 or the Disarming the Highlands, etc. Act 1745, was an Act of the Parliament of Great Britain, which came into effect in Scotland on 1 August 1746. It was part of a series of efforts to assimilate the Scottish Highlands, ending their ability to revolt, and the first of the "King's laws" that sought to crush the clan system system in the aftermath of the Jacobite rising of 1745. These laws were finally repealed on 1 July 1782.
Clan Macpherson is a Highland Scottish clan and a member of the Chattan Confederation.
Clan Grant is a Highland Scottish clan.
Sir Robert Munro, 6th Baronet was a Scottish military officer and politician whose life followed an 18th-century pattern. He fought in support of the Revolution Settlement and the House of Hanover, and their opposition to all attempts by the Jacobites to restore the House of Stuart either by force of arms or by political intrigue. He was killed at the Battle of Falkirk Muir in 1746.
Thomas Rawlinson was an 18th-century English industrialist who some sources have claimed was the inventor of the modern kilt.
Archibald Cameron of Lochiel was a Scottish physician and a prominent leader in the Jacobite rising of 1745. He was the personal physician of Charles Edward Stuart, and younger brother of Donald Cameron of Lochiel, otherwise known as the Gentle Lochiel, who led Clan Cameron during the rising. At Tyburn on 7 June 1753, he was the last Jacobite to be executed for high treason. In popular memory, he is sometimes referred to as Doctor Archie.
Donald Cameron of Lochiel, popularly known as the Gentle Lochiel, was a Scottish Jacobite, soldier and hereditary chief of Clan Cameron, traditionally loyal to the exiled House of Stuart. His support for Prince Charles Edward Stuart proved pivotal in the early stages of the 1745 Jacobite Rising. Lochiel was among the Highlanders defeated at the Battle of Culloden, and thereafter fled to France.
Events from the year 1746 in Great Britain.
The Heritable Jurisdictions (Scotland) Act 1746 was an Act of Parliament passed in the aftermath of the Jacobite rising of 1745 abolishing judicial rights held by Scots heritors. These were a significant source of power, especially for clan chiefs since it gave them a large measure of control over their tenants.
The Jacobite rising of 1745, also known as the Forty-five Rebellion or simply the '45, was an attempt by Charles Edward Stuart to regain the British throne for his father, James Francis Edward Stuart. It took place during the War of the Austrian Succession, when the bulk of the British Army was fighting in mainland Europe, and proved to be the last in a series of revolts that began in 1689, with major outbreaks in 1708, 1715 and 1719.
The siege of Fort Augustus took place from 22 February to 1 March 1746, during the Jacobite rising of 1745. After a short siege, the government garrison surrendered to a Jacobite force, which then moved on to besiege Fort William, using artillery captured at Fort Augustus.
The siege of Inverness took place in February 1746 and was part of the Jacobite rising of 1745.
The Independent Highland Companies were irregular militia raised from the Scottish clans of the Scottish Highlands by order of the British government between 1603 and 1760 in order to help keep the peace and enforce the law in the Highlands and were recognized as such by the government. The officers of the Independent Highland Companies were commissioned as officers of the British Army but the Independent Companies were not recognized as official regiments of the line of the army. The Independent Highland Companies were the progenitors of the Highland Regiments of the British Army that began when ten Independent Highland Companies were embodied to form the Earl of Crawford's Highland Regiment that was numbered the 43rd Regiment of Foot in 1739.
Lochalsh is a district of mainland Scotland that is currently part of the Highland council area. The Lochalsh district covers all of the mainland either side of Loch Alsh - and of Loch Duich - between Loch Carron and Loch Hourn, ie. from Stromeferry in the north on Loch Carron down to Corran on Loch Hourn and as (south-)west as Kintail. It was sometimes more narrowly defined as just being the hilly peninsula that lies between Loch Carron and Loch Alsh. The main settlement is Kyle of Lochalsh, located at the entrance to Loch Alsh, opposite the village of Kyleakin on the adjacent island of Skye. A ferry used to connect the two settlements but was replaced by the Skye Bridge in 1995.
Lieutenant-Colonel Caroline Frederick Scott was a Scottish soldier and military engineer who served in the British Army before transferring to the East India Company.
The Jacobite Army, sometimes referred to as the Highland Army, was the military force assembled by Charles Edward Stuart and his Jacobite supporters during the 1745 Rising that attempted to restore the House of Stuart to the British throne.
Duncan Forbes of Culloden was a Scottish lawyer and Whig politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1721 to 1737. As Lord President and senior Scottish legal officer, he played a major role in helping the government suppress the 1745 Jacobite Rising.