Grantown Family history uncovers Clan Grant betrayal by its chief

For centuries historians have argued over the betrayal of Clan Grant by its own chief following the great ‘45 Jacobite Rebellion.

But just what did happen?

What is the true story of one of the rebellion’s most shameful chapters?

Help is finally at hand thanks to a lifetime of research by a Grantown writer who simply couldn’t let go of the story of his own family’s involvement.

On Thursday at Grantown Museum Chris Grant will launch his 632-page epic ‘The Jacobite Grants of Urquhart and Glenmoriston - their story in the Rebellion of 1745’, which he claims will finally prove what really caused the head of the clan to betray the Grants of Loch Ness-side.

“The event has been an enduring puzzle,” he told the Strathy.

“My book will give a much fuller account of the true facts involved in this infamous incident.”

After this Thursday’s release he will also prepare a launch for the people of Glen Urquhart and Glenmoriston at Castle Urquhart on May 10.

For the first time in 279 years the full story of what really happened - and why - will be shared.

Mr Grant said: “The facts have never been published before and it was only by gaining access to the Cumberland papers - long held in Windsor Castle - that I have been able to uncover the truth.

“Not only will the puzzle be solved but the revelations will turn the previous history of the Grants on its head.”

What truly led to these men being hunted down, deceived and betrayed, before being so dishonourably handed over to the Duke of Cumberland in Inverness?

This book explains in detail the sequence of events that ultimately led to their betrayal by Ludovick Grant, where they became sacrificial lambs for the murky conduct of their fellow Grant clansmen in Strathspey, which had immediately attracted the displeasure of King George in faraway London.

After their betrayal, these men had to endure 10 months of imprisonment in the stinking, disease-ridden prison hulks at Tilbury Fort on the River Thames, existing in conditions which prematurely ended the lives of many of them.

Following their incarceration, the surviving men were eventually transported as indentured slaves to the Caribbean Island of Barbados, where many more succumbed to death from tropical diseases to which their bodies had no resistance. Only a very lucky few in the decade that followed would enjoy the good fortune of surviving their grim ordeals and eventually making their way back to their homes, families and native glens.

Mr Grant was for 40 years a professional chef but driven at the same time to uncover the facts behind a story which has haunted his family for so long.

He maintained: “Even to this day, there are not many books written about the rebellion that do not mention the betrayal of the clansmen at some point.

“But whilst it warrants regular mention, no detailed and factual explanation for its happening has ever been given until now.

“This book tells the story of the nine members of my family as they fought their way through the course of the 45 Rebellion in the Glengarry Regiment, when they marched to Derby and back with Charles Edward Stuart’s Highland Army.

“For the first time ever, readers can learn the sequence of events which led to the betrayal while also exposing the real causes as to why the head of their clan sacrificed them by handing them over to the Duke of Cumberland at the end of a conflict - the consequences of which changed the history and culture of the Highlands forever.

“This was an infamous act which has no equal throughout the long and turbulent history of the Highlands, as never before or since has the leader of any clan acted in such a way against his own people.”

The book will also tell for the first time the fascinating story of what became of the head of the family, Alexander Grant of Shewglie, following the betrayal of the Urquhart and Glenmoriston men.

On the very same day that the betrayal took place in Inverness, Ludovick Grant concluded his business by presenting a letter to the Duke of Cumberland, which Charles Edward Stuart had sent to Shewglie following the raising of the Royal Standard at Glenfinnan.

“On reading this, Cumberland immediately ordered that Shewglie should be arrested on a charge of high treason, after which he was sent to Tilbury Fort.

“However, soon after his arrival there, events took a totally unexpected twist when Shewglie was released from his cell through the influence of some of the leading Hanoverian men in Britain…”

By using many never previously published letters, the book will also show and prove in detail that the history books of the past, which had invariably presented Clan Grant as being a unified Hanoverian-supporting Clan during the 1745 Rebellion, have all been wrong, with the truth being that the majority of the Grants in Strathspey were actually Jacobites at heart.

The hefty volume also tells the story of the Shewglie Grants in the decades that followed Culloden when many of them joined the Honourable East India Company, where they played commanding roles in the Battles of Plassey and Buxar, the victories of which created the foundation for the company’s domination of India for two centuries.

The book, published by Mr Grant, is available for £35 from The Bookmark, Grantown Museum and Grantown Hub.

The fine marble monument which sits in the centre of the family graveyard in Drumnadrochit: “This is where my 6 x great-grandfather is buried, he was the man who fought at the Battles of Prestonpans, Falkirk and Culloden. Also buried there is his grandfather, his great-grandfather and great-great grandfather.

!I found this graveyard back in 2009 in a very sad state of repair but with the help of the community council there and £70.000 we totally rebuilt the walls and railings and renovated the marble monument. That is all explained in the last chapter of the book.”

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