Aviation Specials Magazine 1745 Jacobite Battle for Britain Édition spéciale

1745 Jacobite Battle for Britain, a 100-page historical special written by James Hoare, looks at the last battle to be fought on British soil, when in the autumn of 1745, the people of Great Britain and Ireland were asked what sort of country they wanted to live in. Kings and Princes, of course, had their own opinions on how the future should look but the success or failure of the Jacobite ‘45 was in the hands of ordinary people who were asked to stand up and fight.

What they were fighting for was very much in the eye of the beholder, something that resonates more strongly than ever today. The ‘45 cut across all traditional loyalties to pit families against each other and turn communities in on themselves. Highlanders fought on both sides – and in some encounters, more Highland Scots were fighting for King George II than for the exiled House of Stuart – as did Lowlanders, the English, the Irish, Protestants and Roman Catholics.

For every aspiration was a counterweight. Those who dreamt of a free Scotland faced those who felt that the union with England brought prosperity, and those who fought for the restoration of Britain’s traditional rulers were opposed by those who were willing to throw tradition on the fire in the name of progress. Scots and especially Highlanders were demonised as backwards barbarians doing the bidding of the Pope in Rome and the King in France, while the British Army was characterised as an ‘English’ army of occupation and repression, dancing to the tune of a German usurper.

As you’ll soon discover, in 1745 as today, every great dream cast a dark shadow.