NEW BATTLE
It was the last bloody conflict on British soil, ending in the slaughter of hundreds. Now, two sides are waging war over luxury homes being built on the historic grounds where fallen Jacobites are buried
THE battle proper is thought to have lasted no more than 40 minutes. What came after was not so much armed conflict as slaughter. As the defeated Jacobites dispersed, they were chased and cut down by the Hanoverians and thereafter buried where they fell or else left to rot.
Culloden was the last pitched battle ever fought on British soil and among the most pivotal in Scotland’s history.
On this barren moor a few miles from Inverness, Bonnie Prince Charlie’s pretensions to the throne came to a juddering halt as 1,500 of his soldiers were hacked to death in embarrassingly short order.
More than 270 years on, the modern-day battle of Culloden has been a more protracted affair. Thus far it has raged for five years, the advantage swinging first one way then the other. But now defeat seems inevitable for those intent on protecting the 1746 battlefield – a war grave in the eyes of many – from the encroachment of developers.
Work has already begun on preparing ground for the construction of 16 four and five-bedroom luxury homes, despite claims by protesters that it almost certainly contains the remains of some of the Culloden fallen.
The building site is only a few hundred yards from the National Trust for Scotland’s Battle of Culloden visitor centre – and falls within a red line boundary drawn by Historic Environment Scotland (HES) to represent the area in which the Battle of Culloden was actually fought.
Yet, to the dismay of those who regard the land as sacrosanct, the Government-funded heritage body had no objection to the planning application by Kirkwood Homes to build the houses at Viewfield Farm. It argues farm buildings stood there previously so the site had already been developed.
The protesters, many of them staunch Nationalists, are equally aghast at the Scottish Government’s failure to intervene to protect an area of land of incalculable cultural importance.
If any government should instinctively grasp the ‘sacrilege’ of building houses over the graves of fallen Jacobites, says protest leader George Kempik, surely it should be this SNP one.
But he says: ‘We don’t believe they’ve even looked at it. This hasn’t been put in front of a single minister to investigate.
‘We’ve contacted local MSPs up there, I’ve contacted my own MSP Fiona Hyslop and tried going direct to Nicola Sturgeon. On every occasion we basically get rebuffed.’
Now, as mechanical diggers scoop up the Culloden soil, protesters fear any bucketful could contain the remains of fallen soldiers.
Mr Kempik says: ‘If you think about the name of the area where the houses are being built – Viewhill – it’s a high point.
‘The Hanoverians came from that direction but, when the battle was over and as men fled, they fled in that direction towards Inverness.
‘As is well known by anyone who knows anything about the battle, no quarter was given by the Hanoverians. Men were cut down and basically buried where they lay.
‘I imagine it would have been pits mostly. They wouldn’t be digging individual graves.’
Thus he is in little doubt that an area the size of a housing development will contain remains of the Culloden casualties.
AND Mr Kempik is not alone. His horror is shared by Professor Sir Tom Devine, the nation’s foremost historian, who says it is a ‘national disgrace’ that the plans were waved through.
‘The Battle of Culloden spread into the surrounding fields as English dragoons chased the remnants of the Highland army and cut them down,’ says the professor. ‘Their bones are scattered all around the periphery, which makes this, too, part of the Culloden war grave.’
He adds: ‘Scotland has a wretched record in preserving its sacred battle sites but this would be the worst cut of all.’
Then there is the Scottish diaspora who, through the power of social media, engaged in the new battle of Culloden from homes as far afield as Australia and Canada.
An outraged Joyce MacKenzie from Quebec is typical. She tells her Facebook friends: ‘Every single Scottish governmental and para-governmental cultural agency in Scotland from the top down dropped the ball. Why? Because, in the end, money speaks louder than honour and respect for those who fought on both sides and lay buried there.’
She adds: ‘We fought long and hard and we lost. The diggers are digging deep... do they even have a clue... beyond sad.’
Also bitterly disappointed to see the building work go ahead was the National Trust for Scotland, which argued from the beginning that allowing this development would set a precedent for further ones.
‘Sadly, that has proven to be the case,’ says Diarmid Hearns, the Trust’s head of policy.
FOLLOWING the go-ahead for housing development, another applicant asked Highland Council for permission to build 14 holiday lodges and a 100seat restaurant in the battlefield area. Next came an application to build a farm house, also within the boundary.
Mr Hearns says: ‘These may encourage even more submissions, eventually leading to a circle of buildings which, if left unchecked, would eventually widen, join up and constrict the core site we protect.
‘One need only look to Bannockburn battlefield as an example of how this could pan out.’
It is here, perhaps, that the true scale of the uphill struggle which faced the Culloden protesters becomes apparent. For the country is littered with battlefields threatened by developers.
At Bothwell Bridge in Lanarkshire, only one portion of the 1679 battlefield remains undeveloped and it was the subject of housing development applications in 2005 and 2013.
Plans to widen and reroute the A9 will further erode what remains of the battlefield of Killiecrankie which, in 1689, was the scene of the first major skirmish of the Jacobite uprising.
The A1 bisects the battlefield of Dunbar, where Cromwell defeated royalist forces in 1650, and parts of the area near Musselburgh where the Battle of Pinkie was fought in 1547 have been given over to housing development.
Indeed, until a few years ago, Culloden was seen as one of Scotland’s last remaining unspoiled battlefields.
All that changed when a joint bid by two developers to build 16 homes at Viewhill was allowed on appeal by the Scottish Government in 2014 after it was initially rejected by Highland Council.
The upshot of that was the local authority announcing a new policy for Culloden which offered scope for developers who submitted applications deemed in keeping with the area.
Later, landowner David Sutherland sold the site of the proposed development to Inverurie-based Kirkwood Homes, but since permission had already been granted for the original application, getting the necessary permissions to begin building proved little more than a formality.
And here those determined to protect the integrity of Scottish battlefields point to a further iniquity in their struggle. How can it be fair, they ask, that wealthy developers are afforded the right to appeal local authority planning decisions which go against them when there is no such recourse available in law for objectors?
A new planning Bill is progressing through Holyrood and, if MSPs approve amendments to it, equal rights of appeal could be established in future. But, say the Culloden protesters, it will come too late to
protect a vital part of the nation’s past. They will gather today for a protest march at Culloden against a housing development they know they cannot stop. Yet they deny that the demonstration will be futile.
Mr Kempik says: ‘It’s about making sure that everybody buying a house off Kirkwood Homes on that site realises what they’re buying and supporting is a sacrilege. We want to make sure people understand this is the first decentsized development that has encroached into the battlefield and that now there is another one happening and it is even closer to the main battlefield.
‘Historic Environment Scotland didn’t object to that either – they virtually wrote a supportive letter, it’s a disgusting letter which gives the developer ammunition if it gets rejected by Highland Council.’
For his part, then, the march is about raising awareness and pressing for statutory protection for the battlefield. Indeed, Mr Kempik says he fails to see why Culloden is not a World Heritage Site.
His friend Andy McAlindon, who takes visitors on tours of historic locations while dressed as a Highland warrior, says Culloden is such a special place it gives him goosebumps whenever he is there.
‘I love my country and Culloden is a very emotional place for me,’ says Mr McAlindon, 40, from Kilmacolm, Renfrewshire. ‘I feel very sad when I’m up there and I see this building work going on and the big, huge buckets digging through the soil.
‘We are not saying that there’s definitely bodies there but there very well may be. To see no archaeologist there when I was there last week was heartbreaking.’
Not everyone feels as strongly as he, however. Protesters have tried to recruit many of those living closest to the battlefield only to learn that some are all in favour of the new houses.
‘I feel the locals have not jumped on board,’ says Mr Kempik. ‘I’ve been dumbfounded by them telling me we need the houses and that’s a bit sad in my opinion. They’re not looking at the bigger picture.’
Yesterday, Highland Council said archaeological work had taken place at the building site and was now complete.
A spokesman said: ‘The work undertaken to date includes photographic recording, metal detecting and a watching brief. No further work is now required with regard to this development.’
No finds were made by the archaeologist who carried out a watching brief last month.
Meanwhile, Historic Environment Scotland said it had added Culloden to its Inventory of Historic Battlefields in 2011. HES said in a statement: ‘The Inventory boundary defines the area in which the main events of the battle are considered to have taken place and where associated physical remains and archaeological evidence occur or may be expected.
‘Inclusion on the inventory does not preclude development, rather it means that planning authorities, in this case Highland Council, have to consider any proposals for development carefully, and determine whether development will significantly detract from the importance of the battle site.’
IT added: ‘In the opinion of our predecessor body, Historic Scotland, the Viewhill development was considered not to have a significant impact upon either the battlefield landscape or the underlying archaeology, as the area was on a previously developed site and had already seen modern development.’ Kirkwood Homes declined to comment when contacted by the Mail.
As for the Scottish Government, it claims ministers had no remit to intervene in the planning process. A spokesman said: ‘The independent reporter considered a wide range of evidence before consent was granted in 2014 subject to a number of planning conditions relating to matters including house design, access, archaeology, protected species, land contamination, landscaping and drainage. This decision was final and provided no opportunity for ministers to revisit it.
‘In May 2018, Highland Council issued planning permission for proposed changes to the house designs, infrastructure and landscaping, related to the consent granted in 2014.
‘Ministers had no statutory role in that decision and as formal planning consent has now been granted, ministers have no remit to review that decision.’
Yet in the eyes of some of the most fervent proponents of independence, people who live and breathe their nation’s heritage, there is a sense of betrayal by this Nationalist Government.
Not that it is only independence supporters who should feel wronged by the building work taking place on the Culloden battlefield, says Mr Kempik. He would welcome Unionist recruits to the cause – now seemingly a lost one – with open arms.
‘It’s not about independence,’ he says. ‘It’s about the Culloden battlefield and protecting war graves.’
How curious that the two biggest enemies of that cause should prove to be a Nationalist Scottish Government and the public body charged with preserving the nation’s history.