Remembering the Glencoe massacre
FORTY people gathered at the Massacre of Glencoe Memorial last Tuesday for the annual commemoration of the murderous events of February 13 1692.
People from as far afield as Fife and the Black Isles joined residents from Glencoe and Ballachulish.
A couple from the United States, with the surname MacDonald, who are on holiday in Scotland also attended.
Tuesday’s events began with a service in St Mary’s Church, Glencoe, conducted by the Rev Amanda Fairclough, which was also attended by youngsters from Glencoe and St Bride’s primary schools.
It was followed by the procession to the tapering Celtic cross memorial, including clan and community representatives. Wreaths were laid by representatives of Clan Donald Highlands and Islands, Glencoe Heritage Trust and the National Trust.
A wreath on behalf of Clan Henderson had already been laid on the Sunday by representatives of Clan Henderson.
The 23rd Psalm was sung and piper John MacCallum played The Lament.
Glencoe Heritage Trust’s Roz MacDonald said it was good to see such a strong turnout for the event once again.
‘The sun came out for the procession and the wreath-laying, which was nice, and it was good so many people had managed to get there for the commemoration given the weather recently,’ she told the Lochaber Times.
It was on a freezing cold winter’s morning in February 1692 that a regiment of soldiers carried out an act so heinous and contrary to Highland custom that, more than three centuries later, its name still retains the power to evoke strong emotions.
Glencoe is home to one of the most stunning mountain vistas in Scotland, but it is also where, in the early hours of February 13 1692, 38 men, women and children of the MacDonald clan - or the MacIains as they were more specifically known - were murdered by troops acting on behalf of the government and whom they had billeted in their homes.
The MacDonalds had been rebels, but had taken the oath of allegiance to King William and so felt safe to extend the custom of Highland hospitality to Captain Robert Campbell and his 120 soldiers for the fortnight before the massacre.
But Campbell had been told to ‘put all to the sword under seventy’ in an early morning surprise attack, while his hosts were asleep.
It was to be an example of what could happen to other Highland clans considered a possible threat to the new regime in London under King William of Orange. Among those murdered was chief of the MacDonalds of Glen Coe, Alasdair MacDonald, known as MacIain. As well as those who died by sword, bayonet and musket, others later died of exposure in the bitter winter conditions after being forced from their burning crofts.
Although such violence was not uncommon in the Highlands at this time, what made this shocking was that it had been ‘slaughter under trust’.
But if it was intended as a way of cowering the MacDonalds and their various clan branches into submission, the plan backfired and the memory of Glencoe ensured Clan Donald’s support behind the Jacobite risings of 1715 and 1745.
The power of the Glencoe Massacre – or Mort Ghlinne Comhann in Gaelic – to evoke strong emotions lingers to this day and it is that power that continues to draw people from near and far to the annual commemoration at the memorial.
The tradition of laying of a wreath on the anniversary of the massacre was started in 1935 by Angus MacDonald and subsequently carried on by his son.
Roz MacDonald has attended the commemoration for the past 37 years and agrees it was the fact the murders were carried out ‘under trust’ which made it all the more shocking and ensured the killings continue to reverberate down the centuries.
‘Among Highlanders, such an act was considered the equal of treason and that is why this event of so long ago retains the power it has to this day,’ she added.