Making History

THE photo of the Hielan Coos above was sent to me by my friend Ron a couple of months ago. The old sap reckoned kissing coos would be perfect for February issue and St Valentine’s Day.

Unfortunately, I totally forgot about it but decided to use it now as, because of the Covid-19 lockdown, I haven’t done anything interesting for months…

I figured the cows would cheer us up a bit.

As ever, April issue of your favourite read is packed with fantastic content. This magazine is on sale from April 15 – the following day is the 275th anniversary of the Battle of Culloden.

For most of us, it’s just a date in a history – something we learned pretty much by rote in school. Like the Battle of Hastings 1066, or Bannockburn 1314.

For The Scots Magazine, Culloden 1746 is different. As regular readers will know, I’m always boasting about this being the oldest magazine in the world still in publication. Founded seven years before the fateful battle, the magazine carried reports of events as they unfolded.

In that April edition 275 years ago, The Scots Magazine published letters from those who fought and witnessed the carnage of a battle that changed not just the course of Scotland’s history, but altered our culture forever.

Reading the material in our archives is humbling. It turns a dry date in a textbook into something real – something tangible and visceral. Real people, real lives.

The letters talk of the slicing and cutting of the fight, of shot as thick as hail. And, of the aftermath, how no quarter was given as the screaming wounded were slaughtered where they lay.

The anguish of their writers’ is obvious – and incredibly moving.

You can read some of what they wrote in our special section commemorating the terrible events of that day, starting on page 58.

It gives you a unique and unforgettable insight into one of the most tumultuous periods of our history.