From Sir Alexander McDonald to H.R.H. giving intelligence of Pretender’s movements
‘Sconsar, Isle of Sky, 1746.
‘Sir,—This morning Capt. Hodgson remitted to your R. Highness all the intelligence I had then got; in rideing a few miles I was informed of the Pretender’s whole progress since he landed in this island. By the letter remitted to your R.H. he was left at Portree, 14 miles from my house near which he landed; at Portree he met one Donald McDonald, who was in the Rebellion, and who put him into a boat belonging to the Isle of Rasay, which feryd him into that island; after staying there 2 nights he returned in the same small boat to the neighbourhood of Portree, attended by one Malcolm McLeod. That night he and his companion lay in a byre; next day (the Pretender in shabby man’s apparel since he left Portree) they found their way into a part of MacKinnon’s estate, and having found MacKinnon, though disguised and lurking himself, he found a boat which next day convey’d the Pretender, MacKinnon, and one John MacKinnon, into Moror. They sail’d from this island on Saturday last. MacKinnon was taken in Moror by a party from Sky, and John McK. was this day seized ... they are both on board the Furnace and confirm to a trifle the above relation.
‘Alex. MacDonald.’[70]
The Baronet tells as little as may be; he does not implicate Flora, and, of course, shields his wife. His own position was awkward.
Sir Alexander died in November 1746, when about to visit Cumberland in England. It is to his credit that he did his best to protect the loyal Kingsburgh. But his vacillations were extreme, and if he really helped to corrupt Barisdale, his behaviour is without excuse. ‘Were I to enumerate the villains and villainies this country abounds in I should never have done,’ wrote Cumberland to the Duke of Newcastle. ‘Some allowance must be made for Sir Alexander’s behaviour in the Forty Five,’ says Mr. Fraser Mackintosh. It was not precisely handsome. The epigram on his death, which has variants, ran thus: