Colonel Alasdair Ranaldson MacDonell of Glengarry (1773-1828) was a personality well known to Walter Scott, a haughty and flamboyant man whose character and behaviour gave Scott the model for the wild Highland clan chieftain Fergus Mac-Ivor in the pioneering historical novel Waverley of 1810. As was customary for the chieftain of a clan, he was often called simply "Glengarry".
He was born on 15 September 1773[1] and became the 15th chief of Clan MacDonell of Glengarry in 1788, and in 1794 he raised troops for a regiment of Fencibles. As part of their uniform he invented (or adopted) the Glengarry,[2] a type of cap which he wears in his portrait. The boat-shaped cap without a peak is made of thick-milled woollen material with a toorie (or bobble) on top and ribbons hanging down behind, capable of being folded flat. It has become part of the uniform of a number of Scottish regiments, with variations in the band around above the brim and in the colours.
He bitterly feuded with Thomas Telford and the Commissioners of the Caledonian Canal as it was being constructed through his land, though he collected useful dues from them.
Glengarry considered himself the last genuine specimen of a Highland chief, always wore the Highland dress (kilt or trews) and in the style of his ancestors seldom travelled without being followed by his "tail", servants in full Highland dress with weaponry who had traditional duties like carrying his sword and shield, standing sentinel, acting as bard and carrying him dry across streams.
He was a member of the Highland Society of Scotland and the Celtic Society of Edinburgh, and in June 1815 he formed his own Society of True Highlanders, subsequently leaving the Celtic Society and complaining that "their general appearance is assumed and fictitious, and they have no right to burlesque the national character or dress of Highlands". His mortification at the acceptance of Lowlanders became bitter complaint about the prominent role the Celtic Society had in the visit of King George IV to Scotland, and he made several unauthorised and flamboyant appearances during the visit, to the annoyance of Walter Scott and the other organisers but causing only mild amusement to the King.
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Clearances
Although Scott wrote in his misleading hagiography "He is a kind of Quixote in our age, having retained, in their full extent, the whole feelings of clanship and chieftainship, elsewhere so long abandoned", under his authority timber was felled for sale, the cleared land was leased to sheep farmers and many of his clansmen were forced from the land by increasing rents and evictions. This continued the evictions to make way for sheep farmers which his mother began when his father was chieftain, and most of the clan was forced to go to British North America in part of what was later known as the Highland Clearances. Robert Burns wrote a satirical poem about him in the Address of Beelzebub.
His life was in stark contrast to his contemporary relative Bishop Alexander MacDonell who did missionary duty in Lochaber and tried to help his clansmen displaced by the substitution of sheep-farms for smallholdings to get employment in the Lowlands. In 1794 he organised formation of the 1st Glengarry fencible regiment under Alasdair Ranaldson MacDonell with himself appointed chaplain. When the regiment was disbanded Father MacDonell arranged a tract of land in Canada in 1804 and went with them.
Death and posterity
In January 1828 Alasdair Ranaldson perished trying to escape from a steamer which had gone aground. According to the Inverness Courier, the funeral procession of five miles from Invergarry to Kilfinnan was followed by 1,500 men and 150 gentry, the coffin being carried breast-high by 18 Highlanders. Glengarry's personal piper, Archie Munro, composed a lament, as did the blind household bard, Allan MacDougall. As Brian Osborne records, "In Edinburgh Sir Walter Scott was moved to compose Glengarry's Death Song, an undoubted expression of his genuine affection for the dead chief, if not perhaps a work of the greatest literary quality".[3]
As Glengarry's estate was very much mortgaged and encumbered his son was forced to sell it and move to Australia with his family. The estate was purchased by the Marquis of Huntly, and in 1840 it was sold to Lord Ward, Earl of Dudley, then in 1860 his lordship sold it to Edward Ellice.
References
- ^ Brian D. Osborne, The Last of the Chiefs (Argyll Publishing, 2001)
- ^ Prebble 2000, p. 371 states that MacDonell invented the cap. However, "Glengarry Cap - Diced --- Scots Connection". http://www.scotsconnection.com/2bl2an408699/Kilt-Accessories/Scots-Bonnets/Glengarry-Cap---Diced-/p-214-240-1465/. Retrieved on 2009-02-01. states that the idea came from Balmoral bonnet wearers who bent and creased their bonnets, then was popularised by MacDonell when he raised the Glengarry Fencibles and made the Glengarry bonnet part of their uniform.
- ^ The Last of the Chiefs, at page 226
- The King's Jaunt, John Prebble, Birlinn Limited, Edinburgh 2000, ISBN 1-84158-068-6
- The Highland Clearances, John Prebble, Penguin Books, 1963, ISBN 0-14-002837-4
External links
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