I've often stood on the battlefield site at Culloden. It's usually been overcast and dreich as we'd say. Very occasionally I've been there on a sunny day when the wind has dropped and the curlew takes to the air.

At some point, standing as I've always been in my Hunting Fraser kilt, I've wondered just what it must have been like to be on the opposing government lines. What must have been going through their heads as they looked across the bog and heather at hundreds upon hundreds of what they thought of as savages. I know the 'tartan' that was being worn and the kilts of the day were unlike what we wear now, for the most part, but it must have been quite a sight.

Stripped to the waist, sword or dagger and, perhaps, a targe in hand, long hair stuck across their faces in the sleet and rain, my ancestors must have known they were going to their deaths. They were not stupid. They knew that their steel was no match for grapeshot and cannon. But still they knew they had one thing their opponents did not.

The Highland charge must have been breath-taking. To see your enemy so charged up and willing to come into a hail of bullets and schrapnel nonetheless must have made you shudder as you reloaded, hoping you'd down enough of the screaming banshees before they got to YOU!

It's no wonder that the redcoats in their handsewn finery, as opposed to the tartan hordes in their loose dress, wanted to obliterate the memory, nay the very existence of these kilt-wearing warriors, so much that the atrocities and restrictions that followed were almost inevitable.

To the men on my family's side of the field, their homespun kilts were just their daily wear. To the government, they were a symbol of untameable savagery that had to be put down, at any cost. The burning of crofts, impregnating of wives by rape and driving off of cattle were designed to crush a culture beyond existence.

Thank heavens enough of the few that survived could carry on. The wounded that weren't butchered and the women that lived with their violation saw to it to pass on their memories. We owe them a great debt each time we wrap our cloth around our waist..

Slainte, in their memory...

Bruce