Scottish Clearances

**creagdhubh** · 15th July 13, 12:29 PM

Originally Posted by English Bloke

Thufferin' Thuccotash... Those darned pesky English. Even their sheep can't be trusted!!

Hahahaha! I guess not, John.

**McClef** · 15th July 13, 01:33 PM

The attacks on Prebble that have been cited appear to politically motivated and there is indeed no love lost between certain factions which I could comment upon but won't due to the rules.

Prebble is famous for covering disastrous events in Scottish history and in a way that the facts are always presented which may guide the reader in a certain direction without leading them by the nose. How does one politicise a bridge? (as in The High Girders about the first Tay Bridge?

There is nothing I have read in his work with regard to facts that cannot be verified from experience and study.

**JonathanB** · 15th July 13, 01:55 PM

Originally Posted by McClef

...
Prebble is famous for covering disastrous events in Scottish history and in a way that the facts are always presented which may guide the reader in a certain direction without leading them by the nose.
There is nothing I have read in his work with regard to facts that cannot be verified from experience and study.

That sounds convincing to me. But there was a sense I got in reading Culloden that he piled lots of accurate human interest stories up and left the reader to make the inevitable (to him) Marxist connection. But he didn't tell you how to get from A to B. And whether or not you have a socialist state, human beings with power and status tend to hang on to power and status at the expense of human beings without them.

**Nathan** · 15th July 13, 02:16 PM

Comment placed here in error and has been moved to another more relevant thread.

**McClef** · 15th July 13, 03:04 PM

This thread is about the Clearances, not Culloden.

The folk of Bettyhill have an annual commemoration of how their ancestors were forced to the coast and the name of Leveson-Gower is as hated in Golspie today despite the pretty palace that was built from the profits.

I was at university with a guy from Golspie and what he told me fits in perfectly with what Prebble wrote.

**BBNC** · 18th July 13, 03:08 AM

I wish to thank the rabble for all the useful information. I had the Clearances and Plantations confused. It got me to prowling around the net where I discovered Lowland Scots were involved in James VI's "Plantations." The Plantations were not like the Clearances where tenants were removed from the land, but rather more on the idea of England's Jamestown Plantation in the New World, where landowners were offered estates in the colonies, notably Ulster in Ireland. This brings me a bit closer to my Scottish ancestry. Another piece of the puzzle, so to speak.

**tripleblessed** · 19th July 13, 01:58 AM

Across history, people have left their homes for a wide variety of reasons. When the numbers are as large as
those of the Clearings and/or the Ulster Plantation and other similar "opportunities", you can be virtually certain
you won't find the truth or even much of the story in the writings of those who remained.

**JohntheBiker** · 19th July 13, 05:51 AM

Originally Posted by tripleblessed

Across history, people have left their homes for a wide variety of reasons. When the numbers are as large as
those of the Clearings and/or the Ulster Plantation and other similar "opportunities", you can be virtually certain
you won't find the truth or even much of the story in the writings of those who remained.

History is almost always written by the winners (however you like to define that).

**tundramanq** · 19th July 13, 07:19 AM

The video is really beautiful and informative. I will now wear my Scott Green Weathered with even more pride. Even though I am unsure if Sir Walter Scott was actually a Border Scott. The clan pages I perused kind of skirted this issue.

**Peter Crowe** · 19th July 13, 08:11 AM

Originally Posted by tundramanq

The video is really beautiful and informative. I will now wear my Scott Green Weathered with even more pride. Even though I am unsure if Sir Walter Scott was actually a Border Scott. The clan pages I perused kind of skirted this issue.

About Sir Walter Scott, Chuck, his family were a cadet branch of the Scotts of Buccleuch (Border Scotts) and his ancestor was the 'Bold Buccleuch' (Walter Scott of Buccleuch and Branxholme) who sprung the Border Reiver Kinmont Willie from Carlisle Castle. Sometime later he was asked why he dared commit such a presumptious deed by Queen Elizabeth I of England, and famously replied "Madam, there is nothing a man may not dare to do!"