‘People tend to think it was a Campbell–MacDonald thing but it was more about the government trying to make an example of a small clan so they could stop posting troops to a costly garrison in the Highlands and relocate their soldiers to conflicts in Europe,’ says Derek. The idea was to get the clans to sign an oath of allegiance and those who didn’t (who refused or were too slow) were to be made an example of with the ‘utmost extremity of the law’.
