Clanlands: Whisky, Warfare, and a Scottish Adventure Like No Other

by Sam Heughan

And so we come to the House of Stuart (the same family as Bonnie Prince Charlie) which came to the throne in 1371, ruling Scotland for three centuries with James VI inheriting the English throne as well, becoming James I of England, in 1603. Then there’s the bit in the middle where Charles I (also a Stuart) is beheaded in the midst of the chaos of the English Civil War in 1649. Oliver Cromwell presides as Lord Protector until the Scots proclaim Charles II (a sequel Stuart) King of Scotland, which makes Cromwell raging mad and leads to several bloody battles in the ‘Scottish Campaign’, including the Battle of Worcester, after which Charles II is deposed. However, Charles II leads another Stuart comeback in 1660 and is restored to the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland and all is well again. Until it’s James VII’s (James II of England) turn to mess everything up again by converting to Catholicism, which gets the English Protestants’ knickers in a twist, so they depose him in 1688 and install first cousins from the House of Hanover, William and Mary, meaning inbreeding was totally fine just so long as they weren’t Catholics! James VII (II of England) flees to France and tries to return by invading Ireland but loses the Battle of the Boyne in 1690 and spends the rest of his life in France, living off Louis XIV.