Qualla: Highbridge Skirmish

Highbridge Skirmish: Introduction

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Eleven men and a piper. That was Major Donald MacDonald of Tirindrish's entire force on the morning of 16 August 1745, holding the bridge over the River Spean against eighty-five Royal Scots marching up from Fort Augustus to reinforce Fort William. The MacDonalds did what they had time to do: they ran behind the High Bridge Inn, leapt out of windows, stretched their plaids between them, shouted, and made themselves appear to be five times their actual number. Captain Scott halted his column, sent forward two men to negotiate, and watched both vanish into Jacobite custody. By that evening, after a running fight along Loch Lochy, the Royal Scots had surrendered. The Jacobites had not lost a single man. The 1745 rising had begun.

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Highbridge Skirmish: Reinforcement to a Threatened Fort

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Prince Charles Edward Stuart had landed on the west coast a few weeks earlier and begun assembling a Highland army. Word reached the Governor of Fort Augustus, halfway down the Great Glen, that the Jacobites were gathering. He dispatched two companies of the Second Battalion of t...

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Highbridge Skirmish: The Bluff on the Bridge

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Major Donald MacDonald of Tirindrish had eleven men of Clan MacDonald of Keppoch and a single piper. Tactically, the position was impossible. Numerically, it was farce. So the major and his piper improvised. They used the now-vanished High Bridge Inn as cover, ducking behind wall...

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Highbridge Skirmish: The Long Withdrawal Along Loch Lochy

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

As the Royal Scots turned back the way they had come, fire opened on them from both sides of the road. Other Jacobite bands had been hurrying toward the bridge during the bluff and now closed in. Scott pressed his men along the side of Loch Lochy, intending to reach Invergarry Ca...

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Highbridge Skirmish: Surrender and the Standard at Glenfinnan

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

MacDonald of Keppoch walked alone to Scott's hollow square and offered quarter, with the warning that any further resistance would mean all of them cut down. Scott himself was wounded. Two of his men were dead. He accepted the terms and surrendered. Donald Cameron of Lochiel arri...

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