11 research outputs found
Fatal land: war, empire, and the Highland soldier in British America, 1756-1783
This thesis examines the experiences and impacts of the deployment of Highland soldiers
to North America in the mid to late-eighteenth century. Between 1756 and 1783, Britain
sent ten Highland battalions to the North American theatre, where they fought for the
duration of both the Seven Years‟ War and the War of American Independence. The
pressures of recruiting, utilizing, and demobilizing these men created powerful new
forces in the Scottish Highlands, occurring, and in some cases prefiguring, the region‟s
severe socio-economic problems. The impact of military contributions to the imperial
state also had significant implications for Gaelic self-perception and the politics of
loyalty and interest. This thesis asserts the importance of imperial contacts in shaping
the development of the Scottish Highlands within the British state. Rejecting the
narrative of a centrifugal empire based on military subjugation, this thesis argues that
Gaels, of all social groups, constructed their own experiences of empire, having
tremendous agency in how that relationship was formed. The British Empire was not
constructed only through the extension or strengthening of state apparatus in various
geographical spaces. It was formed by the decision of local actors to willingly embrace
the perceived advantages of empire. Ultimately, the disproportionately large Highland
commitment to military service was a largely negative force in the Highlands. This
thesis establishes, however, the importance of political and ideological imperatives which
drove these decisions, imperatives that were predicated on inter-peripheral contacts with
British America. It establishes the extent to which Highland soldiers willingly ensured
the development of British imperialism in the late eighteenth century
‘All spirited likely young lads’: free men of colour, the defence of Jamaica, and subjecthood during the American War for Independence
The American War for Independence provided opportunities across the British
Americas for people of African descent to embrace military service as a means of
enhancing their rights. In Jamaica wartime disagreements between imperial officials
and the planter elite gave free men of colour an opportunity to lay claim to fairer
treatment and the rights of subjecthood through military service. By examining a
series of unique and unprecedented petitions and recruiting proclamations, this article
reconstructs the creation of the Jamaica Rangers in 1782 and reveals how free men
challenged the racial hierarchies of the island and coalesced politically a decade
before scholars have previously recognised the emergence of community
mobilisation
Through an Imperial Prism: Land, Liberty, and Highland Loyalism in the War of American Independence
John A. Burnett, The Making of the Modern Scottish Highlands, 1939-1965: Withstanding the ‘colossus of advancing materialism.’
John A. Burnett, The Making of the Modern Scottish Highlands, 1939-1965: Withstanding the ‘colossus of advancing materialism.’ Ulster and Scotland Series. Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2011. Pp. 312. 978-1-84682-241-4. €55.00
John A. Burnett, The Making of the Modern Scottish Highlands, 1939-1965: Withstanding the ‘colossus of advancing materialism.’
John A. Burnett, The Making of the Modern Scottish Highlands, 1939-1965: Withstanding the ‘colossus of advancing materialism.’ Ulster and Scotland Series. Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2011. Pp. 312. 978-1-84682-241-4. €55.00
John A. Burnett, <i>The Making of the Modern Scottish Highlands, 1939-1965: Withstanding the ‘colossus of advancing materialism.’</i>
John A. Burnett, The Making of the Modern Scottish Highlands, 1939-1965: Withstanding the ‘colossus of advancing materialism.’ Ulster and Scotland Series. Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2011. Pp. 312. 978-1-84682-241-4. €55.00
Egypt, Empire, and the Gaelic Literary Imagination
This article presents an edition, translation, and analysis of a Scottish Gaelic song by the Reverend Seumas MacLagain [James McLagan] (1728-1805) about the battle of Alexandria of 1801. This text, which has not received any previous scholarly attention, is a rare illustration of an attempt of a member of the Gaelic intelligentsia to re-frame Gaelic identity and history so as to reconcile them with the agenda of British imperialism. While largely unmentioned in analysis of Gaelic Scotland, the victory in Egypt was a crucial moment that was used by McLagan and others to draw the Gaidhealtachd into a British sphere more completely than ever before. By exploring the motifs, formulas, and devices used by McLagan in his song, and contrasting them with other Gaelic and pan-British approaches to the victory in Egypt, this article challenges assumptions about the nature of Gaelic military song in this era and suggests the importance of British imperialism to the Gaelic literary imagination in the early nineteenth century
Egypt, Empire, and the Gaelic Literary Imagination
This article presents an edition, translation, and analysis of a Scottish Gaelic song by the Reverend Seumas MacLagain [James McLagan] (1728-1805) about the battle of Alexandria of 1801. This text, which has not received any previous scholarly attention, is a rare illustration of an attempt of a member of the Gaelic intelligentsia to re-frame Gaelic identity and history so as to reconcile them with the agenda of British imperialism. While largely unmentioned in analysis of Gaelic Scotland, the victory in Egypt was a crucial moment that was used by McLagan and others to draw the Gaidhealtachd into a British sphere more completely than ever before. By exploring the motifs, formulas, and devices used by McLagan in his song, and contrasting them with other Gaelic and pan-British approaches to the victory in Egypt, this article challenges assumptions about the nature of Gaelic military song in this era and suggests the importance of British imperialism to the Gaelic literary imagination in the early nineteenth century
The United States of America
"The United States of America" in "The Americas", Annual Bulletin of Historical Literature 94 (2010), 171-20