The Battle of Culloden

April 16, 1746

As the long, late afternoon shadows of April 14, 1746 crept away toward the shores of Ireland and points west the Cameron men arrived in Inverness.  Their urgent fifty mile march, which in only two days time had brought them from their beloved land of Lochaber to the capital of the Highlands, left many in Lochiel's regiment exhausted.  Nevertheless, mustering at the Bridge-end they were only in town for less than two hours before hearing the Duke of Cumberland's Hanoverian forces were at Nairn, just twelve miles north-east.  They immediately set-off for Drummossie Moor, five miles distant, where Prince Charles Edward Stuart's Jacobite troops were assembled.

In the early evening light Donald Cameron of Lochiel, XIX Captain and Chief of Clan Cameron is said to have gazed upon the hill by Culloden House where the entire body of the army, some 3800 men, "lay upon the ground among the furze and trees of Culloden Wood."  Their ranks would swell to approximately 4500 with the arrival of these 700 "sons of the hound."  Many of these men had been about the Inverness area for two months now waiting for Cumberland's approach; their wait would soon come to an abrupt end.

That evening Lochiel joined his Jacobite peers and Prince Charles at their quarters in Culloden House.  The Prince's "person" was well protected that evening, as the Cameron men had been assigned to "mount guard" upon him.  This area of Drummossie Moor, commonly referred to as Culloden Moor, was the topic which garnered their immediate attention.  It was a "flat and featureless stretch of plain, just the sort of terrain the Hanoverians preferred and where their tactical strengths-large bodies of men, fighting as units, and powerful artillery-could be put to use with the greatest advantage."  The Chief of Clan Cameron, along with Lord George Murray and numerous other chiefs, strongly urged the Prince to abandon this site as it was in the words of Murray "not proper for Highlanders."  Both of Murray's well conceived alternatives, namely rough ground close to Dalcross Castle and a tract of "hill and boggy" land on the south side of the River Nairn were rejected by Prince Charles.  In his thoughts it was either a major battle near Culloden House (a country house on the road the enemy must take to reach Inverness) or facing the loss of Inverness.  The choice of Culloden Moor was made by one of the few advisors which the 25 year old Prince trusted, his Quartermaster and Adjutant-General John William O'Sullivan, a man neither respected nor liked by the Highland chiefs.  As these leaders among men diplomatically discussed the fate of common clansmen, the remaining unoccupied Camerons managed to somehow "get some sacks of meal and were able to bake bread," supplementing the army's given ration of one single biscuit daily.  Soon they would join their fellow Highlanders, wrapped amidst their own tartan, sleeping under the stars on the softened springtime ground.

Early the next morning, the 15th, Prince Charles had the Jacobite soldiers drawn up in order of battle outside of Culloden House, awaiting Cumberland's estimated 8,500 men.  Unknown to the Prince it was the young Duke's 25th birthday.  Consequently, his "well paid and fed" Hanoverian troops earned a day's rest, toasting their "savage disciplinarian" with brandy that Cumberland had distributed among them.  By late morning the Hanoverian troops had still not arrived; reports from the few Jacobite advance scouts stated that they hadn't even broken camp.

Along with this delay came serious complications.  First and foremost the Prince's army had finally run out of food.  Around noontime the soldiers were given what amounted to their last meal, once again a single biscuit.  It is believed that the Camerons fared better than many of the other clansmen, having replenished themselves with meal while in Lochaber.  Nevertheless, they too were feeling the effects of starvation, malnutrition and disease.  Once the army was ordered to "stand down" as many as one third of the Highlanders went in search of food.  Some ventured into Inverness, others foraged west of the River Ness into The Aird.  The Jacobite leaders witnessed their ranks shrinking and knew that they couldn't survive as an organized army any longer without food.  The battle had to come immediately.

"If Cumberland could not be brought to Culloden, Murray reasoned, the Jacobites could go to Nairn."  A surprise night march upon the Hanoverian forces, a tactic which resulted in overwhelming victory for Prince Charles at the battle of Prestonpans, was suggested and approved.  They reasoned that the majority of the enemy would be drunk, tired and ill prepared to form up and defend themselves.  The Hanoverian artillery would not be able to come into play and the Jacobite's specialty, hand-to-hand combat, would prevail.

At eight o'clock that evening a "significant portion" (about 3,500 men) of their army set off for Nairn.  Their departure was delayed due to the necessity of waiting for the arrival of recalled troops, who were searching for food.  "In his joyous excitement at the prospect of victory, Charles was moved to embrace Murray, thanking him for all that he had done..."  The Camerons were in the van, along with the Stewarts of Appin and Lord George who was with "his" Athollmen (a total van of 1,200 men.)  Led and guided by officers of Clan Mackintosh (for this was their clan territory) the Jacobites slogged on in darkness across the wet moorland which was heavy with fog.  It was "trackless moor with sudden quagmires and earth which moved underfoot."  Even though the advance guard was averaging a conservative pace (about two miles per hour) its progress was far too rapid for the heavily encumbered main body.  Murray's van had to repeatedly stop, letting the main body catch up.  Many of the Highlanders were dropping out from hunger and fatigue, literally passing out before hitting the ground.  Finally Lochiel approached Lord Murray, telling him that the attempt must be called off, citing exhaustion, disorganization and time slipping away.  Murray wrote "...it was near two in the morning; and having still four long miles (to go), it was found impractical to be near the enemy till it was within an hour of day-light, and as our hope was surprising them, and attacking them before day, we were forced to give up."  Lochiel was assigned the unpleasant task of riding back to where Charles accompanied the army "to face his Princely wrath by telling him likewise; the army must retreat."  Objections and cries of "betrayal" were thrown at Lochiel by Prince Charles, nevertheless he ordered their about face.  Riding among the men he proclaimed quite loudly, over the rumbling stomachs of the men, "Tis no matter then. March back! We shall meet them later and behave like brave fellows."

"Dawn came, a sullen dawn with rain imminent."  The majority of the weary soldiers arrived back at Culloden Moor that Wednesday between 5 and 6 a.m., though many would come wandering into camp for the next few hours.  Men from each regiment were sent into Inverness in an attempt to once again procure food for the soldiers, most of whom were fast asleep.  Lord George Murray once again proposed retreat, either to Inverness or dispersing to the hills, reforming and fighting south of the River Nairn.  "The Prince rejected these ideas, arguing that Cumberland would be at an advantage at Inverness, that, short of food, the clansmen could not afford to retreat to the Highlands and that to fight south of the Nairn would be to expose Inverness."  Lochiel and the other chiefs agreed with Murray, but out of loyalty obeyed the Prince's wishes.  Charles supposed intention was to feed the men, let them have some well deserved rest and attempt the same surprise march that evening.  He managed to obtain a little bread and whiskey, after which he too was fast asleep.

With the arrival of the imminent rain, and rising winds, also came a messenger. "About 8 o'clock, Cameron, a Lieutenant in Lochiel's Regiment, (who had been left asleep near the place where the halt was made [the prior night]) came to Culloden House, where Charles and his principal officers lodged, and informed them that he had seen the Duke's army in full march toward them."  The officers immediately set out for their regiments, where the pipers wailed, drums beat to arms and trumpets sounded, waking the men for battle.  Prince Charles soon rode onto the moor south of Culloden House on a grey gelding, at the head of the Camerons.  "Go on my lads" he cried, "the day will be ours!" were the final words of inspiration which the Cameron men would hear from their Prince when they took the field at "Cul lodain," "the back of the swamp."

Despite a recent influx of recalled troops, a large number of Jacobites were still away seeking food or sleeping in remote locations ("for some, a thousand or more, even the rant of their clan, squeezed from the bag, was not enough to waken them.")  Including many last minute regimental arrivals Lord Murray estimated 3,000 troops were formed up on the moor that day, other reputable estimates range anywhere from 4,000 to 5,500 men.  Regardless of their numbers these men were "visibly damp and dejected."

In the midst of preparation for the battle of Culloden the Camerons, Stewarts of Appin and the Athollmen were given the honor of being positioned in the first line of the Jacobite right flank.  Since this was a position traditionally reserved for the men of Clan MacDonald, many ill feelings passed between the army's opposite flanks.  "The storm was abating, the rain giving way to drizzle and then to overcast with fitful sunshine, though the wind continued to blow.  The drenching had wetted the men's muskets and powder horns, which meant that the weapons might or might not fire."

At 11 AM some Cameron and Mackintosh men, posted in advance of the army, first saw the coming of Cumberland's army.  Initially they only heard their drums.  They waited to make visual confirmation and then slipped back to the Highland line, where their clansmen had been standing in formation for hours.  Before long the Highlanders lifted their heads, looking into and through the intermittent "sleet-like rain" which was striking their faces, and saw their red coated enemies.

The Camerons, Stewarts of Appin and the Athollmen made up the right flank's first line.  The men of Atholl were positioned on the far right "with their flank resting on the dry-stone wall of the Culwhinia enclosure."  Between them and the Stewarts was Lochiel's regiment.  A reported 700 men, mainly from Lochaber, were there in Lochiel's formation, mostly consisting of Camerons but also known to include a few men from at least the following clans and septs: Fraser, Grants, MacDonald, MacDougall, MacHoule, MacKenzie, MacLachlan, MacLeod, MacMartin, MacMillan, MacNeill, MacOllonie, MacPhee and even a few men from Clan Campbell.  Nevertheless, this was a Clan Cameron regiment, accompanied by their septs and various tenants from Lochiel's estate.

"Before each clan stood the chief...With him were his henchmen and his piper, and a small bodyguard formed by two of the best men from each company of the clan.  With the companies in line, captained by cadets of the chieftain's family, or by chiefs of smaller septs, were two lieutenants and two ensigns, and they, too, were chief's sons or the sons of sons.  The first ranks of each company consisted of men who may have held land or had no land at all, but who were, in the geology of their society, placed among the strata of gentlemen...Behind them stood those with lesser claims to gentility, and behind again yet another rank, so that in some clans the ranks were six deep. In the rear of all stood the wild and bearded humblies...But these common men, disposed themselves by families, brothers and sons about the father, for it was in the tradition of their hills that the oldest and most respected should stand closest to the enemy, and that inspiration and courage should pass through father, brother, son, tenant and servant."

The composition of Lochiel's front rank may be surmised from the above description, beginning with Lochiel himself.  Donald Cameron of Lochiel, the future XIX Chief of Clan Cameron (sometimes referred to as the "Young Lochiel" or "Gentle Lochiel") was the Captain/Commander of the regiment.  He was flanked by his two brothers, Lieutenant Colonel Dr. Archibald Cameron and Reverend Father Alexander Cameron, along with a bodyguard of two picked men from each company of the regiment.  Also with the chief was his principal aide and captain of one company, Allan Cameron of Callart.  Along side was Lochiel's second in command, Donald Cameron of Erracht.  Third in command was Major Alexander Cameron of Dungallon, the brother-in-law of Dr. Archibald Cameron, leading men from Glen Hurich, Sunart and Ardnamurchan.  While Dungallon's son functioned in the capacity of Standard Bearer to the Prince, Donald Mor Cameron and Alexander MacLachlan of Coruanan, by choice and hereditary right upheld Lochiel's seven foot by five foot banner of red fabric, bearing Lochiel's complete armorial achievement.  Although the clan had apparently begun to rally under the motto "Aonaibh Ri Cheile" the banner still had the prior motto, "Pro Rege et Patria" emblazoned upon it, with the dexter arm holding a sword.  The remaining front rank consisted of officers from the many cadet branches of Clan Cameron.  Ewen Cameron of Dawnie led a body of Camerons of Glenevis.  Ewen Cameron of Inverlochy, acting as a captain, led the men from his lands north of Fort William.  Further down the line was a menacing figure, six foot-seven inch Captain Hugh Cameron.  Lieutenant Colonel Ludovic Cameron of Torcastle (Lochiel's uncle) was also there, with the remainder of the 300 Camerons which he raised for the Jacobites.  Most notably among the numerous sergeants who followed these gentlemen were Ian Dubh (Sergeant John/Big John) Cameron and Malcom (Whiskie) Cameron.  These were just two of the men who would lead the Camerons of the rear ranks.  All told there were seven Cameron Captains, an adjutant and fourteen subalterns.  Within the regiment there were also contingents from the numerous tribes of Clan Cameron, under their respective chiefs and leaders, most notably Cameron of Strone at the head of the Macgillonies and a contingent of MacMillans from Loch Arkaig under their own officers.  Many varied "Camerons" would fight for Lochiel that Wednesday afternoon, most of their names died along with them on the battlefield.

Not only among Lochiel's regiment were Camerons to be found.  As the Hanoverian army advanced onto Culloden Moor they were greeted by Camerons in nearly every Jacobite regiment.  Progressing down the front line, past the aforementioned right wing, one would next come upon the 300 men of Clan Fraser.  The Camerons among this battalion were mostly tenants on Lord Lovat's lands centered just east of nearby Beauly.  To their immediate left were the 500 men of Clan Chattan, a confederation of clans made up mostly of Mackintoshes.  Among these men, who had yet to see action in the uprising, were Camerons from Nairn and other towns near the battlefield.  Their leader, lieutenant-colonel Alexander MacGillivray of Dunmaglass, seems also to have commanded the next regiment on the front line, the Farquharsons; Camerons were among them as well.  Moving ahead one would encounter the numerous MacDonald regiments, under the command of Lord James Drummond, The Duke of Perth.  Among these 1,000 angry soldiers were Cameron farmers from Glen Urquhart.  Cameron men were also dispersed among the second line of the Jacobite army, providing, when considered along with the front line, that the clan would participate in every aspect of the upcoming battle.

At about 1 p.m., with the sky darkening and rain "driving" into the Highlander's faces, the first shot was fired.  It came from one of the 12 "ill-manned" Jacobite four and six pounder cannons which were dispersed among the right, left and center of the front line, 500 yards from the enemy.  "The Rebel ball passed over Lord Bury's indifferent head...and came down somewhere in the rear, cutting a soldier in half.  The Jacobite guns were not to improve upon that."  The numerous field pieces of Cumberland's Royal Artillery responded.  "The high moor shuddered, the Rebel lines were at once hidden by the smoke, and the gunners could see their black shot passing smoothly into the fog."  Less than ten minutes later, whether from lack of ammunition or skilled gunners, the ineffective Jacobite cannons fell silent.  The Hanoverian barrage continued.  "Above the rolling, rumbling discharge, and the screams of those who had been hit, officers of the clans shouted desperately `Close up! Close up!...' And the clansmen closed the gaps the round-shot made, but they looked over their shoulders to the rear, or cried back at their officers, demanding the order to charge."  The Highlanders endured this attack for twenty to twenty-five minutes, during which they lost an estimated one-third of their men.  It is said that the order to charge was given by Prince Charles, with the young messenger soon joined the mounting round-shot casualties, never reaching the commanders with the orders.

In the meanwhile the men of Clan Campbell were busy within the Culwhinia enclosure, readying a treacherous surprise for the Highlanders.  Initially ordered to post guard at the Hanoverian baggage train, a significant number of them advanced through the enclosure, being separated from the Jacobites by a four foot tall stone wall.  The Camerons and Athollmen saw the Argyll militia's movement on their right, a few hundred yards off.  Soon Lochiel approached Lord Murray with his concerns about being flanked.  Murray had earlier expressed similar concerns with O'Sullivan, who simply ignored him.  The Campbells took the Culwhinia enclosure and heavily manned its north wall.  They were soon joined by 500 cavalry dragoons, commanded by General Henry Hawley.  With the Campbell pibroch sounding through the rain against the rant of their ancient enemies, Hawley addressed Commander Colin Campbell of Ballimore in regard to the wall: "Pull it down!"

"Because they were nearest to the enemy, three hundred paces from Sergeant Edward Bristow's guns on the flanks of Barrell's and Munro's, the Atholl Brigade and the Cameron men suffered most.  Lochiel, a pistol in one hand and a sword in the other, stood angrily before his men, and heard the balls whispering past to kill them. He sent a kinsman to Lord George, saying that he would be able to hold his clan in check no longer, they were `galled by the enemy's cannon and were turned so impatient that they were like to break their ranks.'  Lord George, no less angry with his vacillating Prince, sent an officer to Charles urging the order to advance."

Enduring more than was humanly possible the men of Clan Chattan bravely broke ranks and charged.  The Cameron men threw down their firearms in disgust, grasped their trusted swords and Lochaber axes tightly, pulled their tartan kilts high to the groin and with the unearthly snarl of a Highland yell coming deep from within disappeared into the black gunpowder smoke soon after the Mackintoshes.  The sons of the hound had come to get meat.

The Hanoverians were blinded by the smoke as well, nevertheless, they could most definitely hear the Highland charge.  The Royal Artillery immediately changed from ball to grape-shot.  "No powder was ladled into the barrels this time, but a paper case rammed home and containing charge, leaden balls, nails and old iron."  "In mid-field, Appin Stewarts and Camerons collided with Clan Chattan, and for a moment the charge halted. Or perhaps it was halted by the first murderous discharge of grape, the balls and the iron whispering and whistling their killing way. Father stumbled over son, brother over brother in the sudden slaughter. Then the charge came on, but now the Appin men and Camerons swung to the right like animals shying in alarm, and they drove for the left of the Royal line."

Just as the Camerons were nearing Barrell's and Munro's regiments, on the aforementioned Royal left flank, Lochiel went down.  It is said that while advancing at the head of his regiment that he had just fired his pistol and was in the act of drawing his sword when the grape-shot broke both of his ankles.  One account has him leaning up on his elbows in the dirt, fifty yards from the action, watching his clan engage the enemy.  "Barrell's and Munro's had held their fire until the bobbing, yelling faces were within twenty yards of them, and then there was time for one volley only from each rank."  One Hanoverian soldier later remarked "We had some hundreds of them breathless on the ground.  They rallied, and before our left could load (they) came again like lions to the charge, sword in hand..."  The furious "leaping, kilted" Highlanders were then upon them.

First and foremost the nearby artillery units were taken out of action.  "Sergeant Bristow, at his guns between these battalions, fired grape from both, one discharge and then he was chopped down by a Cameron sword, as were Bombardier Paterson and Gunner Edward Hust.  All three crawled beneath the wheels of their guns, with terrible wounds from which they were not to die until two months later."  Even their new bayonet training, a technique in which thrusts were directed not at the Highlander in front of them, rather at the one to the right, did not adequately prepare the Hanoverian soldiers for such an onslaught.

"They climbed over their dead, which soon lay four deep, and they hacked at the muskets with such maniacal fury that far down the line men could hear the iron clang of sword on barrel."   "The fight was confused and bitter and the (Hanoverian) line swayed, Barrell's lion standard of blue dipping at the center.  Lord Robert Kerr, captain of the grenadiers, received the first charging Cameron on the point of his spontoon, but then a second cut him through the head to chin.  Stewarts and Camerons flooded through the gap of the guns and cut at the grenadiers of Munro's as well as Barrell's.  Some ran to the rear where Lieutenant-Colonel Rich of Barrell's was standing on foot.  He held out his slender sword to parry the swing of a broadsword and both hand and sword were cut from his wrist."  A captain of Munro's later recounted that "I thank God I escaped free, but my coat has six balls through it.  In the midst of this action the officer that led on the Camerons called to me to take quarter, which I refused and bid the rebel scoundrel advance.  He did, and fired at me, but providentially missed his mark.  I then shot him dead and took his pistol and dirk..."

Lord George Murray was there along with the Camerons. His "spirited" horse took him past the Hanoverian battalion guns to the rear of the Royals, where he dismounted and fought his way back to the Camerons.  Realizing that they needed reinforcements he and his broken sword would soon run across the moor, screaming for the second line to advance.  "The attack was made with the greatest courage, order and bravery, amidst the hottest fire of small arms and continued fire of cannon with grape-shot, on their flanks, front and rear.  They ran upon the points of the bayonets, hewed down the soldiers with their broadswords and drove them back..."

Barrell's regiment was "in reality completely beat aside."  In the meanwhile Wolfe's flanking regiment continued its enfilade firing (which had already decimated the Athollmen to the Cameron's right) into the assembled Camerons and Stewarts of Appin.  A young Major James Wolfe wrote on the following day that the Camerons were "the bravest clan amongst them."  The Camerons continued pressing through the lines, and Barrell's regiment bore the brunt of their fury.  "Still more of Barrell's platoons fell back to form with Semphill's (in the second line) and the ground between the first and second line began to fill with clansmen."  "For a moment, and it was a very short moment, it seemed as though the Camerons were to sweep Barrell's away.  They broke into and through its center, striking down four officers there...in this close confusion, where a man had no room to swing a sword or to lunge with the bayonet, the clansmen stabbed and thrust with the dirks in their left hands."  "...such was the impetuosity of the onset, that they (Barrell's and Munro's) would have been entirely cut to pieces had they not been immediately supported by two regiments from the second line, on the approach of which they retired behind the regiments on the right..."  In this seemingly short period of time the Camerons and Stewarts reportedly delivered upon Munro's 19 dead and 63 wounded.  Barrell's did much worse, with 120 dead or wounded later recorded.  "...although it was on its left that the Royal Army suffered the greatest loss, the figures were nothing against the dead and dying of Lord Murray's clans."

One Hanoverian soldier recounted the action against the Camerons and Stewarts and his English colonel's words: "He bid the men push home with their bayonets, and was so well obeyed that hundreds perished on their points."  "After breaking through these two regiments on their right, the Highlanders (Camerons and Stewarts) passing by the two field-pieces which had annoyed them in front, hurried forward to attack the left of the second line.  They were met by a tremendous fire of grape-shot from the three field pieces on the left of the second line, and by a discharge of musketry from Bligh's and Semphill's regiments, which carried havoc through their ranks, and made them at first recoil; but, maddened by despair, and utterly regardless of their lives, they rushed upon an enemy whom they felt but could not see amid the cloud of smoke in which the assailants were buried."  "[The Camerons] literally hurled themselves upon the enemy regiments...and endured the terrible assaults of grape-shot and musketry from the two regiments on the left of Cumberland's second line (Semphill's and Bligh's)."  Trapped between the Hanoverian first and second lines the Camerons who would stay and fight were eventually "systematically shot and cut down."

"...at last the fury slackened.  One by one, and then in twos and threes, and finally in tens, the Stewarts and Camerons fell back, running, or walking with heads turned in defiance."  To their left Clan Chattan, some of whom had also reached the Royal line, was decimated and on the far left wing the MacDonalds, who repeatedly stopped within one hundred yards of the Hanoverian line were shot dead without ever coming into contact with the enemy.  Lord Murray, who by this point had taken command into his own hands, was attempting to advance with reinforcements from the rear but the battle was already decided.

The retreating Camerons paused before Lochiel, who was probably being closely attended to by his brother Dr. Archibald.  Surrounded by a curtain of clansmen he was lifted among the procession.  "Nothing could excel the love of the Camerons for their Lochiel...for, being wounded in the very height and fury of the battle, two of them took hold of his legs, a third supported his head, while the rest posted themselves round him as an impregnable bulwark..."  About this time a MacLachlan of Coruanan reached down for the fallen standard of Clan Cameron, took it from the pole, and carried it from the field - one hundred and fifty years later it would find its way back to the Camerons of Lochiel.

"Now was the moment for the Argyll men.  They stood up behind the dry-stone wall and fired a volley into the flank of the exhausted, staggering retreat.  They loaded calmly and fired three more volleys, and then they drew their broadswords.  They yelled `Cruachan!' They climbed over the wall and rushed upon the Camerons, but they did not have it all their own way."  Citing extremely reduced numbers among Lochiel's regiment and severity of their preceding action the Campbells thought it safe enough to risk direct confrontation with one of their immortal enemies.  In regard to the physical engagement with Clan Cameron it may be said with certainty that the Highlanders exchanged even amounts of casualties, ending with the Camerons demoralizing the "malicious" Campbells by killing their Commander, Colin Campbell of Ballimore.  Lochiel was safely brought from the field.

"The tartan tide was ebbing back all over the moor and when it passed beyond the three score yards at which a musket was effective, the Royal line stopped its volleying, although Belford's gunners kept up the grape.  The east wind was still blowing strongly, but the rain and the sleet had long since stopped, and the sky which had been steel-grey was now a sulphurous yellow from the smoke.  Along the ranks the subalterns and sergeants cried `Rest on your Arms!,' and the men of Pulteney's and the Royals, of Cholmondeley's, Price's and Fusiliers, the bloody platoons of Munro's and Barrell's, grounded their muskets and stared.  The heather before them writhed and heaved, and the air was full of the cries and the groans of the wounded.  Where the fallen were thickest the bodies made little pyramids, from which naked arms or legs jerked in agony, and the red and yellow of their tartans were mixed with the blood and bile of the clans.  Not only Fusilier Linn (`I never saw a field thicker of dead') but other veterans of the dead ground at Fontenoy thought that they had never seen a field so heavy with dead and dying."  Prince Charles Edward Stuart was gone, quickly retreating to the west and into history.

Based upon reported casualties of the other clans on the Jacobite right wing it is conservatively estimated that out of the 700 Camerons who were on the field that day approximately 225 were killed and 150 wounded.  Prisoner records indicate that only 17 Camerons were taken from the field alive and as prisoners.  The other 133 "estimated" wounded were bayoneted or shot where they lay, or would soon die in confinement.  From this, it may be surmised that at least 358 Camerons, over one-half of Lochiel's regiment, perished on Culloden Moor.  Throughout the entire Jacobite right wing's front line, the gentility of the Highlands, hardly a man survived the charge.

"Lord George Murray, dismounted and still without wig or hat, stood in the rout of the army he might have commanded in victory, had he been given the chance."  Murray would remain long enough to realize that within one hour on this April 16th the Jacobite rebellion had come to its bloody end, with between 1,200 and 2,000 of Scotland's finest lying dead on the moor.  It is said that the surviving Camerons were drawn to a hill just a short way from Culloden by their piper's screaming, desperate rant.  They could see their shattered army in full retreat all around them.  These men of Lochaber would reluctantly retreat to their native land, places that were once safe haven from the outside world.  As was their fate at Culloden, they would soon find that nowhere in Scotland was there a safe haven for true Highlanders.