Jacobite diaspora 1688-1788 Flashcards
Diaspora in 2 parts
- exiles in Europe (mainly nobility)
- exiles in Britain & Ireland (mainly commoners)
Commoners in Europe were mostly soldiers or servants because they lacked means or sophistication to make new lives in alien places
French & Spanish armies recruited surreptitiously in Ireland through Jacobite period & exiled Scottish regiments were in France & Sweden but most integrated in new societies.
By ‘45 Rising, most common soldiers in arriving in Scotland to support Charles Edward were French-speaking 2nd or 3rd generation emigrants
Probably harder for nobility to leave lands, nice houses etc. Their status helped their reception in Europe as European elites had largely shared culture.
Noble Catholics Jacobites were helped by existing networks of Catholics eg Scots Colleges in Paris & Rome, Irish religious communities/seminaries in Paris, Rome, Brussels, Madrid among others. Also trading communities in France & Spain. These gave charity & helped new arrivals make connections eg to sympathetic officials.
Easier for Catholic Jacobites to adapt to new lives because most common destinations (France, Italy, Spain) were strongly Catholic. Church didn’t persecute exhile Protestants but tensions existed eg Protestant services forbidden by Louis XIV at St Germain & Paris church authorities refused Protestants a graveyard. Also, British & Irish Catholics had been sending childen to be educated in europe for some time so already familiar.
Protestant exiles found Europe a more alien environment & were group most likely to try to return to Scotland.
Conversion to Catholicism was an option - and necessary for commissions in French & Spanish armies, to marry aristocratic brides or improve lives. Converting handed propaganda to post-1688 revolutionary regimes. Only handful, senior Jacobites could resist and still be able to gain army commissions.
Most Protestants = dependent economically on what brought from Scotland &occasional help from home.
But Jacobite, primarily military, contribution to host societies was disprortionate to their numbers. eg Admiral Thomas Gordon helped Peter the Great to create formidable modern navy (p129 for more examples).
Some Jacobites contributed in non-military spheres eg Walsh family made fortune in commerce. Swedish East India Company largely founded and run by Scots exile community in Gothenburgs. Bankers helps modernise Franch fnancial sector. John Holker created modern textile industry in France.
Internal diaspora
Nonjurors = did not take oath allegiance to William & Mary.
In England, post-‘45, Jacobite community lost heart & faith in ever overcoming Whig military superiority. Nonjuror numbers at Jacobite core steadily diminished.
Some Catholics stayed loyal to Charles Edward but from 1766 no longer recognised by papacy as ‘king of England’.
Final political desination of English Jacobites after disintegration Jacobite cause is often unclear but based on few accounts available, it was varied.
Peter Legh - non-juring MP
John Pugh Pryse - keen supporter of John Wilkes
Earl of Westmoreland - attended George III’s coronation & promoted to army general.
Possible that while former Jacobites were present in all factions & parties of late C18 politics, they were concentrated at radical end spectrum.
Might therefore have acted as conduit for resistance to established order.
Scottish Jacobites had similar tendency to be disillusioned with Charles Edward & prospect of victory over Whigs. They thought CE had misled them, His refusal to fight on after Culloden condemned them to retribution when guerilla war might have led to a negotiated peace.
Abolition clan chief heritable jurisdictions = flat contravention of treaty of Union. Persecution of Episcopalian clergy.
Period caused many former Jacobites to look for accommodaton with Whig regime.
‘way back’ eg for Simon Fraser (son of executed Lord Lovat) was to raise regiments to fight overseas for Hanovarians.
American Revolution provided opportunity for Jacobites to be ‘rehabilitated’ through military service. All major clans provided ‘cannon-fodder’ to ease chiefs way back into government favour. Sealed with restoration of forfeited estates in 1784.
By time Episcopalian Church stopped praying for exiled Stuarts, when CE died in 1788, nothing left of Jacobite cause.
Superficially, Ireland seemed free of Jacobites & Jacobitism from 1691 onwards but in fact it continued to flourish in Gaelic-speaking villages & secretive Catholic communities.
As late as 1760s, Whiteboys still took secret oaths pledging to fight for Stuart restoration. An underground culture resistant to change, disillusionment & despair.
Ireland’s sectarian oppression already leading to the resentment & resistance that would mark its political development. Hidden Ireland’s ‘lingering affection’ for Jacobite cause = symptom of this.
Transformation from monarchism to republicanism at end C18 was relatively smooth, both a means to the end of overthrowing ruling elite
Jacobitism ended when inner core gave up the cause.
In England & Scotland that happened after disillusionment & defeat followed by reconciliation with status quo.
In Ireland, it happened when a better option came along (republicanism)
