Flora Macdonald Benson J. Lossing, L. L. D. Morning Oregonian (Portland, Oregon), Monday, April 30, 1888 Contact: Myrtle Bridges May 2, 2016
In the winter of 1849 I started to follow the line of General Greene's famous retreat before Cornwallis from the Catawba to the Dan, in 1781; but soon turned eastward to Fayetteville, North Carolina, where I arrived toward sunset on a mild January day. In the evening I called upon Mrs. McL-, [likely McLeod] a sprightly Scotch woman and a widow, eighty-seven years of age. She was the "oldest in habitat" in all that region. She had been brought from Scotland when she was an infant. I was told that she well remembered the notable Flora McDonald when that lady was a resident of North Carolina. She received me very kindly, and seemed to be pleased to be questioned about the famous heroine of the Hebrides. "I was a girl of fourteen," said Mrs. McL-, "when Flora and her husband came to Cross Creek (an old name of Fayetteville.) She was then about forty years of age, not very tall, but a very handsome and very dignified woman, with fair complexion, sparkling blue eyes, the finest teeth I ever saw, and hair nearly covered with a fine lace cap and slightly streaked with white, as she had endured much trouble. Her voice was sweet music," continued Mrs. McL-, and oh, how the poor and the church missed her when she went home, after experiencing much trouble here. She was often at my mother's house when she first came, and I almost worshipped her because of her beauty and goodness. "Is her dwelling-place here yet standing?"I inquired. "No; it was partly burned in a great fire here about twenty years ago. As you pass from the market house to the courthouse you may see the ruins of it near the creek." The old lady then stepped to a quaint looking chest of drawers, and taking out a dingy letter written by Flora to Mrs. McL-'s eldest sister, then a maiden of twenty, handed it to me to read. It was a brief note, but an exceedingly interesting one, as it was in the bold handwriting of the heroine of Skye. I was permitted to make a copy of it and a tracing of Flora's signature. Here is a copy: Dear Maggie: Allen leaves tomorrow to join Donald's standard at Cross Creek, an' I shall be alone wi' my three bairns. Canna ye com' an' stay wi' me awhile? There are troublesome times ahead, I ween. God will keep the right. I hope a' our ain are i' the right, prays your guid friend, Flory Macdonald." "You see," said Mrs. McL-, "she wrote her name Flory-she always did. The letter was written at her new house at Cameron Hill, near the Barbecue Church, where the good Mr. Campbell preached as often as possible. Flora was a pious member of the Barbecue congregation." "Then she did not live here long?" I said. No; she soon moved to Cameron Hill, about twenty miles north of here." On the day when the note was written the royal governor of North Carolina issued a proclamation calling upon all friends of the king to assemble with arms at Cross Creek and join his standard. The Macdonalds were all staunch loyalists. They had been loyal to the Stuarts, now they were loyal to the House of Hanover. The troubles of Flora in North Carolina now began. Her husband and others, to the number of about fifteen hundred, mostly Scotchmen, readily obeyed the call of the governor. "Flora came with her friends," said McL-. "I remember seing her riding along the lane on a large white horse and encouraging her country- men to be faithful to the king. Why, she looked like a queen. But she went no farther than here, and when they marched away she returned to her home. She dined with us, and the next day sister Maggie went out to Barbecue to stay awhile with Mrs. Macdonald, as she had desired." Nearly a month afterward these Scotch loylalists were routed, dispersed, made prisoners or killed in battle at Moore's Creek bridge. Flora's husband was among the prisoners and was sent to Halifax jail. He was soon afterward released on parole, when he left North Carolina with his family for Scotland in a British war sloop. On the way the vessel was attacked by a French cruiser, when the courage of the English seamen and mariners appeared to desert them, and capture seemed inevitable. They were about to surrender when Flora appeared on deck, and by words and deeds so stimulated their spirits that they beat off the enemy and the Macdonalds were landed safely on their native soil of the Isle of Skye. During the engagement Flora was severely wounded in the hand. She remarked, when speaking of her perculiar situation, "I have hazarded my life both for the House of Stuart and the House of Hanover, and I do not see that I am a great gainer by it." Flora Macdonald was the mother of five sons and two daughters. She retained much of her beauty and all of her loveliness of character and dignity until the last. She waas always modist, always kind, always sweet and benevolent in disposition. She died early in March, 1790, and was buried in the cemetery at Kilmuir, on the Isle of Skye. Her shroud, as she had requested long before her death, was made of the sheets on which the Young Pretender, whom she helped to escape to France, reposed at the house of her kinsman, the Laird of Kingsburgh, on the night before he sailed for the continent. Two years later the remains of her husband were laid by her side. The resting place was covered with green sward for eight years. In 1871 a beautiful monument was erected over them. "When the news of Flora Macdonald's death came to the Barbecue congregation," said McL-, "a solemn funeral service was held in the church, when the Rev. Dr. Hall preached a sermon." The venerable lady attempted to tell the story of Flora's exploit which made her famous, but ner narrative was so mixed and meager that it was unsatisfactory. I will endeavor to give the narrative as concisely and clear as possible from the best authorities, prefacing the story with the remark that I regard my personal interview with one who had conversed with the heroine as a memorable privilege. I gratefully pressed the hand of the old lady when I bade her good-bye. The "Young Pretender," as Prince Charles Edward Stuart, grandson of James II of England was called, had landed in Scotland to attempt the recovery of the British throne, from which his grandfather had been driven nearly sixty years before. He drew hosts of adherents around him. He fought battles with the English, but was finally beaten at Culloden. His followers were dispersed and he was for five months a fugitive hunted from mountain and glen, from crag to cave, among the highlands of Scotland. He at length found a hiding place on the Isle of Uist, one of the Hebrides, and a friend in Laird Macdonald. To the house of this Laird came his young kinswoman Flora, in June, 1746, a beautiful and romantic girl, fresh from school at Edinburgh, to visit her relatives. The island was swarming with soldiers in search of the prince, at the head of whom was Flora's step-father. The fugitive could not much longer elude his pursuers. Lady Macdonald had conceived a plan for his escape, but found no assistant willing to brave the consequences. Flora heard the plan and became deeply interested. She had seen the prince when he and his followers rode into Edinburgh. "Will you undertake to asist the Prince, Flora?" asked Lady Macdonald. "I will," was the prompt reply. She was joined in the perilous enterprise by a young kinsman, Neill Macdonjald. Flora obtained from her stepfather a passport from the island, with Neill and three others as a boat's crew, and Betsy Burke, a stout Irish woman, whom she pretended to have engaged as a seamstress for her mother in the Isle of Skye. Betsy Burke was the prince in disguise. On a bright afternoon a little party embarked from Uist. A terrible storm burst upon them that night, but they reached Skye in safety the next morning. Confronted by soldiers on shore, they rowed eastward and landed near the home of Sir Alexander Macdonald. Leaving the prince among the rocks, Flora told her secret to Lady Macdonald, who entertained them all for the night. On the following morning Flora accompanied the prince to Portree. She had conducted him as her servant through crowds of soldiers and people who were eagerly seeking him, for a reward of $150,000 had been offered for his arrest. A small vessel was at Porree ready to convey the fugitive out upon the free ocean and bear him to the friendly coast of France. She bade him adieu. The princed kissed her and said, "Gentle faithful maiden, I entertain the hope that we shall yet meet in the royal palace." They never met again. Neill Macdonald accompanied the prince to France, where he married and settled at Sancerre, the place of long residence of some of the Clan Macdonald who accompanied King James to the continent. His son, born four years before the birth of Napoleon Bonaparte, became the great military leader, the eminent Marshal Macdonald. Flora's complicity in the escape of the prince became known, and she was taken to London with Macdonald of Kinsburgh, and others, and cast into the Tower as a prisoner of state, when George II asked her sternly, "How could you dare to succor the enemy of my crown and kingdom?" She replied, with sweet simplicity, "It was no more than I would have done for your majesty had you been in his place." Her romantic story touched the best hearts of England with sympathy and admiration. It was so evident that Flora was not a partisan of the Young Pretender nor of his religious faith, and that she had acted from the generous and benevolent impulses of a woman's heart, that she and her kindred were pardoned and released. The house wherein she tarried a few days afterward was crowded with the nobility and gentry of both sexes, who congratulated her upon her freedom and poured money into her lap. Her extreme youth and radiant beauty captivated all hearts. A chaise and four horses were provided by Lady Primrose to convey her back to her home; and so the fair young girl who went to London to be hanged as a felon returned in state, followed by the blessings of thousands. Four years after her release Flora married Allen Macdonald, the son of the Laird of Kingsburgh, and not long afterward she became the mistress of the mansion wherein Prince Charles slept in the Isle of Skye on the night before his escape to the sea. There in 1773 she enter- tained Dr. Johnson and his shadow, Boswell, and allowed them to occupy the bed in which the prince slept. Although she had then been a wife more than twenty years and the mother of several children, Dr. Johnson spoke of her as a beautiful woman, of pleasing person and elegant behavior. Her husband was then in embarrassed circumstances, and they contemplated going to join their contrymen, who had emigrated in large numbers to North Carolina. Thither they went in 1774, but failed to find the coveted repose, as we have observed, and they returned to Scotland and their beloved Skye.
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