John Roy Stewart orStuart orStiuart (Gaelic:Iain Ruadh Stiùbhart) (1700–1752) was a distinguished officer in theJacobite Army during therising of 1745 and awar poet in bothGaelic and in English.
He was born atKnock inKincardine inBadenoch.[1] His family could trace their descent fromAlexander Stewart, Earl of Buchan, the infamous "Wolf of Badenoch, and before that to KingsRobert II of Scotland andRobert the Bruce.[2] His father, however, Donald Stewart, was a farmer inStrathspey and grandson of the last Baron of Kincardine. Iain Ruadh was born to his father's second wife, Barbara Shaw.[1]
As Iain Ruadh's family was cultured and well-connected but no longer wealthy,[3] his father gave him a good education and procured him a commission as a Lieutenant in aScots Greys which at that time was serving inFlanders. In 1730, after being refused a commission in theBlack Watch Regiment, Stewart resigned from theBritish Army and was subsequently employed as a covert agent between theHouse of Stuartgovernment in exile at thePalazzo Muti in Rome andLord Lovat in Scotland. During an extended visit by Stewart toBeaufort Castle in 1736, according to later trial testimony, Stewart and Lord Lovat, "diverted themselves composing burlesque verse (in Gaelic) that when young Charles comes over, there will be blood and blows."[4]
At Lord Lovat's later trial forhigh treason before theHouse of Lords,Sutherland cattle drover John Gray of Rogart testified that Iain Ruadh was always well dressed, but that his clothing often alternated, especially during dangerous undercover missions, between traditional Highland garb or the long coats andgreatcoats then favoured bydandies from theBritish upper class.[5]
After secretly visiting a friend from Strathspey at the British encampment on the night before,[5] Stewart fought in theFrench Royal Army under the command of MarshalMaurice de Saxe at theBattle of Fontenoy on 11 May 1745. Before the end of the same month, he had returned to Scotland and joined PrinceCharles Edward Stuart atBlair Atholl on 31 August 1745.[6] He left his wife, Sarah Hall, and their daughter behind atBoulogne, and asked thatPrince James Francis Edward Stuart see that his family be provided for should he fall in the coming rising.[7]
In theJacobite Army he served as military commander of the Edinburgh Regiment atGladsmuir,Clifton, andFalkirk.[6]
Iain Ruadh had previously fathered anillegitimate son named Charles Stewart, who fought for the Hanoverian army inLoudon's Highlanders during theBattle of Prestonpans. Although this meant that father and son were fighting on opposing sides, there is no account of any encounter between them.[8]
Before theBattle of Culloden, Stewart offered to lead his troops around the Water of Nairn and attack theDuke of Cumberland's Army from the rear, but his offer was not accepted.[6]
For five months after the Battle, according to Campbell, "Stewart was a hunted fugitive with a price on his head, and inUirnuigh Iain Ruadh, 'John Roy's Prayer', and in 'John Roy's Psalm', the latter composed in English, he describes the dangers he ran from his pursuers at a moment when he had the misfortune to have sprained his ankle."[9]
According to an account attributed to fellow senior Jacobite Army officerEwen MacPherson of Cluny, in September 1746, Prince Charles requested that Iain Ruadh Stùibhart be sent for. Wishing to surprise him, the Prince arranged for the poet to be summoned to abothy and laid down inside, keeping his face covered by hisplaid. As Stùibhart was brought into the entryway, the Prince stood up, removed the plaid covering, and displayed his face. Iain Ruadh Stùibhart, who had believed Prince Charles to have been either captured or killed, was overwhelmed with emotion and cried out, (Scottish Gaelic:"Mo Thighearna! Mo Mhaighstir!") "My Lord! My Master!"[10] The bard then fainted dead away and fell into a muddy pool besides the bothy entrance, much to the mirth of all present. The Prince always afterwards referred to Iain Ruadh Stùibhart by the nickname, "the Bothy."[11]
Stewart left Scotland with the Prince for France from the site now marked with thePrince's Cairn atLoch nan Uamh on 20 September 1746. Upon arrival in France, he joined Prince Charles' household, and was briefly imprisoned alongside the prince in theChâteau de Vincennes in 1748.[12] After a period in the Netherlands, Stewart was among the five British attendants who accompanied Charles Edward Stuart to Rome in 1766. He succeededJohn Hay of Restalrig as Major-Domo of the Household and by 1768 was the last British attendant left with Charles. In 1784 he was granted abaronetcy in theJacobite peerage, with remainder to the heirs-male of his body. Charles granted Stewart a legacy of £750 a year, although this was stopped whenHenry Benedict Stuart succeeded Charles as head of theHouse of Stuart. He died in 1752[13] atSaint-Omer.[14]
For the rest of his life, James MacIntyre of Beglan, the former standard bearer to the Edinburgh Regiment of the Jacobite Army always climbedCairn Gorm on the anniversary of the standard raising atGlenfinnan and unfurled the "Green Banner of Kincardine" in honour of all the men of Strathspey who fell in the Jacobite rising or during the government crackdown in its aftermath. In 2000,[15] the 1745 Association erected a roadside memorial cairn near Iain Ruadh Stùibhart's birthplace.[16] Iain Ruadh Stùibhart, whose life was also locally celebrated by a 2007 Fèis, still remains a belovedfolk hero in his native district.[15]
Some of his most well-known poems are "Lament for Lady Macintosh" and"Latha Chuil-Lodair" ("Culloden Day"),[17]"Òran Eile air Latha Chu-Lodair ("Another Song on Culloden Day"),[18]Urnuigh Iain Ruadh ("John Roy's Prayer"),[19] andÒran a' Bhranndaidh ("Song to Brandy").[20]
Iain Ruadh's poetry, according to Maggie Craig, is replete with references to theChristian Bible. For example, he compared the Jacobite rising to the events of theBook of Exodus, as an effort to set the British people free from enslavement to bothWhig political ideology and theHouse of Hanover. His most famous poem,John Roy's Psalm, which was composed in English while its author was on the run after Culloden, is anadaptation of theMetrical rendering ofPsalm 23:
According toJohn Lorne Campbell, Stewart's importance toScottish Gaelic literature is increased by the fact that, "He was the only Jacobite leader who was a Gaelic poet. His Gaelic verse shows a polish and an elegance not possessed by his contemporaries, and it is much to be regretted that so few of his compositions have survived. He does not seem to have possessed the knowledge of writing hismother tongue. His two poems on Culloden are of great historical interest, revealing as they do the depth of bitterness that was felt towards the Prince's lieutenant general,Lord George Murray, by a section of the Jacobite leaders."[13]
John Roy Stewart is widely believed in some circles to have been the main model forRobert Louis Stevenson's fictionalized depiction ofAllan Breck Stewart in his novelKidnapped and in its sequelCatriona.[22]