Clan Campbell

“ The companies were independent, and at that time wore the clan tartan of their captains, who were Simon Frazer, the celebrated Lord Lovat; Sir Duncan Campbell of Lochnell; Grant of Ballindalloch; Alister Campbell of Finab, whose father fought at Darien; Ian Campbell of Carrick, and Deors Monro of Culcairn.
The privates of these companies were all men of a superior station, being mostly cadets of good families—gentlemen of the old Celtic and patriarchal lines; and of baronial proprietors. In the Highlands, the only genuine mark of aristocracy was descent from the founder of the tribe ”

“ Under the name of Siol Eachern are included by Mr Skene the Macdougall Campbells of Craignish, and the Lamonds of Lamond, both very old clans in Argyleshire, and supposed to have been originally of the same race.
Macdougall Campbells of Craignish.
“The policy of the Argyll family,” says Mr Skene, “led them to employ every means for the acquisition of property, and the extension of the clan. One of the arts which they used for the latter purpose was to compel those clans which had become dependant upon them to adopt the name of Campbell ”

“ He seems to have been a dreamy, quick-witted but somewhat indolent lad of whom his masters said, ‘if Campbell likes to work no one can beat him’; hot-tempered too, as Highlanders, rightly or wrongly, are credited with being. ”

“ In the spring of 1774, a robbery and murder were committed on an inhabitant of the frontiers of Virginia, by two Indians of the Shawanee tribe. The neighbouring whites, according to their custom, undertook to punish this outrage in a summary manner. Colonel Cresap, a man infamous for the many murders he had committed on those much injured people, collected a party and proceeded down the Kanaway in quest of vengeance; unfortunately a canoe with women and children, with one man only, was seen coming from the opposite shore unarmed, and unsuspecting an attack from the whites. ”

“ He was educated at Oxford, and became distinguished for courage, learning, and enterprise. Appointed colonel in Ireland, he displayed singular energy and address. In the year 1571 he was a member of the House of Commons from Compton, his native place. He strenuously defended the queen's prerogative against the charge of monopoly, [21] alleged by a Puritan member against an exclusive grant made to some merchants. He was the author of several publications on cosmography and navigation. ”

“ Washington charging the enemy's right with his cavalry suffered a heavy loss. He himself had his horse killed, and was wounded and made prisoner. The enemy now rallied, and Greene, finding it impossible to dislodge them, retired. It was an extremely hard-fought battle. The loss of the Americans was five hundred and fifty-five, including sixty officers. One hundred and [745] thirty were killed. Seventeen officers were killed, and four mortally wounded. Among the slain was Lieutenant-Colonel Campbell, who fell while leading the Virginia Brigade on to the charge. ”

“ John Rolfe complained that Captain Martin had made unjust charges against him, and cast "some aspersion upon the present government, which is the most temperate and just that ever was in this country—too mild, indeed, for many of this colony, whom unwonted liberty hath made insolent, and not to know themselves." On the last day of the session were enacted such laws as issued "out of every man's private conceit." "It shall be free for every man to trade with the Indians, servants only excepted upon pain of whipping, unless the master will redeem it off with the payment of an angel." ”

“ In general, the clans thus adopted into the race of Campbell, are sufficiently marked out by their being promoted only to the honour of their being an illegitimate branch; but the tradition of the country invariably distinguishes between the real Campbells, and those who were compelled to adopt their name.” Of the policy in question, the Campbells of Craignish are said to have afforded a remarkable instance. According to the Argyll system, as here described, they are represented as the descendants of Dugall, an illegitimate son of a Campbell, who lived in the twelfth century. ”

“ At the time of the making of his last will and testament, 25th of July 1786, John Campbell, who was never married, had a brother of the whole blood, Robert Campbell, also a citizen of the state of Virginia, a father, a half brother, named Allen Campbell, and a sister of the whole blood, named Sarah Beard, who was a widow and had children. His father, half brother and sister were natives of Ireland, and subjects of the king of Great Britain and Ireland in 1786. The father of John Campbell died before him. ”

“ A female and a minor was the legal proprietrix of the ancient possessions of the tribe, which, by her marriage, might be conveyed to another and a hostile family; whilst her uncle, the natural leader of the clan according to ancient custom, was left without any means to keep up the dignity of a chief, or to support the clan against its enemies. His claims on the estates possessed by the Clandonald were worse than nugatory, as they threatened to involve him in a feud with that powerful and warlike tribe, in case he should take any steps to enforce them. ”

“ It was resolved to pursue the enemy with nine hundred picked men. Near the Cowpens, where Ferguson had encamped on the fourth, and about thirty miles from King's Mountain, the mountaineers were re-enforced by four hundred and sixty men, the greater part of them from South Carolina, under Colonel Williams. Here, at about nine o'clock of the evening, Colonel William Campbell was appointed to the chief command. The mountain horsemen rode on in the night through a rain, with their guns under their arms to keep the locks dry; the leader in front, and each colonel at the head of his troops. ”

“ Williams charged without firing a musket; but Campbell's regiment, chiefly new levies, returned the enemy's fire as they advanced. Lee now ordered Captain Rudolph, of the legion infantry, to turn the enemy's flank, and give them a raking fire. This being done, the British left was broken, and, driven off the field retreated through their tented camp toward Eutaw Creek, where was a brick house, into which a part of them threw themselves. The Americans pursuing closely, took three hundred prisoners and two pieces of cannon. ”

“ Yet at this time the population of the colony was estimated at two hundred and ninety-three thousand, of whom one hundred and seventy-three thousand were white, and one hundred and twenty thousand black, and the militia were computed at thirty-five thousand fit to bear arms.
Dinwiddie wrote to Fox, (father of Charles James,) one of the secretaries of state: "We dare not venture to part with any of our white men any distance, as we must have a watchful eye over our negro slaves, who are upwards of one hundred thousand." ”

“ Falling from his horse, he lay helpless on the ground, surrounded by the dead. His army having fired away all their ammunition, now fled in disorder back to the Monongahela. Pursued to the water's edge by a party of savages, the regulars threw away arms, accoutrements, and even clothing, that they might run the faster. Many were tomahawked at the fording-place; but those who crossed were not pursued, as the Indians returned to the harvest of plunder. The provincials, better acquainted with Indian warfare were less disconcerted, and retreated with more composure. ”

“ In 1680 he invaded Caithness with a band of 700 men and defeated and dispossessed the earl’s heir male. The latter, however, was subsequently confirmed in his lands and titles, and Campbell on the 13th of August 1681 obtained a new patent with the precedency of the former one, creating him earl of Breadalbane and Holland, viscount of Tay and Paintland, Lord Glenorchy, Benederaloch, Ormelie and Weick in the peerage of Scotland, with special power to nominate his successor from among the sons of his first wife. In 1685 he was a member of the Scottish privy council. ”

“ Ordered that William Campbell, William Edmundson, John Anderson and George Blackburn be appointed commissioners to hire wagons to bring up the county salt, allotted by the Governor and council, and to receive and distribute the same agreeably to said order of the council."
Later on Colonel Arthur Campbell rode with seven hundred mounted soldiers against the Cherokees. History gives him the credit of being the first to experiment in attacking Indians on horseback. ”

“ John Campbell of Strachur, in the Highlands of Scotland, entered the Army in June, 1745, as Lieutenant of Loudon’s Highlanders; served through the Scotch Rebellion; made the Campaign in Flanders, 1747, and was promoted to a company on the 1st October of that year. At the peace of 1748, he went on Half-Pay and so remained until the 9th April, 1756, when he was appointed to the 42nd Highlanders previous to the embarcation of that Regiment for America. He was wounded in the attack on Ticonderoga in 1758, and was appointed by General Amherst Major of the 17th Foot on the 11th July, 1759 ”

“ This missive was first given into the hands of the traitor George Campbell, who read it to the settlers on Sunday after church. Next day, while rations were being distributed, it was delivered to the deputy-governor in the colony storehouse. About one o'clock on the same afternoon, George Campbell and a few kindred spirits broke into the building where the field-pieces were stored, took the guns outside, and placed them on horse-sledges for the purpose of drawing them away. At this juncture a musket was fired as a signal, and Duncan Cameron with some Bois Brûlés stole from a clump of trees. ”

“ According to the letter of the law, at least, he had been guilty of rebellion in assuming a military command and marching against the savages without a commission, and he had so acknowledged. Yet he was not more guilty than the bulk of the people of the colony, and probably not more so than a majority of the assembly itself; and the popular movement seemed justified by an urgent necessity of self-defence, and an intolerable accumulation of public grievances. On the other hand, Sir William Berkley had violated his solemn engagement to grant the commission. ”

“ Campbell's house pulled down, but remain unto this day. The next harangue is, "That two of the soldiers who were so bruised with stones, that they were not able to keep up with the party, fell into the hands of the mob, who used them very barbarously; one escaped into a house, but the other is so bruised with stones that his life is despaired of;" all this is absolutely false as appears by the foregoing account. That two of the mob went to Dumbarton, and threatned the inhabitants if they received captain Bushell and his soldiers, is what I know nothing about. ”

“ Thus there was an addition of twenty-one souls to the population of Mr Campbell’s settlement, which with their own ten made a total of thirty-one people, out of whom they reckoned that thirteen were capable of bearing arms, and defending them from any attack of the Indians. ”

“ Martial law had already been established in Virginia by Dale; Argall came over invested with powers to make the government still more arbitrary and despotic, and bent upon acquiring gain by all possible means of extortion and oppression. He decreed that goods should be sold at an advance of twenty-five per cent., and tobacco rated at the Procrustean value of three shillings—the penalty for rating it either higher or lower being three years slavery to the colony; that there should be no trade or intercourse with the Indians, and that none of them should be taught the use of fire-arms ”

“ Although at that moment the 42d was alone, and was confronted by the two columns on the farther side of the hollow, yet Campbell, having a steadfast faith in Colonel Cameron and in the regiment he commanded, resolved to go straight on, and at once, with his forward movement. He allowed the battalion to descend alone into the hollow, marching straight against the two columns. Moreover, he suffered it to undertake a manœuvre which (except with troops of great steadiness and highly instructed) can hardly be tried with safety against regiments still unshaken. ”

“ A desperate combat immediately began, and continued with unabated fury for some time; and so well were the warriors matched that it became doubtful latterly which of them would carry the day. Campbell, however, ultimately made a clever and skilful stroke, which secured him the victory—having split his adversary’s head almost in two. Campbell was thus, according to law, guilty of manslaughter, and being ‘wanted’ for that offence, he and his second, a son of Macleod of Dunvegan and Harris, fled to the latter island for refuge. ”

“ His knowledge of Orissa caused him to be again employed in the Goomsoor war of 1836-7, and at the end of this war he was placed in civil charge of the Khonds, or hill tribes of Orissa, with special instructions to suppress the practices of human sacrifice and female infanticide. Campbell soon obtained a marvellous control over them, and, without resorting once to the use of troops, managed to save the lives of hundreds of destined victims by a consistent policy of expelling from the hills all refractory village headmen, and by refusing to trust to native agents. ”

“ The right flank was guarded by Washington's cavalry, a veteran Delaware company under Kirkwood, and Colonel Lynch with a battalion of Virginia militia. The left was guarded by Lee's legion and Campbell's riflemen. At about ten o'clock in the forenoon, after some firing of artillery, the British, reaching the rivulet, deployed into line of battle, the right commanded by Leslie, the left by Webster. The North Carolina militia, unable to stand the shock, a few excepted, broke, threw away their arms, and fled precipitately through the woods. ”