Old Image Highland Clearances Scotland

Old image from the Highland Clearances in Scotland. The old shepherd takes his crook and sheepdog with him to a new world in America. The Highlander and the lass who weeps at his knees are leaving the mist clad hills of home having been cleared from their native homeland.

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The Highland Clearances. In the terrible aftermath of the moorland battle of Culloden, the Highlanders suffered at the hands of their own clan chiefs. Following his magnificent reconstruction of Culloden, John Prebble recounts how the Highlanders were deserted and then betrayed into famine and poverty. While their chiefs grew rich on meat and wool, the people died of cholera and starvation or, evicted from the glens to make way for sheep, were forced to emigrate to foreign lands. Mr Prebble tells a terrible story excellently. There is little need to search further to explain so much of the sadness and emptiness of the northern Highlands today. The Highland Clearances.