Simon Fraser, 11th Lord Lovat

Simon Fraser, Lord Lovat (c. 1667 - April 9, 1747, London), Scottish Jacobite, chief of the clan Fraser, was famous for his violent feuding and his changes of allegiances. In 1715, he had been a supporter of the House of Hanover, but in 1745 he changed sides and supported the Stuart claim on the crown of Scotland. Lovat was among the Highlanders defeated at the Battle of Culloden and convicted of treason against the Crown. He was the last man in Britain to be beheaded on Tower Hill, London .

Exile in France

Among other outrages in which he was engaged about this time was a rape and forced marriage committed on the widow of the 10th Lord Lovat with the view apparently of securing his own succession to the estates; and it is a curious instance of influence that, after being subjected by him to horrible ill-usage, she is said to have become seriously attached to him. A prosecution, however, having been instituted against him by Lady Lovat's family, Simon retired first to his native strongholds in the Highlands, and afterwards to France, where he found his way in July 1702 to the court of St Germain.

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In 1699, on his father's death, he assumed the title of Lord Lovat. One of his first steps towards gaining influence in France seems to have been to announce his conversion to Catholicism. He then proceeded to put the project of restoring the exiled family into a practical shape. Hitherto nothing seems to have been known among the Jacobite exiles of the efficiency of the Highlanders as a military force. But Lovat saw that, as they were the only part of the British population accustomed to the independent use of arms, they could be at once put in action against the reigning power. His plan therefore was to land five thousand French troops at Dundee, where they might reach the north-eastern passes of the Highlands in a days march, and be in a position to divert the British troops till the Highlands should have time to rise. Immediately afterwards five hundred men were to land on the west coast, seize Fort William or Inverlochy, and thus prevent the access of any military force from the south to the central Highlands. The whole scheme indicates Lovat's sagacity as a military strategist, and his plan was continuously kept in view in all future attempts of the Jacobites, and finally acted on in the outbreak of 1745. The advisers of the Old Pretender seem to have been either slow to trust their coadjutor or to comprehend his project.

Related Topics:
Catholicism - Highlanders - Dundee - Fort William - Inverlochy - The Old Pretender

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At last, however, he was despatched (1703) on a secret mission to the Highlands to sound those of the chiefs who were likely to rise, and to ascertain what forces they could bring into the field. He found, however, that there was little disposition to join the rebellion, and he then apparently made up his mind to secure his own safety by revealing all that he knew to the government of Queen Anne. He persuaded the duke of Queensberry that his rival, the duke of Atholl, was in the Jacobite plot, and that if Queensberry supported him he could obtain evidence of this at St Germain. Queensberry foolishly entered into the intrigue with him against Atholl, but when Lovat had gone to France with a pass from Queensberry the affair was betrayed to Atholl by Robert Ferguson, and resulted in Queensberry's discomfiture. The story is obscure, and is complicated by partisanship on either side; but Lovat was certainly playing a double game. His agility, however, was not remunerative. On returning to Paris suspicions got afloat as to Lovats proceeding's, and he was imprisoned in the castle of Angoulme. He remained nearly ten years under supervision, till in November 1714 he made his escape to England.

Related Topics:
Queen Anne - Duke of Queensberry - Duke of Atholl

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