ABSTRACT
The climactic battle of the campaign is inevitably narrated in all histories of the Fifteen, in local histories and in histories of battles in Britain/England, though often based on a narrow number of sources, and described very briefly. Primary sources, written by defeated and embittered Jacobite junior officers and rank and file, attack the decisions of their leaders, while pro-government sources are limited in their descriptions. As to historians, Baynes’s account is lengthiest and Szechi’s concise account includes the most diverse range of sources. Analysis of the battle, though, is limited. Baynes acknowledged that the attackers had ‘a difficult task’, but that ‘the squabble between Carpenter and Wills draws attention away from the gallantry of Preston’s Regiment’. 1 Szechi is critical of Wills, ‘the worst commander on the government side’, and writes that ‘if the Jacobites had responded as aggressively to his botched attacks on Preston as some of them were clamouring to do, he might have gained the special distinction of being the architect of a truly catastrophic defeat’. 2 On the other hand, the Jacobite command is dealt with sympathetically by Gooch: ‘it is hardly fair to question Forster’s courage because he sought terms when it became apparent he faced overwhelming odds’. 3 What follows is a detailed, well-sourced analytic narrative of the battle and its immediate aftermath.
