I didn’t see your ghosts
feel your spirits in the air
I didn’t understand what
drove folks to leave there;
On Culloden Moor the Scots
were slaughtered and died
Then drove from their lands
in Canada they arrived.
Their hardy characters
explored from sea to sea,
naming off the rivers,
(and my university).
The brutal battle that was fought
upon this day
led to our confederation
and the TransCanada
Highway.
.
.
Most of what I know about the Battle of Culloden I learned from Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander series. However, it’s very cool that my husband’s ancestor Dr. John Rattray was Bonnie Prince Charlie’s personal physician in Edinburgh, and was saved from the noose afterwards only by the timely interference of his golf buddy and judge Duncan Forbes. (John Rattray was Captain of St Andrews and one of the signatories of the official rules of golf in 1744. Cronyism in golf plainly goes back to the beginning of the sport).
Shawn L. Bird 