Annotation:Flora Macdonald's Adieu to the Prince

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 FLORA MACDONALD'S ADIEU TO THE PRINCE (Tha mi fodh ghruaim). Scottish, Slow Air (6/8 time). F Sharp Minor. Standard tuning (fiddle). AAB. This air "is attributed, the editor knows not with what truth, to the celebrated Miss Flora MacDonald, on bidding adieu to Prince Charles. There is a degree of virtue, highly honorable to the national character for sincerity and integrity, perceptible in the universal disregard of the high rewards offered for delivering up the Prince" (Fraser). In fact, Flora Macdonald (b. c. 1721) was a celebrated heroine of the 1745 Jacobite rebellion, instrumental in saving Bonnie Prince Charlie after the battle of Culloden. Flora was born on the Hebridean side of South Uist, to which isle Charlie fled to, hotly pursued by the English forces who had offered a reward of the staggering sum of 30,000 pounds for his capture. The island was patrolled by warships and 2,000 Hanoverian troops were combing the countryside looking for him. Flora was persuaded to his cause and helped him elude his pursuers by dressing him as her Irish maidservent under the alias 'Betty Burke'. For three days she travelled with him under the constant fear of capture until he was able to make his way to Skye and then Inverness, where he was eventually rescued by a French ship which transported him to safety in Brittany. "Before leaving Portee, Flora and the Prince said their goodbyes. He was most grateful to her for risking her life for him during the three eventful days, and for looking after him with great tenderness and affection during the many dangers that had beset them. He presented her with his own portrait in miniature and after thanking her, expressed the hope that they might meet again" (Neil, 1991). They apparently never did, for Flora returned to Skye and five years later married Macdonald of Kingsburgh, with whom she had five sons and two daughters. The family soon found themselves in North Carolina, where Macdonald served with the Royal Highland Emigrant Regiment in the years prior to the American Revolutionary War. They returned to Scotland in the early 1770's and were visited by Dr. Johnson and Boswell on Skye in 1773. Flora was aged 51 at the time and was described by Johnson as "a woman of middle statue, soft features, gentle manners and elegant presence", and by Boswell as "a little woman of genteel appearance and uncommonly mild and well-bred." Flora died in 1790.

 Source for notated version:  Printed sources: Fraser (The Airs and Melodies Peculiar to the Highlands of Scotland and the Isles), 1874; No. 219, p. 98 & No. 219, p. 90. Neil (The Scots Fiddle), 1991; No. 162, p. 209.  Recorded sources:

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