109018: Flora MacDonald

Flora (1722-1790) was the daughter of Ranald MacDonald and Marion MacDonald of Milton, South Uist. Flora’s father died whilst she was still a baby, and her mother remarried, to Hugh MacDonald of Camuscross, Skye.

Flora spent three years at boarding school in Edinburgh, returning to South Uist in June 1745. This was a few weeks before Charles Edward Stuart, Bonnie Prince Charlie, was to land on Eriskay en route to mainland Scotland. After some success, the Prince’s forces suffered defeat at the Battle of Culloden in April 1746, and he became a fugitive, hiding out in Uist and Benbecula. Support was offered by Flora’s stepfather Hugh and she met the Prince for the first time on 21^st June. Arrested the next day, she finally helped the Prince to escape on the 28^th, over the Minch to Skye. Meeting fellow Jacobite Donald Roy MacDonald in Portree, Flora took her leave of the Prince, and he was taken by Donald to the nearby beach, where he made his escape to Raasay.

Flora was later imprisoned in the Tower of London, but released.

In 1750 she married Allan MacDonald of Flodigarry, where they made their home until her father-in-law’s death in 1772, when they moved to Kingsburgh. There they met Samuel Johnson and James Boswell in 1773.

Flora and her husband sailed to America, where Allan fought in the American War of Independence. The couple returned to Scotland in 1779, living for a while at Milton and Daliburgh, before returning to Kingsburgh.