2 - From the Anglo-Scottish Union to the Union with Ireland

Summary

The Union of England with Scotland in 1707 which brought Great Britain into constitutional existence was more of a shotgun marriage than the consummation of a long-standing love affair. On the eve of the Act as it was called in the southern kingdom, or Treaty as it was known in the northern, relations between the two were in fact deteriorating. Although both rejected James VII and II in 1689, and accepted William and Mary, the consequences of the Glorious Revolution caused friction between them. The main problem as far as most Scots were concerned was that they were caught up in the wars against France to which William committed his new realms. Scotland became one of the cockpits of conflict, for the Stuarts retained much more active support there than they could command in England. The Jacobites, as the supporters of the exiled James and his son James Edward were known, defeated Williamite troops at the battle of Killiecrankie in August 1689, but their leader, James Graham of Claverhouse, died in the action. Though government forces won at Dunkeld later the same year, their victory only obtained a sullen and uneasy peace in Scotland. The massacre of the Macdonalds at Glencoe for tardiness in taking the oaths of allegiance was intended to teach Scots inclined to follow them in their defiance that the government would not tolerate even token resistance.