LIFE OF LIEUT. GENERAL HUGH MACKAY OF SCOURY

Hugh Mackay of Scoury was a Scottish soldiers of fortune who served in the armies of continental Europe and was a leading commander in the Williamite wars in Scotland and Ireland. . Born in 1640, as a young man Mackay took service with Louis XIV of France, serving under the great Marshal Turenne. However, under the influence of a new Dutch Protestant wife, he switched sides and enlisted in the service of the States General of the Netherlands, where he raised a Scottish brigade. Mackay’s division was the foremost corps in William of Orange’s army when he landed at Torbay in November 1689 to depose James II. The following year Macay was appointed William’s Commander in Scotland, but his lowland Scots army was defeated by the Jacobite Highlanders under ‘Bonnie’ Dundee at the battle of Killiekrankie. However, Dundee’s death in the battle effectively ended his rebellion, and Mackay moved to Ireland where he secured a major victory over James’s last army at Aughrim – bloodiest battle of the Williamite wars,- in which over 7,000 died. Returning to the Netherlands as Commander of the British division in a Dutch-German-British army fighting France, Mackay was killed in 1692 at the battle of Steinkeerke. This is a splendid contemporary biography of a Scottish fighting soldier, of interest to any student of the Williamite, Jacobite and Anglo-French wars of the late 17th century.