Battle of Killiecrankie

Battle of Killiecrankie
Part of the Jacobite Rising
Pass of Killiecrankie, from an 1802 book
Date 27 July 1689 Location Killiecrankie, Scotland 56°45′11″N 3°47′46″W / 56.753°N 3.796°W / 56.753; -3.796Coordinates: 56°45′11″N 3°47′46″W / 56.753°N 3.796°W / 56.753; -3.796 Result Jacobite victory
Belligerents
Jacobite Royalists (Highlanders & Irish)	Orange Covenantor Royalists (Highlanders & Lowlanders)
Commanders and leaders
John Graham of Claverhouse, 1st Viscount Dundee†	Hugh Mackay
Strength
3,000 foot	4,000 foot
Casualties and losses
Over 600, inc. Dundee	Up to 2,000
Location within Scotland

The Battle of Killiecrankie (Gaelic: Cath Raon Ruairidh) was fought between Highland Scottish clans supporting King James II and VII and troops supporting King William of Orange on 27 July 1689, during the first Jacobite uprising. Although it was a stunning victory for the Jacobites, it had little overall effect on the outcome of the war and left their leader dead. Their forces were scattered at the Battle of Dunkeld the next month.

The battlefield has been included in the Inventory of Historic Battlefields in Scotland and protected by Historic Scotland under the Scottish Historical Environment Policy of 2009. The battle is remembered in four songs known as The Braes o' Killiecrankie, of which the best known was published by James Hogg.

William of Orange, invited to England by certain key members of a Parliament displeased at having a Catholic king, invaded in 1688. King James fled the country on 23 December, and, in February 1689, the English Parliament declared that, by fleeing, James had abdicated. Parliament then offered the throne jointly to William and Mary, the Protestant daughter of James to whom William largely owed his claim to the throne.

Scotland was a divided country politically, culturally, and religiously. The Stuarts had ruled Scotland since the time of Robert II in the late 14th century, and had also sat on the English throne since 1603. The Scottish Gaelic-speaking, mostly Catholic and Episcopalian Highlanders tended to stay loyal to the Stuart king James VII, while the English-speaking, mostly Presbyterian Lowlanders—who were the majority and held most of the political power in Scotland—tended to support William of Orange.