Page:English Historical Review Volume 37.djvu/378

 370 THE HIGHLAND FORTS July related on the information of John Millross, a private of Guise's, who a few weeks later made his escape to Aberdeen. He declared that upon the Rebels approaching the Castle, they fired several shots at them and would have fired more, but the Governor, Mr. Grant, and Lieut. Minchin were very backward and hindered them from firing ; for upon the rebels getting under the Castle both of them proposed to surrender. The redcoats insisted much against it. But they were obliged to submit to the Governor and Lieut. Minchin, who was very drunk at that time. Lieut. Walter Grahame of Guise's, after the Governor and Minchin had ordered all firing to cease, came boldly up and called to the private soldiers to stand by him and he would stand by them as long as he had a bit of life in him, for he was ashamed to see so little done in defence of the Castle. When the rebels were going up and down the town, the Governor refused firing at them for some time, and Millross declared that in his mind they might have done more execution on the rebels than they did. 1 Some officers of Guise's also escaped from the rebels and gave so bad an account of the governor's particular behaviour and of the whole defence, that Cumberland resolved on the first oppor- tunity to call Grant to account before a court martial. It was a sinister circumstance that Grant was uncle of the Master of Lovat, through whom he had to admit that he obtained more favourable terms for himself than for the other officers. He was allowed by the rebels to go to his own house, where when Cumber- land reached Inverness he was arrested. A court martial found him guilty of misbehaviour before the enemy and of shamefully abandoning the fort. Grant was dismissed from the service, as also was Lieutenant Minchin ; but Colonel Innes of Guise's, who had likewise been present, managed to obtain his acquittal, as Cumberland stated, rather on equivocation of the evidence than on proof of his innocence. 2 Though it had been expected that Fort George would at least make a good defence, that Fort Augustus must soon fall seems to have been regarded as certain. Cumberland wrote that by the plan he had seen of the fort it was impossible for it to defend itself long, as the curtain was composed of council rooms and lodgings for the principal officers ; and in another letter added that more money had been laid out there on ornament than on strength, 3 A month or two later, when he had seen the fort itself, he described it as ' certainly a very extraordinary piece of fortification '. 4 Probably when the forts were built it had never been supposed that they would have to resist artillery. This does not excuse 1 State Papers, Scotland, ii. 29, no. 14. Statement made by Millross on 15 March ; enclosure by Cumberland to Newcastle. 2 /Zwf. ii. 30, no. 30 ; 31, no. "24 ; 32, no. 24. 3 Ibid. ii. 29 on 14 March. * Ibid. ii. 31, no. 33.