MacDonald, Flora
MacDonald, Flora (1722–90). Born on South Uist, but educated in Edinburgh, Flora's help was enlisted during a visit to the island of Benbecula for Charles Edward Stuart's escape to Skye, after Culloden. Reluctant, but persuaded to succour one in distress, she sought a passport from her stepfather (in charge of the militia) to enable her to cross the Minch with a manservant and ‘an Irish spinning maid, Betty Burke’; the party then travelled from Kilbride to Portree for a boat to take Charles to Raasay. When the escape became known, she remained self-possessed throughout her arrest and subsequent brief detention in the Tower of London. Once Jacobitism had become a safe lost cause, her actions were heavily romanticized. Described by Johnson as ‘a woman of soft features, gentle manners, and elegant presence’ on meeting her in Kingsburgh (1773), Flora MacDonald emigrated to North Carolina the following year, but later returned to Skye.
A. S. Hargreaves
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MacDonald, Flora
