How many military bubbas here?

[gilmore]

while I'm one of those who hasn't served, I'd like to think that the military and wearing the kilt today have a hell of a lot in common, specifically standing up and fighting for what you believe in. The symbolic meaning of the kilt, in many ways, shows how an entire country refused to be controlled by a leader that was not their own. I may be wrong, but it would be liked someone walking around in a uniform from a country that fought back it's oppresors, honoring those who fought before you to allow you to do the things you do today.

any historians chime in on this?

That is the myth. And that is all it is. The Scots were almost evenly divided between supporting the Hanoverians and the Jacobites.

The myth of fierce dedication to the lost cause started after the Stuart dynasty was safely out of the picture. By far most of the Jacobite songs attributed to the time of the Uprisings were written long afterward, sometimes by authors who were children or not even born at the time, such as James Hogg, 1770-1835, or Lady Carolina Nairne, 1766-1845, who wrote "Wha'll Be King But Charlie?" at a time when Charlie was an aging alcoholic with no prospects living off the charity of foreign monarchs who did not have the best interests of the people of Scotlan uppermost in their hearts. "Skye Boat Song" with its "lad that's born to be king" wasn't even written until the 1880's.

The novels of Sir Walter Scott also played their part in this mythologizing, as did "The Highlander" movies of the late 20th century in their own way.

There is also the problem of anachronism. The kilt, at least the small kilt, was just developing at the time of the Jacobite uprisings. The idea of family or clan tartan kilts was a Victorian invention.

Kilts as part of a uniform did not come into play until well after the Jacobites had been defeated, and were the result of aristocrats raising regiments to serve in British armies, especially during the Napoleanic Wars, when the Scots regiments fought against France, Scotland's former partner in the Auld Alliance against England. These aristocrats dressed their troops in their often "newly-discovered" falsely-attributed tartans. And their motivation was of course loyalty to the Hanoverian dynasty, as well as hopes of receiving honors from it.

One of the saddest stories is said to be that of the Countess of Sutherland, who, through her factor, offer employment in the regiment she was raising in return for exempting the family of the enlistee from the clearances she was then undertaking, dispossessing her tennants of the homes they had lived in for generations. Even after raising her troops, she went back on her word and ordered them evicted, tore down their homes and turned the land over to pastures for sheep.

As for the average Scot, the fighting men who wore the kilt, the motivation was most often pecuniary. Scotland was a poor country with few other economic opportunities out of dead end positions.

A satirical view from the common folk is expressed in "Twa Recruitin Sergeants:"

Twa recruiting sergeants came frae the Black Watch
Tae markets and fairs, some recruits for tae catch.
But a' that they 'listed was forty and twa:
Enlist my bonnie laddie an' come awa.

Chorus:
And it's over the mountain and over the Main,
Through Gibralter, to France and Spain.
Pit a feather tae your bonnet, and a kilt aboon your knee,
Enlist my bonnie laddie and come awa with me.

Oh laddie ye dinna ken the danger that yer in.
If yer horses was to fleg, and yer owsen was to rin,
This greedy ole farmer, he wouldna pay yer fee.
Sae list my bonnie laddie and come awa wi' me

Chorus:

With your tattie porin's and yer meal and kale,
Yer soor sowan' soorin's and yer ill-brewed ale,
Yer buttermilk, yer whey, and yer breid fired raw.
Sae list my bonnie laddie and come awa.

Chorus:

And its into the barn and out o' the byre,
This ole farmer, he thinks ye never tire.
It's slavery a' yer life, a life o' low degree.
Sae list my bonnie laddie and come awa with me

Chorus:

O laddie if ye've got a sweetheart an' a bairn,
Ye'll easily get rid o' that ill-spun yarn.
Twa rattles o' the drum, aye and that'll pay it a'.
Sae list my bonnie laddie and come awa.


Or this lament from "The Banks o' the Nile:"

"...O, cursed, cursed be the day that e'er wars began
For they've taen out of Scotland mickle a bonnie lad...
And left them to feed the worms on the banks o' the Nile"

So, far from being like "someone walking around in a uniform from a country that fought back it's oppresors" those soldiers who were first to wear the kilt WERE WEARING the uniform of their aristocratic oppressors, almost all of whom lived in England, spoke neither Lallans Scots nor Gaelic, certainly did not understand the latter, and had no interest whatsoever in promoting an independent Scotland.