‘Perhaps the Highlanders May Imitate Them’. Highland Identity and the British Empire, from the Forty‐Five to the Seven Years War

Abstract

AbstractParticipation in imperial service has been seen as a means through which Highlanders, once regarded as a threat to the British state, were assimilated, allowing Highland and British identities to coexist. This was not an uncomplicated process. Reports of Highland soldiers' conduct in the Seven Years War echo earlier accounts of the Jacobite rising and compare Highlanders to Native Americans. Such accounts reflect Enlightenment concerns about the nature of social development. They demonstrate that Highland soldiers in the British Army continued to be regarded as ‘others’ whose supposedly untamed nature remained but was now regarded as useful to the Empire.