MacGregor Clan 1924 Sterling Silver Vintage Bonnet Badge

FAMILY MacGregor

MOTTO S' Rioghal mo Dhream - Royal is my race

BLAZON A Lion's Head Erased Crowned With An Antique Crown Ppr.

With good back pin

Size approx. 40mm x 48mm

Silver Hallmark Thomas Ebbutt - Edinburgh 1924

Clan Gregor or Clan MacGregor is a Highland Scottish clan that claims an origin in the early 800s. The clan's most famous member is Rob Roy MacGregor of the late 17th and early 18th centuries. The Clan is also known to have been among the first families of Scotland to begin playing the bagpipes in the early 17th century.

18th century and Jacobite risings. The grave of Rob Roy MacGregor, his widow and sons.Rob Roy MacGregor was born in 1671, a younger son of MacGregor of Glengyle. However, given the circumstances, he had been forced to assume his mother's surname of Campbell). The adventures of Rob Roy MacGregor have been immortalized and romanticized by Sir Walter Scott in his novel Rob Roy. Rob Roy was undoubtedly a thorn in the flesh of the government until he died in 1734. He supported the Jacobite cause in 1715 and after the Battle of Sheriffmuir he set out plundering at will. In one such raid on Dumbarton, the town was put into panic and Dumbarton Castle was forced to open fire with its cannon. He also led Clan Gregor at the Battle of Glen Shiel in 1719. He is buried in Balquhidder churchyard.

During the 1745 uprising, some of Clan Gregor fought at the Battle of Prestonpans with the Jacobite army under the Duke of Perth. Some of Clan Gregor were among the Jacobite force that was defeated at the Battle of Littleferry in 1746 in Sutherland, and therefore missed the Battle of Culloden that took place the next day.

After the rising, when the MacGregors were returning home, no-one ventured to interfere with them when they strode across Atholl, with their flying colours they strode passed Finlairg Castle where according to one source the Clan Campbell militia "durst not move more than pussies", and the MacGregors defying in broad day light the out posts which Lord Campbell of Glenorchy had established in the passes. The MacGregors flaunted their weapons and returned to their old cattle-stealing ways, only being tamed over the course of time by the Commissioners of the Annexed Estates from 1755.

Persecution of the MacGregors did not end until 1774, when the laws against them were repealed.