Shinty From Culloden to London – The Breaking of a Way of Life (1746–1845)

Shinty After Culloden – The Breaking of a Way of Life

“How the Highland game of shinty survived suppression, exile, and migration after 1746 – carrying the spirit of the Gael from Culloden to London and beyond.”

By Alan MacPherson – Tanera Camans
Part of my continuing research into the origins of Scotland’s national game.

The Battle of Culloden, fought on 16 April 1746, was the last pitched battle on British soil. It brought the Jacobite Rising to a brutal end, and with it, the traditional Highland way of life that had endured for centuries.

For the Highlands, Culloden was not merely a military defeat – it marked the destruction of a social and cultural system that had defined the region for generations.

The Clan System in Ruin

Before Culloden, Highland society revolved around the clan: extended family groups bound by land, kinship, and loyalty to a chief. After the battle, the government moved swiftly to dismantle this structure.

Chiefs lost their powers, clan territories were broken up, and the Highlands were drawn under firmer control from London.

The severing of these bonds struck at the heart of Highland identity. Without the clan, the framework of community life – leadership, language, music, and custom – began to erode.

Suppression of Language, Dress, and Music

The Disarming Act (1746) outlawed tartan and Highland dress, stripping away visible signs of identity. Gaelic was discouraged, and the role of poets and tradition-bearers diminished.

Bagpipe music, once central to clan gathering and warfare, was stigmatised. Though never formally banned, the great gatherings of pipes, song, and dance were driven into decline. What had once united the Highlands in sound and spectacle was silenced – at least in public.

Shinty in the Shadow of Suppression

Shinty (camanachd), as a native Highland game, was deeply tied to winter gatherings, feasts, and the New Year. With the erosion of the clan system and restrictions on assembly, matches became harder to organise.

Yet shinty endured. It required only simple equipment – sticks, a ball, and open ground – and so survived where other Highland traditions faltered.

Even in the years immediately following Culloden, evidence shows that the game continued to be played across the Highlands. In 1769, the Aberdeen Press and Journal reported a tragic case from Fintry, Stirlingshire:

“William Dun, a young lad in the parish of Fintry, for killing his comrade with his club, when playing at Shinty, were both fugitate for non-appearance.”
Aberdeen Press and Journal, Monday 22 May 1769

Though a sombre incident, it confirms that shinty remained an active part of Scottish life within a generation of Culloden – familiar enough to appear in court records without explanation.

A few years later, the traveller and naturalist Thomas Pennant recorded the same pastime in gentler tones. His Tour of Scotland, 1769 was published in 1771, but described the scenes he had witnessed years earlier while journeying through the Highlands in the aftermath of Culloden.

Pennant’s note on the game is brief yet valuable – one of the earliest printed accounts of shinty in English after the Rising:

“The shinty, or the striking of a ball of wood or hair: this game is played between two parties in a large plain, and furnished with clubs; whichever side strikes it first to their own goal wins the match.”
– A Tour of Scotland in 1769

His mention of “a ball of wood or hair” and “clubs” leaves no doubt that the game he observed was shinty (camanachd). Writing barely two decades after the Disarming Acts, Pennant’s account quietly affirms that the ancient Highland game endured where other traditions were suppressed – still played openly on the winter fields of the north, unarmed, communal, and resilient.

Such accounts show that while many Highland customs faded, shinty continued as a living tradition – simple, social, and enduring.

The Game Endures

The Game of Shinty – as depicted in The Penny Magazine (London, 31 January 1835) – offered one of the earliest illustrations introducing the Highland game to a British audience. Published by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, it portrayed shinty as vigorous, communal, and distinctively Scottish.

This 1835 issue marks one of the earliest widely circulated visual depictions of shinty in print – a time when the game was being explained to a London readership as a living Highland tradition.

In exile, in the army, or in new settlements, Highlanders carried with them their camans, their love of the game, and the spirit of the glen – a living memory of home that could be revived wherever they found open ground.

That same spirit of endurance is echoed in the story of Ewen MacPherson of Cluny, chief of Clan MacPherson and one of Prince Charles Edward Stuart’s most loyal commanders during the Rising of the ’45.
After the Jacobite defeat at Culloden in April 1746, Cluny’s home was burned, his estates seized, and a £1,000 bounty placed on his head. He spent nine years in hiding across Badenoch – first in a cave on Creag Dubh above Newtonmore, and later in a timber shelter on Ben Alder, remembered as Cluny’s Cage. This secret refuge, built among holly trees and hidden from view, became the last stronghold of one of the Highlands’ most loyal chiefs.

According to Badenoch tradition – later recorded in the Oban Times (18 January 1896) – it was during the winter of 1747–48 that Cluny, while concealed near Laggan, heard New Year shinty matches echoing from the glen below. The cries of players and the clash of camans carried through the frozen air to his hiding place. Moved by the sound, he is said to have cut a caman from a birch branch and joined the game one Hogmanay, reuniting with his people not as a rebel, but as a Highlander among friends.

Whether fact or folklore, the story endures because it captures the same truth as the game itself: even in loss and exile, shinty remained a link to identity, belonging, and the unbroken heart of the Highlands.

Migration and the Diaspora

The aftermath of Culloden (1746) and the Highland Clearances forced thousands of Highlanders into exile. Many emigrated to Canada, America, and Australia, while others moved into Lowland cities or south to England in search of work and stability.

London became a key hub for displaced Highlanders – from servants, gillies, and artisans to soldiers and professionals. By the late 18th and early 19th centuries, this growing community began forming clubs and societies to preserve their shared identity, language, and traditions.

Among these, the Highland Society of London, founded in 1778, played a leading role in promoting Highland dress, Gaelic culture, music, and traditional pursuits. It was established “with the view of establishing and supporting schools in the Highlands and in the Northern parts of Great Britain, for relieving distressed Highlanders at a distance from their native homes, for preserving the antiquities and rescuing from oblivion the valuable remains of Celtic literature, and for promoting the improvement and general welfare of the Northern parts of Great Britain.”

Its first President, Lieutenant-General Simon Fraser of Lovat, embodied the enduring loyalty of Highland leaders to their people and culture. Though best known for championing piping and Highland Games, the Society’s wider cultural mission embraced other Highland customs – including shinty, which continued to flourish within the recreational life of the London Highland diaspora.

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Shinty Emerges in the Cities

By the early 1800s, newspapers were recording matches played by Highlanders in London and beyond. These were not casual games but organised events with rules, equipment, and ceremony.

• 1821 Blackheath (London): The Statesman described a Christmas Day shinty match where players were chosen by the ritual hand-over-hand caman grip. The ball was leather-covered and 1½ inches in diameter, and the teams – dressed only in Highland attire – travelled by coach, marched with a piper, and played on a marked field. This report records a complete set of practices – team selection, ball specification, equipment, dress code, and ceremony – already codified 72 years before the Camanachd Association.
• 1830 Seacombe Ferry (Merseyside): The Liverpool Albion reported a Christmas Day contest between Highlanders of Ross-shire and Inverness. The pitch was about a mile long, with goals 2-3 yards wide. Teams carried county identities and mottos, marched with a piper in full tartan, and were cheered by crowds. The report noted broken camans, exhaustion, and tactical play, concluding with Inverness declared the victor. The reporter likened the players dispersing home to the “remnants of Prince Charles’s clans after Culloden.”
• 1835 Blackheath (London): The Kentish Mercury and Greenwich Gazette reported a gathering of the Club of True Highlanders for a spirited game of camanachd on Blackheath. Players in “bonnets blue and naked knees” competed with good humour, then marched off to the sound of the pipes and dined at the Princess of Wales Tavern with Highland toasts and reels. The paper explained that this “truly Celtic game” was the same as the medieval cambuc, played in the 13th century and banned under Edward III – a lineage stretching back 700 years.
• 1842 Blackheath (London): The John o’ Groat Journal recorded a match involving thirty-eight kilted Highlanders, played on Queen Victoria’s accession day. The contest was accompanied by pipes, witnessed by curious Londoners and even the King of the Belgians, and ended with a feast, Highland reels, and toasts. This was shinty as both sport and spectacle, firmly rooted in Gaelic ceremony.
• 1843 Blackheath (London): The Inverness Courier described the Society of True Highlanders opening their oak caman chest, each stick branded with the society’s initials and knotted with red or green ribbons. Teams were called out under clan names such as Mackintosh, Macleod, Maclean, and Cameron, echoing the Highlands on London soil. Matches lasted hours, followed by refreshments and even reels danced in the train carriage home. By 1843, shinty in London was already fully organised, clan-evocative, and ritualised.
• 1844 Blackheath (London): The Stirling Observer recorded a Christmas Day match of twenty-five-a-side, with “hails” set 200 yards apart. The Society of True Highlanders’ camans again bore red and green ribbons, and players wore distinctive Highland attire described as the “worsted” and the “carrick.” The Greens defeated the Reds 3-2, in a match played in good spirits before players returned to town by train.

(For the full texts of these reports, see Appendix A below.)

These accounts make one thing clear: by the 1820s – and indeed as early as the 1821 Blackheath match – shinty outside the Highlands was already codified, structured, and richly ceremonial. Through the 1830s and 1840s, reports show it evolving into large public gatherings, carried out with ritual precision, cultural pride, and growing visibility.

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1845 – The Club of True Highlanders

By the mid-1840s, shinty in London had reached a new level of prominence. The Society of True Highlanders, with its caman chest and formal organisation, staged matches at Blackheath that became cultural events.

The Illustrated London News engraving of July 1845, titled “Shinnie, by the Club of True Highlanders, on Blackheath,” captures this moment. Highlanders in full tartan are shown locked in fierce contest, while pipers, banners, and onlookers surround the field. Behind them, a tent is decorated with flags, and mounted gentlemen observe proceedings. Most significantly, the engraving provides visual proof of the same practices described in print two years earlier: the camans are shown with ribbons tied at the bend – exactly as the Inverness Courier (1843) and Stirling Observer (1844) reported.

The engraving provides clear evidence that shinty was already thriving, organised, and celebrated – with rules and rituals carried from the Highlands to the commons of London.

By 1845, shinty was being publicly affirmed: its rules of play, standardised equipment, pitch arrangements, and cultural ceremony were on display in London, confirming in image what had already been recorded in detail in 1821.

The Club of True Highlanders

“The above Club was established in the year 1815, for the relief of distressed natives of Scotland, and the preservation of the music, costume, and sports of the Gael. After an existence of thirty years, and numerous distributions from their funds, they have still a considerable sum in hand, which is fast accumulating, and will enable them more effectually to alleviate the distresses of those whom misfortune has overtaken distant from their natal soil and their own country friends.”
– Illustrated London News, 12 July 1845

This statement confirms that by the mid-1840s, the Club of True Highlanders had existed for three decades, combining charitable relief with the preservation of Gaelic heritage – music, dress, and sport. It positions shinty not only as a game, but as a living cultural expression within a self-consciously Gaelic institution at the heart of Victorian London.

Engraving from the 1800s, depicting members of the Club of True Highlanders in full Highland dress, with camans and a shinty ball before them.
The image symbolises the endurance of Gaelic sport, ceremony, and identity long after Culloden.

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Conclusion

In the aftermath of Culloden, the Highlands lost their chiefs, their dress, and much of their old way of life. Yet shinty endured, carrying forward the spirit of the Highlands. Whether in Laggan’s glens, on the sands of the Mersey, or the greens of Blackheath, the caman remained a stubborn continuity – an unbroken thread between past and present, rebellion and resilience.

The Statesman’s 1821 report already describes a codified game: ritual team selection, a leather-covered ball, Highland dress, a marked field, and a piper’s ceremonial march – a full set of codes in practice more than seventy years before formal standardisation.

The 1830s and 1840s brought even greater visibility: county teams, ribboned camans, clan roll-calls, and illustrated scenes of great London matches. These were not isolated novelties, but continuations of a living Gaelic tradition that adapted and thrived wherever Highlanders gathered.

Although the Camanachd Association (founded 1893) is often remembered as the beginning of organised shinty, it was neither the first to attempt such organisation nor the inventor of the game’s rules. Earlier clubs and societies – from the Club of True Highlanders (1815) to countless regional bodies – had already preserved equipment, customs, and ceremonial forms.

The Association’s true achievement was not invention, but preservation – centralising and standardising a tradition that had been long practised and widely celebrated.

Thus the record is clear: shinty was never waiting to be invented in 1893. It was already codified in the 1820s, affirmed in the 1830s and 1840s, and thriving across the Scottish diaspora long before the birth of its governing body. It endured when so much else was lost, carrying forward the heart of the Highlands – a living connection between the people, the land, and their enduring game.

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Appendix A – Primary Sources: Pre-1850 Shinty in the Diaspora

(The following extracts are reproduced in full to preserve the original detail of early shinty reports.)

1821 – Blackheath, London

Source: Statesman (London) – Friday 28 December 1821

Highland Sports

There is nothing more characteristic of the true amor patriae of our Northern friends than their extraordinary attachment to their national language and dress. Their native sports and amusements -founded generally upon harmless and innocent simplicity – fix themselves so firmly upon the youthful mind of the Gael, that neither time nor distance can efface them from his memory; for whenever he engages in the athletic exercise of throwing the stone, the manly and healthy game of the Shinny or Cammanach, or hears the martial sounds of the pipes, his eye glistens “with the joys that are past, for the thoughts of his soul are on the days of other years.”

New Year’s Day (Old Style) was the only great festival or holiday known to the ancient Highlanders; but of late, Christmas and New Year’s Day (New Style) are partially observed. On these occasions – when the old and young meet to congratulate one another upon the happy return of the season – the usual pastime of the youth is a match at Shinny or Cammanach, while the aged encourage or instruct them, and often seize the caman in their nerveless grasp with an energy beyond their years, and wish they were young again.

The rosy-cheeked and plaid-clad lasses look on with delight at the manly exertions of their future husbands on the closely contested field; and at the end of each match the pipers strike up, and young and old trip the merry reel with light fantastic toe upon the snow-bound heath, while the brim-filled shell goes round, charged with usquebaugh (whisky), which is necessary to resist the chilling blast from penetrating the over-heated chests of the players.

These reflections upon the days of our youth – in which we were not unconcerned spectators—arose from a circumstance which occurred last Christmas Day. Some enthusiastic Highlanders, having a few days before hastily proposed to renew the sports of their youth by a Shinny match on Blackheath, in their native garb, accordingly met at King’s Hotel, in the Haymarket, at ten o’clock, and from there proceeded by Greenwich coaches (previously engaged) to the Hare Inn, Blackheath.

After refreshing themselves, they marched to the heath with their piper before them, to the tune of “The Garb of Auld Gael” and “Gillean an Eilidh” (The Lads with the Kilts), to the no small astonishment of the inhabitants of Blackheath – who imagined that the Highlanders, being armed with claymores, pistols, and dirks, had gathered to settle some deadly feud, according to the ancient customs of their country.

They were, however, agreeably surprised when they saw the Highlanders divest themselves of these weapons and appear on the heath with only the harmless shinny or camman (a club bent at the end) in their manly grasp.

Two gentlemen were appointed to select the players and determine the first choice according to the rules of the game. One of them threw his caman to the other, who caught it in the middle. The first then grasped it just above the other’s hand; the second repeated the process, and so on alternately up the shaft until the last hold gave its owner the choice.

The players were then selected, and the field being properly marked, the sides were chosen using the same alternating hand grips. Every arrangement being completed, the ball (about 1½ inches in diameter and covered in leather) was placed in the centre of the field, and the game commenced by giving the contended globe to the wind.

“Chief mixes his strokes with chief, and man with man,
As Autumn’s dark storms pour from two echoing hills.”

Towards each other approached the youth; the field echoed from wing to wing, like a hundred hammers that drummed in turns on the anvil. The strokes of the youth were heard, and many were the anxious eyes of their friends as they watched them clash on the heath.

The Blackheath locals now had an opportunity to calm their fears and join in the general laughter caused by the slipperiness of the ground, which resulted in falls and ludicrous tumbles that caused much merriment. They nevertheless praised the uncommon agility of the Highlanders, owed in part to the freedom their native dress afforded their sinewy limbs – none being allowed to play in any other garb.

The match concluded at three o’clock, and the plaided youth returned from the well-contested field in regular order, the victorious party in front, with pipers playing “Scots Wha Hae Wi’ Wallace Bled” and “The Highland Laddie.” After some refreshments, they mounted their carriages and returned to town with the piper playing all the way, arriving back at King’s Hotel between four and five o’clock, elated with their day’s amusement – and with an understanding to repeat the same on New Year’s Day next.

Editorial Note: The Statesman (1821) provides the earliest detailed record of London shinty. It describes team selection by caman-gripping, specifies a leather-covered ball, and notes the requirement of Highland dress. Already, by 1821, we see rules, ritual, and ceremony in place.

Earlier than 1821: The report’s phrasing – that Highlanders met on Blackheath to renew “the sports of their youth” – suggests that shinty’s rules and rituals pre-dated this London match. The hand-over-hand caman selection, the leather-covered ball, Highland dress, and a marked field appear as assumed norms, not inventions of the moment. This makes the 1821 report not an origin point but evidence of an older Highland code, carried south and enacted in London.

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1830 – Seacombe Ferry, Merseyside

Source: Liverpool Albion – Monday 3 January 1831

A Golf Match on Christmas Day

By A Looker-On

“Now bid the herald sound the loud alarms,
And call the squadrons sheathed in brazen arms.” – Homer

On the morning of Christmas Day, a considerable party of Scottish gentlemen – probably numbering about fifty – played several excellent games of their favourite national amusement: the shinty of the Lowlands, or the cammock of the Highlands. This game is better known in the north of England by the name bandy.

It is not easy to make the mere English reader understand the merits of this game, being peculiar only to the northern parts of the kingdom. It has neither the regularity of cricket, nor the easy management of golf, as it mostly depends on agility and dexterity.

The match – between the young gentlemen of the County of Ross and those of Inverness – attracted much interest. Owing to the novelty of the amusement in this part of the country, many strangers and friends of the players came to view the scene of action.

By some oversight, the brave lads of Argyleshire were divided – some played with the Invernessians, others with the “buffs” of Ross-shire.

The March to Battle

Upon reaching Seacombe Ferry, the youthful bands formed two deep with their clubs shouldered, and – preceded by a Highland piper in full tartan, playing shrill and martial airs of the warlike clans – they marched along the pebbled beach of the Mersey, toward the new battery, and from there to a fine sandy plain near the Rock.

The appearance of these northern youths was romantic enough. With all the enthusiasm of soldiers (but little of their discipline), they arrived on the plains of Troy; and had the black, bleak rock in the distance been the Tower of Ilium, it might well have yielded at discretion to these more-than-Grecian heroes:

“Such, and so thick, embattled squadrons stood,
With erect, a moving iron wood.”

The Match Begins

After settling the necessary preliminaries, a space of about a mile in length was agreed upon, and goals were placed. On this occasion (though not necessarily in Highland tradition), the ball was required to pass between a narrow space of two or three yards at either end – greatly increasing the difficulty and strategic focus of the match.

The combatants stood front to front, eager and impatient to begin. The ball was thrown into the air, equidistant from both goals, giving equal chance to both sides.

The Ross-shire Buffs, rallying under their proud motto “Cuidich ’n Rìgh” (“Aid the King”), faced the Invernessians, whose cry was “Clach na Cudainn” (“The Stone of the Tubs”).

Each side strained every nerve, every limb, to defend their county. Clubs clashed with terrific knocks. Shouts and huzzas rent the sky. All was motion, agility, and strength.

A sturdy Ross-shire Highlander drove the ball across the smooth sand, cheered on by thunderous applause from his party. Just as it was about to pass through the goal, an agile Invernessian stopped its flight with a mighty swing, returning the pliant globe to its origin!

Another deafening cheer rose from the Invernessians, echoing against the bleached clefts of the adjacent rock. The Ross party, momentarily “chop-fallen”, gathered themselves like a gathering storm and rejoined the contest with force.

Clubs broke, shins were struck, and bodies collapsed onto the sand. Some leaned on their camans from sheer exhaustion. Others swung mightily – only to miss the ball and smash their club into the sand.

Turning of the Tide

For the first hour, Ross-shire had the clear advantage – skill and speed were on their side. Had it not been for fresh reinforcements joining Inverness, they might have carried the day. Compounding this was miscommunication over goal positions, as Ross repeatedly drove the ball more than half a mile past the agreed boundary.

For a time, bets were 5 to 2 in favour of Ross.

But the Inverness reserves turned the tide. After some smart and amusing play, the county of Inverness was declared the victor.

After the Game

It had been planned that after the shinty match, the sides would compete in throwing the stone and the hammer – two favourite Highland tests of strength. But whether due to exhaustion or the call of Christmas dinner, these secondary events were not pursued.

Instead, the gentlemen regaled themselves with “mountain dew” – namely, Mackenzie’s best Milburn whisky, a celebrated Inverness distillery.

They danced a few Highland reels on the sandy floor of old ocean, and then:

“Chief and henchman, serf and all,
Each to his welcome Highland hall…”

having spent the day in joyful exercise and the best of good humour, vowing to repeat the event next Christmas with less confusion and better planning.

Perhaps, the reporter suggests, they might even consider bringing a football next time – “equally amusing and far less dangerous than shinty.”

As the Highland gentry returned home in small groups, marching to the shrill music of the pibroch, one could not help comparing them to the scattered remnants of Prince Charles’s clans after Culloden:

“When, mustering far distant yell,
The northern wilds marched stern and steady.”

Editorial Note: Though mislabelled as a “golf” match, this account is clearly shinty. It records county teams (Ross vs Inverness), with distinctive mottos, a mile-long pitch, narrow goals, and detailed tactical play. The closing comparison – likening the players dispersing after the match to the remnants of Prince Charles’s clans after Culloden – directly links this 1830 event to the Highland memory of 1746, revealing how deeply the game was tied to identity and heritage even in exile.

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1835 – Blackheath, London

Source: Kentish Mercury / Greenwich Gazette, 17 June 1835

A gathering of the Club of True Highlanders took place on Blackheath for a day’s sport at the ancient game of camanachd. The players, described as wearing “bonnets blue and naked knees,” contested the match with great ardour but good temper.

After an amicable conclusion, the Highlanders marched off the field to the sound of the pipes, and repaired to the Princess of Wales Tavern, where they dined, drank Highland toasts, and danced reels late into the evening.

The report added explanation for English readers, noting that this “truly Celtic game” was the same as the medieval cambuc, recorded as early as the 13th century and prohibited under Edward III because of its popularity.

Editorial Note: Although a brief account, this report captures the ceremonial character of early organised shinty in London – complete with bagpipes, shared feasts, Highland toasts, and dancing.
It also makes an important cultural link, tracing shinty’s lineage back to the medieval game of cambuc, first recorded more than 700 years ago, placing the Highland pastime firmly within the long tradition of stick-and-ball sports that predate the modern era.

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1842 – Blackheath, London

Source: John o’ Groat Journal – Friday 22 July 1842

Grand Camanachd (Shinty) Match near London – 20 June 1842

On Monday the 20th ultimo, the anniversary of the accession of Queen Victoria, the Club of True Highlanders held their annual festival at Blackheath, near London. Mr. Menzies, well known for his presiding abilities and patriotic spirit, was chosen Chief. All other arrangements were also met with satisfaction.

Blackheath Common served as a fitting Campus Martius for the Caman. It was, indeed, a stirring scene. Among the players (or “hurlers”) – of whom thirty-eight wore the kilt in true Highland taste and style – were some “clean callants” from the far north. Dashing Donalds all! Gàidheil.

To some London onlookers, their attire may have appeared more colourful than clad, but rest assured, they were warm enough “for a’ that.”

The match itself was hotly contested, animated by the strains of the pipe, and cheered on by a cloud of curious Cockneys. The shinty ball whizzed across the field like a flying bullet. One moment the players were clustered in a tight scrum, club-to-club, with the ball sliding among their tartan hose; the next, they sprinted across the common in pursuit, as the ball rebounded like lightning.

Even the King of the Belgians, passing en route to town, caught a glimpse of the match and received a hearty Highland salute. Perhaps, by now, he has been initiated into the mysteries of the Celtic Caman.

After the club contest, the players sat down to a sumptuous repast – the only distinctly English aspect of the day – and both victors and vanquished gave ample justice to the food.

To aid digestion came the Highland Fling and various Caledonian dances, kept up with spirit into the evening. The event ended, as Highland custom dictates, with a deoch-an-doruis (stirrup-cup) – which teetotallers might call deoch-an-donais (the devil’s cup)! After much hand-squeezing and hearty farewells, all were loath to part ways.

The gathering was marked by decorum and good humour throughout, doing honour to the spirit and character of the Club. It was one of the finest displays of genuine Gaelic gallantry seen near London in many a day.

Though there were no “Knights of the Shire” or great gentry present, as Burns said, “a man’s a man for a’ that.” And as Juvenal claimed, “Manliness is itself nobility.” In that case, this day was rich with nobles.

The ultimate aim of the Caledonian Club was not mere festivity but charity – the worthiest and most fitting of ends to which all their conviviality pointed.

Editorial Note: This detailed account captures shinty’s ceremonial splendour in mid-Victorian London: thirty-eight kilted players, pipes and dancing, a royal spectator, and a strong charitable mission. It reflects shinty not merely as a sport, but as a living expression of Gaelic identity and community far from the Highlands.

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1843 – Blackheath, London

Source: Inverness Courier – Wednesday 3 January 1844

The 25th of December being a general holiday in London, the sons of the Gael resident in the metropolis, to the number of several scores, assembled as usual on the splendid and spacious grassy plain called Blackheath, behind Greenwich Park, to have a bout at the good old national game of shinny.

There, the cammock chest of the Society of True Highlanders, under the charge of trusty Macleod, awaited their arrival. It contained some of the finest specimens of the club or cammock we ever saw – made of British oak, each branded with the initials of the society, and bound above the buss (the bend or head of the club) with a knot of green or red ribbon, to distinguish the sides of the respective players.

Around 11 o’clock a.m., Messrs Gollan (of Gollanfield) and Mackenzie were chosen as head-stocks (team captains), and while the operation of calling sides was underway, we were, in imagination, wafted back to the land of “the mountain and the flood,” as the clannish names of Mackintosh, Macleod, Maclean, Maclennan, Mackenzie, Chisholm, Cameron, &c., flanked by:

“Na Frisealaich ’s na Grantaich”
(The Frasers and the Grants)

…sounded in our ears.

The Highlanders then laid aside their belted plaids, stripped to their shirts, and commenced the game in right good earnest – to the small amusement of the wondering Cockneys present, who clearly regarded every blow struck, and every crash of camans meeting in the manly strife, with the utmost interest.

The ladies, it was observed, were only deterred from joining the sport by the unfortunate encumbrance of their petticoats!

After the first four games had been played – during which the most admirable tact and activity was displayed on both sides (the last game lasting hours) – the Highlanders repaired to the Princess of Wales, an inn adjoining the heath, where they took refreshments in the shape of “true blue” and Reid & Co.’s Entire (porter/beer).

Afterwards, they returned again to the heath and renewed the contest until the sun had hid his head in the western horizon and warned the Gael that the strife must cease.

The unaccountable absence of the bagpipes on this occasion was much felt and regretted.

On returning to London by the Greenwich Railway, the Highlanders crowded together in the train, and – as it sped along – a reel (as best they could) was got up to Gaelic airs played by a Chisholm of Strathglass, which, had it been continued, might well have endangered the bottom of the carriage, and perhaps even brought their feet in contact with the rails!

As it was, however, they arrived safely, well pleased with the manner in which the day had been spent.

Editorial Note: This richly detailed account shows that by 1843, shinty in London was fully organised under the Society of True Highlanders. The description records team captains, a dedicated caman chest, oak sticks branded with society initials, ribbon-marked sides, and a formal roll-call of clan names.
Together, these details reveal that the game had developed structured teams, leadership, equipment standards, and ceremonial customs – proof that shinty’s Highland character and organisation endured wherever Highlanders gathered.

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1844 – Blackheath, London

Source: Stirling Observer – Thursday 9 January 1845

The Game of “Shinty” – A Highland Christmas Match at Blackheath

A favourite Highland game was played at Blackheath, on the afternoon of Christmas Day, by Highlanders resident in London and its vicinity. The match was keenly contested and played in a manner that would not dishonour those districts of the Highlands which are noted for their excellence in this hardy sport.

There were twenty-five on each side, and the “hails” were placed about 200 yards apart.

The majority of the players were natives of Inverness and Ross-shires, and the shinties, which were the property of the “Society of True Highlanders,” were distinguished by being knotted with green and red ribbons. Many were in full costume of “the worsted,” but a great number wore the full dress of “the carrick,” which is generally played in with favour in the Badenoch and Lochaber districts.

The “greens” won three, and the “reds” two hails.

Play commenced at twelve o’clock and terminated at half-past three, without any accident. Those who had enjoyed this healthy sport returned to town by the Greenwich Railway, and, at their terminus, the hearty shaking of hands and good-natured adieus at parting testified the strong feeling they bore to one another. The utmost good feeling prevailed during the game.

The day was beautiful in the extreme, and in the early part of the afternoon, there were a great many spectators, who appeared exceedingly pleased at the novel and amusing spectacle.

Editorial Note: This account from Christmas Day, 1844, is particularly significant – the first known report to use the word “Shinty” in its headline. It provides a clear record of team sizes (25-a-side), goal distance (200 yards), and distinctive Highland dress, noting both the “worsted” and “carrick” styles traditionally favoured in Badenoch and Lochaber.

It also confirms the ribboned camans belonging to the Society of True Highlanders, and even records a result – Greens 3, Reds 2. Taken together, these details show a fully developed and ceremonially rich tradition.

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1845 – Blackheath, London

Source: Illustrated London News – Saturday 12 July 1845

CAMANACH’D OR SHINNIE.

We here present to our readers the match of this ancient Scottish game, which was played on Monday last, (June 30,) by the members of the Club of True Highlanders. The spot selected for the sport was Blackheath, and the mustering-place the “Princess of Wales.” A considerable party of the members, accompanied by their friends and numerous visitors, numbering several ladies, were early at the appointed spot.

The game, which is played with a hard ball and curved sticks, (the merit of which consists in sending the ball beyond a given boundary,) then commenced, and was kept up with much spirit until near five o’clock, during which time many clever hits were made, and many a blow on the shin both given and received; all the players being in full Highland costume. The piper, too, was in attendance, and kept up the hilarity of the day by performances of celebrated Scotch airs.

After the game was concluded, the party retired to the “Princess of Wales,” where a sumptuous repast was provided, and passed the remainder of the evening in mirth and good fellowship:-

And sure and a’ they’re nae to blame
For sounding out each hero’s fame,
Wi’ kilt well buckled round his wame,
Wha played wi’ ’em at shintie.

The above Club was established in the year 1815, for the relief of distressed natives of Scotland, and the preservation of the music, costume, and sports of the Gael. After an existence of thirty years, and numerous distributions from their funds, they have still a considerable sum in hand, which is fast accumulating, and will enable them more effectually to alleviate the distresses of those whom misfortune has overtaken distant from their natal soil and their own country friends.

The members of the Club hold their usual meetings at the Crown and Anchor Tavern, Strand.

Editorial Note: This national illustrated paper spread knowledge of shinty far beyond the Highland community. It confirms the game as Highland costume spectacle, with formalised rules and social ritual, backed by the charitable aims of the Club of True Highlanders (founded 1815). The engraving visibly shows ribboned camans, matching the 1843 and 1844 written reports.

Research and transcription by Alan MacPherson – Tanera Camans