General Wolfe | The Battle of Culloden

General James Wolfe, the 'boy solider' who joined the military at 14 fought in one of Britain's bloodiest battles while he was still a teenager.

Historian James Grasby visits Wolfe’s childhood home to find out what would shape him into becoming a soldier at such a young age and delves into his involvement in The Battle of Culloden in Scotland in 1746.

If you’d like to hear about The Battle of Culloden from another perspective, listen to this episode from National Trust for Scotland: Lord George Murray with Murray…–Love Scotland: Stories of Scotland's History and Nature – Apple Podcasts  

Production 
Presenter: James Grasby 
Producer: Claire Hickinbotham 
Sound Designer: Jesus Gomez 

Contributors 
Ghazala Jabeen – National Trust, Quebec House 
Freddie Matthews – Historian and Cultural Heritage Curator 
Stephen Brumwell – History writer - brumwellhistory.com 

Discover more 
You can visit General Wolfe’s childhood home, Quebec House │ Kent | National Trust, which was renamed in his honour after his victory at The Battle of Quebec. See where he grew up, Henrietta’s cookbook, and the robe with which his body is thought to have been brought back to Britain. 

You can also visit the battlefield at Culloden | National Trust for Scotland 

If you'd like to get in touch with feedback, or have a story idea you'd like to hear, you can contact us at [e-mail] 

Episode Transcript

FREDDIE MATTHEWS (00:41):
I think it's fair to say both these boys
coming from military families,they're young boys like any
other young boys.
It's likely they would have beenplaying soldiers nearby.
The architecture of Wolfe'smind, the architecture of his
military and tactician's mind. Ithink he was cutting his teeth
and he was forming thatarchitecture here in Westerham.

JAMES GRASBY (00:59):
In 1746, a battle raged in Scotland.
It was short, under an hour, butit was bloody.
Hundreds of lives were lost.
The Jacobites, mainly Scots,were fighting for control of the
throne against Britishgovernment forces.
Among the government forcesnumber, a 19-year-old James

(01:22):
Wolfe.
The boy who'd played soldiers inthe woods in Westerham with his
best friend was now on thebattlefield for real.
Have you ever imagined being afly on the wall of history? Join
me for an inside view of thestories of people, places and

(01:44):
moments that made us.
I'm historian James Grasby. Leanin for a tale from time. Back
When.
I'm fascinated by how ourchildhoods shape us.
What you spend your time doing,who you spend your time with,

(02:05):
where and how you live, all playa part in determining your
future.
You may know General James Wolfeas victorious hero at the Battle
Of Quebec in Canada.
He led British troops fightingagainst the French there. But
the victory came at a cost, andat the age of just 32, he died
on the battlefield.

(02:25):
It's what he is most rememberedfor. His childhood home in
Westerham in Kent was renamedQuebec House in his honour.
But this podcast, in partnershipwith National Trust For
Scotland, looks back at hisearly years and his involvement
as a teenager at the Battle OfCulloden.
Wolfe had already seen action bythe time he was fighting against

(02:46):
the Jacobite rising at Cullodenin 1746.
He'd already started beingnoticed by his superiors, and
was already climbing the ranks.He seemed to be living his life
in double time.
I'm in Westerham, not far fromSevenoaks, and there's a crow
flies 25 miles, I guess, fromthe centre of London.

(03:08):
I've just driven through thetown where General Wolfe is
celebrated. In the garage, thepub!
I can see there's a sign there,Quebec Square. There's brass
plaque on the wall, the home ofGeneral James Wolfe from 1727 to
1738.
If I can just get a glimpse ofit over this high wall. It's
like a little crown, threestories, sash windows, a

(03:32):
delicious brick house.
Hello.

GHAZALA JABEEN (03:40):
Hello.

JAMES GRASBY (03:41):
Ghazala, how do you do? I'm James.

GHAZALA JABEEN (03:42):
Nice to meet you.

JAMES GRASBY (03:43):
I love your House!

GHAZALA JABEEN (03:44):
Oh, thank you! Welcome!

JAMES GRASBY (03:47):
Oh, look at that, a panelled room and a musket
over the fireplace. Everythingyou would expect from the
outside.
Ghazala Jabeen is Collectionsand House Officer at Quebec
House. She's going to show meround, but I'm also meeting
curator Freddie Matthews.
Freddie!

FREDDIE MATTHEWS (04:05):
Hello James.

JAMES GRASBY (04:05):
How do you do? I'm very thrilled to meet you!

FREDDIE MATTHEWS (04:08):
It's brilliant to host you here today because
it's a hidden jewel, I think.

JAMES GRASBY (04:12):
I saw on the bronze plaque outside that the
period of occupation by theWolfe family was very short.

FREDDIE MATTHEWS (04:17):
Like anyone, your formative years are in some
ways the most important.
So this is where Wolfe lived forthe first 11 years of his life
with his parents Edward andHenrietta and his little brother
Edward and he'd play with hisbest friend George Warde who
lived at the much grander housedown the road known as
Squerryes-
Squerryes Court.

JAMES GRASBY (04:36):
I'm gripped by childhood homes. Woolsthorpe,
Isaac Newton's House. IsaacNewton as a boy played in the
garden. It became a laboratoryfor that boy.
Thomas Hardy at his birthplacein Bockhampton. He used the
countryside as a gazetteer ofplaces and people from which he
then drew his novels.
When Wolfe grew up here as aboy, how did he use the
landscape here?

FREDDIE MATTHEWS (04:57):
Even though we don't have many sources at all
to turn to about what exactly hewas doing with his friend George
Warde outside, I think it's fairto say both these boys coming
from military families, they'reyoung boys like any other young
boys, it's likely they wouldhave been playing soldiers
nearby.
So similarly, the architectureof Wolfe's mind, the
architecture of his military andtactician's mind.

(05:18):
I think he was cutting his teethand he was forming that
architecture here in Westerham.
I always find it fascinating togo for walks in the countryside
near here and look at thelandscape.
There's flat open spaces that insome places are reminiscent of
Culloden and there's these pineladen hills where you get these
almost cliff-like edges aroundSquerryes Park that feel like

(05:41):
the cliffs of Quebec in Canada.

JAMES GRASBY (05:43):
Ghazala and Freddie, I can't wait to see
more of the House.

FREDDIE MATTHEWS (05:45):
After you.

GHAZALA JABEEN (05:46):
So, James, let's go to the parlour room.

JAMES GRASBY (05:48):
Lead the way.
Bit of a step. Lovely old oakfloor. Quite a low door. Panel
door. And another beautifulpanelled room. But what is
stunning and sensational in thisroom is an enormous bronze bust.
Is this the man himself?

GHAZALA JABEEN (06:04):
Yes, it's a bust of James Wolfe. He was
supposedly over six foot. Redhair. Bright piercing blue eyes.
The long nose. The kind of weakchin. The slanting forehead.

JAMES GRASBY (06:14):
He cuts a striking figure, doesn't he, and
quite a dash with his hair sweptback and long curls running over
his shoulders.
He's presented as a strong manin the bust that honours him,
but he was not a well man,according to accounts in
letters.
And what can be gleaned from thecontents of a handwritten
cookbook belonging to Wolfe'smother Henrietta suggests he was

(06:34):
ill in childhood too.
After the birth of her two sons,it starts to become a recipe
book not just for the things thefamily may have eaten at the
dinner table, but for medicinalcures as well.

FREDDIE MATTHEWS (06:48):
I think we'd say today he had several
underlying health conditions. Hemanaged to mask them pretty well
with characteristic stoicism andgrit, particularly to his men he
had to lead by example.
But behind the scenes, he wasbattling with things like
Rheumatism with dysentery,eventually what was known as the
gravel, essentially kidneystones.

(07:09):
There's a frequent tone ofmelancholy in his writing, even
sort of fatalism at times, andmany people suggest that, you
know, what we now calldepression, you can see in some
of his experiences through hiswriting.

JAMES GRASBY (07:20):
Despite his health, he was not to be beaten
by it.

FREDDIE MATTHEWS (07:23):
This was a time that you couldn't win
battles and wars through sheerbrawn and military firepower
alone.
You needed science on your side,you needed reason and tactics
and a structured approach towarfare and this is something
that Wolfe really personified.
In his own writing was veryhumble and thought that he

(07:44):
wasn't intelligent at all but hehas a tutor to teach him maths
and geometry which he'd lateruse when calculating the angles
of his cannons and how to scaleup the cliffs onto the plains of
Abraham in Quebec.

JAMES GRASBY (07:57):
Death was to come for Wolfe on the battlefield of
Quebec, but maybe it wasinevitable that he would die
fighting.
I've read it somewhere, amilitary historian describing
the various phases that asoldier goes through
psychologically.
When you go into combat as ayoung soldier, you think, it's
not going to happen to me.
When you've been in combat for abit, you begin to think, it

(08:18):
might happen to me.
Then there gets a point when youthink, It will happen to me and
you prepare yourself for death,in a sense that Wolfe,
struggling with his own health,had already got to that stage in
his life where he knew death wasinevitable.
And do you think that that ideabrought about his attitude to
confronting the enemy and beingvisible at battle, that he

(08:39):
didn't have a fear of death.

FREDDIE MATTHEWS (08:41):
There's definitely a fatalism in a lot
of his writing.
A lot of people have said thatthat's what spurred him on at
Quebec in what some perceived asa slightly reckless way, was
knowing that his days werenumbered.
But then again, he'd seen moreaction than most of his
contemporaries by the age of 22.

STEPHEN BRUMWELL (09:00):
Although Wolfe was born into a rare era of
peace, That was really just likea sort of an interlude in a far
longer ongoing conflict.
I'm Dr Stephen Brumwell. I'm anindependent historian and the
author of a biography of JamesWolfe called Paths of Glory.
By the time Wolfe had served atCulloden, he'd already seen

(09:22):
considerable active service.
At the age of 16, he was inaction at the Battle Of
Dettingen, where George IIcommanded his army in person,
the last British monarch to doso.

JAMES GRASBY (09:33):
The Battle of Dettingen is described as a
lucky escape for George II andhis British forces, including
16-year-old Wolfe and hisyounger brother.
Wolfe's regiment was involved inheavy fighting there, both sides
using muskets, a forebearer tothe modern-day rifle.

STEPHEN BRUMWELL (09:49):
Wolfe writes a letter to his father describing
how he saw heads and limbsflying from where the enemy
cannonballs were coming in. So,from a very early age, he was
used to seeing the carnage ofwar.

JAMES GRASBY (10:03):
Close by Wolfe during the heavy fighting at
Dettigen was King George II'sson, the Duke Of Cumberland.
And the Duke Of Cumberland wouldgo on to lead troops at the
Battle Of Culloden just threeyears later.
Cumberland had noticed Wolfe,and not long after, Wolfe is
rising through the ranks.

(10:23):
We're now going up what has tobe the most solidly built oak
stairwell.

FREDDIE MATTHEWS (10:29):
When the National Trust gets round to
publishing 100 best staircases,this would be my vote for number
one.

JAMES GRASBY (10:35):
You're right, Freddie!
We're heading upstairs to meetWolfe's parents, Edward and
Henrietta, to find out howstrong an influence they had on
him.
Going up into one of theprincipal rooms, I'd guess over
the entrance hall, looking outover the street that we arrived
by, what a lovely room, anotherpanelled room.
And in the drawing room,portraits of Edward and

(10:56):
Henrietta, as well asHenrietta's cookbook. And among
the recipes for dinners, thoseconcoctions for curing
illnesses.

GHAZALA JABEEN (11:04):
So you've got orange water, gooseberry wine.

JAMES GRASBY (11:08):
I can see something there. Take green
snails, soak them in beer. Acure for consumption.

GHAZALA JABEEN (11:13):
It shows what type of mother Henrietta was.
And to me, she's a presentindividual in the life of both
of her sons.
A caring woman, but anindividual who knew what she
wanted for both of her boys.

JAMES GRASBY (11:27):
There's also letters stored digitally that
shed more light.

GHAZALA JABEEN (11:31):
When Wolfe was in his early 20s, he wished to
marry, but Henrietta wasdetermined not to allow the
marriage because her dowrywasn't large enough or her
mother was a wanton woman.
And Wolfe wasn't very happy. Butlater he found a young woman
that he was engaged to, who hismother very much approved of.
The letters kind of reveal abeautiful relationship between

(11:54):
mother and son.

JAMES GRASBY (11:55):
There are also surviving letters that Wolfe
wrote to his father that show avery different relationship.
Edward Wolfe was a British armyofficer and he was Wolfe's route
into the military.

GHAZALA JABEEN (12:06):
His letters to his father were formal, so he'd
ask about military tactics andcampaigns.
He'd also ask his father formoney. A soldier's pay wasn't
great to live on. His fatherrightly had an impact on his
career, but I feel his motherwas the primary individual.
There's a connection, there'slove, and it goes beyond your

(12:28):
childhood. So she shaped him asa boy and whatever influence
that she had, it continued to bethat he respected her right till
the end of his life.
And I think you don't always seethat when you talk about
military leaders, you talk abouttheir success and the battles
and the legacy, but it's thesocial element who made them and
why, which I think is very kindof endearing and quite important

(12:53):
because you understand theircharacter, not just their kind
of success.

JAMES GRASBY (12:58):
The young General Wolfe had been shaped by his
strong mother, his militaryfather and his boyhood
friendship with George.
And now the boy soldier isentering adulthood. As the
18-year-old Wolfe is taking partin military campaigns overseas,
the 1745 Jacobite Rising isgathering steam.

(13:18):
The Jacobites' campaign startednearly 60 years before the
Battle Of Culloden in 1689, inan attempt to put James Stuart,
James VII, as he was called inScotland, or James II, as he was
known in England, back on thethrone.
By the time 1745 comes around,the Jacobites, supporters of
James, Jacobus being Latin forJames, were rallying to put his

(13:41):
grandson on the throne, PrinceCharles Edward Stuart, also
known as Bonnie Prince Charlie.

STEPHEN BRUMWELL (13:48):
The second Jacobite rebellion really got
underway in the summer of 1745.Initially, the British
government in London didn't takethe uprising that seriously.

JAMES GRASBY (14:01):
But two major defeats in the run-up to the
Battle Of Culloden atPrestonpans and Falkirk
eventually leads the Britishgovernment to sit up and take
notice.
They replace the commanderswho've been defeated and they
bring more troops back fromoverseas to bolster their
number.
And this is the point Wolfe isbrought into the picture. And

(14:21):
the commander in charge now, theDuke Of Cumberland.

STEPHEN BRUMWELL (14:25):
The British army under Cumberland is
gradually being reinforced,moving north, looking for a
final encounter with theJacobites, which will settle the
situation once and for all.

JAMES GRASBY (14:47):
That encounter, the Battle Of Culloden, would
come on the 16th of April 1746.It was also the Duke Of
Cumberland's birthday, and theJacobites knew that.

STEPHEN BRUMWELL (14:58):
It was decided that because the British army
had been celebrating thebirthday of the Duke Of
Cumberland and had been issuedwith an extra ration of brandy
to toast his health, thatsomehow they'd be in their tents
sleeping off these excesses.
And they would be particularlyvulnerable to a night time
attack on their camp.

(15:20):
Orchestrating this maneuver wasextremely difficult because this
is done in pitch darkness.
It's done involving thousands ofmen.
So what basically happens isthat before they reach their
objective, it becomes clearthey're not going to get there
before daybreak, before theBritish wake up and ready to
receive them.
So they have to March all theway back again.

(15:42):
Many of the Jacobites are dogtired, they're hungry, they've
been on their feet all night.
They just want to go to sleep.
They're in the worst possiblecondition to fight a battle that
day. Unfortunately for them,that's what happens.

JAMES GRASBY (15:56):
The Jacobites under Charles Edward Stuart or
Bonnie Prince Charlie had losttheir advantage and now British
forces under Cumberland were inthe stronger position.

STEPHEN BRUMWELL (16:05):
Cumberland's men had been rested, they'd been
fed, their morale was high,whereas the Jacobite Morale was
low.
Fighting at Culloden, in theopinion of a lot of people,
apart from Charles Edward Stuarthimself, it was the wrong day,
it was the wrong place to fight.It was an open moorland.
It was the worst possible placeto use Highlanders.

(16:26):
But it was the best possibleplace for regular British
infantry and cavalry andartillery to be used. It was
like a conventional battlefield.
According to Wolfe, the battleonly lasted about an hour. And
that was from the openingartillery bombardment, which the
British unleashed upon theJacobites.
The Jacobite forces stood underthis barrage for quite a while

(16:47):
before they couldn't take anymore.
Finally attacked across themoor. But the attack itself, the
charge, the Highland charge, ifyou want to call it that, was
very uneven because differentunits progressed at a different
pace because the moor itself wasvery boggy.
And it was only on the rightwing of the Jacobite army that
the charge actually connected.

JAMES GRASBY (17:09):
And right at the point the lines connected,
Wolfe's regiment.

STEPHEN BRUMWELL (17:13):
But Wolfe himself wasn't with his regiment
that day.

JAMES GRASBY (17:16):
Wolfe was aide de camp, the assistant to a higher
ranking officer, Henry Hawley,who was leading the cavalry.

STEPHEN BRUMWELL (17:22):
He was out on the left flank. He wasn't
involved in that extremelybloody fight.

JAMES GRASBY (17:29):
Hawley and Wolfe's involvement comes later.

STEPHEN BRUMWELL (17:32):
When the Jacobites are finally, they're
retreating, that's when thecavalry are unleashed.
This is traditionally in warfareof that period. This is when the
heaviest casualties occurbecause people aren't defending
themselves. They're throwingaway their weapons. They're
running for their lives.
That's when the cavalry who areon horseback, of course,

(17:54):
overtake them, start cuttingthem down with their swords.
This is the episode of thebattle that that Wolfe would
have been involved in.
And there's a long establishedstory involving Wolfe. In
connection with this, whichbasically is that the Duke Of
Cumberland saw a Highlandofficer lying bloody on the

(18:17):
ground and this Highlanderlooked up at him with a defiant
look in his eye and Cumberlandsays to Wolfe, shoot me this
rebel dog.
And Wolfe says, I would rathersurrender my commission than
commit such a deed.

JAMES GRASBY (18:29):
The story, one of the most well-known involving
Wolfe, is shrouded in myth andthere's no evidence it actually
happened.

STEPHEN BRUMWELL (18:36):
There's evidence that something like it
happened, but you need to swapHawley for Cumberland.

JAMES GRASBY (18:42):
It's more probable it was Hawley who
delivered the order, not onlybecause it was Hawley who was
leading the cavalry, but becauseWolfe was less likely to disobey
Cumberland.

STEPHEN BRUMWELL (18:52):
If Wolfe had refused a request from
Cumberland, he would have beenout of favour with Cumberland,
but he never was.
So I think the episode didhappen, but it involved Hawley
rather than Cumberland.
But the upshot, of course, isthat even though Wolfe and I
think it probably was Wolfe,refused to shoot the officer.
Hawley just said to the nearestsoldier, is your musket loaded?

(19:14):
Yes, sir. Shoot me that man. Andhe did.
The Battle Of Culloden prettymuch put an end, a bloody full
stop, if you want to put it thatway, to the Jacobite Rebellion.
There was talk about regrouping,fighting on, but basically
Charles Edward Stuart, he'dalways thought that his
Highlanders were invincible.
They'd won at Prestonpans,they'd won at Falkirk, and they

(19:38):
were defeated at Culloden.
After that, his interest inbecoming the monarch of Great
Britain, he didn't think it wasgoing to happen.
So effectively, that was the endof the Jacobite rebellion.

JAMES GRASBY (19:50):
In the aftermath of the Battle Of Culloden, the
British government enforced lawsdesigned to integrate Scotland,
specifically the ScottishHighlanders, with the rest of
Britain. But in reality, thelaws were a suppression of
Scottish culture.
Highlanders no longer had theright to own arms or wear
Highland dress such as kilts.

(20:10):
Landlords or lairds who had beeninvolved with the uprising had
to forfeit their estates andabandon their way of life.
And so it seems strange that acouple of years after the Battle
Of Culloden, Wolfe is back inScotland, having been posted

(20:31):
there.
And he stays for eight years,even making friends with some
Highlanders.
Fast forward to 1759, and Wolfeis commanding British forces,
attempting to overthrow theFrench in Canada and there are
Highlanders among his men.
And fighting for British forcesmeant you could wear Highland
dress.

(20:52):
So we're leaving the drawingroom, down this beautiful,
massively built oak stairway.Turning my back on the front
door and into a back room.
Woo! Freddie, you are naughty!
I've turned around and have beensurprised to see a Highlander
behind me. What a magnificentsight.
The woolen socks, which arefantastically brightly coloured.

FREDDIE MATTHEWS (21:15):
As is the tartan kilt, the sporran, the
claymore, the traditionaldouble-edged sword.

JAMES GRASBY (21:21):
And so Highlanders fought for Wolfe at
the Battle Of Quebec.

FREDDIE MATTHEWS (21:25):
If it hadn't have been for his closeness to
the Fraser Highlanders, it couldbe said that maybe the battle
would have gone a completelydifferent way.

JAMES GRASBY (21:34):
And the contribution is recognised in a
well-known painting of Wolfe'sdeath.
Several figures are huddledaround Wolfe as he takes his
last breath. One is a FraserHighlander.
It's a painting, although notentirely accurate, that saw
Wolfe remembered for being asoldier's soldier.

(21:55):
Over your shoulder Freddie I cansee a very famous picture the
death of Wolfe.
He's lying as if he's descendedfrom the cross and in the
background there is a soldieradvancing about to give the
signal that the Battle Of Quebecis won.

FREDDIE MATTHEWS (22:10):
This is one of those images that everyone's
seen and if they don't know thatthey've seen it, they have seen
it.
You've seen it somewhere!
Because this is one of the mostwidely distributed popular
images of all of the 18thcentury.
This is the moment where Wolfefamously utters his last words,
God be praised, I may rest inpeace, and then he closes his
eyes and passes away.

JAMES GRASBY (22:34):
He was struck by musket balls, wasn't he? I think
there was one in his sort oflower stomach, abdomen, who got
hit in the wrist. And then themortal wound was a musket ball
they received to the chest thatkilled him.
Pretty ghastly end.

GHAZALA JABEEN (22:49):
It was.
But one thing you can say, thathe was with his men. He rallied
his men.
He didn't step aside and hewasn't watching from afar.
He was a soldier's soldier.
And that's what I thought wasvery important about him. He
understood battle and heunderstood what it meant.
And, you know, I'm sure he'dmade friendships with some of

(23:11):
the men. He cared for the menthat he was in charge of.
So although it's a terrible wayto go, if you're looking at it
objectively, it's in thatcontext, the context of the 18th
century, it's a heroic way togo.
And that's why the paintings areso magnificently done. It's
portraying a hero. And it's abrilliant piece of propaganda.

(23:33):
How do you get people to supportthese very costly wars? You
create a hero.

JAMES GRASBY (23:39):
That's a great way to contextualise it. I
absolutely see the differentangles and pictures that
different peoples will have ofit.

GHAZALA JABEEN (23:46):
And so much of what we've spoken about in his
life, his childhood, hisparents, his friends, the people
he surrounded himself with,formed him to become an iconic
figure.
Whatever the perceptions aretoday of him, he made a mark.

JAMES GRASBY (24:13):
If you want to hear more about the Battle Of
Culloden, we've hooked up withthe National Trust For Scotland
to tell the story of the battleand the build-up to it from two
different points of view.
I'd encourage you to have alisten to Uncovering Culloden,
the general who helped shape theJacobite uprising, a Love
Scotland podcast.
Thanks for listening to thisepisode of Back When, and I'll

(24:35):
see you next time.