Enoch Starmer and our 'Island of Strangers' Ep 140. 14 May 2025

Alistair McConnachie of pro-UK unionist campaign group and think tank, A Force For Good (AFFG), American historian, author and singer-songwriter Avellina Balestri, and viewers discuss:
- Welcome.
- Keir Starmer's remarkable Speech!
- His White Paper admits that immigration does not lead to economic growth!
- And it emphasises the importance of building home-grown skills - "the damage has been incalculable".
- Reform UK have every reason to panic!
- Foreign care worker recruitment to be abandoned.
- Applications for 'Indefinite Leave to Remain' now requiring a 10-year wait!
- Will Keir Starmer get this past the Invasion Migration Sector (which we pay for)?
- Starmer is rendering John Swinney and the SNP's "pro-immigration argument" irrelevant.
- GUEST Avellina Balestri:, Part 6 of Avellina's series on Scottish and British Loyalists in the USA in the 18th century; Sir Peter Halkett; born in Pitfirrane Castle, Dunfermline; engaged in the Jacobite Conflict; his conflict at the Battle of Prestonpans; captured and promises not to fight them again; Duke of Cumberland kicks him out of Army: Cumberland "enabled" Butler's "Life of the Saints"; Halkett recognised as a "symbol of honour" across Scotland; George II intervenes to restore Halkett into the Army; killed at the Battle of Monongahela, 1755; buried in Highland Plaid; Halkett's Legacy; Avellina's book and songs, links below.
- Please support our vital work, merch and donation links below.

REFERENCES
Keir Starmer's Speech at launch of White Paper, 12-5-25:
https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/pm-remarks-at-immigration-white-paper-press-conference-12-may-2025

"Restoring Control over the Immigration System", White Paper, May 2025 (downloadable as a PDF): https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6821f334ced319d02c906103/restoring-control-over-the-immigration-system-web-optimised.pdf

LINKS FOR GUEST
Avellina Balestri Website: https://www.AvellinaBalestri.com

Avellina's Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@avellinabalestri

Avellina's Book: "All Ye That Pass By: Book 1: Gone for a Soldier"
https://www.amazon.co.uk/All-Ye-That-Pass-Soldier/dp/B0D9QMCS6N

Avellina's "Braddock's Sash" Song, at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_AnzKfFSkQ

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This is the 140th episode of "Good Evening Britain" broadcast on Wednesday 14th May 2025.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, and welcome to Good Evening Britain, a Force for
Goods weekly show coming to you live from our studios
here in the heart of the great British city of Glasgow,
with me your host, Alistair mcconachey. We are broadcasting on
all our digital platforms throughout the United Kingdom and across

(00:22):
the world. We're bringing you quality pro UK comment and
analysis every Wednesday from seven until eight pm on Facebook,
on YouTube, on x and on TikTok. Folks, please do

(00:43):
send in your greetings, tell us where you are watching
from on this lovely spring evening. Please send in your
comments and your questions and we will do our very
best to get round to them. Now, we have a
guest coming up at the bottom of the hour at
seven point thirty. It's our American friend who is going

(01:06):
to be giving us part six of the series which
she has put together on Scottish and British loyalists in
the French and Indian War in the USA back in
the mid eighteenth century, and we're going to be looking

(01:30):
forward to inviting Avelina Ballestre to tell us all about that,
So that will be at seven thirty. Coming up. Before then,
we are going to be spending some considerable time looking
at the remarkable, the remarkable news from Ko Stamer. On Monday,

(01:56):
he gave a presentation which were his proposals to deal
with the levels of legal that's legal lgal legal immigration
into the United Kingdom, which not many people necessarily realize

(02:17):
but is absolutely off the charts. And it has been growing,
of course, as we know since Tony Blair took over
in nineteen ninety seven. But in the past five years
it's just gone crazy, gone crazy. And that's legal immigration.
And when I say crazy, i'm talking about in the millions.

(02:40):
Up until June twenty twenty four, the year for which
we have figures. From June twenty three to June twenty four,
over one point two million legal people came into the country. Now,
these figures, these figures, far far and away, are greater

(03:02):
than the illegal figures that we know about, or even
the Channel crossers, of which there are tens of thousands.
But if you multiply that, by goodness knows what you'll
get up to one point two million legals. That was
in the twenty three twenty four year. In the twenty
two twenty three year, there was also another one point

(03:22):
two million who came in, so these are millions of
people now coming in legally. The system is completely out
of control. We've been heavily emphasizing that in all our programs,
and people have been wondering what on earth can we
do about it? Well, I have read the white paper

(03:42):
of the proposals and I'll tell you all about that.
Very interesting and to be frank with you, just shocking,
shockingly surprising in its reach. But we'll get into all
of very shortly. Please stick around. Let's say hello to

(04:04):
some people. Derek first in tonight, Good evening, Alistair and
the affg family. Another lovely sunny heat wave, weather to continue,
very good making up from last year's wet summer in
Great Britain. That's right, Derrek guy. I can't recall him
may as lovely as this for many a long year.

(04:27):
Hello to Debbie says hello to everyone, Xana. Hi to
you Paul at the front line in Whitecliff's Country down
there in Kent. Hi to Catherine, who is calling in
from Glasgow. Adam Bray. There's the name we haven't seen

(04:48):
for a while. Hello, I'm back. How are we all
doing this evening? Good to have you back, Adam, hope
you're doing well. We're doing very well. We're we're buoyed up.
I have to say, by the experience of reading this
extraordinary white paper from Keir Starmer, what on earth do

(05:08):
we make of it? We've called tonight's show Enuch Starmer
and the Island of Strangers because all the opponents of
Ker are calling him enuch now for reasons that are obvious.

(05:29):
Hello to British legends, and to Stephen and to Christopher,
who says, I seem to remember David Cameron pledging to
cut migration from some three hundred thousand to one hundred
and fifty thousand. We need general reform and reform UK
as a party. So let's get started on this remarkable

(05:52):
speech from here Starmer. He gave a speech and he
introduced the white paper. Now his speech in itself a
remarkable and the white paper is really quite extraordinary. Now
we have read it all eighty pages. It's called Restoring
Control over the Immigration System. And if you google that

(06:15):
you two can be taken to the page where you
can download it as a PDF. Well, we spent a
whole day going through it with a tooth com took
us several hours naturally to read it all, and we
have got a lot to say about it. And I
will say this, I don't have any criticisms of it whatsoever,

(06:37):
other than, of course it doesn't go far enough. We
know that I mean, but in itself extremely well written
and full of ideas which if they can get it
past Parliament, will definitely bring down immigration levels. Not near

(07:01):
the amount that we need though, but will definitely bring
it down. So where to start. Well, firstly, let's start
with the reaction that his opponents on the left in
the Labor Party have had. And their main thing, of

(07:23):
course is to compare him to Enok Powell. And the
phrase island of strangers was in fact, well there you go,
there's an island of strangers. One that was the National
and it was trying there's the island of strangers. They

(07:45):
found themselves made strangers in their own country. That's from
UK Powell's Rivers of Blood speech. And would you believe it?
But Keir Starmer says, we risk becoming an island of strangers.
So people saw that that connection straight away, and he's
now got the epitaph of being as per that National

(08:09):
front page, the New Incarnation of Enoch Poll. Well, presumably
they're trying to make that like a bad thing. But
what they've actually done there is they've mainstreamed Enoch poll
and his ideas. These points of view that Enoch had

(08:30):
are now mainstream. We've now got a politician saying saying
things that that Enoch Powell would certainly agree with. Put
it that way, but I think Enop Powell would be
a bit like me and he would say he would say,

(08:51):
we need to go further and faster. But okay, so
here are some of the things then, that that Starmar
has been talking about philosophically in this paper. It's underwritten
with the belief that immigration does not, after all, lead

(09:13):
to economic growth. Now, this has been something that the
system has really heavily promoted in the past, and indeed
it's something that Starmer himself would once upon a time
have believed. But he no longer appears to believe that
because during his speech he had a question and answer

(09:34):
time and he was asked about that isn't immigration necessary
for economic growth? And his response was very good. He
said that hypothesis has been tested. Now during the last
four or five years, since the Boris wave, we have

(09:55):
had unprecedented levels of huge amounts of legal immigration, and
Starmer pointed out, but growth has been stagnant. So in
other words, he simply pointed to what has already happened,

(10:17):
what we've already been able to see, and pointed out
to the fact that in fact, growth is stagnant. And
that's another part of what he said in this document
is that the proper the proper measurement is GDP per capita,
and that GDP per capita itself has not been growing

(10:43):
at all. And so that sort of thing, although it
might sound to you and I fairly obvious for the
politicians to actually be saying that, for here Starmer to
be saying that is really quite is really quite an
extraordinary thing. So that's big news. That's big news. Now.

(11:07):
Let me just read, for example, some of the things
he says here, and this is in his forward. Let's
put the forward of the document up here now, at
the bottom of the first paragraph. There he says, the
previous government repeatedly promised to inward migration would be brought
under control. Instead, Britain became a one nation experiment in

(11:29):
open borders. The damage this has done to our country
is incalculable public services and housing access have been placed
under too much pressure. Our economy has been distorted by
perverse incentives to import workers rather than invest in our
own skills. Another thing that's going through this report is

(11:51):
the importance of investing in British skills rather than relying
upon simply bringing in workers from abroad. Actors like engineering,
for example, apprenticeships have almost half to while fezas doubled.
So and he goes on there about how it's it's

(12:13):
wounded trust in politics, but a very a very important
and a very important philosophical points, very important philosophical points
that he that he wants to make.

Speaker 2 (12:26):
Now.

Speaker 1 (12:26):
Obviously that I do have one or two points that
I want to get to about how it could be
improved and how it doesn't nearly go far enough. But
for now, let me just concentrate on all all the
good stuff here. And do you know what, if I
was Nigel Farage, I would be a bit worried about this.
I really would be, because because forget the Tories, this

(12:48):
document positions labor as far more serious about immigration control
than the Tories are or have ever been. Think about
that this document positions labor as far more based, as
far more serious about immigration control than the Tories are

(13:11):
or have ever suggested that they are. And so the
Tories are not even really in this conversation. I don't
know how the Tories are going to get back into
this conversation. This is really a conversation between Labor and Reform,
and Reform has not yet produced a document like this either,
so they need to get their act together as well.

(13:32):
They do have a very good person, of course, associated
with the Matt Goodwin who writes a lot of good stuff,
but other than him, Reform does not have a coherent
document that lays out exactly what they want in the
way that the Labor Party has done here. So this
is forcing Reform to up their game considerably, considerably up

(13:56):
their game. So what are the There's lots of policy
is here now with immigration, With legal legal immigration, people
are coming in to the tune of one point two
million long term immigrants per year on three main routes,
work visas, student visas, and family connection visas. And this

(14:21):
report has something to say about all of these avenues,
and it tightens up work, student and family visas not
as far as I would like to see. I would
like to see them simply saying we're going to set

(14:41):
limits on the number of visas that are coming in
in order deliberately to stop it happening. But that's something
that's going to have to wait, maybe for Reform to
come up with. But what it is doing is it's
managing the process at the moment in such a way
that it will restrict. It will make it harder to

(15:03):
get work visas, it will make it harder to get
student visas, it will make it harder to get family visas,
and so that way, through the management of that, they're
trying to bring down the levels, and they will succeed
with these policies. They will succeed in bringing down these figures,
which again must worry Reform because how are Reform going

(15:24):
to going to combat that when they see the figures
apparently going down? Not nearly enough, though not nearly enough.
I'll get to that in a minute. So two of
the main policies, and there's lots of policies in here,
but they will stand out ones. And I had to
read this several times to just make sure I was

(15:47):
reading it properly. Here on page twenty seven, we will
therefore end overseas recruitment for social care visas. Now, social
care visas have been a driver of the mass immigration

(16:10):
in the last few years. So to stop the social
care visas is a very very serious, serious policy that
hitherto nobody was thinking about even suggesting that possible. But
here it is in black and white on page twenty seven.

(16:32):
We will therefore end overseas recruitment for social care visas
in line with our wider reforms to skill thresholds. We
will close social care visas to new applicants from abroad
for a transition period until twenty twenty eight. We will
permit visa extensions and in country switching for those already

(16:55):
in the country with working rights. That in country switching
means switching from a social care visa to another kind
of work visa. So but nevertheless, to actually end foreign
recruitment is game changing in a way. And it turns out, then,
doesn't it, that in fact the social care visas from
overseas weren't as critical as as we're being told they

(17:19):
actually were. Further in the document, what we're finding is
people is policies saying that people in this country need
to be trained for these sorts of jobs, and it
does emphasize that this is a long term thing that's
going to take several years to work through the system.
But nevertheless, it's exactly the sort of language that we

(17:41):
need to be hearing. And if you had asked me
about this a month ago, I'd have said, no way
is this likely to happen. But here we go, Here
we go. The second major major thing which is going
to have a big impact is extending the period before
you can claim indefinite leave to remain. At the present moment,

(18:08):
if you come in on a work visa or a
social care visa or whatever, legally you can be in
the country for five years. Up to five years. You
do have to really pay your own way during that time.
If you're a legal immigrant, you don't get access to
public housing, you don't get access to housing benefit, you

(18:28):
have to pay an NHS surcharge. You're considered that you
have to look after yourself. But after five years legal residents,
you can then apply for indefinite permission to remain and
you will get it. It's called indefinite leave to remain.
But once you get indefinite leave to remain, then you

(18:51):
get everything. You get all the benefits as if you
were as if you were a British citizen, housing, public housing,
housing benefit, universal credit. Everything is given to you after
only five years legal residence on a work visa or

(19:11):
a student visa or a family visa. And that's utterly absurd.
And as people pointed out at the start of this year,
and as we were pointing out on this program as well,
all these people who came in under the Boris Wave
beginning in twenty twenty, they're all now becoming eligible for
indefinite permission to remain, which means over the next few

(19:36):
years they all get it. It's going to cost the
nation billions in welfare payments. And so what people were
saying at the start of the year is we need
to extend that period before you can apply for indefinite
leave to remain. We wrote an entire article about it.

(19:57):
We said, you shouldn't you shouldn't get indefinitely to remain,
You shouldn't get access at all. But if you're going
to give it to them, then you should extend the
period from five years to ten years, fifteen years, why
not twenty five years before you can apply for all
the benefits of the British state lo and behold as
it happens today it's announced the policy was announced in

(20:22):
the White Paper, but today it's announced that that period
is going to be extended to ten years, which means
that all the people who came in under the Boris
Wave will not be able to apply for indefinite leave
to remain and will not get access to the full
British welfare system until they've been here ten years. And

(20:45):
that's absolutely crucial because a lot of people are just
going to say, well, you know what, I was just
hanging about Britain until I got indefinitely to remain. Now
I'm not going to get it for another five years,
so I'm just going to go home. So you're going
to see a lot of people leaving Britain as a
concert quence of that. You're going to see a lot
of people not bothering to come to Britain if they

(21:06):
have to hang around for ten years before they get
access to the welfare system. And you're going to see figures,
You're going to see people leaving, and you're going to
see less immigrants coming in because of the extension of
that of that period. So that's a massive thing as well,

(21:26):
and that's something that could have been done under the Tories,
but the Tories just gave up on immigration entirely. So
to actually extend that period from five years to ten
years before you can apply for indefinite leave to remain,
that's a big, big policy and that change. That's a

(21:48):
game changing policy because it also now leaves the door
open to other groups like Reform to come in and say, well,
let's just make it fifteen years before you can apply
for indefinite leave to remain. Let's make it twenty years.
Why do we even have indefinitely to remain as a concept.
You know, all of that whole idea now is opened up,

(22:10):
opened up, and the potential there is incredible. Now he's
going to have a fight on his hands, of course,
to get this through Parliament. And as we know, he
and us all are up against what I call the
immigration invasion industry, the invasion migration sector, and they will

(22:33):
fight tooth and nail, and they're very well funded by
the British taxpayers. And so it remains to be seen
how much of what is in this document is able
to be delivered, But my goodness made this is a
big start. Let's have a look at some of the

(22:56):
comments that you've got to say on this. Remember, folks,
we've got a guest coming up in five minutes. Hello
to Scotland Scorpion. Yes, the human rights lawyers are going
to be the problem. We'll just see how long it
takes for all these reforms to work through the system.

(23:22):
They may, let's hope they don't have to get approval
by the judiciary. They do make the point here that
too much has been reliant upon the courts instead of
upon Parliament making specific laws, And in this document they're
referring specifically to Article eight of the ECCHR and the

(23:44):
extent to which that's abused by the courts just making
up laws whereas they go along. Oh boy doesn't like
chicken nuggets in Europe, so you'll have to stay in
Britain so that you can enjoy his chicken nuggets. You
know that story from a few months ago. They do,

(24:05):
they do talk about how the courts can be abusing
the system and they want to look at the extent
to which they can they can streamline and clarify the
law literally through Parliament, so that the so that the
judges don't have the personal discretion that the judges have

(24:30):
to obey what is the black letter of the law,
so they're going to look at that. I don't know.
I don't hold out much hope for that approach to work,
not in the face of the massive billion pound funded
legal industry. But we'll see at least the thinking about

(24:50):
the problems of the ECCHR, which again is very unusual,
very surprising. So it's also rendering people at John Swinney
are relevant because John Swinney wants more immigration into Scotland
and his big thing is that it will increase economic growth. Well,
as Q Starmer will tell him, it doesn't increase economic growth.

(25:15):
Economic growth has been tested and found wanting and in fact,
as a consequence of mass immigration, it is largely stagnant,
at least with the levels and types of mass immigration
that have been coming into the country. It does imply
in this report that you'll get better economic growth if

(25:38):
you have a higher grade of immigrant whose potential to
earn is a lot greater. But that's obviously just common sense,
that's something we all know. Yes, yes, well, folks, let
me just see if there's anything I need to just

(26:00):
say about that. We'll put when the show's finished. Will
put links to Starmer's speech and will put links to
this document the storing control over the immigration system, will
put links in the description. He did say that the
issue of asylum is a separate issue and they are

(26:21):
going to release another white paper on that in the summer,
whenever that may be. So there's another policy document coming
out which is aiming to deal with the problems of asylum,
and I hold out much less hope regarding that one,
because the only way you can deal with asylum across

(26:42):
the English Channel is to criminalize it, and that will
require us leaving the UN Refugee Convention, and that doesn't
look like something that Starmer would do, but it's definitely
the only way that you stop it. Because, as I
always say, those people coming across the English Channel might
look like illegals to us, they might look like criminals.

(27:05):
I do believe they are essentially breaking into the country,
but under the UN Refugee Convention, they are seen as legal,
and they are seen simply as following their legal right
to do that, believe it or not. So the only
way out of that is to leave the UN Refugee
Convention and to start criminalizing and sending to prison anybody

(27:28):
who crosses the English Channel in a dinghy, and believe me,
that will stop it very quickly. You don't need to
send them to Rwanda, you don't need to do anything
like that. You just need to leave the UN Refugee
Convention and send these people to prison and then it
will start to stop. And that will be our advice
to QO Starmer, and that's the advice that we'll be

(27:49):
putting in our book which we'll be coming out later
this year. Swinny wants more immigration. Of course they will
allow more, and we'll hopefully, hopefully they're going to struggle,
but they're going to try to set themselves as apart
from labor. But it's going to fail because qu Starmer's
seen which way the wind is blowing. John Swinney has

(28:12):
yet to catch up. And the wind has been blowing
from the mouth of Nigel Forage. That's what's moved this debate.
That's the wind that's moved this debate is the the
words that are coming out of Nigel for Age. And
unfortunately for John Swinney, he's got left behind. But Cure

(28:35):
Starmer's getting blown along in this wind. And unlike Nigel
at this precise moment cure Starmer can actually effect a
change if he is serious. Folks, I would like us
to welcome our our guest tonight, who is our American friend,

(28:56):
Avelina Bilestrie. And for some reason, and my thing tonight
is really poor my microphone. Let's hopefully that's better tonight. Right,
let's go.

Speaker 3 (29:14):
It's lovely to be on again with you, Alistair.

Speaker 1 (29:17):
Excellent, excellent. Well, we're very glad to have you all
the way from Maryland in the Great us of A
and especially to speak with us tonight about well, the
sixth part of your series, which we're calling Scottish loyalists

(29:40):
in the eighteenth century, specifically in the Seven Years War,
or what's known in the USA as the French and
Indian War, when the British fought the French along with
some of the Indian tribes that were associated with the French.

(30:06):
And so basically you've been looking at prominent officers of
Scottish descent who were fighting in the British army. And
so far we've covered Major John Pitcairn, General Simon Fraser,
Major Patrick Ferguson, General Edward Braddock and General John Forbes

(30:35):
in that order, and these guys were fighting in the
French and Indian War, which, for the benefit of the
viewers was in the USA was between seventeen fifty four
and seventeen sixty three, so that's the period in which
we are talking generally speaking, and this was twelve years well,

(30:59):
the end of the Ancient Indian Wars, twelve years before
the start of the American War of Independence for British.
So this is a period where there's a lot of
conflict going on. There's a lot of fighting, lots of
different groups of people are involved. The Native American tribes
are fighting on all sides as well, because they're just

(31:21):
walking out to see where their best interests are lying
at any particular moment. And a fascinating period that not
very many people know about. So tonight we're going to
talk about Sir Peter Halkett, who was another Scotsman who there.

Speaker 3 (31:43):
I always love the tassels on that portrait on his uniform.

Speaker 1 (31:47):
Indeed, indeed, indeed, so let's kind of begin at the beginning,
and she I.

Speaker 4 (31:55):
Just got to offer very very quick clarification with regards
to the past figures. So Major John pick Heron did
indeed participate in both the Seven Years War and the
American Revolution, and so did General Simon Fraser of Balnaine,
though Major Patrick Ferguson was really only got properly involved

(32:20):
after the Seven Years War and was mainly just involved
in some other side like in between quote conflicts, but
mainly American Revolution was his main forte. And then afterwards
we did focus on Edward Braddock, General Edward Braddock, who
there's some controversy about whether he was Scottish or English
because his name is very Anglo Saxon. But there's debate

(32:44):
about where he was born, and it's possible that it
had to do with him coming from a military family
so they moved around and they like commuted between Scotland
and England, so he may have been born in England
or Scotland. We're not one hundred percent sure, but there
is a tradition that he was born in Perthshire, so
that's open.

Speaker 3 (33:01):
And then we did.

Speaker 4 (33:02):
General John Forbes, who was definitely a Scotsman and and
so that was that's and he was famously the one
who took Fort Duquine, which Braddock failed to take in
the French Indian War. So that's that's what we're up
to now and now we're doing Sir Peter Halcatt excellent.

Speaker 1 (33:22):
So I was doing a wee bit of research into
him today. And he was born in a castle that
many people in certainly that the Velmine area will know about.
And we've got a photograph of it here. Now what's
that one called again, that's that's what it's Pitt Farron

(33:45):
Farron House, which now I believe is like a museum
or or or perhaps a golf club.

Speaker 3 (33:55):
Yes, it's associated with a golf club.

Speaker 1 (33:57):
Now, yes, yes, yes, So obviously he was not of
the common health as it where he was. He was born.

Speaker 4 (34:06):
Into nobility, and the families, the Lowland Scottish families in
this region of you know, relative either noble or gentry
or at least you know, well connected sort of upper class,
knew each other and knew each other well. And there

(34:28):
was a lot of intermarriage and interconnection in these families.
And so for example, hal Could and Hallcutt family were
quite well known and connected to the Forbes family from
the previous episode, and they also would have been connected
and known of the Pitt Karen family were also from
that same region, same general vicinity, and interconnected with each

(34:52):
other so Sir Peter Halcott was indeed Lowland Scottish noble,
and he he was both a military man in the
British Army and also a member of Parliament for a time,
and he participated in the government, in the government efforts

(35:14):
to quell the Jacobite Rebellion of seventeen forty five when
Bonnie Prince Charlie comes to Scotland to try to reclaim
the crown for his father. And so this is something
that is important to point out because a lot of
people forget that the Jacobite rebellions were civil wars across
the British Isles. They were not England versus Scotland.

Speaker 3 (35:36):
Far from it.

Speaker 4 (35:38):
Many many Scots fought on the side of the Hanoverian government.
And also you have you know, Jacobites from across you know,
the British Isles, English and Welsh and Irish, that they
weren't just Scottish. And you know, there was a lot
of complexity and layers to this. So you had very

(35:58):
prominent people and families who were Scottish who were very
supportive of the sittying you know, Hanoverian monarch et cetera.

Speaker 1 (36:07):
So that's absolutely well understood among certainly those of us
who'd take an interest in that humans.

Speaker 4 (36:17):
Yeah, Unfortunately, popular culture tends to mess this up, especially
with Outlander and and other programs that you know, just
just sabotage history really badly. But but this is the
fact of it is that it and the nationalists, you know,

(36:37):
the nationalists have a very you know, they have a
very propagandaized view of the conflict and they want to
try to use it to forward their own sort of
political goals and agendas and so forth, and so that
that that's that anyway, So Peter, getting back to him,
he participates in the Battle of Preston, Pants is not

(37:00):
too far outside of Edinburgh, and so he's under Sir
John Cope and he is in this losing battle for
the government side. The Jacobites win basically route them, and
so Sir Peter gets captured by the Jacobites, and the
Jacobites are struggling to figure out how to deal with

(37:23):
their prisoners. At this point, they've taken on prisoners and
they don't know quite how to has them. So they're
they're presented with a situation where they're like, do we
execute our prisoners or do we try to extract from
them a promise that they, you know, will basically if
we let them go, will they vow not to come
back and fight us in this theater of war.

Speaker 3 (37:44):
So that's what they do. They put to everyone.

Speaker 4 (37:45):
Look, you guys, you know this is what the Prince
also wants, because for all of his flaws, body Prince
Charlie had a good reputation for genuinely being trying to
be humane, trying to be merciful. He didn't want to
mass execute people. So basically they're saying, okay, do you
want to take this sort of oath that you're not
going to.

Speaker 3 (38:05):
Start as again.

Speaker 4 (38:06):
So Halkitt does so, he says, okay, I take the oath,
and that he leaves. So fast forward a little bit
in time and we get to the Duke of Cumberland,
who is King George the second son, who's the one
basically now in charge of trying to crush this rebellion,
and he calls upon Halkitt to come back to the

(38:26):
field to fight the Jacobites.

Speaker 3 (38:29):
So hal Kitt refuses to do so.

Speaker 4 (38:34):
Cumberland continues to press him to do so, and how
could again strongly refuses and very famously says, your grace,
you are the master of my commission, but not of
my probity and honor.

Speaker 3 (38:50):
And so this was a big deal.

Speaker 4 (38:52):
He's challenging the king's son, he's challenging the person in
charge of crushing this rebellion. You know, you can get
it accused of and ste ordination, and it's something that's
it's very much of a statement as well, because this
is someone who's a Lowland noble, and you know, in
this time period Lowlanders and Highlanders had a lot of

(39:13):
animosity toward each other. It was an intense sort of thing. Now,
Halkitt actually owned lands in the Highlands though, so while
he was a Lowlander, he still did have connections up there, and.

Speaker 3 (39:24):
He felt that I gave my word on it. I
don't care.

Speaker 4 (39:28):
And people would say to him and try to talk
him down off of this and say, they're highlanders, some
of them are even papists. You don't have to keep
your word to these people. And he wouldn't budge on it.
He's I gave my word. I don't care what their
region is or their religion. I gave my word. I
won't break it. And so Cumberland is angered by this.

(39:50):
He sees it as in subordination, and he suspends his commission,
Halcott's commission, and so Halcott starts to become this name
now because he he's now becoming kind of a high
profile case due to this situation, and he's determined to
fight for it. Now. I'll give a very brief side
quest on Cumberland's briefly because he gets spoken about a lot.

(40:12):
He has a lot of negative reputation because he was
very brutal. You know, he gets called butcher Cumberland and
stinking Billy for a reason. It's not misplaced. But I
will say that, you know, he's a little more complicated
than some portrayals because while yes, he's absolutely ruthless towards
rebels no matter what stripe they are, it's not so

(40:34):
much an ethnic thing. Some people portray it as him
either being anti Scottish, which is nonsense, or anti Highlander,
which is not true. He actually was quite supportive of
any Highlanders who were in favor of his royal house.
He just was super anti rebel. It's also very interesting
because he was the kind of person who did have
his own code of honor, his own chevelle k streak.

(40:54):
We see this over on the continent right during the
War of Austria in succession. Cumberland actually has a good
reputation for chivalry. So for example, when he's wounded in battle,
he insists upon the enemy, this is the French, the
enemy wounded officers being treated before he is treated. And

(41:17):
he also has a very good reputation among his own men.
They consider him very generous to them, very considerate of
their needs, very.

Speaker 3 (41:24):
You know, inspirational to them.

Speaker 4 (41:26):
So he's good with them also in very one anecdote
that I think sums up this characteristic of his, which
is that he feels if you do him a good service,
he will go far and away to return that service.
So there's a quite famous Catholic priest, father all Been Butler,
and in this is a time period when Catholics are
still basically Catholic priests are you know, banished from the

(41:49):
British Isles for the most part and are not allowed to,
you know, do their ministry in Britain. So this is
an exiled Catholic priest who that one of the seminaries
on the continent, father Alban Butler. And he is an
englishman's you know, and he's just in exile basically because
he is a Catholic priest. And again this is during

(42:11):
the era of the penal laws, so Catholics have all
kinds of disabilities against them in terms of the government
and in terms of you know, functioning, and they have
to pay fines and all of the rest of it
in Britain.

Speaker 3 (42:22):
So anyway, father Butler.

Speaker 4 (42:25):
On the continent, he because he's an English speaker, obviously
an Englishman, he gets recruited to help with the British
wounded during these big battles that have raged, and to
take care of the British wounded, and to negotiate prisoner
exchanges between the French and the British and so forth.
So he is so helpful and so compassionate to well,

(42:49):
frankly his fellow countrymen who are in this position that
Cumberland learns of this. And Cumberland is the kind of
guy again if you do a favor for his men,
you're doing it directly for him. He says to Butler, listen,
do you want anything? If it's within my power, I
will grant it. And so essentially Butler says, I want

(43:10):
to go home, and even though it's illegal to do so,
and Cumberland says, fine, you go home, I will personally
guarantee your safety. So Butler does go home, and then
he becomes quite famous for this is something that's very
well known in the Catholic world. What he's most famous
for is writing a series of biographies of the Saints.

Speaker 3 (43:31):
It's called Butler's Lives of the Saints. And this is
enabled by Butcher Cumberland.

Speaker 4 (43:36):
Really, without Butcher Cumberland inadvertently, these these works that are
Catholic classics, would not exist.

Speaker 3 (43:42):
So that's that's him scrolling all the way around. Though
we must say he hated rebels.

Speaker 4 (43:47):
He had no toleration for them, and he was very
low patience for anyone who questioned his methods or anyone
who So that's that, and we're back to Halkitt.

Speaker 1 (43:58):
Okay, back to Helkitt, and he is now still exoed
from the British Army.

Speaker 4 (44:03):
Yes, he's exiled from the British Army, as are a
number of other again officers who tried to do anything. Again,
this is just tiny, tiny inform that there's another guy
very much at the same time as Halcut and in
kind of the same mode of being in trouble. Charles Whiteford,
who also was a lowlander Haynaverian, who also tries to

(44:25):
go up against Cumberland when he's saying, look, this guy
spared my life when he could have killed me in Prestonpants,
same thing, same situation, and he says, I want to
try to get a pardon on his behalf. Cumberland will
have none of it. He says, wait, I want to
at least secure his family's safety. Cumberland again will have
none of it. And I went secure his lands. Nope,

(44:45):
And then he finally says, look, if you do not
grant any kind of mercy on this, I want you.

Speaker 3 (44:50):
I want you to exile me.

Speaker 4 (44:51):
I want you to blot me from your buck, essentially
because I will not serve a sovereign who cannot show
mercy to a defeated enemy. And weirdly enough, in this
actually particularly case, Cumberland did softens slightly because he valued
white for skills so much he kept it on board.
But going back again to Halkit, we get that hal
Kitt struggles to get his commission back. He fights, he

(45:11):
fights to get it back through legal means, and is
determined to get himself rectified. And you know, restored ultimately
after his name gets quite famous for this across Scotland
and he becomes this figure that symbolizes the penalties of honor.
I guess, you know, it's like it doesn't always instantly
pay to be honorable. And so basically he ends up eventually,

(45:35):
after gaining quite a lot of renown and respect across
the political isle and across the regional isle and religious isle,
he gets his commission back because King George the Second
amazingly intervenes in his behalf and restores it directly going
in contrast to his own son. You know, Cumberland was
his son who just won a great victory for him,

(45:55):
but he still upholds Halkitt's honor so that he is restored,
so that, you know, again he has a great deal
of theme associated with the name because of that. So
then we get to the to the Seven Years War
French Niam War. So now he's restored, he goes over
to America to be part of General Edward Braddock's expedition

(46:15):
to take French Fort Ducane, and he goes over with
his two sons, Francis and James, who are serving under him.
So he and Braddock worked together on this they struggle
to get supplies and to get you know, wagons for
this gig, and they're trying to struggle working with different
colonial bodies of government and so forth, and anyway, they

(46:37):
end up batman Angahela. And as I went into in depth,
I'm not going to go to it again. This was
a massacre. Basically the French and their Indian allies attack
the British, you know, and it's a total slaughter and
you know, it just ends really really badly.

Speaker 1 (46:56):
So let me just clarify for the for the for
the listeners, this is the Battle of Mongahilaong which manonga Helam, Yeah,
which was ninth of July seventeen fifty five. So that's
the period that that that we're looking at. And it
was a massive defeat, as you say, for for the

(47:16):
British against the French along with their Indian tribes and Britain.
What had what had Britain been trying to do at
that battle? What was the the aim was to capture fort.

Speaker 3 (47:30):
Or Ducane they were trying to take from the French.

Speaker 1 (47:33):
And they failed at this time of night at.

Speaker 3 (47:36):
That point they did indeed fail.

Speaker 1 (47:38):
Was as we mentioned, as you mentioned, was it last
time around. They actually succeeded three years later and taken
what was a vital strategic outpost in that particular war.

Speaker 4 (47:53):
So while the brad where Bradick failed for succeeded, so
they they finally got it.

Speaker 1 (48:02):
But your man, your man how caught here as part
of the Braduck team and unfortunately, and we'll just we'll
just wind this up now, but.

Speaker 3 (48:10):
Real quick.

Speaker 4 (48:11):
So basically how it ends up, Yeah, how howkud gets
He fights very gallantly, he gets shot, and then very tragically,
his son James, upon seeing him get shot, rushes over
to his father and himself is killed and gets shot.
And then his man servant tries to go over and help,
and he too is shot. So it's this kind of horrible,

(48:32):
you know, kind of family tragedy and and and so
they're the surviving son. Francis can't even get over to
try to deal, you know, with the with the corpses
of his family. And so however, he comes back. He's
determined to go back and find them. So he is
on Forbes March and don't forget the Forbes and the
hall Cuts were close because they came from the same

(48:53):
area of Scotland. And they were of you know, the
upper crust. So he is with Forbes on that return
turn trip, determined to find his father and brother. They
go back to Monongahela. They see all of the skeletons
lying around. It's very distressing for everyone who goes on
this mission. But they finally find these two skeletons and

(49:15):
wrap together almost like they're in an embrace, and they think, oh,
this could this could be it. He's not sure and
nobody can really tell now at this point, but he says,
my father had a gold tooth.

Speaker 3 (49:26):
My father had an artificial tooth. Check that.

Speaker 4 (49:28):
They check it, it's there. He gets so overwhelmed, Francis Halkutt,
He's like, oh my god, it is my father. That
he faints into the arms of his comrades. And then
ultimately he has his father and brother buried in Highland plaid,
which again this beautiful thing because they are Lowlanders and
the great tensions of the aftermath of the Jacobite Rebellion

(49:51):
were such that to have a lowlander breach this gap
with the highlanders, you know, at this time, and just
he manages to transcend all of the disruptions of the
age again, so so he gets laid to rest there
with full military honors as they could provide, at least,
wrapped in in Highland plaid, and again he just comes

(50:14):
to represent how people, you know, in this society that
was so broken into so many factions, so many different
types of people, so many issues with each other, whether
it was religious or ethnic or political.

Speaker 3 (50:27):
Or what have you, that this one man and his honor.

Speaker 4 (50:33):
Was such that he becomes this symbol of the best
really to be had in Scotland, the best to be
had in Britain, the best that there was hope for unity,
that there was hope for union in the end to
be found really based upon this person's legacy again of
just decency and courage and honor. So he again he

(50:59):
stands out as the very unifying figure, a true nobleman
in the the you know, most profound sense of the word.
So I think that that really is sort of the
takeaway of the story, and how he was able to
bring together so many different aspects of of British society,

(51:20):
so many different types of people who were natural enemies
and would oppose each other naturally, but they were able
to be brought together through his legacy, through his memory,
and and again in a way he also is this
forever connection, uh, from from America to Britain because he's

(51:41):
still here. He's in Pennsylvania, so you know right there,
it's kind of like he forever claimed it on some
level for for Britannia through his very presence here. So
so so so there's there's that he was. He was
a unity figure, like like you Alistairs.

Speaker 1 (52:01):
Do you know what I like the way though that
you summarized that as well. A man who fought for
the British government forces against the Jacobites, lost at the
Battle of Preston Pans on the twenty first to September
seventeen forty five, swore to the Jacobites that he wouldn't

(52:24):
take up arms against them. Consequently was chucked out of
the British Army by no less a man than Cumberland,
but was reinstated by George the Second. But who didn't
take up arms against the Jacobites, who went to fight

(52:44):
for Britain in the USA against the French who were
causing mischief over there. So very interesting story, not one
I had ever heard of before, not one that many
people would ever likely hear of if they didn't want.

Speaker 4 (52:59):
Yeah, it's unfortunate that he's not better It's very unfortunate
he's not better known like so many of these other figures.
I mean, I feel like they should be. They should be,
they should be.

Speaker 1 (53:09):
Just wait, do you know what I mean? It's going
to be better known. It's going to be better known
after this program, because what we'll do is we'll click
what you just said there will get that out. Is
going to get hundreds of views.

Speaker 3 (53:20):
Wonderful. Why we do this, that's why we do this.
We're trying to honor, honor, the honor the noble dad.

Speaker 1 (53:27):
Really, that's that's right. Now. You do have a book
out it's called search Amazon for all oh ye that
passed by?

Speaker 3 (53:36):
And people gets in it.

Speaker 1 (53:40):
Hall Cut is referenced in it. Very good. So rather
than putting up a very complicated Amazon U r L,
all you need to do is to go to Amazon
dot co dot UK or in America Amazon dot com
and search for quote unquote, oh ye that pass by.
Now you also you've also got a YouTube page well,

(54:05):
which is YouTube dot com forward slash. I'm at Avelina
Blestrie A V E L l I N A B
A L E S T r I for the benefit.

Speaker 2 (54:18):
There's a song on there about Bananga HeLa in which
Halkit gets referenced called Braddock's sash, so he he gets
uh stand he and his his son, so his sons.

Speaker 1 (54:28):
He gets a reference in your song because not many
people know you're also a singer and songwriter and your
your website address is Avelna Blestrie or one word dot
com Avelena. It's been a pleasure to speak to you.
I don't know if you've get any more Scottish people
wind up that you're investing with six of them.

Speaker 4 (54:49):
We have, Well, what I was going to propose, now
that we've we've we've veered into jack aboute territory, what
I would like to do next time, take a little
change up from from doing stuff happening in the American
Wars and instead do Colonel James Gardner who was killed
at Preston Pans there was another government scott He's a

(55:11):
favorite of mine, so I'd really like to do him next.

Speaker 1 (55:14):
Let's do it. You're usually on every two or three months,
so we'll look forward to having you back on and
you can you can research shop on that guy. I'm
sure you already know a huge amount about him anyway, and.

Speaker 4 (55:29):
Absolutely I'll print out some quotes from him because he
was quite the writer.

Speaker 1 (55:33):
Okay, good, we'll have Elena. Thanks very much for everything.
Hope things go well for you over there stateside, and
we'll look forward to seeing you again.

Speaker 3 (55:42):
Absolutely, thank you so much for having me on. It's
been a pleasure.

Speaker 1 (55:45):
Thank you God, bless fantastic have Elena a less tree, author, singer, songwriter,
historian and great friends of A Force for Good and
we're delighted that we have people of such caliber on

(56:07):
our show. So all good stuff, all good stuff. Now,
just at the top of the hour, Please can I
remind folks to always check out our store a forcefogod
dot UK forward slash shop hyphen one, where you will

(56:31):
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(56:54):
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(57:39):
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(58:01):
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(58:28):
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(58:48):
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(59:09):
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consider it, because you know us. We're dedicated to this
and we always deliver. Folks, it's been really nice to speak.
Thank you to our guest, Avelina, and thank you to

(59:31):
all the people who made comments tonight. Let's see if
there's anything that I can read out with somebody spamming here,
we'll get rid of them. They spamming on spaming on Facebook.
Let's get rid of them. Block user. That's what we
need to do. Oxanna says thanks, as does Christopher, as
does Derek. Christopher says a great show, and Naksana says

(59:54):
good night, and Scotland Scorpion says, by for now, thank you, folks.
We will be back next week with another guest. Look
At Johnston will be our guest next week, another favorite
of the show. So until then, it just remains formed
to say God bless the United Kingdom and God Save

(01:00:15):
the King. See you next week.