Hugh MacDonald (2 February 1699 – 12 March 1773) was a Roman Catholic bishop who served as the Vicar Apostolic of the Highland District for the strictly illegal and underground Catholic Church in Scotland between 1731 and 1773.^[1][2][3]

Hugh MacDonald was born in a wattle and daub house located where the River Meoble emptied into Loch Morar on 2 February 1699. According to his biographer John Watts, only the larger size of the future bishop's birthplace differentiated it from the houses that surrounded it and showed his family to be of higher status.^[4] Although Hugh MacDonald is habitually referred to today as, "the son of the Laird of Morar", he was in reality the son of Alexander MacDonald, Tacksman of Glen Meoble for his elder brother Allan MacDonald, the Clanranald Laird of Morar. Hugh MacDonald's mother was Mary MacDonald, the daughter of Ranald MacDonald of Kinlochmoidart.^[5]

At the time many Catholics in the West Highlands and Islands, like the future bishop and his parents, were looked after by Ulster Irish-speaking missionary priests sent by the Catholic Church in Ireland. One such priest, Antony Mongan, baptized the future bishop. Another, the elderly and consumptive James Cahassy, was assigned during most of the bishop's childhood to the illegal chapel at Eilean Bàn in Loch Morar.^[6]

He was educated for the priesthood at the Seminary founded by James Gordon at Eilean Bàn in Loch Morar and continued his studies at a new location after the seminary was forced by the Jacobite rising of 1715 to move to Scalan in Glenlivet.^[7] He continued his studies afterwards at Paris.

After completing his studies, he returned to Scotland and was ordained a priest at Scalan by Bishop Gordon on 18 September 1725. He was appointed the Vicar Apostolic of the Highland District and Titular Bishop of Diana by the Holy See on 12 February 1731. He was consecrated to the Episcopate on 18 October 1731. The principal consecrator was Bishop James Gordon, and the principal co-consecrator was Bishop John Wallace, assisted by Bishop Alexander Smith.^[1][2][3]

Upon learning that Prince Charles Edward Stuart had arrived from France and landed at Loch nan Uamh on 25 July 1745, Bishop MacDonald asked his kinsman, MacDonald of Morar, how many French Royal Army troops and military advisers had arrived with the Prince and panicked when he was told merely the Seven Men of Moidart and almost no military supplies or money. As a result, Bishop MacDonald argued in vain against beginning the Jacobite Rising of 1745.^[9][10]

When it became clear that his pleading was in vain, the Bishop reluctantly assigned several priests of his District, including Alexander Cameron and Colin Campbell of Lochnell, to the Jacobite Army as military chaplains, and blessed (Scottish Gaelic: an bratach bhàn), the Jacobite standard raised at Glenfinnan.^[11]

According to historian Maggie Craig, the 1745 rising was and often still is inaccurately, "presented as a Protestant-Catholic struggle" and it is just as often alleged that a Stuart restoration would have meant the forced conversion of all the British people to Roman Catholicism without distinction.^[12] In reality, according to his biographer, however, Bishop MacDonald was under strict orders from the Congregation for Propaganda at the Holy See, "not to become involved in domestic politics, and as such should not have been near Glenfinnan."^[13]

According to a later report by Bishop John Geddes, however, as an outlawed clergyman of an illegal and underground church denomination, it is understandable why Bishop Hugh MacDonald would have felt very hopeful about the House of Stuart government in exile's promises of Catholic Emancipation, freedom of religion, and civil rights to everyone outside the Established Churches of the realm. It is equally understandable why the Scottish Catholic laity, who, "were discouraged and much exposed to oppression", would similarly, "wish for an event that was likely to release them, and put them again into the possession of the privileges of free-born citizens."^[14]

Also according to Watts, the majority of those attending the unfurling of the standard were Episcopalians and Presbyterian Jacobites who felt just as hopeful about Jacobitism^[15] as Catholic Jacobites and who, according to Maggie Craig, were similarly, "in their attitudes to women, personal liberty, and religious freedom ... were light years ahead of their adversaries." They also knew the consequences they would face if they failed, but were willing to risk those consequences to fight for what they saw as a better future for their families and their country.^[16] What Protestant Jacobites thought, however, of having a Catholic bishop bless the standard rather than a clergyman of their own denominations is not recorded. It is very possible, according to the Bishop's biographer, that the sense of fighting for a common cause may have made Protestant Jacobites more accepting of a Catholic ceremony than would have been normal at the time.^[17]

According to Bishop John Geddes, "Immediately after the Battle of Culloden, orders were issued for the demolishing all the Catholic chapels and for apprehending the priests."^[19] Historian John Watts confirms that this policy was followed by government troops and that, "In doing so, they appear to have been acting on official orders."^[20]

After Culloden, Bishop MacDonald's movements as a fugitive are difficult to precisely document and he said in later years only that he, "lurked the best way he could."^[21] It is known that he was sometimes in hiding at the chapel, library, and former seminary upon Eilean Bàn in Loch Morar.

For this reason, Royal Navy crews under the command of Captain John Fergussone of HMS Furnace and Captain Duff of HMS Terror portaged over nine miles of rough, uncharted, and previously thought impassable terrain. They were seeking to capture the Bishop and high-ranking Jacobite Army leader Lord Lovat, who were correctly suspected of meeting with each other upon Eilean Bàn on 8 June 1746. Although the Bishop and the others on the island saw the sailors coming from afar off and managed to escape the island and flee the loch-side in the nick of time, the crew of HMS Furnace continued searching in caves surrounding the Loch and eventually succeeded in capturing Lord Lovat.^[22]

According to a later report by Bishop John Geddes, Lovat had gone to Eilean Bàn to make his Confession and be received back into the Catholic Church by Bishop MacDonald.^[23]

According to a report of the action for the Duke of Newcastle, upon the island, "They found the before-named Popish bishop's house and chapel; which the sailors quickly gutted and demolished, merrily adorning themselves with the spoils of the chapel. In the scramble, a great many books and papers were tossed about and destroyed."^[24]

According to historian John Watts, some of the chapel and seminary foundation stones may still be seen upon Eilean Bàn today. He has termed the 8 June 1746 book burning and the destruction of most of Bishop MacDonald personal papers, "an irreplaceable loss both for the eighteenth-century Church and the scholar of today."^[25]

The Bishop remained in hiding in the neighbouring countryside until, on the sixth rescue attempt ordered by the Comte de Maurepas, the French Minister of Marine, he, the prince, Donald Cameron of Lochiel, and Dr Archibald Cameron of Lochiel were all successfully evacuated from the Prince's Cairn at Loch nan Uamh to France on 19 September 1746.^[26][27]

While in France he obtained a pension under the name of Marolle. He returned to Scotland in 1749. In 1755 he was apprehended in Edinburgh for being a Catholic priest and for his share in the '45. The priest hunter responsible for his arrest was rewarded by the Royal Treasury.^[28]

He was tried at Edinburgh on 1 March 1756, "and in punishment for his refusal to purge himself of Popery, was sentenced to be banished from the kingdom, never to return under pain of death."^[29] The sentence, however, was never enforced, and, though the Bishop was obliged to live outside his district, he contrived to visit his district occasionally to perform episcopal duties, such as the setting up of Buorblach Seminary.^[1]

He died in Glengarry, Lochaber, on 12 March 1773, aged 74.^[1][2][3]

After moving from Inverie (Scottish Gaelic: Inbhir Aoidh) in Knoydart (Scottish Gaelic: Cnòideart), to Morar (Scottish Gaelic: Mòrar), Alasdair mac Mhaighstir Alasdair, a former Jacobite Army Captain, near relative of the Bishop, and one of the two most important figures in Scottish Gaelic literature, composed a poem in praise of both the place and of Bishop MacDonald, the priests, and students at the illegal Buorblach seminary.^[30]

• Odo Blundell (1909), The Catholic Highlands of Scotland. Volume I: The Central Highlands, Sands & Co., 21 Hanover Street, Edinburgh, 15 King Street, London.
• Odo Blundell (1917), The Catholic Highlands of Scotland. Volume II: The Western Highlands and Islands, Sands & Co., 37 George Street, Edinburgh, 15 King Street, Covent Garden, London.
• Maggie Craig (2010), Bare-Arsed Banditti: The Men of the '45, Mainstream Publishing, Edinburgh and London.
• Robert Forbes (1895), The Lyon in Mourning: Or a Collection of Speeches, Letters, Journals Etc., Relative to the Affairs of Prince Charles Edward Stuart. Volume I, Printed at the University Press by T. and A. Constable for the Scottish History Society.
• Robert Forbes (1895), The Lyon in Mourning: Or a Collection of Speeches, Letters, Journals Etc., Relative to the Affairs of Prince Charles Edward Stuart. Volume II, Printed at the University Press by T. and A. Constable for the Scottish History Society.
• Robert Forbes (1895), The Lyon in Mourning: Or a Collection of Speeches, Letters, Journals Etc., Relative to the Affairs of Prince Charles Edward Stuart. Volume III, Printed at the University Press by T. and A. Constable for the Scottish History Society.
• John S. Gibson (1967), Ships of the '45: The Rescue of the Young Pretender, Hutchinson & Co. London. With a Preface by Sir James Fergusson of Kilkerran, Bart., L.L.D.
• John S. Gibson (1994), Lochiel of the '45: The Jacobite Chief and the Prince, University of Edinburgh Press. Foreword by Sir Donald Cameron of Lochiel.
• Charles MacDonald (2011), Moidart: Among the Clanranalds, Birlinn Limited
• John Watts (2004), Hugh MacDonald: Highlander, Jacobite, Bishop, John Donald Press.