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78th Fraser Highlanders at Louisbourg
21st Century, Circa 2008
Louisbourg, Nova Scotia


Credits:
flicker.com

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During the 18th century, the Highlands of Scotland underwent drastic changes both socially and economically. After Culloden in 1746, the old clan system disintegrated with chiefs abandoning their clanspeople for more comfortable lives either in the Lowlands or England. Severe penal laws which proscribed the wearing of traditional Highland dress, the bearing of arms and the music of the bagpipe were also enforced which contributed to a further deterioration of Gaelic culture. The old system of agriculture also underwent change with the introduction of large flocks of imported sheep by new landlords who evicted Highland clansmen from vast tracts of land. Only young men who had been recruited into special Highland regiments formed in the mid 1700's could wear Highland dress and play the pipes. These early regiments played an important part in the British effort to capture Canada. These same young men who saw the New World would bring back stories to the hills and glens of their homeland. These stories and the hardships they were enduring in Scotland at the time propelled them across the Atlantic.