General Hugh MacKay, 1690 (c)

Oil on canvas, by Nicolaes van Ravesteyn II (1661-1750), 1690 (c).

Mackay (1640 (c)-1692) joined the army in 1660. He served in France and Italy and was part of the French army which invaded the Netherlands in 1672. The following year he married a Dutch woman and became convinced that he was fighting for an unjust cause. Mackay resigned his commission and took up a captaincy in a Scottish regiment in Dutch service. He journeyed to England in 1685 to assist King James II in putting down the Duke of Monmouth Rebellion.

Mackay later broke with James and was one of the officers who supported William of Orange's bid for the crown in 1688. He became Commander-in-Chief of the army in Scotland the following year. Although his forces were defeated at the Battle of Killiecrankie (1689), MacKay was eventually successful in suppressing the Jacobite cause in the Highlands. He later served at the Battle of Aughrim (1691) and commanded the British division of the Allied army in Flanders. General Mackay was killed at the Battle of Steenkirk in 1692.