Flora MacDonald was born in 1722 at Milton on the island of South Uist in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides. She was the daughter of Ranald MacDonald of Milton and Marion MacDonald. Her father died when Flora was very young, and her mother later married Hugh MacDonald of Armadale. Flora was raised among extended Clan MacDonald relatives on South Uist and Skye, in a Gaelic-speaking society shaped by kinship, cattle, tenancy, Presbyterian and Episcopalian influences, and loyalty to clan leaders. Tradition holds that she received part of her education in Edinburgh, though details are uncertain. She learned English as well as Gaelic and acquired the domestic and social accomplishments appropriate to a gentlewoman of the Highland gentry. Her family was not among Scotland’s richest aristocracy, but clan connections gave her access to influential households. Flora became famous at twenty-four during the aftermath of the Jacobite rising of 1745. The defeated Prince Charles Edward Stuart was hiding in the Hebrides while government forces searched for him. With assistance from relatives, Flora helped him travel from South Uist to Skye disguised as her Irish maid, “Betty Burke.” She did not necessarily act from strong Jacobite ideology; later accounts emphasize compassion for a fugitive in danger. Authorities arrested Flora and confined her first in the Tower of London and then under less severe supervision. Her courage and modest manner made her a celebrity, and she received visitors and financial assistance before being released under the 1747 indemnity. In 1750 she married Allan MacDonald of Kingsburgh, with whom she raised a large family. Long before emigrating to North Carolina, Flora’s identity had been formed by childhood loss, Highland kinship, bilingual culture, political violence, imprisonment, sudden fame, marriage, and motherhood. These experiences made her a symbol of personal loyalty. They also help explain why, when revolution later divided British America, she and Allan viewed loyalty to the Crown through the memory of rebellion’s dangers in Scotland.