Cogadh no Sìth or ‘War or Peace’ (PS 204) is one of the few tunes for which there are dated contemporary references, as well as it also providing part of the case for a missing volume 3 of the Campbell Canntaireachd.
The earliest reference was in 1746 when John MacDonell of Scotus (or ‘Spanish John’) was with some remnants of the Jacobite army following the events at Culloden, who had assembled at Lochiel’s home at Achnacarry. He recorded that
‘they were awakened at break of day by… by all the Highland Bagpipes playing the general Cogga na si, having been alarmed by the scouts that a force sent by the Duke of Cumberland was approaching.’
The next appearance comes in a Regimental Order Book for the Western of Argyle Fencibles dated the 25 July 1778. It was one of five duty tunes described as the ‘Gathering’ or Coagive & Shea. This later reference assumed a greater importance when I had established that Colin Campbell, the writer of the canntaireachd volumes, had served in that regiment. When discussing its implications with Roddy Cannon, I had made the point that Campbell therefore must have known that tune, but as it does not appear in the two surviving volumes it added to the case that there was a volume missing.
Roddy contemplated that point, then commented that the argument became even stronger since by the ordered nature of the tunes in the existing two volumes Cogadh no Sìth would not in any case have fitted into either of them. Following this breakthrough the topic re-surfaced in our subsequent conversations. It was during one of those that I remarked that if my recollection was correct, in circa 1962 I passed through what had become the Highland Brigade training depot at Fort George. When there, a big parade took place with ‘brass’ present. During the General Salute, the first part of the ground Cogadh no Sìth was played by a solo piper while the rifles used at that time were held vertically in front of the body in the Present Arms position.
Once more Roddy thought about it and said that it all made sense, as the ground was based on an old military fife tune variously called ‘The Mother’ or ‘Point of War’. This was one of three fife tunes which made up what was called the Long Reveille (or as one book of Fife music has it, ‘The Rouse at Daybreak’; the other two tunes being ‘The Three Camps’ and ‘Scotch Reveille’).
This now reaches a poignant moment: I received in the post a draft that Roddy wanted me to check back to it’s original manuscript in the National Library. Also included were his copies of the three tunes transposed down to ‘our pitch’. It was at the time I received his letter that I heard of his sad demise. In the cover note he also drew my attention to the fact that the third tune had a similarity to ‘The Earl of Mansfield’.
Certainly it does all make sense. The transition of the original Fife tune to the pipes probably occurred around the period following the Union of 1707, when all the military forces in the UK were brought under one command, Due to forces being raised for combined service in the Low Countries, it would have brought pipers and fifers in closer proximity to each other. It would also have provided plenty of time for the professional soldiers on both sides of the Jacobite wars to have become use to the tune’s function as an ‘alarm’ by the time of the ’45.
