They came in peace of course to carry on a centuries-old trade but there were times when their journey to the district was on altogether more serious business. In January 1746 the Highland army of Charles Edward Stuart, Bonnie Prince Charlie, routed the Hanovarian redcoats of General Hawley on the south muir of the town in what proved to be their last victory in the long Jacobite wars, and the last time the famous Highland charge carried the day. Men of fifteen major Highland clans occupied the town and district for eleven days before moving off to Stirling and the final march north to Culloden. The folk of Falkirk feared the worst but a local legend tells us that the Highlanders found their way to the newly opened brewery of James Aitken in what became Newmarket Street and spent most of their time sampling the delights of Falkirk ale, leaving the terrified burghers in peace!
When the Rising was over and a measure of peace returned, the trade began to revive and the trysts resumed. But the Disarming Acts which the Government had imposed on the Highlands created real difficulties for the drovers. Among the regulations which banned gatherings, the speaking (and singing) of Gaelic and the playing of the pipes was a ban on carrying weapons. For the drovers passing through dangerous places - with a Macgregor behind every hill - this was too risky and so the Government was persuaded that for the sake of the economy the Act would be suspended for the duration of the droves and the trysts. And from this relaxation came the revival of the musical celebrations which might be seen as the origins of the Mod itself. No doubt the drovers at the end of their long and successful journeys would celebrate with a tune, a song and a dram or two. Certainly in 1781 on 11th October at the tryst’s new site near Roughcastle a great piping competition was organised with prizes offered by the Highland Society of London. Thirteen pipers performed in the old Masonic Lodge in the Silver Row having first listened to a newly composed Gaelic poem recited by an aged bard. The judges chose one Partick McGregor, piper to Henry Balnaves of Ardradour who won “a set of new pipes worth five guineas and forty merks of money.” The prizes were presented two days later on the tryst ground following a procession from the town. This competition was repeated in the following two years by which time the Disarming Acts had been repealed and in 1784 the event was moved to Edinburgh.