Crofters’ War was a series of agrarian disturbances in Scotland during the 1880’s. Many of the people of Highland Scotland had in earlier years been systematically evicted from the central glens by landlords who wished to raise sheep in the area. The evicted tenants had been resettled on strips of land known as crofts. Many of these crofts were on islands, and some of them still exist. The landlords later took more farmland for deer hunting and grouse shooting and evicted other tenants for rent arrears. These actions caused the crofters to resist.
In 1882, the crofters’ resistance erupted into a disturbance called the Battle of the Braes at Glendale, Skye. Marines and gunboats supported the local police against the crofters. The Crofters’ Holdings Act of 1886 improved the crofters’ conditions and brought the disturbances to an end.
