Volume one, Clans and Clearance
This volume looks at the clearances generally, and at some of the surprising orthodox beliefs about them; and then examines the Highland clans as they were in the centuries before the Jacobite rebellion of 1745-6, an account which sometimes differs from what is now generally believed.
Volume two, Eighteenth-century Clearances
This deals with the clearances which took place before 1800, and with the position of the Highlanders at the end of the eighteenth century, as shown by contemporary observers including the writers of the Old Statistical Account, which was published in twenty-one volumes between 1791 and 1799.
Volume three, The Sutherland Clearances
This tells the story of the sweeping changes carried out under the direction of the Countess of Sutherland on her estate in that county in the first quarter of the nineteenth century, and the similar clearances which took place on the other Sutherland estates, owned by lesser Sutherland landlords, at about the same time.
Volume four, Highland Clearances 1800-40
This covers the clearances in the first forty years of the nineteenth century in every district of the Highlands except Sutherland (the changes there were dealt with in volume three), and also the position of the Highlanders in about 1840, as indicated by contemporary observers including the writers of the New Statistical Account, the reports in which were compiled between 1833 and 1840.
Volume five, Highland Clearances 1840-1900
This considers the clearances from 1840 to the turn of the century; the growing resistance of the Highlanders, both before and after the “Crofters’ War”; and the position of the Highlanders towards the end of the century, as revealed for example in the enquiries carried out by the Napier Commission (1883), and the Brand Commission (1893).