From the Stornoway Gazette, May 1951. An event of outstanding interest took place in the Parish of Uig on Wednesday, 16th May, when the new Free Presbyterian Church at Miavaig was opened. The Ref JA Macdonald, Applecross, the former minister of Uig, conducted divine worship and preached an able discourse from Matt xxi, v13. The […]
Read more →We don’t do much editorialising here but please allow an aside. Yesterday, after years of argument, debate and mudslinging and a last-minute breakdown, was the first scheduled Sunday ferry from Stornoway to Ullapool (BBC video here) taking people away after the Heb Celt Festival but also now a permanent fixture. Several hundred people turned out […]
Read more →From Lewsiana (1874, 1886) by W Anderson Smith. The school referred to seems to be the old blackhouse school in Islivig, which was replaced in the 1880s by the new public school at the north end of Brenish – but Smith’s passage seems to come from the earlier edition of the book. A mile or […]
Read more →From Martin Martin’s 1697 account of a voyage to St Kilda. (Photo by Scotproof) The inhabitants are Christians, much of the primitive temper, neither inclined to enthusiasm nor to popery. They swear not the common oaths that prevail in the world; when they refuse or deny to give what is asked of them, they do […]
Read more →A very strange tale of the death of a Hebridean woman in Iceland, and the subsequent supernatural problems that ensued when her hosts failed to fulfill her dying wishes. This comes from Folk-lore and Legends: Scandinavia, by various authors, published London 1890. The tale originates in the Eyrbiggja Saga and was also given a treatment […]
Read more →Donald Òg, younger son of Dugald Macaulay of Brenish and himself tacksman of Brenish and Ardroil ca. 1740-1762, left, like many of the Macaulays, a lasting impression on the oral tradition of the area. Among his characteristics were a taste for swordfighting, and a certain delight in the vastness of his herd: evidently when his […]
Read more →The Highland News, 5 July 1913: On Wednesday, 2nd inst., the Rev Allan Mackenzie, parish minister of Uig, received a deputation from his congregation who presented him with a handsome new trap and carriage rug. Mr John Matheson Aird said that when the congregation understood how much the minister required a new trap, they entered […]
Read more →Dolly Doctor wrote in Tales and Traditions of the practice of performing the t-ainmean in the upper end of Uig – evidently the last man to carry it out was a Mackinnon, grandfather of Dolly Doctor’s informant, so perhaps towards the end of the 18th century. This offering was made to a god of the […]
Read more →David Watson was ordained as minister of Uig in 1845 but as the congregation had mostly migrated to the Free Church, his Church remained largely empty. He was at odds with the people and the estate, as the following notes in the 1851 diary (published by Acair) of the Chamberlain John Munro Mackenzie attest: Thursday […]
Read more →A letter from the Rev Alexander Macleod (formerly Established Church minister in Uig, who had taken his congregation to the Free Church in 1843 and left Uig shortly thereafter for Lochalsh) to Lady Hood, his previous patron. See also a letter from 1824. Lochalsh 19th March 1844 My very dear and much respected friend, I had […]
Read more →After Rev Alexander Macleod and the entire congregation left the established Church in 1843 for the Free Church, the manse at Baile na Cille was vacant for nearly two years. In 1845, David Watson, a native of Croy, educated in Aberdeen, was received as a probationer and required to preach in Uig on 16 February 1845, […]
Read more →by John Macleod OBE DL MA (1928-1998), of Carishader. Published by Comann Eachdraidh Uig in 2001. ISBN 0 903960 73 7. A detailed account of all the ministers in Uig and the significant developments and changes under their ministries from 1778 to 1929, with supporting material and documentation; in addition to the church records, it provides […]
Read more →From Emily Macdonald’s Twenty Years of Highland Memories (1939). Before Emily was married to Dolly Doctor, she stayed at Uig Lodge as a guest of her uncle, Lord Leverhulme, along with other guests. One Sunday Mrs Strang and I decided we would like to go to the local church and hear a real Gaelic service. […]
Read more →Further to the clipping from 1917 about Uig adopting summer time a year after it was officially introduced, it seems that throughout Lewis there were further difficulties with the concept. The following is from Eilean an Fhraoich of 1965, in an article looking back to 1925. Summer time had been introduced during the war but […]
Read more →From Eilean an Fhraoich, December 1965 In April 1925 – a year late – the churches in Stornoway held a special service to commemorate the centenary of the coming to Uig of Rev Alexander Macleod, who, in the words of one of the speakers at the gathering, “was the first Christian minister in modern times […]
Read more →A rather long letter from Rev Alexander Macleod, Baile na Cille, to his “benefactress” Lady Hood, Mrs Stewart Mackenzie, written some six months after his arrival in Uig. Manse of Uig 30th November 1824 Honourable and Dear Madam, It is time that I should acknowledge your very friendly letter from Brighton dated […]
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