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Foreward

Introduction

MacAskills of Rudh an Dunain

Lieutenants of the Coast 1

Lieutenants of the Coast 2

Lieutenants of the Coast 3

Tales from Frances Tolmie

MacCaskills in Canada

Annex

Notes and References

Bibliography

I have three sons and in an attempt to set something down in writing for them about their ancestors I became intrigued with the MacAskills of Skye. The more I researched the past of this family, associated with the Clan MacLeod, the deeper I was drawn in, not only into their history, but also that of the MacLeods and of Skye as a whole.

My mother's grandmother was a MacAskill and her father, William, was the second son of Kenneth MacAskill, tacksman of Rudh an Dunain at the end of the 18th and during the first half of the 19th century. William had emigrated to Canada in 1830 and so my mother was a Canadian, but one of those more Scots than the people who stayed behind. She was intensely proud of her MacAskill background and would tell me that the name meant "of the castle". To a degree she was right, but she did not know why or how.

When I was young I was only mildly interested and on visits to Skye made no effort to seek out the past, but since starting this family study I have trod the turf and heather to explore the old haunts of the MacAskills and I have dug into old books and articles and found a wealth of material on the subject. Here I have been lucky, for the people of the Highlands and especially the West Coast were great story tellers and took delight in recording the deeds and lineage of their forebears. Donald MacLeod in the introduction to the 1934 edition of Martin Martin's 1695 account of the Islands tells how, in the long winter evenings, the people of remote villages would gather around the large peat fires of their Ceilidh Houses to relate from memory tales of old, of the heroes of the ancient Irish/Scots culture and of more recent times. A late Victorian drive to collect, translate into English from the Gaelic and publish these stories has resulted in a wealth of material being available to the academic researcher. I have in this work, however, had to rely in the main on secondary sources owing to the distance I live from the depositaries of the primary evidence. Nevertheless I have made strenuous efforts to draw only upon respectable and well researched sources, and these are listed where appropriate.

In my research I have received much help especially from the staffs of the library of the Clan Donald Centre at Armadale and the Skye and Lochalsh Museum Service and also the library in Weymouth. The latter have been indefatigable in their efforts to obtain for me, on "Inter-Library" loan, a myriad of books and papers from sources allover Scotland very often on the scantiest of information. I have corresponded with Bella MacRea of Glen Brittle and Aimie Davidson of Beaverton in Ontario and I have shared notes with Doctor Alasdair MacLean of Aird Bhearnasdail. I am more than grateful to all these for their help.

This is the second stab I have had at producing these notes. As I am constantly learning more about the MacAskills I doubt if this will be the last edition.

On to the Introduction.