Badge.—Sea Ware.
The Macneills consisted of two independent branches, the Macneills of Barra and the Macneills of Gigha, said to be descended from brothers. Their badge was the sea ware, but they had different armorial bearings, and from this circumstance, joined to the fact that they were often opposed to each other in the clan fights of the period, and that the Christian names of the one, with the exception of Neill, were not used by the other, Mr Gregory thinks the tradition of their common descent erroneous. Part of their possessions were completely separated, and situated at a considerable distance from the rest.
The clan Neill were among the secondary vassal tribes of the lords of the Isles, and its heads appear to have been of Norse or Danish origin. Mr Smibert thinks this probable from the fact that the Macneills were lords of Castle Swen, plainly a Norse term. “The clan,” he says,[165] “was in any case largely Gaelic, to a certainty. We speak of the fundamental line of the chiefs mainly, when we say that the Macneills appear to have at least shared the blood of the old Scandinavian inhabitants of the western islands. The names of those of the race first found in history are partly indicative of such a lineage. The isle of Barra and certain lands in Uist were chartered to a Macneill in 1427; and in 1472, a charter of the Macdonald family is witnessed by Hector Mactorquil Macneill, keeper of Castle Swen. The appellation ‘Mac-Torquil,’ half Gaelic, half Norse, speaks strongly in favour of the supposition that the two races were at this very time in the act of blending with one people. After all, we proceed not beyond the conclusion, that, by heirs male or heirs female, the founders of the house possessed a sprinkling of the blood of the ancient Norwegian occupants of the western isles and coasts, interfused with that of the native Gael of Albyn, and also of the Celtic visitants from Ireland. The proportion of Celtic blood, beyond doubt, is far the largest in the veins of the clan generally.”
About the beginning of the 15th century, the Macneills were a considerable clan in Knapdale, Argyleshire. As this district was not then included in the sheriffdom of Argyle, it is probable that their ancestor had consented to hold his lands of the crown.
The first of the family on record is Nigellus Og, who obtained from Robert Bruce a charter of Barra and some lands in Kintyre. His great-grandson, Gilleonan Roderick Muchard Macneill, in 1427, received from Alexander, Lord of the Isles, a charter of that island. In the same charter were included the lands of Boisdale in South Uist, which lies about eight miles distant from Barra. With John Garve Maclean he disputed the possession of that island, and was killed by him in Coll. His grandson, Gilleonan, took part with John, the old Lord of the Isles, against his turbulent son, Angus, and fought on his side at the battle of Bloody Bay. He was chief of this sept or division of the Macneills in 1493, at the forfeiture of the lordship of the Isles.
The Gigha Macneills are supposed to have sprung from Torquil Macneill, designated in his charter, “filius Nigelli,” who, in the early part of the 15th century, received from the Lord of the Isles a charter of the lands of Gigha and Taynish, with the constabulary of Castle Sweyn, in Knapdale. He had two sons, Neill his heir, and Hector, ancestor of the family of Taynish. Malcolm Macneill of Gigha, the son of Neill, who is first mentioned in 1478, was chief of this sept of the Macneills in 1493. After that period the Gigha branch followed the banner of Macdonald of Isla and Kintyre, while the Barra Macneills ranged themselves under that of Maclean of Dowart.
In 1545 Gilliganan Macneill of Barra was one of the barons and council of the Isles who accompanied Donald Dubh, styling himself Lord of the Isles and Earl of Ross, to Ireland, to swear allegiance to the king of England. His elder son, Roderick or Ruari Macneill, was killed at the battle of Glenlivet, by a shot from a fieldpiece, on 3d Oct. 1594. He left three sons—Roderick, his heir, called Ruari the turbulent, John, and Murdo. During the memorable and most disastrous feud which happened between the Macleans and the Macdonalds at this period, the Barra Macneills and the Gigha branch of the same clan fought on different sides.
The Macneills of Barra were expert seamen, and did not scruple to act as pirates upon occasion. An English ship having been seized off the island of Barra by Ruari the turbulent, Queen Elizabeth complained of this act of piracy. The laird of Barra was in consequence summoned to appear at Edinburgh, to answer for his conduct, but he treated the summons with contempt. All the attempts made to apprehend him proving unsuccessful, Mackenzie, tutor of Kintail, undertook to effect his capture by a stratagem frequently put in practice against the island chiefs when suspecting no hostile design. Under the pretence of a friendly visit, he arrived at Macneill’s castle of Chisamul (pronounced Kisimul), the ruins of which stand on an insulated rock in Castlebay, on the south-east end of Barra, and invited him and all his attendants on board his vessel. There they were well plied with liquor, until they were all overpowered with it. The chief’s followers were then sent on shore, while he himself was carried a prisoner to Edinburgh. Being put upon his trial, he confessed his seizure of the English ship, but pleaded in excuse that he thought himself bound by his loyalty to avenge, by every means in his power, the fate of his majesty’s mother, so cruelly put to death by the queen of England. This politic answer procured his pardon, but his estate was forfeited, and given to the tutor of Kintail. The latter restored it to its owner, on condition of his holding it of him, and paying him sixty merks Scots, as a yearly feu duty. It had previously been held of the crown. Some time thereafter Sir James Macdonald of Sleat married a daughter of the tutor of Kintail, who made over the superiority to his son-in-law, and it is now possessed by Lord Macdonald, the representative of the house of Sleat.