Series 3 > Highland papers

AN ACCOUNT OF THE NAME OF McLEA 99
the north and that they are always as yet in possession of
it, and that the whole of that Strath are for the most part
McLea’s, both man and wife, or either the man or the wife,
and that the McLea to whom Stratchonnen belonged, died
without heirs male and had one only daughter, and who
being heiress of Stratchonnen [sic] and that one of the
Earls of Seaforth married this heiress, and that Strat¬
chonnen [sic] now belongs to the Earl of Seaforth who,
since that time, keeps the McLeas in their former possession
of Stratchonnen, who generally at this time call them¬
selves McKenzies, tho’ they own and acknowledge them¬
selves to be originally McLeas.—There was also the family
of Auchindoun in Lissmore of whom I suppose the Bishop
McLea descended, who built the Castle of Auchindoun, of
which family I can give no particular accounts, being
utterly a stranger to it, and was never in that place of the
Country, being never in Lissmore.—There was also the
family of the McLeas of Faisnacloich1 in Muckairn which is
now called Stonefield, who wanting children, and a son of
the family of Lochnell being yellfostered in his house (a
common old custom in Argyleshire that sons of familys
there of greater note used to be yellfostered in Gentle¬
men’s houses of lower and enferior degree). He gave his
Lands of Feashnacloich to a son of Lochnell’s who was
fostered in the house, of whom the present Sheriff or [sic]
Argyle (Campbell of Stonefield) is descended and who is
designed as above. And it is said that the forty merk land
of Lochnell belonged to McLea of Lochnell who, not having
issue of his own, disponed his Lands of Lochnell to a son of
the family of Argyle who was called John Gorm Campbell,
of whom the present Lochnell is descended who is but the
fifth or sixth out of the family of Argyle.
1 Fasnacloich is in Appin, so this seems a mistake for Achnacloich, which
is in Muckairn. This Achnacloich, which belonged to the abbey of Inchaffray,
passed into the hands of Archibald Campbell of Lochnell and after him
to his grandson by a son of his fourth marriage. This grandson and his
descendants were known as the Campbells of Achnacloich or Stonefield,
a name which they transferred to lands which they acquired in Knapdale
and still possess.