History of the Mackenzies, with genealogies of the principal families of the name by Alexander Mackenzie
page 66 of 768 (08%)
page 66 of 768 (08%)
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The charter was granted and dated at the Castle of Urquhart,
witnessed by the bishops of Ross and Moray, and confirmed by David II. in 1344. ['Invernessiana,' p.56.] From all this it may fairly be assumed that the line of Mac Kenneth was not far from the breaking point during the reign of Kenneth of the Nose. Some followers of the Earl of Ross about this time made a raid to the district of Kenlochewe and carried away a great herschip. Mackenzie pursued them, recovered a considerable portion of the spoil, and killed many of the raiders. The Earl of Ross was greatly incensed at Kenneth's conduct in this affair, and he determined to have him apprehended and suitably punished for the murders and other excesses committed by him. In this he ultimately succeeded. Mackenzie was captured, chiefly through the instrumentality of Leod Mac Gilleandrais - a desperate character, and a vassal and relative of the Earl - and executed at Inverness in 1346, when the lands of Kenlochewe, previously possessed by Kintail, were given to Mac Gilleandrais as a reward for Mackenzie's capture. On this point the author of the Ardintoul manuscript says, that the lands of Kenlochewe were held by Kenneth Mackenzie "and his predecessors by tack, but not as heritage, for they had no real or heritable right of them until Alexander of Kintail got heritable possession of them from John, Earl of Ross," at a much later date. Ellandonnan Castle, however, held out during the whole of this disturbed and distracted period, and until Kenneth's heir, who at his father's death was a mere boy, came of age, when he fully avenged the death of his father, and succeeded to the inheritance |
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