This story comes from the end of the 18th century, but seems to hark back to an earlier time.  However it is likely that the Viking element was grafted on later – did Vikings pick up local pilots? And potatoes didn’t arrive in the islands until the middle of the 18th century, and even by the 1790s there was a resistance to growing them. However: Some Uig men were out fishing around the Flannan Isles, and a Viking longboat came along and asked for a local person [ » read more ]

In December 1900, the lighthouse on Eilean Mor in the Flannan Isles, which had only been lit for the first time a year previously, was discovered deserted by its three keepers; their dinner table had been set with cold meat, pickles and potatoes, and a chair was overturned in an obvious urgent departure.  Two sets of oilskins and seaboots were missing, and otherwise the quarters and lamp were in perfect order.  The last record, on a slate ready for transferral to the log book, was dated 15 [ » read more ]

From Sanais,1988. There lived in Uig, before the advent of the policeman, a man of great physical powers and a wild, lawless nature, who robbed and plundered his neighbours with impunity.  To remove him, the crew of a boat to visit the Flannan Isles evolved a plan to maroon him on one of the islands.  They invited him to accompany them on their voyage, the last of the season.  He accepted their offer and set off, and landed safely on Eilean an Tighe.  When they [ » read more ]

Photo by rojabro. This isn’t strictly an Uig tale, though one episode takes place on the Flannans, and there is a suggestion that Macpherson may be the grandfather of Kenneth Macpherson the catechist from Bayhead, who married Ann Smith from Strome and Valtos and lived in Ness.   It’s offered in the hope that someone may be able to shed some light on the story, identify the house of the Misses Crighton, confirm or (more likely) dismiss the connections to the Bayhead family, or identify the source, [ » read more ]

A tale from Donald Macdonald’s Tales and Traditions of the Lews: Dòmhnall Càm and the big smith went one summer to the Flannan Isles, and the Morrisons of Ness, hearing the Macaulays were from home, came and drove the cows from the moor, for they met with no opposition.  When Dòmhnall and his party returned the womenfolk told them what had happened, and they set off in their boats direct across the mouth of Loch Roag so as to intercept them, as they would be slow with [ » read more ]