Iain Mac Fhearchair

Iain Mac Fhearchair (John MacCodrum) (1693-–1779)[1] was a Scottish Gaelic-speaking Bard and seanchaidh "who lived and died in the island of North Uist.

For this reason, the MacCodrum descendants of the couple were referred to in Scottish Gaelic as, Clann righ fo gheasan, ("King's children under a spell") and never harmed seals, whom they believed to be their relatives.

Despite the Clan's neutrality, all the lands of MacDonald of Sleat were included in the savage repression of Highland dress, language, and culture that followed the defeat of the uprising at the Battle of Culloden in 1746.

John MacCodrum's satirical poem, Oran an Aghaidh an Eididh Ghallda ("A Song Against the Lowland Garb"), "shows clearly where his own sympathies lay.

"[12] In October 1763, as the controversy over the authenticity of Macpherson's epic poem Ossian, which he alleged was a translation from Scottish Gaelic, was heating up, Sir James MacDonald of Sleat wrote a letter to Doctor Hugh Blair in Edinburgh which sheds light on MacCodrum's role as a seanchaidh.

Despite their friendship, however, Alasdair Mac Mhaighstir Alasdair did not hesitate to include two of MacCodrum's poems, Òran air Sean aois ("A Song on Old Age")[15] and Comh-radh, Mar go b' ann eider caraid agus namhaid an Uisgebheatha ("A Dialogue between a Friend and a Foe of Whisky"),[16] in his groundbreaking 1751 poetry collection Ais-Eiridh na Sean Chánoin Albannaich and to pass them off as his own work.

"[21] Following his death in 1967, Scottish Gaelic war poet and fellow North Uist native Dòmhnall Ruadh Chorùna was buried in the same cemetery.

"[23] One of Iain's most popular songs is Smeòrach Chlann Dòmhnaill ("The Mavis of Clan Donald"), in which the Bard, according to Bill Lawson, "praises the isle of his birth.

"[24] The song was recorded by Scottish vocalist and fellow North Uist native Julie Fowlis on her 2014 album Gach sgeul - Every story.

Donald, a former farm worker in Paiblesgarry, left North Uist, first for the nearby island of Barra, and then for the Mira River valley in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, Canada, during the 1820s.