John McPhee Family - Blue Vapours

Scottish origins of our McPhee family
By Bernard McPhee
John McPhee, (grandfather) came from Inverness
Scotland to Australia with his father John McPhee,
whom we have of late been calling “John Inverary
McPhee” (1796 – 1867), because of the information
on his death certificate, recorded by Mr Ewen
MacPherson of Little River.
The first undisputed Scottish documented
information about John Inverary McPhee comes
from his Certificate of Marriage to Charlotte
MacArthur in 1826. Anyway we know that John
Inverary McPhee’s parents were Duncan McPhee
and Ann Cameron, and the Census of 1841
reinforces the fact that John was not a native of
Lochaber. But he married Charlotte MacArthur of
Stronaba in Inverness, and from then on at least
he lived in Lochaber. Our New Zealand relatives
have kindly provided the only photo extant of John
Inverary McPhee.
McPhee of Lochaline and Glendessary
It is widely considered most likely that this same
Duncan McPhee and his wife Ann Cameron were
also the parents of Hugh Donald McPhee whose
widow and descendants came to Australia and then
on to New Zealand in the 1850’s.
So we know the names of Duncan McPhee’s
parents also. In latter times they lived at Lochaline
in Ardnamurchan, but in all probability they
came from Glendessary on the North side of
Loch Archaig before this, and fit in neatly with
the genealogical evidence amassed by Somerled
MacMillan about McPhee families from that area
who, after the battle of Culloden were dispossessed
and scattered.
Lochaber from 1826 to 1853
When, after his marriage to Charlotte MacArthur
in 1826, John Inverary McPhee went to live
at Killiechonate in Lochaber, and there he
was in the household of the MacDonalds at
that residence. (Stuart MacDonald notes that
John McPhee Family
Donald MacArthur of Limestone Ridge in South
Australia was a close kinsman of the MacDonells
of Keppoch, and we know that he was a close
kinsperson also of the Charlotte MacArthur just
mentioned.)
The MacDonald at that residence was John
MacDonell Killiechonate commonly called John
Dubh Aberarder, and his wife Catherine most
interestingly was the daughter of Colonel Alexander
MacDonell Keppoch, the 16th Keppoch Chief, who
died heroically at the Battle of Culloden. Catherine
died at the age of 90, three years after John
Inverary McPhee had moved
to Killiechonate.
Why is all this important? Because in our family
there was the saying: “Remember the MacDonells
of Keppoch”, or in another way of saying it:
“Remember that you are related to the
MacDonells of Keppoch.”
Killiechonate is a long standing residence for
MacDonells of Keppoch. Stuart Macdonald in
his ‘Back to Lochaber’, The Pentland Press,
Edinburgh,1994, notes that families in Lochaber
had been there in roughly the same
places for centuries.
McPhee and MacDonell
McPhee had been connected with MacDonell from
the very beginning in Lochaber.
As far back as about 1400, a certain Miss McPhee
who was the daughter of McPhee of Glen Spean,
married the 2nd Chief of the Keppoch MacDonells
and thence she was to become the mother of two
Keppoch Chiefs (the third and fifth Chiefs), and the
grandmother of two Keppoch Chiefs (the fourth
and sixth Chiefs) and the mother in law of the
first Captain of Clan Cameron, Allan of the Raids,
who built the Chapel at the Cemetery of Cille
Choirill in Lochaber, just over the Spean River from
Killiechonate.
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