Parish Number - 113
Births: (Film # 990671 - Item 4) 1821 to 1854.
Marriages: (Film # 990671 - Item 4 ) 1821 to 1854.
Census: 1841 (Film #101852), 1851 (Film #103689), 1861 (Film #103837)
1871 (Film #104001), 1881 (Film #203427), 1891 (Film #208643)Imperial Gazetteer of Scotland, 1868
UIST (North), a parish in the part of the Outer Hebrides which belongs to Inverness-shire. It contains the post-office stations of Lochmaddy and Carinish. It comprehends the island of North Uist, a number of inhabited islands lying adjacent to North Uist or near it, and a great many neighbouring isles and islets, some of them covered with verdure and suitable for pasture, others bare rocks, valuable only for the seals which frequent them. The principal islands, additional to North Uist itself, are Kirkibost, Illeray, Balishear, Brimsay, Vallay and Oronsay, all connected with the island of North Uist by dry sands at low water; Rona, less than a mile to the south-east; Borreray, about 2 miles to the north; and Kisker, about 10 miles to the west....The peninsulas, of all imaginable forms, and the multitudinously water-studded segments of land into which the eastern half of it are cut, smile dirision upon any attempt at either enumeration or description...The western division of this island is, comparatively speaking, continuous land; and sends up, in lines from south-east to north-west, three distinct groups or ranges of heights. One of these ranges bounds the sound of Harris....The second range extends almost from end to end of the district along very nearly its middle...The third range is a prolonged and irregular group of much less elevation than the others.....A belt of uneven low land between this last group and the sea is exceedingly beautiful in summer and autumn, produces luxuriant crops of oats and barley, and forms both the chief and the most profitable area of arable ground in the island...The inhabitants of North Uist have shared very largely in the miseries which have resulted so generally to the Hebrides and to the Highland shores of the mainland from bad husbandry, defective harvests, the precariousness of the fisheries, and the destruction of the kelp trade; and so much more numerous were they, some 20 years ago, than the means of subsistence where competent to support, that two witnesses before the Committee on Emigration expressed a conviction that no fewer than 2,500 ought to be removed. Kirk Session Records
The Kirk Session of a parish consists of the the minister of the parish and the elders of the congregation. It looks after the general well-being of the congreation and, particularly in centuries past, church discipline within the parish. These records can sometimes provide invaluable information that is available nowhere else. An example would be the case of an illegitimate child. In many cases, the fornication resulting in the birth of the child would be a matter of church discipline and would thus be recorded in the minutes of the Session. It has been known ot occur that the parish register recorded the name of the mother of an illegitimate child in error, such error being brought to light by examing the Kirk Session records dealing with the birth of the child. There is also a possibility that other valuable information concerning the parents might be contained in the Kirk Session records. Kirk Session records are generally held at the Scottish Record Office in Edinburg. These records have not in most cases beeen microfilmed by the LDS Church.
There are no Kirk Session records available for this parish.