John MacAlan of Ergardia - JOHN MACDOUGALL [c 1317-1377]

Ewan de Ergadia (of Argyll) (circa 1300 – d. between 1335 and 1355) Also known as John Lord of Lorn but may be confused with his nephew and successor John Gallda (John The Foreigner, the son of his younger brother Alan) : Ewan was the Seventh Chief of the clan, and was the son of our Fifth Chief, Sir John of Lorn (Iain Bacach). Ewan enters the records in 1306 as a member of the household in the royal service of the English Prince of Wales, the future King Edward II. He and his family spent even more time there as an exile from Scotland during the Wars of Independence and after while Robert the Bruce was alive. The Scottish exiles living in England were know as “The Disinherited” because Robert I (Robert Bruce) had forfeited their Scottish properties from their families for opposing him. In September 1334 “Ewin lord of Lorn” made a grant of lands on the isle of Lismore to the Bishop of Argyll. The old family title of de Ergadia was now lost or forfeited. Some sources Ewan’s son Eoghan predeceased him, likely between 1355 and 1360.

This time away in exile in England seems to have earned one the son of his brother Alan, the By-name of John Gallda (John the Foreigner). Ewan or perhaps his nephew John Gallda regained the previously forfeited title of Lord of Lorn in 1344 along with some of its former lands from Bruces son, King David II. However the clan had forever lost most of its island possessions except for part of the island of Kerrera. In 1346 David II King of Scots granted “John of Lorne” all the crown’s lands not now held by other clans within Lorn once held by his grandfather Alexander, the 4th Chief of the clan. In September 1354 Ewan de Ergadia 7th (John of Lorn) Chief of Clan MacDougall resigned his family claim to John (MacDonald) of the Isles for Mull, the north part of Jura, Tiree, and the former MacDougall Treshnish Isles fortresses of Cairnaburg and Dunchonnell. In return John of Lorn as the document names him, was also given the right to build eight ships of twelve or sixteen oars. Also John of the Isles regranted to him three unciates of Tiree nearest to Coll, and the churchlands of Duror and Glencoe. John Gallda married the kings niece circa 1360, Joan (also spelled Jonet or Janet), who was the daughter of Sir Thomas Isaac and Princess Matilda. Thus she was the grand-daughter of the clan’s old foe, King Robert I, i.e. Robert the Bruce. Through this marriage he reacquired much of Lorn which had been held by the MacRuairies until it had been forfeited to the crown. John Gallda also regained the now royal Dunstaffnage castle from the Campbells who had governed it for the crown since 1309.

In 1368 King David II made the lands of Glenlyon in Perthshire a present to his niece Joan and her husband Ewan. Thereafter in Glenlyon tradition Ewan was remembered as John of Lorne. These Perthshire lands had been devastated by the Black Plague which reached Scotland in 1350 so John Gallda repopulated Glenlyon and the dale of Fortingall with MacDougalls from Argyll after its population had been decimated by plague. John Gallda had two daughters, Janet (Jonette) and her younger sister Isabella. John Gallda was the last MacDougall Chief to use Dunstaffnage castle as his main seat. Upon his death Dunstaffnage castle and the Lordship of Lorn passed to the Stewarts through Ewan’s daughters’ inheritance. Dunstaffnage remained as the main seat of the Stewart Lordship of Lorn.

Around 1386 both of John Gallda’s daughters married Stewarts of Innermeath from Perthshire. Janet and Isabella inherited Lorn equally as females under the laws of primogeniture. Then Janet and her husband Sir Robert Stewart traded their half of Lorn to her younger sister Isabella and her husband Sir John Stewart in exchange for Sir John Stewart’s inherited estate of Durrisdeer in Perthshire. Through Isabella the Lordship of Lorn then passed to her Stewart husband. These Stewarts of Innermeath became the Lords of Lorn and retained the Lordship until around 1468 when the Lordship of Lorn transferred to the Chief of the Campbells. John Gallda died around 1375 and the King quickly had his royal widow remarried to someone who would not pursue any right to the crown. Upon John Gallda’s death the Chiefship of Clan MacDougall permanently separated from the Lordship of Lorn. There is debate that John Gallda had an illegitimate son Alan who next became Chief but others say that Iain of Dunollie became the next and Eighth Chief with his clan duthus at Dunollie castle.

https://macdougall.org/chiefs/