The Register commenced in 1764, the year in which the settlement of the Rev. John Thomson as parish minister took place. Mr. Thomson was evidently not a proficient Gaelic scholar, although able to preach in the native tongue. He could not master the spelling of the local popular surnames, but he has preserved in the register a careful and minute phonetic rendering both of the names of persons and of places. His pains to identify persons led him to give the proper and popular cognomens, and in many cases to give the names of the fathers, grandfathers, and greatgrandfathers of those seeking to enter the bonds of matrimony, or to have their children baptized.
A perusal of the Register will show how necessary it was to be careful in noting the distinction between persons of the same name in that part of the country. Although the majority of the people bore the name of Mackay, there was a considerable mixture of other names, such as—Morrisons, Munros, Macintyres, Sutherlands, Calders, Campbells, Macleods and Macdonalds.
The various classes are very sharply defined. For example, we find as the very lowest a person designated as residing sometimes with his father, and sometimes with his father-in-law. The next step in the social grade is a person living in a certain place. Then follows "little tenent," “tenent," "farmer," "tacksman," and some of the tacksmen have the prefix of Mr. or addition Esquire, while the parish minister himself seems to be at the top of the social ladder.
