Iain Macleod
Iain Macleod was born at Clifford House, Skipton, Yorkshire, on 11 November 1913. His father, Dr. Norman Alexander Macleod, was a well-respected general practitioner in Skipton, with a substantial poor-law practice (providing medical services for those who could not afford to pay); the young Macleod would often accompany his father on his rounds. His parents were from the Isle of Lewis in the Western Isles of Scotland, belonging to the branch of the Macleods of Pabbay and Uig. They moved to Skipton in 1907. Macleod grew up with strong personal and cultural ties to Scotland, as his parents bought in 1917 part of the Leverhulme estate on the Isle of Lewis, where they often used to stay for family holidays.
Iain Ciar MacLeod
MacLeod stated that there was another MacLeod tombstone on Iona, which was supposed to have been the stone of a sixteenth-century MacLeod of Lewis. In spite of this, MacLeod speculated that this stone was in fact that of Iain Ciar; since, in his opinion, Iain Ciar was too wicked a man to have been buried in the family vault with his predecessors. MacLeod transcribed the stone and considered the Latin short-form to represent: "Here lies the body of the distinguished John Dominus M'Leoid", as well as the date, "1414". He also noted that the stone bears a coat of arms and described it as containing a lymphad, below which were four animals standing erect. The two animals on the left were facing one another and MacLeod thought they could be lions. The third animal he considered to be a stag; the fourth MacLeod could not identify, though he supposed it could represent some heraldic device from his wife, who was of the Irish O'Neil dynasty.