If you visit our tent at a Highland Game, you will be given the following information. What follows is an edited electronic version of our flyer. We will be glad to send you a membership application and flyer upon request. All of our materials are available at each Highland Game we attend, as well as a selection of books and other materials on Scotland and Clan Cameron.

The Cameron Clan in North America
Unite!

The Clan Crest
A sheaf of five arrows tied with a band, encircled by the belt and buckle, may be worn by clansfolk.

Clan Motto
"Aonaibh re cheile" which means "Unite"

Clan Plant Badge
The Oak

The Camerons
The Camerons are one of the ancient clans of Scotland. Genealogy has it that the name Cameron came from the Norman Cambrun, a place name in Fife meaning crooked hill or from the Gaelic Cam shron, (the s is silent) meaning crooked nose.

While most of the records of the earliest ancestors of the Clan are lost in antiquity, Sir John of Cameron (Cambrun) was one of the Scottish Barons who signed the famous Declaration of Independence at Arbroath, in 1320. There is some evidence to believe that the Camerons were a branch of the famous medieval royal house of MacDuff, although the first chief from whom contemporary records can be traced was Donald Dubh, Black Donald, who guided the Camerons from 1400 to 1460.

For Centuries, the Camerons have lived in Lochaber, and area of roughly 12 by 16 miles, which straddles Glenalbyn. Glenalbyn, the Great Glen, divided the Highlands into two parts; the Southern Highlands comprised of the Grampion and Monadhliah ranges and, to the north, the Northern and Western Highlands. While the Caledonian Canal traverses the entire length of Glenalbyn, most of Cameron country is over 1,000 feet high, with more than forty peaks over 2,000 feet. The most notable is Ben Nevis, the highest mountain in Britain, at 4,400 feet.

Lochiel
The heredity Chief of the Clan is Donald Angus Cameron of Lochiel, 27 th Chief and Captain of Clan Cameron. It is Highland custom to address our Chief as "Lochiel". Clanfolk are encouraged to communicate with our Chief who welcomes correspondence from all over the world. Lochiel and his family live at Achnacarry, the ancestral home of the Camerons of Lochiel, near Inverness in Scotland.

The Clan Cameron Association
The Cameron Clan in North America, with branches throughout the United States and Canada is part of the worldwide Clan Cameron Association. The aims of the Association are cultural and educational; to promote friendship among Americans and Canadians, who enjoy a distant kinship, as well as to encourage through education the perpetuation of the history, the music and folklore of our forebears.

The Association is nonpolitical and nonprofit. Clansfolk owe their political allegiance solely to the United States or Canada, and must not, in using the name of the Association, take part in any political activity involving the internal affairs of Scotland or the United Kingdom.

Central to the operation of the Association is the hereditary chief. He has appointed a Commissioner in North America, who acts as his representative in day to day matters involving the Association. To facilitate administration and cooperation between branches, Lochiel has also appointed five regional Presidents who take responsibility for branches within their jurisdiction; the Southern United States, the Northern United States, the Rocky Mountain-West United States, the Western United States, and Canada respectively.

The various branches within these regions are democratically organized, electing their own Branch Presidents and Officers, and taking responsibility for keeping their own legal and financial affairs, in keeping with federal, state and local laws. The Branches publish regular newsletters and sponsor tents at various Scottish Games across the U.S. and Canada.

Membership
Membership in the Cameron Clan in North America is open to all persons."The following statement of the Lochiel family shall govern General Memberships.

"We (the Lochiel family) favour a liberal policy towards membership of the Clan as those who are "tenuous" but keen are often the most proactive and productive and if they have chosen Clan Cameron then we would be happy to accept them. In days gone past people took the name Cameron for all sorts of reasons -- protection for example -- so we would not be changing from that original ethos."

The word "sept" is a bit vague but broadly means a branch of the family, an associated family or simply adherents or dependents. Therefore some septs are allied with more than one Clan family.

Septs of the Clan
Chalmers
Chambers
Clark (e)
Clarkson
Clrary
Clerk
Dowie
Gibbon
Gilbert (son)
Kennedy
Leary
Lonie
MacAldowie
MacAlonie
MacChlery
MacClair
MacLeary
MacGillery
MacGillonie
MacIldownie
MacKail
MacKell
MacLear
MacCleary
MacLerie
MacMartin
MacOnie
MacOstrich
MacPhail
MacSorley (i)
MacUlrig
MacVail
MacWalrick
Martin
Paul
Sorley (ie)
Taylor