Scotch-Irish

[Barry R McCain]

Jim McKane has reworked the Scotch-Irish section of the Ulster Heritage main website.  There will be a growing collection of essays found there on the Scotch-Irish.  Now it will be done a little differently than other Scotch-Irish websites.  We are going to include many topics outside of the typical stereotypical literature on the group commonly called the Scotch-Irish.

That term, 'Scotch-Irish' is just an older way of writing 'Scots-Irish' and the two are totally interchangeable and both are correct.  One of these themes will be the large number of Highland Scots that migrated to Ulster and are part of the Scotch-Irish.  Technically these families exist outside of the dictionary definition of being Scotch-Irish.  The norm is to define Scotch-Irish as descendants of the Lowland Plantation Scots that settled in Ulster circa 1607 to 1700 and especially those that then migrated to the Colonial backsettlements. 

Scotch-Irish history is very poorly represented, one could even say it is marginalized by many writers and historians.   For example Aryshire and Gallowayshire, to districts from where many Plantation Scots originated, were also part of Gaelic Scotland.  The so called Highland/Lowland divide does not really apply to the Scottish Lowland western seaboard.  Gaelic and Cymreig Celts dominated in the western Lowlands of Scotland.  As late as the early 1500s the leading man of letters from southern Aryshire, Walter Kennedy, wrote in Gaelic and in fact ridiculed the increasing use of English in the Lowlands. 

Real history is always way more complex and interesting than the variety that makes it into the history books. One reason is the Celtic fringe of the British Isles has really never had a history written from its perspective.  London and the home counties dominate the writing of British history.  The people and societies of southwest Scotland rarely have their history told in any great detail. 

We hope to in our own small way correct this.  To see the new Scotch-Irish section of the Ulster Heritage website, just go to the site www.ulsterheritage.com  and click on the Scotch-Irish link from the left hand menu.

 

[Bud Rogers]

Hi Barry,

Just joined the forum.  Glad to find you guys.  I've been a member of the Ulster project at FTDNA for a while now.

I recently re-read Jim Webb's Born Fighting.  Webb's book gave me the first clue that we might be Scots-Irish, although so far we cannot document anything before 1830 in eastern Tennessee.  I have also just finished Leyburn's Scotch Irish.  I also have Fischer's Albion's Seed, although I haven't read it yet.

I'd be curious to know other's thoughts on how accurate those books are about the Scots-Irish, and especially if there are any parts that I should take with a grain of salt.  I would also appreciate recommendations of any books or other documents that might help to fill in the picture of the Scots-Irish as they moved west from Virginia and the Carolinas.  Our family story picks up right about where those books leave off.  It seems like there's maybe one chapter in there that might tie our story into the bigger one, but so far I haven't been able to find it.

[Colla MacDonnell]

Barry,

I have an immense amount of research on MacDomhnaill galloglaigh I would like to make available.  Would I do this on your Scotch-Irish site or history site?  I have extensively researched the period 1299 to 1375 when my family went with Edward the Bruce to Ireland and then moved permanently from the Hebrides to Connaught and the Ulster of Ireland.  Most of this research is new and unpublished

Colla

[Barry R McCain]

Yes, we would be very interested in the Gallóglaigh material.  Send me an email and we can arrange the best way to present the material.  I've studied the Gallóglaigh quite a bit, fascianting topic. Nomenclature is very problematic in Ulster.  Many historians do not include the Gallóglaigh nor the Redshanks as 'Scots-Irish.'  This I think is subjective on their part, what they really mean is the Gallóglaigh and Redshanks were not part of the Plantation Scots that came in the 1600s.   

More later,

Barry

[Barry R McCain]

To wax and expound some on the last post.  With the Scots-Irish we get also into the very tricky issue of contemporary politics in Ulster.  The facts are simple and how to present them is very complex.

There have been 'Scots'  active in Ulster for over a thousand years.  Three of the main aspects of this activity can be classified as 1) Gallóglaigh anno domini 1200 to 1350,  2) the Redshanks or Albainigh circa anno domini 1450 to early 1600s and then 3) the Presbyterian Lowland Scots 1610 through 1700. 

In that long epoch there are other factors.  The Scottish Lowlands, parts of them, had the same Gaelic society that existed in the Highlands, Islands, and Ireland.  Western Aryshire and Gallowayshire particularly were very Gaelic, both in language and ethnicity. These lowland Scottish areas also were very active in Ireland during Medieval times and beyond.  Then came the great cultural revolution of the Protestant Reformation and a gradual language shift to Lallans... then the migration of the population to Ulster. 

Using religion to classify Ulster Scots is also a problem.  Many Ulster Scots of the first two groups, Gallóglaigh and Redshanks, are Roman Catholic to this day.  As writer and Presbyterian Minister Rev George Hill also pointed out (he wrote in the mid 1800s); to quote him:

...Is it not a curious and very suggestive fact that some of our most determined Protestants now in many districts of Ulster are descended from ancestors who were just as determined Roman Catholics in 1641?  And, is it not an equally curious and suggestive fact that many Roman Catholics of the present day are descended, maternally at least, from Protestants who suffered in 1641? ...


This is very true and something that we see in the DNA Project all the time.  It is ironic that two of the most iconic Scots-Irish Americans, John Wayne and Patrick J Buchanan.... are Catholic (John Wayne used to call himself a cardiac Catholic and officially entered the Church on his deathbed; Pat Buchanan is a very traditional Roman Catholic and very active in his faith). 

Take a family named McDonald for an example... many McDonalds in the Ulster migration in the 1700s to the Colonies.  Yet, it was the Antrim McDonalds that caused the siege of Derry, i.e. they were the 'Irish' that attacked Derry in 1689, and yet it is their ancestors that converted to the Protestant faith and participated in the Ulster migration and 'became' Scots-Irish.  Yet these families have nothing to do with the Plantation of Ulster of the influx of Presbyterians from Scotland to Ireland.  They are Highland Gaels in Antrim, which had been living in Ireland for over a century when the Plantation took place.  I know McDonald families that celebrate the defense of Derry City and yet it was their own ancestors that attacked it! 

My own McCain family also were Highland Scots in Ireland, I know we did have branches of our family inside Derry City during the siege of 1689, they played a prominent part in fact along with an inlaw, Rev James McGregor (another Highland Scot).  Rev McGregor's first language with Irish however and my McCains were also Gaelic speaking, and to confuse matters even more, we have Presbyterian and Catholic branches of our family.

If you define Ulster Scots and Scots-Irish as being descendants of the Plantation Scots, then they would not make the grade.  But, in reality they are of course an integral part of the Scots-Irish community in the New World.

Real History is not for sissies.   



 

[UlsterBrown]

Barry,

I really enjoyed your last post, and not just because it presents a great segue to my question.

Although a "Brown", my Y-DNA appears to ally me with the O'Cathain group (FTDNA 96441).  Our earliest "known" ancestor was Valentine Brown who emmigrated to America in the late 1700's, showing up in North Carolina by at least 1788.  But as I read more about Scots-Irish history and compare it to what little we know about Valentine's life, it seems circumstantially more plausible that he may have been Scots-Irish rather than "native" Irish.  Stories persist that he came over with a "Scot" named McMillan and that his passage may have been gained by indenture; landed perhaps in Philadelphia or Charleston, SC, settling in Ashe/Wilkes County NC; may have married a McDaniel; was a member of the Baptist Church; his children, on later census records, listed their father's birthplace as "Ireland", etc.  The migration patterns, religious preferences, settlement communities and even family associations of Valentine's children who moved to Letcher County Kentucky all suggest a Scots or Scots-Irish background (though obviously circumstantial).

So my question is this: Considering my Y-DNA results (which suggests a TMRCA with the O'Cathain of perhaps 15-20 generations),  is it unlikely that Valentine may have been "Scots-Irish"?  To me, it certainly makes it somewhat difficult to accept that he was a plantation Scots-Irish.  On the other hand, Valentine Brown seems an unlikely name for a native Irishman (or a Presbyterian Scots-Irish for that matter) born ca 1750, considering the regard they had for the English Sir Valentine Browne of Kenmare (unless our Valentine was trying to "pass" with an alias!)

Your thoughts would be quite welcome!

Greg

[UlsterBrown]

And before you answer  ...

If the Y-DNA argues "native Irish", might it be that an ancestor of Valentine Brown converted to the Protestant/Presbyterian church sometime during the Plantation and came to ally themselves with the Plantation Scots-Irish?

So, a pre-Plantation migration of an O'Cathain clan member to Scotland and then back during Plantation?  A native Irishman with a change of heart rather than locale?  What say you, oh keeper of the wisdom of Ulster?

Greg

[Albaringa]

i also was a discussion member in Ulster project . with the same nickname .

[Scapellplop]

I dont smoke cigars but I used to drink Scotch.  I still like Scotch but Im trying to be more into the "buy American" thing so for several years now Ive been drinking Bourbon and Tennessee Whiskey.  In fact as I type this Im sipping on some Jack Daniels Single Barrel Select; but I still like Scotch and have a warm spot in my heart for Glenlivet.  I also like Jameson Irish.
 
Cruiser
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