The Ulster-Scots in America

Good to hear PP that you are taking a bit of our common history to those who may not be aware of it.

I bought a book recently 'The Scot in America and the Ulster Scot'. It was first published in 1912, and is an account of two speeches given by Whitelaw Reid, American Ambassador to Britain. A few lines from his speech...

'But it is now time to take into account another stream of Scottish immigration - the Ulster Scot. This term is preferred to the familar ''Scotch-Irish,'' constantly used in America, because it does not confuse the race with the accident of birth, and because the early immigrants preferred it themselves.

'And, in fact, if these Scottish and Presbyterian colonists must be called Irish because they had been one or two generations in the North of Ireland, then the Pilgrim Fathers, who had been one generation in Holland, must by the same reasoning be called Dutch, or at the very least English-Dutch.'

'After a time they began to suffer from unfriendly legislation,from Church persecution,and from the hostility of the expelled British monarch,James 2nd,which among other things forced them to their long and heroic defence of Londonderry. These experiences turned their eyes after the Scotsmen already prospering in the American colonies, and presently a great movement began among the Ulster Scots. In 1718 five small ships arrived at Boston with about 750 of them,who ultimately settled, some at Londonderry, New Hampshire,'

'A few months later came the Declaration of Independence,summing up the conclusions to which for years the Scots and Ulster Scots had been leading. Out of the fifty-six members who composed the Congress,eleven were of Scottish descent; and among them were such conspicious leaders as John Witherspoon, of New Jersey, James Wilson, of Pennsylvania, Philip Livingston of New York, and Edward Rutledge, of South Carolina.... the Declaration was signed. We guard it now, sacredly preserved in the handwriting of the Ulster Scot who was Secretary of the Congress; it was first publicly read to the people by an Ulster Scot, and first printed by an Ulster Scot.'

To add, those 750 in 1718 who came,were later followed by thousands of others over that century. Estimates vary, but 250,000 - 300,000 is the usually agreed amount.