Scotch-Irish-L Archives

Archiver > Scotch-Irish > 2000-03 > 0953869360


From: Linda Merle <>
Subject: Re: Pilgrims are getting mighty old -- List Admin
Date: Thu, 23 Mar 2000 19:42:40 -0800
References: <200003201746.AA592576802@mail.fea.net>
In-Reply-To: <00b101bf94ed$7ee72220$07a966d1@jacknday>


Hi, Mary, you know you sent your email to the whole list ?? <GRIN>.

>so why did they use the S/I term?

I don't know.... Have you tried the local spiritualist church? If the seance
gets results, let us know....maybe I'll try it too <grin>.

Re endless newbie discussions on what is Scotch Irish. This isn't a
therapy list for "self discovery" <grin>. The basics and the books are in
the FAQ.
Why is it that people expect 900 other people are sitting here ready to
facilitate them ? We're NOT! After the first 200 times, it's boring. So we
put it in a FAQ. Read the FAQ if you are new to get "caught up". Or find
a buddy to talk to one on one. It has to do with media -- expecting a large
list to stop what its doing and focus on you is rather infantile. Shift media
to webpages and our FAQ.

Ethnic labels aren't an exact science. I mean if I were adopted by a family
of Swedes, I'd be ethnically a Swede. Who/what is SI is really a debate.
The term isn't used outside of the USA so until they get off the boat -at a
port in what was to be the USA, you got to call them something else.

My experience is that the Ulster cousins don't mind being called "Scotch-
Irish". They are more aware of the role these folk placed in the founding
of this country than ourselves and identify with the "Scotch Irish" with
pride. The Canadians do not like the name and
prefer Ulster Scot. That's usually used in Ulster (ie, the traditional nine
counties -- a fuzzy geographical term). However then there are the people
who prefer Ulster British, which is really more inclusive. Ulster Scot leaves
out the Ulster English, Ulster Irish, Ulster Welsh, UIster Hugenots, Germans,
etc. It's kind of like mapping everyone in America to ....
Pilgrims (people from
the south east end of England with distinctive religious views.)

Clearly its confusing in the homeland, though as y ou move back in time
to times earlier than the current Troubles (to earlier Troubles <grin>), you
find the rigid ethnic boundaries break down. By 1830 when the O S
Memoirs were written, the populace are described as one people. They
lived amongst one another (easily confirmed in the Tithe Applotments),
not being geographically separated through low-level (as compared to
Bosnia, Switzerland, Kososo) "ethnic cleansing". They were the same
people, much as Americans are alike, although even after a few generations,
we are different. (For example, my family, both sides, used the expression
"Clink" for jail -- English slang for the prison that once existed in London,
the Clink, though my friend Yolanda, a Hispanic American, never heard the
expression till I used it). However the O S Memoirs depict one people.

When you move further back, to the early 1600's (pre 1641 rising), books
like Blaneys "Presbyterians and the Irish Language" depict a very different
place. In some parishes there were no Catholic priests or Established
Church. The Scots had a Presbyterian minister -- everyone went there.
These parishes requested Gaelic speaking ministers because, again,
contrary to a lot of propagandized history, many Scots spoke Gaelic.
They brought it over. They spoke Gaelic in Galloway and in many rural
pockets of lowland Scotland. And they learned it from their neighbors.
As late as 1730, apparently the Presbyterians of Bushmill didn't do so
well with the English <grin>. Many of the "census substitutes" left to us
of that period were done by English, like Perot, who could not tell a
Scots from an Irishman. In some of the most Scottish parishes in Antrim,
he found only Irish. He identified a colony of Breton weavers in I think it
was Wexford as Irish. "Irish" to him meant they didn't speak English
he understood. So we can't rely the accuracy of the surveys done in
the mid 1600's to identify ethnicity in Ireland.

The one thing that holds true for it all is that they were Ulster folk, as
they still are, just as we are Americans and Canadians.

The more genealogy you do usually the more confused you can get if you
think you can establish your ethnicity based on your ancestors (you can't).
My father's English side has Scots and maybe Irish in it. My mother's Irish
side is German and whatever Marshall's in Tyrone are -- Scots? Anglo Irish?
Her very anglophobic "Scotch Irish" father is descended from Edward I
through an English roundhead line. So far my father's Scottish line remains
Scottish, at least -- though possibly related to the greatest villain in
Scottish
history (Earl of Stair -- responsible for the Culloden massacre).

Whatever you want to be you should be allowed to be, though you
shouldn't be allowed to persecute others --because they say Scotch
and you say Scot and on to the potEYto/potAHto silliness. This is abuse.

It's often said that many of the folk who received the label Scotch Irish
in the USA never were in Ireland.

>e I'm still not sure whether or not the Co. Louth area is
>technically
>included in Scotch-Irish terminology and records.

<grin> I'm not sure there are Scotch Irish records. There's records of
Protestants, but there again, it is really not correct to use the term Scotch
Irish till they jump off the boat in the USA. Lots of people labeled "Scotch
Irish" in the USA came from southern IReland. The entire Protestant artisan
class deserted Ireland. Dublin was once a Protestant city, full of all classes
of poeple, all Protestant, but largely not of Scots descent but of Irish,
Welsh, English, French, etc, etc. They all left, often earlier than the Ulster
Presbyterians. Among them were the Disneys and the Fords.

Thanks for your email -- I forget that running a list like this is very weird
and that you end up making decisions based on very different logic than
people may think. It's an interesting experience and thanks to the "family"
at Rootsweb, I've learned a lot about how the Internet works.

However I sure feel like a hick this week. My company is going "ebusiness"
and I have spent three days in training learning to build ebusiness websites
using our new software which uses complex Microsoft software (Site Server)
and our document management software to do amazing things.

My usage of the Term is based on a lot of scholarly research within
the context of the Scotch Irish Society as well as research and discussion
in Ulster with folks who have dedicated large portions of their lives studying
this stuff. I have the phone number of my friend who has spent I think
all 75 years of his life thinking, talking, walking, breathing, and writing
about
these terms (Scotch Irish/Scots Irish/Ulster Scot, etc, etc etc). There's
going to be a scholarly journal making its appearance full of scholarly
discussions this spring. And in May there is a large conference at the
Ulster American Folk Park (I think) and my subject matter expert is giving
a paper there as are many others. So there is a lot of research being done
and about to be published.

Linda Merle





This thread: