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From: "Sarah" <>
Subject: Re: [S-I] William's Army at Boyne
Date: Tue, 15 Mar 2011 16:17:11 -0500
References: <191279026.1946348.1299098458337.JavaMail.root@sz0165a.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net>
In-Reply-To: <191279026.1946348.1299098458337.JavaMail.root@sz0165a.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net>


I needed a chance to add this to the conversation on the American
Revolution. I have a copy of a book titled "How the Scotch-Irish won the
American Revolution" .... their markmanship, cunning abilities at using the
woods to hide in. Then surprising and defeating the flashing Redcoats
marching along in neat lines . They had learned many tactics from the
Indians who attacked them continously ......but mainly their courage. They
had been fighting the British for ages.....It seemed to be bred into them.
Its a good little book. Especially if you are Scotch-Irish.
Sarah
>
To: <>
Sent: Wednesday, March 02, 2011 3:40 PM
Subject: Re: [S-I] William's Army at Boyne


> Hi Sharon, actually it's google books that's the repository of knowledge,
> not me <grin>.
>
> However it's important to recall that many of these books have been
> superceded by better scholarship. Those books cost beaucoup money to read,
> unless you can interlibrary loan them. So we family historians may look
> quite ignorant to a history graduate student.
>
> Regarding the history of the Battle of the Boyne, clearly it was not
> written by Ulstermen. Our poor ancestors were left with very little
> choice: either side with Tyrconnell, King James and the Irish Catholics or
> settle in with the hopelessly incompetent English and hope the latter did
> win. They did, thanks to King William's continental soldiers. So our
> ancestors not only won over the Irish but survived the English.
>
> There a few histories of the American Revolution that make the point that
> the reason the English lost it was the same: military incompetence.
> Apparently such men are born brilliant and it's good to have at least one
> around when you have a war.
>
> Twould have been nice if someone would have bothered to document who
> fought in William's Irish army.
>
> Maybe we'll find those lists yet.
>
> Linda Merle
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Sharon Oddie Brown" <>
> To:
> Sent: Wednesday, March 2, 2011 1:51:07 PM
> Subject: Re: [S-I] William's Army at Boyne
>
> You are such an amazing repository of knowledge! Thank you for sharing.
> Sharon Oddie Brown
> Sharon Oddie Brown, Roberts Creek, BC, Canada. History Project:
> http://www.thesilverbowl.com/ Blog:
> http://sharonoddiebrown.blogspot.com/ Some Become Flowers:
> http://www.harbourpublishing.com/title/SomeBecomeFlowers Family Tree:
> http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?db=silverbowl
>
> On 02/03/2011 6:43 AM, wrote:
>> Hi Charlie,
>>
>> The answer to your question appears to be no! There is NOT a list of
>> officers. I also supposedly descend from an officer and have searched for
>> a list for many years. I hope I'm wrong, though.
>>
>> The reasons why there is not a list are the following:
>>
>> The situation was a civil war. King James claimed to be king; various
>> forces had deposed him and replaced him with King William. While this was
>> a 'glorious' revolution in London -- and bloodless -- it was NOT glorious
>> or bloodless in Ireland. Things were chaotic. The records keeping in time
>> of civil war is usually pretty bad (no one knows which side'll win)....
>> There is one reason why we do have compiled records of who fought in
>> James' army: he lost the war so the winning side was very concerned with
>> determining who to hang, imprison, and especially whose property to seize
>> so they could use it to pay off their own side.
>>
>> Predates formation of modern British army. Check your British genealogy
>> Bible. Presumedly that's Ancestral Trails (you gotta copy, right?<grin>).
>> I haven't checked it on this issue myself, but I believe it'll point out
>> to you that the modern day British army wasn't created till after this
>> date. Sure, there are some records -- some very good -- from the mid
>> 1600s. There are for example records relating to British army units in
>> Ireland leading up to the Glorious Revolution. They become bad in the
>> years immediately before. Discipline was slipping and, as the history
>> books will tell you, Protestant officers were being replaced with
>> Catholic. Hence my ancestor's name disappears a little before it. But
>> records do show that he served (or a man with that name) -- and one of
>> the other four officers in his unit was the brother of his second wife,
>> which is good supportive evidence to show that this man with a common
>> surname was indeed the man whose second wife was this other man's br!
> !
> o!
>> ther.... These records are microfilmed and in LDS.
>>
>> The field of British military history is an immense speciality because it
>> is very complex. It requires a lot of knowledge. There are books written
>> on it. Almost all of those books are written on records kept from about
>> 1750 or so, when the modern army was formulated. If you read the history
>> you will learn that a standing army is a rather modern notion in Britain.
>> One of the reasons is that they are expensive to feed and clothe. Also it
>> is difficult to retain their loyality. Through their officers they could
>> easily be instantaneously transformed into an invading army (invader
>> usually heading in from Ireland, btw). Why kind of idiot would want one?
>> Even most of the kings weren't quite that stupid -- or rich enough to
>> keep one even if that stupid. Parliament struggled to keep the kings of
>> England rather poor so that they couldn't buy themselves a standing army
>> to use against Parliament. This is the very kind of thing that lead to
>> the British Civil Wars and that ensure that th!
> !
> e !
>> British settlers of Ulster in 1642 would not be rescued by an English
>> army: The king couldn't afford to put one in the field. Instead the Scots
>> stepped in, for many reasons, some of those definitely not the king's!
>>
>> Since there is not a lot of lit written on the earlier military records,
>> its best to start with history. Avoid history books with no footnotes or
>> bibliographies. These aren't history books -- they're either novels,
>> children's books, or text books written to brainwash the reader (often a
>> high school student). So when you find one you immediately turn to the
>> back and check to see that it has copious footnotes and a very long
>> bibliography. If it doesn't, it is junk or rather tinder for your fire.
>>
>> This is because while you read the book you can use the footnotes and
>> bibliography to figure out where additional material is. This is called
>> research! You then visit a library and check out those sources. They'll
>> lead you to more sources. You find the end of a thread and follow it on
>> and on and on.
>>
>> These sources are of two general types: published sources and
>> manuscripts. Published sources are your indexes. They're printed and so
>> you can read them. Some actually have indexes (footnotes and
>> bibliographies). They lead to the primary sources, which are manuscripts.
>> Manuscripts on the other hand, are hand written in a script you can't
>> read (though you might be daft enough to try, like me!), not indexed
>> (though possibly cataloged), and don't have footnotes or
>> bibliographies -- though the finding aids surrounding them and catalogs
>> might. Note that the language changes when shifting from published
>> material to manuscripts. Yes. And they're in different places: published
>> sources are found in libraries and manuscripts in archives or
>> repositories. Some establishments are both. And once books get old
>> enough, they are often only in archives. Archives and repositories do not
>> use the Dewey Decimal System....each one uses it's own. Another thing to
>> figure out.....
>>
>> These days, a lot of manuscript material is also on microfilm in
>> collections that are only affordable by large research institutions, like
>> the Family History Library and your nearby university. Actually my nearby
>> universities don't have some that the Family History Library does. In our
>> case, look for a university with a very strong emphasis on British
>> history and/or law.
>>
>> So you can actually do a lot of work from your home or a nearby library,
>> or, worse case, Salt Lake City. The Family History Library has a set of
>> the published Parliamentary Papers related to Ireland. These go back to
>> Queen Lizzie's day and earlier. And they're indexed. The Family History
>> Library also has NIDS. For more info on NIDS, see the guide to British
>> and Irish genealogy at the British Isles Family History Society:
>> http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~bifhsusa/ They are where I learned a
>> lot of this information -- their seminars.
>>
>> The easy stuff-- Consult Kitzmiller's "In Search of the Forlorn Hope: A
>> Comprehensive Guide to Locating British Regiments and Their Records (1640
>> to WWI), Two Volume Set "
>> http://www.amazon.com/Search-Forlorn-Hope-Comprehensive-Regiments/dp/0961926058
>>
>> He explains a lot. Note the date is before King William.
>>
>> Also sources like "British Sources for Irish History 1485-1641"....oops,
>> too early! It's a very useful guide to manuscripts in local, regional,
>> and specialized repositories in England, Scotland, and Wales". Among
>> other things, it identifies lists of soldiers who served in Cromwell's
>> regiments in Ireland, allowing one to trace the family back to Engerland
>> but more often, are deeds and marriage arrangements of landed families
>> and collections of letters. No email in those days so people had to write
>> letters to one another to take care of business.
>>
>> You can't overlook "Irish and Scotch-Irish Ancestral Research" by Falley.
>> Your first stop!
>>
>> Once things got settled into the modern times, the English started
>> archiving military records in a standard division of the National
>> Archives:
>> See http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documentsonline/ . However before
>> that, and as one approaches the earlier periods (about 1750 if I recall
>> right), more and more of these are scattered in the Parliamentary papers.
>> Often they were compiled among them. WHich is why for the earlier period
>> the published compilations of the parliamentary papers are so valuable --
>> you'll find reports of military campaigns that were present to
>> Parliament, lists of men to be attained and / or executed, common
>> criminals, etc. So you have to buff up the ol' research skills! A degree
>> in library science helps a lot. (I was outside reading novels under the
>> trees while the library science majors toiled away in the library
>> myself). I learned to do research in graduate school -- and it's the most
>> valuable thing I learned in graduate school (other than to watch out for
>> the English majors, who had been told that the university would get rid
>> of half of them by the next year and who were rather dangerous!
> !
> a!
>> s a result since if they left school, in that era, they were on their way
>> to Vietnam. They'd rush out and check out any books mentioned by
>> instructors so no one else could read them. They are all headed for their
>> own unique circle of hell -- if I get my way, that is! -- I was a
>> comparative lit major, not English - we were much nicer people as our
>> field was less crowded).
>>
>> It's a lot of fun, but so far I've never found any list of King William's
>> officers though I hope someone tells me I'm wrong and provides it.
>>
>> A huge ditto for researching those periods when there was an Irish
>> parliament, btw. Unfortunately many of those records were destroyed in
>> the Four Courts Fire. Here the dreaded word "secondary collections'
>> arises -- much of what you use is stuff others copied out of the primary
>> records, destroyed in the Four Courts Fire. Consult "Irish and Scotch
>> Irish Ancestral Research" and spend a lot of time in the FHL catalog.
>> Also read your standard Irish genealogy books that mention these
>> collections and identify what's in them, like John grenham's work.
>>
>> Officers, though, are generally upward mobile blokes, often younger sons
>> of landed families -- or clergy (themselves descended from younger sons
>> of landed families). They wanted LAND. So you check land records. If they
>> were officers they were probably awarded land for their service or paid
>> off in some way. So you check the Irish deeds. For that you'll want to do
>> some additional reading. They're microfilmed and in the FHL. See the
>> British Isles Family History Society USA's site (above) for info.
>>
>> Good bib here:
>>
>> http://www.genuki.org.uk/big/BritMilRecs.html
>>
>> It includes English Army Lists and Commision Registers, 1661-1714 (6
>> volumes) by Charles Dalton (Francis Edwards Ltd., London, England, 1960).
>>
>> These days, you google. Esp. go to google books. Often old books are
>> there. Dalton is there (I don't know if all is).
>>
>> In the first vol of Dalton, p. 231 is a Sir John Hammer. A footnote says
>> he was kted in Aug 1660, succeeded his father Sr Tho Hammer as 3rd Bart
>> in 1678. Col of a regt. at the battle of the Boyne. D. as Maj-Gen 1701.
>> The introduction to this volumne says:
>> "xxi: The second Charles raised territorial regiments in time of
>> emergency to bring his army up to a proper war footing and disbanded them
>> when the scare was over. He was not above paying some of these new raised
>> troups out of 'militia money' but for the whole term of their existence
>> these ephemeral troops were de facto and de jure, "regulars' and not
>> 'militia'. Lists of militia regiments and militia commissions are
>> occasionally to be found in the Domestic Entry Books of Charles II...."
>> !! Another place to search......
>>
>> Lastly, a lot of material is to be found scattered throughout regional
>> repositories and archives in England, Scotland, and Wales. WHich is why
>> one uses "British Sources for Irish History" and other books. In the
>> University of Nottingham Library is the Middleton Collection. The Irish
>> papers are divided into Munster Plantation Papers and Ulster Plantation
>> Papers though the latter has a lot on the Leix plantation and the manor
>> of Galen Ridgeway in Queen's County. Among the Ulster papers is one, in
>> 1612 concerning an estate (Fenbragh) in Tyrone, another regarding passage
>> of lands in Tyrone from Sir Percival Willoughby to Captain
>> Leigh....1630 -- receipts of half a year's rent from the tenants of the
>> manor of Galen Ridgeway...
>>
>> Some of this stuff may be in PRONI as well. And the Galen Ridgeway in
>> Dublin....The PRONI website has huge amounts of info on Ulster estates,
>> some of it gathered from other places.
>>
>> However if you ever find a list you MUST tell us, okay? It's probably not
>> in the military archive in the National Archives (as it would have been
>> found). It's scattered in some collection somewhere. Possibly even in the
>> personal papers of a servant of King William's and lost for centuries,
>> buried in a library gathering dust.
>>
>> More likely by searching many of the papers of King William and his
>> daughter, etc, and the parliamentary papers of the period, esp. those
>> discussing the Williamite settlement (the payoff for his soldiers in
>> Ireland), you'll find mention of names, esp. as soldiers got old and sick
>> or died. Then they or their widows petitioned for aid directly to
>> Parliament. Mine wouldn't be there as he died at sea coming to America in
>> 1729 and his widow married a Clinton in New York, the source of many
>> rebels, governors and generals.
>>
>> Linda Merle
>>
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Charlie Weaver"<>
>> To:
>> Sent: Wednesday, March 2, 2011 7:34:15 AM
>> Subject: [S-I] William's Army at Boyne
>>
>> Is there a roster or list of officers of the men
>> who served in William's army at Boyne in the
>> 1690 period? My ancestor, James PETTIGREW II,
>> supposedly was an officer in that army, but I would
>> like to see some documentary proof of that. James
>> was reportedly given an estate which eventually became
>> Crilly House, Aughnacloy, Co Tyrone.
>> Information on source availability for this information
>> would be greatly appreciated.
>> Charlie Weaver, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, USA
>> <>
>>
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