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Scotch-Irish in New England
By Rev. A. L. Perry, Professor of History and Politics, Williams
College, Williamstown, Mass.
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Taken from The Scotch-Irish in America: Proceedings and Addresses of the
Second Congress at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, May 29 to June 1, 1890.
Mr. President and Brethren of the Society--
Rev. Mr.William Boyd
The Scotch-Irish did not enter New England unheralded. Early in the
spring of 1718 Rev. Mr. Boyd was dispatched from Ulster to Boston as an
agent of some hundreds of those people who expressed a strong desire to
remove to New England, should suitable encouragement be afforded them.
His mission was to Governor Shute, of Massachusetts, then in the third
year of his administration of that colony, an old soldier of King
William, a Lieutenant-Colonel under Marlborough in the wars of Queen
Anne, and wounded in one of the great battles in Flanders. Mr. Boyd was
empowered to make all necessary arrangements with the civil authorities
for the reception of those whom he represented, in case his report of
the state of things here should prove to be favorable.
As an assurance to the governor of the good faith and earnest resolve of
those who sent him, Mr. Boyd brought an engrossed parchment twenty-eight
inches square, containing the following memorial to his excellency, and
the autograph names of the heads of the families proposing to emigrate:
"We whose names are underwritten, Inhabitants of ye North of Ireland,
Doe in our own names, and in the names of many others, our Neighbors,
Gentlemen, Ministers, Farmers, and Tradesmen, Commissionate and appoint
our trusty and well beloved friend, the Reverend Mr. William Boyd, of
Macasky, to His Excellency, the Right Honorable Collonel Samuel Suitte,
Governour of New England, and to assure His Excellency of our sincere
and hearty Inclination to Transport ourselves to that very excellent and
renowned Plantation upon our obtaining from His Excellency suitable
incouragement. And further to act and Doe in our Names as his prudence
shall direct. Given under our hands this 26th day of March, Anno Dom.
1718."
To this brief, but explicit memorial, three hundred and nineteen names
were appended, all but thirteen of them in fair and vigorous autograph.
Thirteen only, or four per cent of the whole, made their "mark" upon the
parchment. It may well be questioned, whether in any other part of the
United Kingdom at that time, one hundred and seventy-two years ago, in
England or Wales, or Scotland or Ireland, so large a proportion as
ninety-six per cent of promiscuous householders in the common walks of
life could have written their own names. And it was proven in the
sequel, that those who could write, as well as those who could not, were
also able upon occasion to make their "mark."
I have lately scrutinized with critical care this ancient parchment
stamped by the hands of our ancestors, now in the custody of the
Historical Society of New Hampshire, and was led into a line of
reflections which I will not now repeat, as to its own vicissitudes in
the seven quarter-centurys of its existence, and as to the personal
vicissitudes and motives, and heart-swellings and hazards, and cold and
hunger and nakedness, as well as the hard-earned success and the sense
of triumph, and the immortal vestigia of the men who lovingly rolled and
unrolled this costly parchment on the banks of the Foyle and the Bann
Water! Tattered are its edges now, shrunken by time and exposure its
original dimensions, illegible already some of the names even under the
fortifying power of modern lenses, but precious in the eyes of New
England, nay precious in the eyes of Scotch-Irishmen every-where, is
this venerable muniment of intelligence and of courageous purpose
looking down upon us from the time of the first English George.
It is enough for our present purpose to know that Governor Shute gave
such general encouragement and promise of welcome through Mr. Boyd to
his constituents, that the latter were content with the return-word
received from their messenger, and set about with alacrity the
preparations for their embarkation. Nothing definite was settled between
the governor and the minister, not even the locality of a future
residence for the newcomers; but it is clear in general, that the
governor's eye was upon the district of Maine, then and for a century
afterward, a part of Massachusetts. Five years before Boyd's visit to
Boston, had been concluded the European treaty of Utrecht, and, as
between England and France, it had therein been agreed that all of Nova
Scotia or Acadia, "according to its ancient boundaries," should remain
to England. But what were the ancient boundaries of Acadia? Did it
include all that is now New Brunswick? Or had France still a large
territory on the Atlantic between Acadia and Maine? This was a vital
question, wholly unsolved by the treaty. The motive of Massachusetts in
welcoming the Scotch-Irish into her jurisdiction was to plant them on
the frontiers of Maine as a living bulwark against the restless and
enterprising French of the north, and their still more restless savage
allies; the motive of the Ulstermen in coming to America was to
establish homes of their own in fee simple, taxable only to support
their own form of worship and their strictly local needs--to escape in
short the land lease and the church tithe; the bottom aims, accordingly,
of both parties to the negotiation ran parallel with each other, and
there was in consequence a swift agreement in the present, and in the
long sequel a large realization of the purposes of both.
August 4, 1718, five small ships came to anchor near the little wharf at
the foot of State street, Boston, then a town of perhaps 12,000 people.
On board these ships were about one hundred and twenty families of
Scotch-Irish. They reckoned themselves in families. It is certain that
the number of persons in the average family so reckoned was, according
to our modern notions, very large. There may have been, there probably
was, at least seven hundred and fifty passengers on board. Cluttered in
those separate ships, not knowing exactly whither to turn, having as a
whole no recognized leader on board, no Castle Garden to afford a
preliminary shelter, no organized Commissioners of Immigration to lend
them a hand, the most of them extremely poor--the imagination would
fain, but may not picture the confusions and perplexities, the stout
hearts of some and the heartaches of others, the reckless joy of
children and the tottering steps of old men and women. One patriarch,
John Young--I know his posterity well--was ninety-five years old. And
there were babies in arms, a plenty of them!
McGregor, Cornwell, Holmes, McKeen, Cargill, Nesmith, Cochran, Dinsmoor,
Mooars.
Besides Mr. Boyd, who had stayed the summer in Boston, where he found
already settled a few scattered and peeled of his own race and faith,
there were three Presbyterian ministers on board, Mr. McGregor, of
blessed memory, Mr. Cornwell, and Mr. Holmes. Those best off of all the
passengers, the McKeens, the Cargills, the Nesmiths, the Cochrans, the
Dinsmoors, the Mooars, and some other families, were natives of
Scotland, whose heads had passed over into Ulster during the short reign
of James II. These were Covenanters. They had lived together in the
valley of the Bann Water for about thirty years, in or near the towns of
Colerain and Ballymoney and Kilrea. Their pastor was James McGregor.
They wished to settle together in the new land of promise. They or their
fathers and neighbors had felt the edge of the sword of Graham of
Claverhouse in Argyleshire; they wished to enjoy together in peace in
some sequestered spot the sweet ministrations of the gospel according to
their own sense of its rule and order, and, being better able than the
rest to wait and choose out for themselves, we shall follow their
fortunes a little farther on.
Others of the company were the descendants of those who participated in
the original "Colonization of Ulster," which dates from 1610; and of
those who, three years later, formed the first Presbytery in Ireland,
the "Presbytery of Antrim." Others still were the progeny of those
Scotchmen and Englishmen, whom Cromwell transplanted at the middle of
the century to take the places of those wasted by his own pitiless
sword--"the sword of the Lord and of Gideon!" And a few families of
native Irish also mingled in the throngs around the wharf, doubtless
drawn by sympathy and attachment to take the risk of the New with their
neighbors whom they had found trustworthy and hospitable in the Old. I
only know for certain that the numerous Young family, consisting of four
generations, and the wife of Joshua Gray, of whom we shall hear more
pretty soon, were Celtic Irish.
If now we except some individuals and families of this great company,
who found pretty soon a transient or permanent home in Boston in
connection with their countrymen already settled there in an isolated
way, and who a few years afterward formed a Presbyterian Church in Long
Lane (later Federal street) under Rev. John Moorehead, of saintly but
eccentric memory, which Church turned Congregational in 1786, and
afterward, under the famous Dr. Channing, became the bridge to
Unitarianism; and if we except also perhaps as many families who went up
that autumn to Andover, then a new town, whose development they
influenced both socially and theologically, and a considerable number
more who went up temporarily to await events to the towns along the
Merrimac, as Dracut and Haverhill, all the rest of the migration became
located in the course of six months in three main centers, to which we
must now attend in order, and from which these peculiar people diffused
themselves little by little into every corner of New England.
1. WORCESTER. Nowadays we in Massachusetts call Worcester "the heart of
the Commonwealth." It is a shallow bowl of beautiful country. The fall
of 1718 marked the fifth year of its permanent settlement. There were
about fifty log houses and two hundred souls within the circle. These
were all English and Puritans, and from the towns immediately to the
eastward. But the Indians were hostile. Two previous settlements on the
spot had been abandoned from this cause, the first in King Philip's war
in the year 1675, the second in Queen Anne's war in 1709. Now the colony
was determined to hold the ground. At least five garrison-houses, one a
regular block fort, stood within the bowl. Accordingly, Governor Shute
looked favorably upon the proposition, that a part of the Scotch-Irish,
now in one sense on his hands, should go direct to Worcester, to find a
much-needed home for themselves, to reinforce the fifty families already
on the ground, and to take their chances in helping to defend the
menaced western frontier, fifty miles from Boston!
Matthew Gray, Ealanor Gray
We do not know exactly how many went to Worcester. We may fairly infer
that at least fifty families--large families--went straight from Boston
to Worcester that autumn, and that the population of the place was thus
more than doubled at one stroke. I entertain the opinion, gathered from
scattered and uncertain data, that it was the poorer, the more
illiterate, the more helpless, part of the five shiploads who were
conducted to Worcester. I have hanging in my study, handsomely framed,
the original deed by which my immediate maternal ancestor, Matthew Gray,
conveyed to his son, of the same name, in 1735 his farm in Worcester of
fifty-five acres, still called there the "Gray Farm," to which deed are
appended, not the autographs but the "marks" of Matthew and Jean, his
wife. Neither Matthew nor Jean could write. The deed is witnessed,
however, by "William Gray. Jr.," who writes a fair hand; but "Ealanor
Gray," who witnesses with him, makes her "mark." Three marks to one
manual is a bad proportion, but you will allow me to premise that the
Grays, though illiterate, were long-headed.
Robert Gray, Robert Crawford, John Gray, James Hamilton, Andrew
Farren, Robert Peebles, Jonas Rice, Robert Lethridge. Matthew Gray, John
Battay
There is much evidence that the poor Scotch-Irish were welcomed in
Worcester at first. They were needed there, both for civil and military
reasons. Jonas Rice, the first permanent settler of Worcester, who had
been a planter during the second settlement broken up by the Indians,
returned to his farm to stay, October 21, 1713, and remained with his
family alone in the forest till the spring of 1715. Adonijah, his son,
was the first child born in Worcester, November 7, 1714. The cool
courage, good sense, and strict integrity of Jonas Rice made him the
first great leader in the town where great leaders have never been
wanting since. He was just the man to appreciate the stout hearts of his
new-come, not yet well-understood neighbors. No town organization had as
yet been made when, in 1722, Lovell's Indian war broke out, and two
Scotch-Irishmen, John Gray and Robert Crawford, were posted alone as
scouts on Leicester Hill to the westward, doubtless at Rice's instance.
In September of the same year a township organization was first
effected, and John Gray, with Jonas Rice, were two of the first
selectmen; William Gray was chosen one of the two fence viewers, and
Robert Peebles one of the two hog reeves. At the first annual town
meeting the next year new names of the strangers appear on the list of
town officers; for example, James Hamilton as surveyor, and Andrew
Farren as fence-viewer, though John Gray dropped this year from
selectman to sealer of leather; but at the second annual March meeting,
1724, John Gray goes back to his earlier post as selectman, James
McClellan, great-great-great grandfather to the late general-in-chief,
becomes a constable; Robert Lethridge a surveyor of highways; William
Gray and Robert Peebles, fence-viewers; John Battay, tythingman, and
Matthew Gray, my own great-great grandfather, both sealer of leather and
hog-reeve.
The most interesting of the purely Irish families, who came with the
Scotch to Worcester, with whom they had contracted relationship during
their long residence in Ulster, or become attached by community of
sentiment and suffering, was the Young family, four generations
together. They brought the potato to Worcester, and it was first planted
there in several fields in the spring of 1719. The tradition is still
lively in Scotch-Irish families (I listened to it eagerly in my boyhood)
that some of their English neighbors, after enjoying the hospitality of
one of the Irish families, were presented each on their departure with a
few tubers for planting, and the recipients, unwilling to give offense
by refusing, accepted the gift; but suspecting the poisonous quality,
carried them only to the next swamp and chucked them into the water. The
same spring a few potatoes were given for seed to a Mr. Walker, of
Andover, Mass., by an Irish family who had wintered with him, previous
to their departure for Londonderry to the northward. The potatoes were
accordingly planted; came up and flourished well; blossomed and produced
balls, which the family supposed were the fruit to be eaten. They cooked
the balls in various ways, but could not make them palatable, and
pronounced them unfit for food. The next spring, while plowing the
garden, the plow passed through where the potatoes had grown, and turned
out some of great size, by which means they discovered their mistake.
This is the reason why this now indespensable esculent is still called
in New England certainly, and perhaps elsewhere, the "Irish potato."
John Young, William Young, stone cutter.
John Young was perhaps the oldest immigrant who ever came to this
country to live and die. If the inscription on his tombstone is to
trusted, which the American Antiquarian Society, of Worcester, copied
and published many years ago, he was ninety-five years old when he
landed at Boston. He lived in Worcester twelve years, died in 1730; was
buried in the old yard on the common. His son, David Young, an old man
when he came, died at ninety-four years, and was buried in the same
place. His son, William Young, a stone cutter by trade, erected over
their graves a common double headstone, with the following inscriptions
in parallel columns, united at the bottom by the rude yet precious
rhyming lines:
David Young.
"Here lies interred the remains of John Young, who was born in the isle
of Bert, near Londonderry, in the Kingdom of Ireland. He departed this
life, June 30, 1730, aged 107 years. Here lies interred the remains of
David Young, who was born in the parish of Tahbeyn, county of Donegal,
and kingdom of Ireland. He departed this life, December 26, aged 94
years.
The aged son, and the more aged father
Beneath (these) stones their mould'ring bones
Here rest together."
William Young
Moses Young, probably the son of this epitaphist, William Young, was a
lad of some six years at the time of the emigration, and became the
ancestor of numerous families of that name in Western Massachusetts, and
particularly in Williamstown, the town of rny residence, where there are
no less than five Young families at present, living in one neighborhood,
the same they have occupied as farmers for a century and a quarter.
These families and individuals have never exhibited the main traitsof
their Scotch-Irish companions and their descendants. They have been less
"canny" and enterprising. Race blood tells from generation to
generation. They have been, perhaps, more inclined to intoxicants than
the others; although, if the truth must be told, the whole tribe in New
England, as a rule and in the earlier times, have drank more than their
fair share of the liquor. Only now and then one of the Youngs has tried
professional and official life. John Young, born in Worcester June 2,
1739, studied medicine with the first and famous Dr. Green, of
Worcester. He practiced a little while in Pelham, and then moved to
Peterborough, N. H., about 1764. Both of these were Scotch-Irish towns,
and Dr. Young's migrations illustrate the usage, well-nigh universal in
the last century, of families and individuals moving from town to town
within the Presbyterian circuit. Young was always very poor, and became
very intemperate. The common custom of "treating" the doctor and
minister at each professional, and even friendly call, wrought mischief
to multitudes of both orders, and the later and the last necessities of
poor John Young, who died February 27, 1807, were considerately
ministered unto by the town of Peterborough.
When "Lovell's War" was over and before the "Old French War" began, and
when the two sets of population in Worcester settled down to a better
neighborhood acquaintance, the inevitable antipathies waked up as
between Englishmen and Scotchmen, as between Presbyterians and Puritans.
Certain traits and habits of our folks, to be specified later as common
to them in all New England, intensified the feeling of repugnance felt
toward them in Worcester. They were commonly called "Irish." Even a
formal act of the General Court of Massachusetts denominated them "poor
Irish people;" and a little later the General Court of New Hampshire
styled the Londonderry section of them "a company of Irish at Nutfield."
This designation they all naturally enough resented. "We are surprised,"
writes Rev. James MeGregor, the pastor of Londonderry, in a letter to
Governor Shute, bearing date in 1720, "to hear ourselves termed Irish
people, when we so frequently ventured our all for the British crown and
liberties against the Irish papists, and gave all tests of our loyalty
which the government of Ireland required, and are always ready to do the
same when required."
Abraham Blair, William Caldwell, Rev. Matthew Clark
In Worcester there were at least two, Abraham Blair and William
Caldwell; and in Londonderry several more, including Rev. Matthew Clark,
of the survivors of the heroic defense of the Ulster Londonderry in
1689; and these men and their heirs were made free of taxation
throughout the British provinces by Act of Parliament, and occupied what
were called "exempt farms" in New England until the American Revolution,
so immensely important to the establishment of their throne did William
and Mary hold the services of the Protestant settlers and defenders of
Ulster against the last and the worst of the Stuarts. Now, for these
very men and their companions in exile to be stigmatized as "Irish," in
the sense in which that term was then held in reproach, was a bitter
pill to our fathers; and this, and other prejudices more or less
well-founded, only yielded, in the course of time, to the influence of
their simple virtues and sterling worth.
John Gray, Andrew McFarland, Rev. Edward Fitzgerald, Rev. William
Johnston
The tenure by which these people held their lands in Worcester seems at
first to have been the same as that of their English neighbors, who came
earlier, namely, by direct grant of the General Court of Massachusetts;
at any rate, there is a very early record that lots were so granted to
John Gray and Andrew McFarland, two of their leaders; and the lots so
granted earlier to members of the Committee of Settlement, and to others
not actual settlers, were soon in the market at a very cheap price, and
it is known that some of the families bought these lots at second hand,
because the deeds are on record and I have seen them; it was not,
accordingly, at this point of lands or any thing connected with them,
that the jealousy and bitterness between the two strains of blood began,
but rather at the point of differences of language and personal habits,
and especially of church beliefs and ceremonial. The English had put up
a rude log meeting-house the year before the Scotch-Irish came, and the
year after a more commodious structure was erected on the site of the
"Old South Church" (but quite recently removed); the Ulster
Presbyterians, from the very first, liked to have worship by themselves,
and in their own way, whenever and wherever they could; it is known that
they held service, sometimes in summer, in the open air, and for a
considerable period, by vote of the town, they occupied for preaching
purposes one of the old garrison houses, commonly called the "Old Fort."
Here having formed a religious society, they enjoyed for a time the
ministrations of Rev. Edward Fitzgerald and Rev. William Johnston;
still, they did not abandon the Puritan Church on the Common, and were
taxed, of course, for its support. This taxation made friction, for they
were poor and could not support their own minister besides contributing
to the support of the other, and Mr. Fitzgerald being unable to procure
proper maintainance removed from the town. The numbers of Presbyterian
communicants were nearly equal to those of the Congregational Church,
and the latter had proposed a union with the former, and Mr. Fitzgerald
had once been invited to occupy the pulpit, vacated by the dismissal of
Rev. Mr. Gardner in 1722, for a single Sabbath when no candidate could
be procured, but the request was not repeated and no inducement was held
out to him to remain.
In 1725 the English settled a new minister in the person of Rev. Isaac
Burr, and the tacit understanding if not the express agreement was that
if the Presbyterians would aid morally and pecuniarily in his support,
they should be permitted to place in the pulpit occasionally teachers of
their own denomination, and so the Scotch people united with the other
inhabitants. After some time, finding that their expectations were not
being realized in this regard, and were not likely to be, the Scotch
withdrew from the Church on the Common, and installed the Rev. William
Johnston to be their minister. Feelings were deepening, difficulties in
the way of union were multiplying, and the Scotch had no suitable place
of worship of their own. When in 1733 the Church on the Common was
repaired and somewhat adorned, and a committee of seven (all English)
being appointed "to seat ye meeting-house pursuant to instructions," it
can not be denied that the olive branch was held out to the party of the
second part by assigning them in general very good seats, according to
the standard of the time, for example: "In ye fore section of ye body"
(with five English families)
John Gray; "In ye second section of ye body" (with three English)
William Gray, James Hamilton, Andrew McFarland, John Clark, Robert
Peebles; "In ye third section of ye body" (all Scotch) Matthew Gray,
Alexander McKonkey, William Caldwell, John Duncan, William Gray, Jr.,
Mathew Gray, Jr., Andrew McFarland, Jr., John Gray, Jr.; "In ye fourth
section of ye body" (with four English), James Thornington, John Battey,
Oliver Wallis, Robert Blair: "In ye fifth section of ye body" (all
Scotch), James Forbush, John Alexander, William Mahan, John Stimson,
Duncan Graham, John McFarland, Joseph Clark; "In ye sixth section of ye
body" (with three English families), John Patrick, James Glasford, John
Sterling, Hugh Kelso; "In ye fore section of ye foremost gallery" (no
Scotch); "In ye second section of ye foremost gallery" (with five
English), Samuel Gray, Thomas Hamilton, Matthew Clark, William Temple;
"In ye fore section of ye long gallery" (with fourteen English), William
McClellan, James McClellan, John Cishiel, Robert Barbour; "In ye second
section in ye long gallery" (with three English), Patrick Peebles, John
McKonkey, Robert Marble, John Peebles.
Three years after this apparently ostentatious patronage of the
Presbyterians, the latter, having been compelled to contribute for
eleven years to the support of the Rev. Mr. Burr without any pulpit or
other recognition of their peculiar views, made a formal appeal to the
justice of their fellow-townsmen in town meeting for relief from a tax
inconsistent with their religious privileges. It was of no avail. The
petition is not extant, since little care was taken to preserve the
memorials of this unoffending but persecuted people, whose history
discloses the injustice and intolerance of our English ancestors but the
answer of the town of Worcester to their application is on record, and
it is a curious specimen of an attempt to make the worse appear the
better reason. One can hardly say whether there be in it more of Yankee
subtlety or religious illiberality. It begins in this way "In answer to
the petition of John Clark and others, praying to be released from
paying toward the support of the Rev. Isaac Burr, pastor of the church
in this town, or any other except Mr. Johnston, the town, upon mature
consideration, think that the request is unreasonable, and that they
ought not to comply with it, upon many considerations." Thereupon follow
four enumerated and elaborate alleged reasons for refusal, no one of
them, nor all of them together, expressing fully the real reasons. The
first is a mere quibble, the second asserts that, inasmuch as both
churches follow substantially the Westminster Confession of Faith, "they
may enjoy the same worship, ordinances and Christian privileges, and
means of their spiritual edification, with us, as in the way which they
call Presbyterian, and their consciences not be imposed on in any
thing."
As is usual in this kind of document, the third enumerated consideration
falls into an accusing of the brethren, "but we have rather reason to
suppose that their separation from us is from some irregular views and
motives, which it would be unworthy of us to countenance;" and the
fourth consideration I will quote in full, for the purpose of exhibiting
its spirit: "We look upon the petitioners and others breaking off from
us as they have done, as being full of irregularity and disorder, not to
mention that the ordination of their minister was disorderly, even with
respect to the principles which they themselves pretend to act by, as
well as with respect to us, to whom they stand related, and with whom
they cohabit, and enjoy with us in common all proper social, civil and
Christian rights and privileges; their separating from us being contrary
to the public establishment and laws of this Province; contrary to their
own covenant with us, and unreasonably weakening to the town, whose
numbers and dimensions (the north part being excepted by the vote from
paying to Mr. Burr) will not admit of the honorable support of two
ministers of the gospel, and tending to cause and cherish divisions and
parties, greatly destructive to our civil and religious interests, and
the peace, tranquility and happiness."
It is hardly necessary to add that these masterful bits of logic, from
which almost all of the formal fallacies of the books might be
illustrated, carried the town by a large majority. This was in 1736. It
gave rise to two distinct impulses among the Presbyterians: first, to
build a meeting-house of their own, in which "Mr. Johnston" might
officiate, which there was no law to prevent; and second, among
individuals of better fortune and more independence than the rest, to
shake off the dust of their feet for a testimony against the
infinitesimal bigotry of Worcester Puritans, and go elsewhere.
The Worcester Registry of Deeds bears ample evidence that many farms in
"the north part" of the town, where the Scotch-Irish were specially
located, and where the "Old Fort" stood in which they sometimes
worshipped, changed hands in 1737 and in the years immediately
following. John Gray, for example, and each of three sons of his, made
significant conveyances of land in Worcester in that interval; and it is
quite noticeable that the name of John Clark, the first to sign the
petition to the town of Worcester for exemption from church taxes in
behalf of himself and fellow signers, stands prominent a couple of years
later among the first settlers of the Scotch-Irish town of Colerain,
fifty miles to the northwest of Worcester, so named from the old Ulster
town on the Bann. The Morrisons, Pennells, Herrouns, Hendersons,
Cochranes, Hunters, Henrys, Clarks, McClellans, McCowens, Taggarts, and
McDowells, many of whom had been previous settlers in Worcester, were
the chief families in this frontier and Presbyterian town, now on the
border of Vermont.
But the most striking proof of the discontent of the folks of our blood
with their church-treatment in Worcester was the formal organization
there in 1738, two years after the contemptuous rejection of their
petition, of a company consisting of thirty-four families to purchase
and settle a new town on principles in keeping with their own. Thus
originated Pelham, about thirty miles west of Worcester. Robert Peebles
and James Thornington (afterward spelled Thornton) were a committee to
contract with Colonel John Stoddard and others, who owned the territory.
In the contract occurs this passage: "It is agreed that families of good
connection be settled on the premises, who shall be such as were the
inhabitants of the Kingdom of Ireland or their descendants, being
protestants, and none to be admitted but such as bring good and
undeniable credentials or certificates of their being persons of good
conversation and of the Presbyterian persuasion as used in the Church of
Scotland, and conform to the discipline thereof."
Capt. Daniel Haywood, John Ferguson, Jonathan Edwards
The first meeting of these proprietors was held in Worcester at the
house of Captain Daniel Haywood, in February, 1739, and all subsequent
meetings of the proprietors were held in Worcester, until in August,
1740, when a meeting was held in the new township at the house of John
Ferguson. At this first meeting in their own new town it was "voted to
build a meeting-house, to raise £100 towards building it, and choose a
committee to agree with a workman to raise the house and provide for the
settling of a minister." Subsequent to this, £220 were raised in two
installments for the erection and completion of the structure. In the
spring of 1743 two meetings were held in the new meeting-house, and
measures were then taken "to glaze the meeting-house, to build a pulpit,
and underpin the house at the charge of the town." The first pastor they
called to settle was their old quasi-pastor at Worcester, Rev. Mr.
Johnston, who had in the meantime removed to Londonderry, N. H., but he
naturally enough declined the call. But Robert Abercrombie, a native of
Edinburgh, a profound scholar, and possessor of a library surpassed by
few in its time, and which has been kept together till the present time,
began to preach to the people in the summer of 1742. His ordination
sermon was preached by the famous Jonathan Edwards, and he remained a
steadfast friend and coadjutor of that persecuted servant of God
throughout his subsequent troubles in the neighboring Northampton. It is
worth noting, that the public school of Pelham was kept in the new
meeting-house for about ten years, when it was "voted to build three
school-houses, one at the Meeting-house, one at the West End of the
town, and one on the East Hill."
Now, notwithstanding these repeated drafts on the home colony and church
at Worcester, to Colerain and Pelham and elsewhere, those who remained
there were still determined to build a meeting-house of their own. They
had been weakened, but not disheartened. They naturally chose a site
near to the "Old Fort," which had been to them more or less a
worshiping-place, on the "Boston road," not far from the center of their
scattered homesteads. I have often been in the neighborhood of this
place, and am confident I can point out the spot within a very few rods.
In their extreme poverty they raised the needful moneys, the timber was
brought to the site, framed and raised, and the building in the earlier
progress of construction, when the other inhabitants of Worcester, many
of them persons of consideration and respectability and professed piety,
gathered tumultuously in the night-time, leveled the structure with the
ground, sawed the timbers, and burnt or carried off the pieces and other
materials. This was in 1740. The defenseless, but indignant strangers
were compelled to submit to this infamous wrong. The English Puritans
and their irresponsible hangers-on chose indeed the night-time for their
mob-violence aud devilish meanness, but no blackness of darkness can
ever cover up a deed like this; no sophistries, no neighborhood mis-affinities,
no town votes, no race jealousies, no wretched shibboleth of any name,
can ever wipe out that stain. The blood of English Puritans and of
Scotch Presbyterians mingles in my veins; my greatgrandfather Perry, my
grandfather of the same name, my uncle, too, in the same line,
officiated as deacons for ninety-four successive years in the old South
Church on the Common, which originated and perpetrated this outrage on
humanity; nevertheless I give my feeble word of utter condemnation for
this shameless act of bigotry, the details of which I learned as a
little boy at my mother's knee.
1740 - Scotch Towns in Mass. - Warren, Worcester Co.; Blandford -
Hampden Co. Pelham & Colerain.
The motives to a still further exodus from Worcester on the part of the
Scotch were of course still further intensified by this scandalous
destruction of their property in 1740, and it is significant, that the
third and fourth purely Scotch-Irish towns in Massachusetts, namely,
Western (now Warren), in Worcester County, and Blandford, in Hampden
County, were both incorporated the next year, 1741. These two towns,
even more than the two earlier ones, Pelham and Colerain, have continued
and still remain in the hands of the descendants of the Worcester
families. In Blandford the families of Blair, Boise, Knox, Carnahan,
Watson, Wilson, and Ferguson, were prominent; and in Western some of the
same names, especially the Blairs, with Reeds and Crawfords, and many
more. Notwithstanding these successive migrations from Worcester, a very
considerable number of families remained there, among them, the
McClellans, the Caldwells, the Blairs, the McFarlands, the Rankins, the
Grays, the Crawfords, the Youngs, the Hamiltons, the Duncans, the
Grahams, the Forbushes, the Kelsos, the Clarks, the Fergusons, the
McClintocks, the McKonkeys, the Glasfords, and the McGregors. The later
movement of individual families from Worcester and Pelham and Coleraine
and Western and Blandford carried Scotch-Irish blood into every town of
Western Massachusetts, and ultimately into most of the towns of Vermont,
while the reflex movement from and into Massachusetts to and from the
contemporary settlements in New Hampshire and Maine, soon to be
characterized, served to keep in touch and sympathy, in mutual
acquaintance and interchange of ministers, and more or less of
intermarriage, all these local centers of our race in New England.
The two most distinguished men who have come out from this Worcester
branch of the great migration of 1718, have been Dr. Matthew Thornton, a
signer of the Declaration of Independence, and Professor Asa Gray, at
the time of his death the most accomplished botanist in the world.
Matthew Thornton (or Thornington, as the name was then spelled) was a
lad of four years when the five ships zigzagged into Boston harbor.
James Thornton
His father, James Thornton, instead of going to Worcester directly that
autumn, was one of a company--Willis estimates them at about three
hundred--who wintered on shipboard in Portland harbor. In the spring,
with few others, he settled at Wiscasset, in the Kennebec country. After
a very few years there, we find both father and son in Worcester, where
the boy received whatever primary education he had, and after studying
medicine, which was rudely taught in those days, commenced practice in
Londonderry, among those who were from his native land, and who
proverbially possess warm national remembrances. Here he acquired a wide
reputation as a physician, and in the course of several years of
successful practice became comparatively rich for those times. He also
sustained several public offices, taking, as Scotch-Irishmen are wont to
do, an active and influential part in the public affairs of his
locality.
He became surgeon to a regiment of New Hampshire men in the famous
expedition against Cape Breton under Pepperell in 1745; and it is
related of his regiment of five hundred men that only six died
previously to the surrender of Louisburg,
Capt. John Mooar.
although a company from Londonderry commanded by Capt. John Mooar, were
employed for fourteen successive nights, with straps over their
shoulders, and sinking to their knees in mud, in drawing cannon from the
landing-place to the camp, through a morass. Scotch-Irishmen always
hated the French next to the Devil!
At the breaking out of the Revolution, Thornton held the post of colonel
in the New Hampshire militia, and had also been commissioned a justice
of the peace by Benning Wentworth, acting under British authority; but
after Lexington and Concord, on the 19th of April, 1775, John Wentworth,
then governor, retired from the government of New Hampshire and went to
England. Under these circumstances the colony called a "Provincial
Convention," of which Thornton was appointed president. There was no
state constitution as yet and no declaration of independence, but there
was no other constituted government in the province besides this
provincial convention, and I am fond of thinking, and believe it to be
historically correct to affirm, that this extemporized but indispensable
New Hampshire convention, presided over by a Scotch-Irishman, Ulsterborn,
was the first independent sovereignty upon this continent! It certainly
assumed the functions of an independent government in the name of the
people of the colony.
Matthew Thornton
Thereafter the public career of Matthew Thornton, both in state and
nation, is well known to the world, and a station on the railroad, from
Boston to Concord, commemorates in its name, "Thornton's Ferry," a fine
estate on the banks of the Merrimac, confiscated by New Hampshire from
its Tory owner, which became by purchase the home and burial place of
the first of our kith and kin to gain a national reputation here in the
line of statesmanship.
An anecdote of Judge Thornton has been preserved, which may serve to
illustrate the keen and ready wit possessed by him in common with most
of the Scotch Irish race. In his old age, 1798, he happened to attend a
session of the New Hampshire legislature, which met in a town adjoining
his own. He was eighty-four years old. He had served many years before
in all three branches of the legislature. Meeting at this time an old
Londonderry neighbor, who was now a member of the House, the latter
asked the judge if he did not think the legislature had improved very
much since the old days when he held a seat? if it did not have more men
of natural and acquired abilities, and more eloquent speakers than
formerly, "for then," said he, "you know that there were but five or six
who could make speeches, but now all we farmers can make speeches." "To
answer that question, I will tell you a story I remember to have heard
related of an old gentleman, a farmer, who lived but a short distance
from my father's residence in Ireland. This old gentleman was very
exemplary in his observance of religious duties, and made it a constant
practice to read a portion of Scripture morning and evening before
addressing the throne of Grace. It happened one morning that he was
reading the chapter which gives an account of Samson catching three
hundred foxes, when the old lady, his wife, interrupted him by saying,
'John, I'm sure that canna' be true; for our Isaac was as good a
fox-hunter as there ever was in the country, and he never caught but
about twenty.' 'Hooh! Janet,' replied the old gentleman, 'ye mauna'
always tak' the Scripture just as it reads; perhaps in the three hundred
there might ha' been aughteen, or may be twanty, that were real foxes;
the rest, were all skunks and woodchucks.'"
Professor Asa Gray, the cosmopolitan botanist, was born in Paris, N. Y.,
in 1810, and died in his seventy-eighth year, in Cambridge, the seat of
his labors and the center of his fame. He was a great-great-grandson of
the first Matthew Gray of Worcester, to whom I also stand in the same
genealogical relation. Some ten years ago I spent, by invitation, an
evening at his house, in order to unfold to him a little the story of
our common ancestors in Worcester. He was very courteous, and apparently
attentive; but I soon discovered that the drift and training of his mind
had led him to care vastly more about the genealogy and physiology of
plants the world over than about the genealogy and mode of life of that
Scotch-Irish ancestry from whom, nevertheless, he derived directly all
the peculiar traits of his own mental activity. He was canny, absorbed,
analytic, comprehensive, religiously consecrated.
In 1885, on attaining his seventy-fifth year, he was the recipient of a
large and beautiful silver vase, the gift of the botanists of the United
States to their honored master, and a flood of congratulations from
friends at home and abroad. The following terse and appropriate lines
were sent by James Russell Lowell:
"Kind Fate, prolong the days well spent,
Whose indefatigable hours
Have been as gaily innocent
And fragrant as his flowers."
Comparatively early in life he became a member of most of the learned
societies of the world, and at length even the most exclusive gladly
opened their doors to him. The Royal Society of London was one of these,
and he was also one of the "immortal eight" foreign members of the
French Institute. During his last visit to Europe, in the last summer of
his life, he was received with distinguished honors every-where, among
which were the highest degrees ever conferred by the great universities
of Oxford, Cambridge, and Edinburgh.
He himself tersely and modestly stated his own fundamental beliefs as
follows: "I am, scientifically and in my own fashion, a Darwinian;
philosophically, a convinced Theist; and religiously, an acceptor of the
creed commonly called the Nicene, as the exponent of the Christian
faith."
2. LONDONDERRY. The core of the company that settled Londonderry, N. H.,
in April, 1710, consisted of sixteen men, with their families, namely:
James McKeen, John Barnett, Archibald Clendenin, John Mitchell, James
Sterrett, James Anderson, Randall Alexander, James Gregg, James Clark,
James Nesmith, Allen Anderson. Robert Weir, John Morrison, Samuel
Allison, Thomas Steele, John Stuart. Thirteen of these men lived to an
average age of seventy-nine years; six of them attained to nearly
ninety, and two of them overpassed that limit; and one, John Morrison,
lived to see ninety-seven years. All of the Scotch-Irish of that
generation, wherever they located in New England, unless their personal
habits were such as shorten life, attained on the average to a very
advanced age. The pioneers in this second settlement were most of them
men in middle life, robust and persevering, and adventurous and
strong-willed, fronting death with no thought of surrender. Most of them
were the descendants of Scotch Covenanters who had passed over to Ulster
later than the mass of the settlers there, and they had kept together in
church relations, as well as in residence, more closely than most of the
Scotch settlers. Their residence was in the valley of the Bann, mostly
on the Antrim side of the river, in or near the towns or parishes of
Coleraine, Ballymoney, Ballymena, Ballywatick, and Kilrea; and when they
decided to emigrate, they still wished to keep together in church
relations, and those of them who had been under the pastoral charge of
Rev. James McGregor, who came with them, especially the McKeen families
and their numerous connections, desired to form a distinct settlement
here and become again the charge of their beloved pastor.
Casco Bay
With this end in view, about twenty families, taking others with them,
amounting in all (as Willis estimated) to three hundred persons, sailed
from Boston in the late autumn to explore Casco Bay for a home, under a
promise from Governor Shute of a grant of land whenever and wherever
they decided upon a location in any still unappropriated quarter in New
England. They wintered, hungry and cold, in Portland Harbor. In the
early spring they explored to the eastward, but there is no record how
far they went or what they found. It is enough for our present purpose
that Maine seemed to offer no genial home to those sea-worn and
weather-beaten voyagers. Though they left a few of their number in
Portland, to whom we shall recur later, and probably a larger number on
the Kennebec at or near Wiscasset, the bulk determined to seek a milder
climate and a more favorable location. Undoubtedly while still in Boston
their attention had been called to Southern New Hampshire as well as to
Maine, both at that time under the jurisdiction of the governor of
Massachusetts, for they sailed directly back to the mouth of the
Merrimac and anchored at Haverhill, on that river, where they heard of a
fine tract of land about fifteen miles to the northward, then called
Nutfield, on account of the abundance of the chestnut and walnut and
butternut trees which, in connection with the pines, distinguished the
growth of its forests. A party, under the lead of James McKeen,
grandfather of the first president of Bowdoin College, and
brother-in-law of Pastor McGregor, went up and examined the tract; and
ascertaining that it was not appropriated, they decided at once to take
up here the grant obtained from the government of Massachusetts of a
township twelve miles square of any of her unappropriated lands.
Having selected the spot on which to commence their settlement, and
having built a few temporary huts on a little brook which they called
"West-Running Brook," a tributary of Beaver Brook, which falls into the
Merrimac at Lowell, and leaving two or three of their number in charge,
they returned to Haverhill to bring on their families, their provisions,
their implements of labor, and household utensils. Mr. McGregor and some
others had passed the winter at Dracut, on Beaver Brook, just north of
Lowell; and two parties, one from Dracut and the other from Haverhill,
were soon converging through the forests toward West-Running Brook, when
they met, as tradition says, at a place ever after called "Horse Hill,"
from the fact that both parties there tied their horses while the men
surveyed the territory around as the future home. This day was April 11,
old style, 1719. The next day, having in the meantime explored with the
leaders more fully what they had selected for the township, the good
pastor, under a large oak on the east side of Beaver Pond, delivered to
his people, now partially re-united, the first sermon ever preached in
that region--Isaiah, 32, 2: "And a man shall be as a hiding-place from
the wind, and a covert from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry
place; as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land." The spot where
this religious service was held, especially the tree around which these
hardy pioneers assembled, was for a long period regarded with great
reverence by the people of Londonderry. When at last it decayed and
fell, the owner of the field in which it stood planted a young apple
tree among its rotten roots, which now serves, and will long serve, to
designate the venerated spot.
These first families, in order to secure the advantages of near
neighborhood, and be better able to protect themselves against the
attacks of the Indians, with which all the New England colonies were at
that time threatened, planted their log-houses on each side of
West-Running Brook, on home-lots but thirty rods wide and extending back
on a north and south line till they inclosed sixty acres each. These
lots constituted what has ever since been called the Double Range. For
fifty years or more this range continued to be a populous section of the
town. The first season the settlers cultivated a field alongside the
brook, then and ever since called the "Common Field;" but the best land
in the township was not in that section, for it lay too low, and as each
settler had allotted to him another sixty acres elsewhere, after a while
the lowland began to be deserted of houses, and nothing is now to be
seen along the Double Range but meadows, dotted here and there by the
cellar-holes of these earliest planters. No price was paid for the land,
since it was the free gift of King William to his loyal subjects of the
old country, some of them faithful champions of his throne in the siege
and defense of Londonderry.
The first dwellings were, of course, of logs, and covered with bark. It
is to be noticed, however, that in these exiles for rightousness's sake,
sound and pious as they were, there was as much human nature to the
square inch as in the rest of mankind. When John Morrison was building
his house in the Double Range his wife came to him, and in a persuasive,
affectionate manner said to him, "Aweel, aweel, dear Joan, an' it maun
be a log-house, do make it a log heegher nor the lave,'' (than the
rest). Beaver Brook, however, tumbles well in its course from the pond
to the Merrimac, and saw-mills were soon built, and within a year or two
good framed houses were erected; the first for Pastor McGregor, only
quite recently demolished, and the second by John McMurphy, Esq., who
bore a commission as justice of the peace, dated in Ireland, and so
antedated the commission signed by Governor Shute, April 29, 1720, to
Justice James McKeen, in some sense the foremost man of the settlement.
Lovewell's War
Two stone garrison-houses, strongly built and well prepared to resist an
attack of the Indians, were put up the first season, and to these the
several families retired at night whenever, for any reason, special
danger from that source was apprehended. But it is remarkable, that
neither in Lovell's War, when Londonderry was strictly a frontier town,
nor in either of the two subsequent French and Indian wars, did any
hostile force from the northward ever even approach that town. Tradition
has always been busy in ascribing the signal preservation of this colony
from the attacks of the Indians to the influence of Pastor McGregor over
Governor Vaudreuil, of Canada. It is said that they had known each other
in the Old World at college; that a correspendence was kept up between
them on this side the water; that at the request of his friend the
governor caused means to be used for the protection of the settlement;
that he induced the Catholic priests to charge the Indians not to injure
any of these people, as they were different from the English, and that
the warriors were assured beforehand that no bounty would be paid for
such scalps, and no sins forgiven to those who killed them. It is
certain that the early inhabitants of Londonderry believed in all these
assertions; and it is some confirmation of them that a manuscript sermon
of McGregor's, still extant, has on the margin the name and various
titles of the Marquis Vaudreuil, by which, of course, he would be
addressed upon occasion.
Manchester, N.H.
At any rate, the earliest pioneers were much indebted to the volunteer
services of an Indian of some tribe and connection. Taking Mr. McGregor
to a high hill, he pointed to a tall pine some nine miles distant, and
told him that in that direction and neighborhood there were falls in the
river, where he would find an abundance of fish. By the help of his
compass the pastor, with a few of the settlers, was able to mark out a
course to Amoskeag Falls, where the city of Manchester now stands, and
with a scoop-net, which they had provided, readily secured an ample
supply of salmon and shad, with which the Merrimac then abounded. This
was for a long time a valuable resource to the inhabitants of
Londonderry. The salted fish constituted an important article of their
food, especially before their new fields became productive. But their
food at best was scant and poor for many years. Bean porridge, barley
broth, hasty pudding, samp and potatoes, were the chief reliance.
Londonderry and Col. John Wheelright, Wells, Maine
In securing a perfectly valid title to their lands, and the democratic
privileges of a town corporate, the people of Londonderry experienced no
little embarrassment. The executive jurisdiction of Governor Shute over
the territory was acknowledged by every body, and the validity of his
grant to them of the land in the king's name; but could they also get a
prior title direct from the original Indian chiefs claiming to own the
land? Rev. John Wheelright, of Exeter, had obtained by fair purchase, in
1629, from the four principal Sagamores, all the territory lying between
the river Piscataqua and the Merrimac. Colonel John Wheelright, of
Wells, Me., had inherited from his grandfather that portion of this
right, now occupied by the Scotch-Irish; and he gave to a committee of
these, partly at the instance of Lieut.-Governor Wentworth of New
Hampshire, a formal deed of the land ten miles square, corresponding to
the grant of Governor Shute; and in consideration of this service both
Wheelright and Wentworth received certain lots of land in Londonderry,
which proved in the sequel to be some of the best farms in the town.
Before this was accomplished, however, appeared the first state paper of
the Scotch-Irish in America, the original of which is now among the
collections of the New Hampshire Historical Society, which I proceed to
quote in full, because it shows there were men among them--probably in
this case James Gregg and Robert Wear, who signed it--who knew how to
put sharp points into clean words, and especially because it shows that
they thoroughly appreciated already the town-government system of New
England, and wanted all its advantages for themselves:
Nutfield.
"The humble petition of the people late from Ireland, now settled at
Nutfield, to His Excellency the Governour and General Court assembled at
Portsmouth, Sept. 23, 1719,--Humbly sheweth: That your petitioners
having made application to the General Court met at Boston in October
last, and having obtained a grant for a township in any part of their
unappropriated lands, took encouragement thereupon to settle at Nutfield
about the Eleventh of April last, which is situated by estimation about
fourteen miles from Haverel meetinghouse to the North-west, and about
fifteen miles from Dracut meetinghouse on the River Merrimack north and
by east. That your petitioners since their settlement have found that
the said Nutfield is claimed by three or four different parties by
virtue of Indian deeds, yet none of them offered any disturbance to your
petitioners except one party from Newbury and Salem. Their deed from one
John, Indian, bears date March 13, Anno Dom. 1701, and imparts that they
had made a purchase of said land for five pounds. By virtue of this deed
they claim ten miles square westward from Heverel line; and one Caleb
Moody of Newbury, in their name, discharged our people from clearing or
any way improving the said land, unless we agreed that 20 or 25 families
at most should dwell there, and that all the rest of the land should be
reserved for them. That your petitioners by reading the grant of the
Crown of Great Britain to the Province of Massachusetts Bay, which
determineth their northern line three miles from the River Merrimack
from any and every part of the River, and by advice from such as were
more capable to judge of this affair are satisfied that the said
Nutfield is within his majesties province of New Hampshire, which we are
further confirmed in, because the General Court met at Boston in May
last upon our renewed application, did not think fit any way to
intermeddle with the said land. That your petitioners, therefore,
embrace this opportunity of addressing this Honorable Court, praying
that their township may consist of ten miles square, or in a figure
equivalent to it, they being in number about seventy families and
inhabitants, and more of their friends arrived from Ireland to settle
with them, and many of the people of New England settling with them; and
that they being so numerous, may be erected into a township with its
usual privileges, and have a power ot making town officers and laws.
That, being a frontier place, they may the better subsist by government
amongst them, and may be more strong and full of inhabitants. That your
petitioners being descended from, and professing the faith and
principles of, the established Church of North Britain, and loyal
subjects of the British Crown in the family of his majesty King George,
and encouraged by the happy administration of his majesties chief
governour in these provinces [Gov. Shute], and the favorable inclination
of the good people of New England to their brethren, adventuring to come
over and plant in this vast wilderness, humbly expect a favorable answer
from this Honourable Court, and your petitioners as in duty bound shall
ever pray, etc. Subscribed at Nutfield in the name of our people, Sept.
21, 1719."
Derryfield late called Manchester, N.H.
Under the auspices, perhaps it would be proper to say patronage, of
Lieutenant-Governor Wentworth, Nutfield was incorporated as a town in
June, 1722, containing ten square miles indeed, but not equilateral,
"duly bounded," panhandled, gerrymandered, so as to reach up to their
fishing station on the Merrimac at Amoskeag Falls--this portion
afterward called Derryfield, and now Manchester. The following entry
upon the town record must not only be viewed as a genuine token of
gratitude for past favors received, but also in part as expressing a
sense of pre-thankfulness for "the substance of things hoped for:" "The
people of Nutfield do acknowledge with gratitude the obligation they are
under to the Hon. John Wentworth, Esq., Lieutenant-Governor of New
Hampshire. They remember with pleasure that His Honor, on all occasions,
showed a great deal of civility and real kindness to them, being
strangers in the country, and cherished the small beginnings of their
settlement and defended them from the encroachment and violence of such
as upon unjust grounds, would have disturbed their settlement, and
always gave them a favorable ear and easy access to government, and
procured justice for them, and established order, and promoted peace and
good government amongst them; giving them always the most wholesome and
seasonable advice, both with respect to the purity and liberty of the
gospel, and the management of their secular concerns, and put arms and
ammunition into their hands to defend them from the fears and dangers of
the Indians; and contributed liberally, by his influence and example, to
the building of a house for the worship of God; so that, under God, we
own him for the patron and guardian of our settlement, and erect this
monument of gratitude to the name and family of Wentworth, to be had in
the greatest veneration by the present generation and the latest
posterity."
In the meantime and afterward, the people of the town now christened
Londonderry at its incorporation, though the ancestors of most of them
came from the parallel valley dividing County Antrim from County
Londonderry--the seige and defense of the Ulster town in which some of
them had taken a personal part giving that name the preference--were
surveying their heritage, building their first meeting-house, and laying
out upon the higher grounds, new ranges for farms. Among the first of
these was the English Range, so-called, to accommodate a few heads of
families from Massachusetts who had cast in their lot with, and were
welcomed by, the Scotch-Irish.
Joseph Simonds
Number One on the English Range was assigned to Joseph Simonds, who was
one of the first twenty heads of families, who was one of the four
undertakers to build in 1719 the first saw-mill on Beaver Brook, and who
(which is much less worth the mention) was one of the great-great-great
grandfathers of my children. A few weeks ago I had myself driven
leisurely in a buggy over all parts of ancient Londonderry; I crossed
the original farm of Joseph Simonds, No. 1 in the English Range, and was
told by Mr. Choate, proprietor of the same or adjoining estate, that
"the best lands in Londonderry were on the English Range;" I rode also
over the crest of Aiken's Range, and along the brook bearing the same
name, and farther west toward the so-called High Range, past the
second-built church, and then bearing east past the site of Dr.
Morrison's church, and near the place of the Hill church and graveyard,
and, crossing the railroad again, with Beaver Pond on the left, climbed
the hill past the original meetinghouse, which John Wentworth helped to
build, and the original graveyard there--God's own sown field--and on
the road towards Parson McGregor's first framed house touched the
highest land in old Londonderry; whence returning to Derry village, we
crossed the old "West Running Brook," and passed also by the "Common
Field," and on Beaver Brook again, the place of the first saw-mill,
which Joseph Simonds helped to build, and where logs have been rolled in
and boards tossed out from that day to this.
Londonderry again. Rev. Matthew Clark.
It was not all harmony in state or church in ancient Londonderry. The
town thrived and the congregation became very large. "Many men of many
minds." The Scotch-Irish were a straight-thinking and a plain-speaking
people. Parson McGregor died in 1729. Though but a youth at the time, he
took part in the defense of the Ulster Derry, and always claimed to have
himself discharged the large guns from the tower of the cathedral which
announced to the starving besieged below the approach of the ships up
the Foyle that brought them the final relief. Soon after the death of
McGregor, Rev. Matthew Clark, then seventy years old, came direct from
Ireland to Londonderry, and was asked to supply the desk and take
pastoral care, but not to become formal pastor. There is extant an
original portrait of this man, representing him with a black patch
around the outer angle of the right eye, the patch covering a wound that
refused to heal, received in one of the sallies of the besieged at
Londonderry. He had been an officer in the Protestant army during the
civil commotions in King William's time, and had been particularly
active in the defense of Derry. It is related of him that, while sitting
as moderator of the presbytery, the martial music of a training band
passing by recalled the smoldering fires of his youth, and made him
incapable for a little time to attend to his duties, and his reply to
the repeated calls of the brethren was, "Nae business while I hear the
toot o' the drum!" and when he died at the age of seventy-six, in
January, 1735, in compliance with his special request on his death-bed,
his remains were borne to the grave by those only who had been his
fellow-soldiers and fellow-sufferers in the siege of Londonderry! This
is at once the most picturesque and the most pathetic scene in the story
of the Scotch-Irish in New England. Forty-five years after the event,
this modern Israel, this "Warrior of God," in two senses, borne along
between the mingled pines and nut-trees of a new God's acre in the
wilderness, by those only who, with him, had stood to the outermost
verge of their lives for the faith once delivered to the saints!
David McGregor.
Two years after the death of Matthew Clark, David McGregor, son of the
first minister, who had received his literary and theological education
chiefly under the tuition of Clark, himself an university-bred man, took
pastoral charge of the new West Parish in Londonderry. Two
meeting-houses had already been built in this parish--one on Aiken's
Range, and the other, called the Hill Meeting-house, nearly a mile west.
Here were the seeds of a deep-seated and long-continued quarrel.
Moreover, there was great dissatisfaction with Mr. Davidson, the third
pastor in the old parish. The population was increasing, and was already
beginning to diffuse itself into new settlements in the neighborhood. At
a sacramental season in 1734, only fifteen years from the first
settlement, there were present, according to the church records, seven
hundred communicants. The everlasting place-of-the-meeting-house
question, which has wrought more plague and alienation in New England
than all theological dogmas put together, was stirring up the ministers
and the sessions and the people into a hotch-potch; and this, as at
Worcester, with other matters of disagreement, intensified the spirit of
separation, and multiplied in course of time new colonies going forth to
post themselves elsewhere. During the quarter-century preceding the
Revolution, ten distinct settlements were made by emigrants from
Londonderry, all of which became towns of influence and importance in
New Hampshire. Two strong townships in Vermont, and two in Nova Scotia,
were settled from the same source within the same time; besides which,
numerous families, sometimes singly and sometimes in groups, went off in
all directions, especially northward and westward, up the Connecticut
river and over the ridge of the Green Mountains, to carry every-where
the sturdy qualities, the fixed opinions, and the lasting grudges
characteristic of Scotch-Irishmen.
Major Robert Rogers.
Neither the crown nor the colonies ever appealed in vain to these brave
people, now widely scattered, for help in the old French wars. Not a
route to Ticonderoga or Crown Point but was tramped again and again by
the firm-set feet of these New England Protestants. They were with
Colonel Williams in the "bloody morning scout" at the head of Lake
George in 1755, and in the battle with Dieskau that followed; they were
with Stark and Lord Howe under Abercrombie in the terrible defeat at
Ticonderoga in 1758; many of them toiled under General Amherst at his
great stone fort at Crown Point in 1759, whose broken ruins even astound
us to-day; and others still were with General Wolfe on the Heights of
Abraham the same year, where and when was fought the most vital and
decisive battle ever seen upon this continent. Major Robert Rogers, the
famous commander of the three companies of rangers raised by New
Hampshire in 1756, was himself a native of Londonderry,(no he was born
in Mass.) and most of his men were enlisted in the same locality.
When it came to the Revolution, however, Rogers's loyalty to the English
king, for whom he had risked his life in numberless scouts and fights,
overrode his sense of the grievance of the colonies, and he was
proscribed as a Tory by the act of New Hampshire. Not so John Stark.
Stark was captain of one of Rogers's companies of rangers, and at one
time commanded the whole corps, with the rank of major. Rogers went to
England in 1777, and Stark, the same year, went to Bennington! In August
next will be consecrated there, with fitting ceremonial, to national and
local liberty, a limestone shaft 301 feet high, whose foundations are
cut into the solid and everlasting rock--a shaft paid for from out the
treasuries of the three states which furnished Stark his men for that
fight; from out the treasury of the United States, under whose colors, a
little later, he fought Burgoyne in person at Saratoga, and from out the
scattered contributions of patriotic men and women all over the land; a
shaft which will stand a silent witness for many things and many
men--for the Berkshire militia, for the Green Mountain Boys and the
Catamount tavern, but most of all for John Stark, the most distinguished
Scotch-Irishman of New England, a native of Londonderry, and for the
seventy Derry volunteers who went with him to Bennington, and whose
names are of record, and for Robert McGregor, a grandson of the old
pastor, who was on Stark's staff in 1777!
Col. George Reid.
Colonel George Reid, another native of Londonderry, pure blood, held a
command in the New Hampshire forces during the entire war of the
Revolution; was in the battles of Bunker Hill, Long Island, White
Plains, Trenton, Brandywine, Germantown, Saratoga, and Stillwater; was
with the army in all their hardships at Valley Forge during the severe
winter of '77--'78. He took an efficient part in Sullivan's expedition
against the Six Nations, and was in chief command at Albany during the
last summer of the war. Afterward he was appointed by his old commander
and companion-in-arms, General Sullivan, then president of the State of
New Hampshire, to command, as brigadier-general, all the forces of the
state in a most critical juncture of the civil and military affairs of
that section.
James Miller - Winfield Scott.
It is not so generally known that James Miller, who brought out more
reputation from our last war with Great Britain at the northward than
any other American save Winfield Scott, was a Scotch-Irishman out of the
loins of Londonderry. He was born in Peterborough, N. H., in 1776;
studied for a while in his youth at Williams College, in Massachusetts;
became interested more or less in military affairs, and was recommended
to the War Department at Washington by General Benjamin Pierce, father
of the late president, and was commissioned Major in the Fourth U. S.
Infantry March 3, 1809, the last day of Jefferson's Administration.
The war with England soon breaking out, young Miller was ordered to
Indiana Territory under General Harrison, and his regiment was in the
battle of Tippecanoe. Under General Hull at Detroit, James Miller and
Lewis Cass, both young officers in the army, and the two becoming
thereafter life-long friends, planted with their hands the United States
flag on Canada soil, at Sandwich, July 14, 1812. Both were afterward
taken prisoners with Hull, though Cass snapped his sword before
surrendering it; and both made public complaint of what they deemed the
cowardice of Hull, on the basis of which and other like testimony he was
tried by court-martial and condemned, but was pardoned by the president,
and lived to vindicate his action in a pamphlet now generally regarded
as exculpatory and triumphant.
After Miller was exchanged he was put into command of the Twenty-seventh
Regulars, and ordered to the Niagara frontier under General Jacob Brown.
The story of the battle of Lundy's Lane is known to all Americans; but I
have recently had the pleasure of reading a letter written by Colonel
Miller three or four days after the battle to his wife--"My Beloved
Ruth"--in which he gives interesting details of the storming of the
battery and the capture of the cannon, which are not down in the books.
Brown's order to him, as he transcribes it for his wife, is a little
different from what it stands in the histories--"Colonel, take your
regiment, storm that work, and take it!" "I'll try, sir!"
With three hundred men he moved steadily up the hill in the darkness,
along a fence lined with thick bushes, that hid his troops from the view
of the gunners and their protectors, who lay near. When within short
musket range of the battery, they could see the gunners, with their
glowing linstocks, ready to act at the word Fire! Selecting good
marksmen, Miller directed each to rest his rifle on the fence, select a
gunner, and fire at a given signal. Very soon every gunner fell, when
the colonel and his men rushed forward and captured the battery--not,
however, until a terrible hand-to-hand fight in the darkness with the
protectors of the guns had ensued. The British fell back. Rallying, and
being re-inforced by three hundred men sent forward by Drummond from
Queenstown, they were repulsed the second time. Let Miller tell the rest
of the story in words to his wife:
"After Generals Brown, Scott, and others were wounded, we were ordered
to return back to our camp, about three miles [Chippewa], and
preparations had not been made for taking off the cannon, as it was
impossible for me to defend them and make preparations for that too, and
they were all left on the ground, except one beautiful six-pounder,
which was presented to my regiment in testimony of their distinguished
gallantry. The officers of this army all say, who saw it, that it was
one of the most desperate and gallant acts ever known; the British
officers whom we have prisoners say it was the most desperate thing they
ever saw or heard of. General Brown told me the moment he saw me that I
had immortalized myself. 'But,' said he, 'my dear fellow, my heart ached
for you when I gave you that order, but I knew it was the only thing
that would save us.'"
James Miller.
Miller had indeed immortalized himself already; and five years later, in
the piping times of peace, he resigned his commission in the army, an
act he regretted as long as he lived, and received the appointment of
Governor of Arkansas, a place he held for four years. He returned to New
Hampshire, an invalid, in 1823, and received the appointment of national
collector at Salem and Beverly in Massachusetts, a post he held for
twenty-four years, when he resigned, and was succeeded by his youngest
son, who held it eight years longer. He was doubly immortalized in this
last period of his life by having Nathaniel Hawthorne, a subordinate in
the custom-house, "a chiel amang them takin' notes," and the notices of
James Miller in the miscellaneous writings of Hawthorne honor the pen
and heart of the one as much as the life and conduct of the other.
Miller died 7th July, 1851, and lies buried in Salem. He was a
Scotch-Irishman indeed, in whom was no guile.
Londonderry and the towns populated from it have furnished ornaments to
society all over New England in every walk of life. Let me rather say,
all over the country, particularly North and Middle and West. I will
only mention two by name in this connection, Horace Greeley and Geo. W.
Nesmith. Greeley was a man known and read of all men. His faults were as
open as his virtues, and both rested back alike upon a true and rough
manhood.
"Strong-armed as Thor--a shower of fire
His smitten anvil flung;
God's curse, Earth's wrong, dumb Hunger's ire--
He gave them all a tongue!"
George W. Nesmith
Geo. W. Nesmith died only a month ago, in his 90th year, and passed his
life in the near neighborhood of Daniel Webster's birthplace in New
Hampshire, both of them graduates of Dartmouth College, and the two
remarkably intimate with each other till Webster's death in 1852, though
Nesmith was by much the younger man. In the very crisis of the fate of
his college, Webster defended and emancipated it in the Supreme Court of
the United States; perhaps in part from that very reason, so strongly
was the younger man drawn toward the traditions of the elder. Nesmith
flung his old age till the very last into a supreme effort to sweeten
and harmonize troubles that have come upon his college, not troubles of
the same crucial type as struck in the first quarter of the century, but
still troubles that impede its usefulness and lessen its prestige.
I have no list of the governors of New Hampshire from 1775, when all
direct authority of the British crown was suppressed there, and even if
I had I could not certainly tell what proportion of them have been of
Scotch-Irish origin; but I have been pretty familiar with the names of
New Hampshire governors for fifty years, and I venture in this great
presence the historical conjecture, that nearly, if not quite, one-half
of them from that day to this have been of our own strain of blood.
Kennebec
3. KENNEBEC COUNTRY. Full as New Hampshire became of the Scotch-Irish,
especially in the southern and eastern halves of it, it is likely that
this element became still more predominant in what is now the State of
Maine. We have already noted the but half-suppressed anxiety of Governor
Shute at Boston to get as many as possible of the five ship-loads into
his province to the eastward, as a frontier-barrier against the French
and Indians of Canada. Although many of the supposed three hundred
persons who wintered in the harbor of Portland returned the next spring
to the Merrimac to settle Londonderry, some of them remained in Maine.
Armstrong, Means, Jameson, Gray, Gyles & McDonald - Portland, Maine
We know certainly, that John Armstrong, Robert Means, William Jameson,
Joshua Gray, William Gyles, and a McDonald remained and founded families
in Portland. James Armstrong, for example, an infant son of John, was
born in Ireland in 1717, and the parents had a son Thomas, born in
Portland in 1719. It is pretty certain also, that parts of that company
were left on points along Casco Bay and the mouth of the Kennebec, at or
near Wiscasset, before the main part returned to the Merrimac.
Joshua Gray
We happen to know with almost absolute certainty the fortunes of one of
the families left behind in Portland, when the future Londonderry
settlers returned to Massachusetts. This was the family of Joshua Gray.
He had a Celtic-Irish wife, and a large family.
The names of the sons of this family were Reuben, Andrew, James, John,
Samuel and Joshua.
In the spring of 1759, the year of Wolfe's battle on the Heights of
Abraham, Governor Pownall, of Massachusetts, fitted out an expedition of
395 men in order to capture from the French the mouth of the Penobscot
River. They left Portland May 4, and arrived at Wasaumkeag Point, May
17. Among the enlisted men were Andrew and Reuben Gray. In Governor
Pownall's journal may be found the following: "May 26. Visited Pentaget
with Captain Cargill and twenty men. Found the old abandoned French
Fort, and some abandoned settlements. Went ashore into the Fort. Hoisted
the King's Colours there and drank the King's health. Embarked in the
sloop King George for Boston."
The place thus described is now known as Castine, from Baron Castine,
whose name is a very familiar one along the eastern coast of Maine; and
among the twenty men who accompanied Governor Pownall on that occasion
was Reuben Gray. A strong fort was planned at Wasaumkeag Point, and the
work of building it was carried forward so diligently, that it was
completed July 5, 1759, the expense being £5,000. A garrison was kept
there until 1775, when the fort was dismantled by Commodore Mowett in a
British man-of-war, and later in the same year entirely destroyed by
Colonel Cargill, of New Castle. The building of this fort marked the
beginning of settlements by the English around the Penobscot Bay and
river region, the first settlers being members of the military
expedition, who, on being discharged, established themselves near the
fort, where their homes could have its protection against the French and
Indians.
Reuben & Andrew Gray - Penobscot.
The two Gray brothers, Reuben and Andrew, being of a venturesome
disposition, crossed the bay and located at what is now called
Penobscot, and were the first settlers of English origin to build their
homes on that historic peninsula. Several brothers of Reuben and Andrew
followed them to the Penobscot, and at last also, their old father and
mother. The distinction is claimed for Reuben's son, Reuben Gray 2d, of
being the first male child of English parentage born east of the
Penobscot River, the date of his birth being 1762. The old father,
Joshua, died about the opening of the Revolution, but the Irish widow
continued until after the close of the war. The first Reuben seems to
have died about 1820; and the second certainly in 1858; and about ten
years ago, as my two oldest boys, with other students of Williams
College, were making sailing excursions along the coast of Maine, they
ran across, at Brooksville, within the mouth of the Penobscot, Captain
Abner Gray, son of the second Reuben, then nearly eighty-five, as
straight as an arrow, helpful and hospitable, and that chance
acquaintance led to the correspondence that has given us these facts
about the Scotch-Irish on the Penobscot. The Grays of this very family
are still in large numbers in Brooksville and Bucksport, on the lower
Penobscot, and so are Wears, and Orrs, and Doaks, and other Scotch-Irish
families.
In published extracts from court records of the Province of Maine I have
read the affidavits of several of the early inhabitants, who stated that
they came to Boston in August, 1718, from Ulster, and thence that autumn
to Maine, where they settled in Brunswick and that neighborhood; which
is another independent evidence that parts of our now famous five
ship-loads furnished the first Scotch-Irish settlers of Maine, as well
as of New Hampshire and Massachusetts.
Capt. James Luzmore.
Kennebec.
Also: McFadden, McGowen, McCoun, Vincent, Hamilton, Jolmston, Malcolm,
McClellan, Crawford, Graves, Ward, Given, Dunning, Simpson
The next attempt to introduce this class of immigrants into Maine seems
to have been from a source entirely independent of the previous one,
though nearly contemporaneous with it. Robert Temple, who had been an
officer in the English army, and was a gentleman of family, was the
leader in the enterprise. His motive was to establish himself as a large
landed proprietor in this country. He says in a letter to the Plymouth
proprietors: "In September, 1717, I contracted with Captain James
Luzmore, of Topsham, to bring me, my servants, and what little effects I
had to Boston." "My eye," he continues, "was always toward a good tract
of land as well as a convenient place for navigation." Returning from an
examination of Connecticut, he says: "I was resolved to see the eastern
country also before I should determine where to begin my settlement."
The proprietors of the west banks of the Kennebec took him down to see
their land, but he gave the ultimate preference to land on the east side
of the river, which belonged to Colonel Hutchinson and the Plymouth
Company, and he became a partner in that concern and engaged to bring a
colony to it. Within two years he chartered five large ships to bring
over families from Ulster to carry on the settlement. They were the same
sort of people that came to Boston, and from the same general
localities. During the two years, 1719 and 1720, several hundred
families were landed on the shores of the Kennebec from its mouth to
Merrymeeting Bay. Many of the families settled in what is now Topsham,
which received its name from Temple's place of departure on his first
voyage, the port of Exeter in Devonshire; another portion settled in the
northerly part of Bath, on a tract of land stretching along on
Merrymeeting Bay to the Androscoggin, and was called Cork, and sometimes
Ireland, from the country of the settlers, which name it still retains;
and still others straggled along on the eastern side of the bay and
river, and descendants of these still occupy and improve portions of the
country. The familiar Scotch names, McFadden, McGowen, McCoun, Vincent,
Hamilton, Jolmston, Malcolm, McClellan, Crawford, Graves, Ward, Given,
Dunning, Simpson, still live to remind the present generation of the
land from which their ancestors came.
1722, nine families captured by Indians - Merrymeeting Bay.
John Temple m. dau of Gov. Bowdoin of Mass. & Elizabeth Temple m. Thomas
D. Winthrop of Mass.
and were the parents of Robert C. Winthrop of Boston
Unhappily, the Indian troubles, which we call "Lovell's War," commenced
shortly after Temple's people got fairly seated on the Kennebec, broke
up some of the settlements, which had begun to assume a flourishing
aspect, and scattered away many colonists from the rest; some of these
sought a refuge with their countrymen at Londonderry, N. H., but the
greatest part of them removed to Pennsylvania; Brunswick and Georgetown
were destroyed and deserted; in the summer of 1722, nine families were
captured at one time by the Indians in Merrymeeting Bay; but Temple
himself and many of his people remained, and the descendants of both
have connected their names indissolubly with Bowdoin College in
Brunswick, and with both state and church in Maine. Temple himself
received a military commission from Governor Shute, and rendered good
service in the defense of his adopted country. His posterity have served
it long and well. His eldest son, Robert, married a daughter of Governor
Shirley; the second son, John, lived to become a baronet, and married a
daughter of Governor Bowdoin, of Massachusetts. Their daughter,
Elizabeth, married Thomas D. Winthrop, of Massachusetts, and those are
the parents of Robert C. Winthrop, of Boston.
1729 - Colonel Dunbar, Montgomery, Campbell & McCobb - Pemaquid. Rev.
Robert Rutherford. - Presbyterian & familes: McClintock, Huston, McLean,
McKeen, Caldwell, Dick, Forbush, Brown, McIntyres & McFarnland
After the breaking up of the Norridgewock tribe on the Upper Kennebec,
some of Temple's Scotch settlers returned to the deserted places on the
eastern shore, and new adventurers sought the vacant seats. In 1729,
Colonel Dunbar, a native of Ireland, of Scottish descent, in the hope of
separating Maine from the Massachusetts government, obtained a
commission from the crown as governor of the territory. He had
previously been commissioned as surveyor-general of the woods, with a
view to preserve the pine timber for the British navy. He selected Fort
Frederick, at Pemaquid, as the seat of his government, and was placed in
possession by a detachment of troops from Nova Scotia in 1730. Rightful
were the claims of Massachusetts to the eastern shore, but Dunbar took
immediate measures to occupy and improve the lands in his new province
by inviting his countrymen, the Scotch-Irish, to settle upon them
through liberal inducements both of lands and privileges. He granted
one-hundred-acre lots on Pemaquid in the neighborhood of the fort, laid
out and improved a large farm for himself, and ceded to his countrymen,
Montgomery and Campbell and McCobb, large tracts, which soon became
towns. In the course of two or three years, more than one hundred and
fifty families, principally of Scotch descent, were introduced into this
territory. Some were drawn from the older settlements of the stock in
Massachusetts and New Hampshire, and some were fresh colonists from
Ireland. These had their pastor, Rev. Robert Rutherford, and their
Presbyterian institutions, which they cherished with great tenacity for
a long time. Among these families were McClintocks, Hustons, McLeans,
McKeens, Caldwells, Dicks, Forbushes, Browns, McIntyres, and McFarlands.
Massachusetts continued to protest against the government of Dunbar,
excellent as were its results, and it was terminated in August, 1732,
and jurisdiction restored to Massachusetts. Dunbar returned to England
in 1737, where, like Penn, he was committed to prison for debt, but
afterward released through the liberality of his friends, and in 1743
was appointed governor of St. Helena, an English island since rendered
famous by the exile of a more distinguished ruler than this early
Scotch-Irish governor of Maine.
Samuel Waldo - Agent of Mass. displaced Dunbar
Samuel Waldo, who had been a sort of agent of Massachusetts in
displacing Dunbar, and who had an interest in the territory as a
patentee, and who had seen the benefit arising from the admirable class
of immigrants whom Dunbar had introduced, proceeded to profit by the
example in respect to his own ample possessions lying between the St.
George and the Penobscot rivers. In 1734, Waldo carefully examined the
resources of his land grant, and fortunately discovered the invaluable
quarries of limestone, which have proven from that day to this day a
source of continued riches and progress to the inhabitants of that
peninsula. The first movements in the manufacture of lime there, which
are now so extended, and which seem at present to claim the attention of
our legislators at Washington, were so small that the lime was shipped
to Boston in molasses casks. The St. George river, on which the first
settlements were made, is a plunging stream, and afforded then and now
fine mill sites for handling both wood and stone, and the near forests
gave an abundant supply of timber.
Waldo's first settlers wer all of Scotch Descent from the 1718 migrants
to Boston:
Alexander, Blair, Kilpatrick, Patterson, Nelson, Starett, Howard,
McLean, Spear, Crieghton, McCracken & Morrison.
At Stirling - Anderson, Malcolm, Crawford, Miller, Auchmutey, Carswell &
Johnston.
Waldo's first settlers upon his eastern grant were all of Scotch descent
from the North of Ireland--some of them of recent immigration, and
others had been in the country from the first arrival in Boston in 1718.
This company consisted of twenty-seven families, arrived upon the spot
in 1735, and each family furnished with one hundred acres of land on the
banks of the St. George, in the present town of Warren, Maine. The names
of some of these pioneers will show to those familiar with the history
of Maine how much the state is indebted to this enterprising proprietor,
Samuel Waldo, for placing in permanent contact with the soil these most
useful settlers. Among the names are Alexander, Blair, Kilpatrick,
North, Patterson, Nelson, Starrett, Howard, McLean, Spear, Creighton,
McCracken, and Morrison. The Old French War broke out in 1744, which
greatly interrupted developments in Maine for ten years, when Waldo went
to Scotland again, and formed a company of sixty adults and many
children, who reached St. George's river in September, 1753, and were
settled in the western part of Warren, to which they gave the name of
Stirling, the ancient royal city of their country. These were mostly
mechanics; the names of some of them were Anderson, Malcolm, Crawford,
Miller, Auchmutey, Carswell, and Johnston; and this we believe to be the
last immigration into New England of people of Scottish extraction, in
any considerable number, prior to the outbreak of the Revolutionary War.
Fox - Book of Martyrs.
>From these three centers of diffusion, now briefly
indicated--Worcester, Londonderry, Wiscasset--the Scotch-Irish element
penetrated and permeated all parts of New England: Maine the most of
all, New Hampshire next, then Massachusetts, and then in lessening order
Vermont and Connecticut and Rhode Island. They were all in general one
sort of people. They belonged to one grade and sphere of life. They were
for the most part very poor in this world's goods. The vast majority of
all the adults, however, could read and write. If they had but one book
to a family, that book was surely the Bible, which is itself, as we
sometimes forget, a large collection of books of very varied character;
and if there were two volumes to a family, the second place in most
cases was disputed between Fox's "Book of Martyrs" and Bunyan's
"Pilgrim's Progress." Their personal habits, their mental
characteristics, their religious beliefs and experiences, and their very
superstitions, were held largely in common; and all these were in more
or less pronounced contrast with corresponding traits of the English
Puritans who had nestled before them in most parts of New England.
So far as their physical natures went, they had received in the old
country a splendid outfit for the race of life, in large bones and
strong teeth, and a digestive apparatus the envy of the mountain bears.
Men and women both were trained to an almost tireless physical industry.
The struggle for physical subsistence had been with them no mere figure
of speech. First of European countries, the potato had been found by
Ireland, to which it had been brought from Virginia by slave-trader
Hawkins in 1565, an invaluable resource of food for the poor; and each
and every company of Scotch-Irish brought with them to New England, as a
part of the indispensable outfit, some tubers of this esculent, which
they prized beyond price. The pine lands of New England, which are
always sandy, are adapted to the potato; and if there were no suffering
from hunger in those large families during the first years of their
sojourn, it should doubtless be put to the credit of the
easily-cultivated, much-multiplying Irish potato!
Each and every company of these people brought also with them into New
England the agricultural implements needful for the culture of the
flax-plant, and the small wheels for spinning the flax-fiber, and the
looms for weaving the linen textures. Nothing connected with the
newcomers excited so much interest in English and Puritan Boston, in
1718, and the three following years, as the small wheels worked by women
and propelled by the foot, for turning the straight flax-fibers into
thread. There was a public exhibition of their skill in spinning flax,
by the Scotch-Irish women, on Boston Common in the spring of 1719, at
which prizes were awarded to the foremost. Drake's "Boston" gives an
account of the sensation produced by the advent of this strange machine
there, and of societies and schools formed to teach the art of thus
making linen thread. For four years the novelty exercised its
fascination, and the first ladies of the town paraded on the common to
exhibit their newly-learned art, derived from their stalwart sisters
from over the sea. It is not historically set down in the records in so
many words, but at this safe distance, and (as it were) under the
protection of the guns of Fort Duquesne, we may venture the assertion,
that the Boston girls were hard to beat in their newly-found and most
useful avocation!
Londonderry incorporated 1722
When Londonderry was incorporated in the name of George III, June, 1722,
the charter enacted "that on every Wednesday of the week forever they
may hold, keep, and enjoy a market for the buying and selling of goods,
wares and merchandise, and various kinds of creatures, endowed with the
usual privileges, profits and immunities, as other market towns fully
hold, possess and enjoy; and two Fairs annually forever, the first to be
held and kept within the said town on the 8th day of November next, and
so annually forever, and the other on the 8th day of May in like manner.
Provided, if it should so happen, that at any time either of these days
fall on the Lord's day, then the said Fair shall be held and kept the
day following it. The said Fair shall have, hold and enjoy the
liberties, privileges and immunities as other Fairs in other towns fully
possess, hold and enjoy."
For more than one hundred years these semi-annual fairs were maintained
without a break. Their original design was good, namely, to afford
opportunity to people of neighboring towns to meet and exchange their
commodities with each other for a mutual profit--and we will just note
in passing that the Scotch-Irish of that day had not made the grand
modern discovery that exchange of commodities is a crime to be prevented
by the exercise of all the powers of the United States government. The
assemblages at these fairs were usually large, merchants from Haverhill
and Salem and Boston were present with their goods, and every variety of
home growths and manufactures was collected for exchange. Every thing at
first was conducted with a decent order and propriety, although the fair
was always held in and around the only tavern of the town, and there was
always much drinking over the bar and some intoxication. As time went on
and as stores became multiplied in the towns, and as means of
communication improved, the benefits of these fairs and the grounds for
their maintenance diminished, and the obvious evils increased, until
they proved a moral nuisance, attracting chiefly the more corrupt
portion of the community, and exhibiting each year for successive days
scenes of vice and folly in some of their worst forms. Serious attempts
were made from time to time by the town to mitigate these evils, but
with little success. In 1798 the following vote was passed at the annual
town-meeting:
"From the misconduct and disorderly behavior of most of the people which
frequent the fair, as now holden, the good intention and original design
are altogether defeated, it is hereupon enacted, that it shall be
confined to two days, one day each spring and fall--voted also, that no
booth shall be used after 9 o'clock in the evening of said days, for
selling merchandise or liquor, or furnishing any kind of entertainment,
without forfeiting and paying a fine of one pound." And at last the
final suppression of the fair was brought about in 1839, as the result
of the temperance reformation in Londonderry, for when the bar was
removed from the tavern and no intoxicating drinks were to be had in the
place, the crowds assembled as usual, but at once withdrew.
William Stinson - Londonderry - Rev. David McGregor
The ministers were particularly skilled as between each other in
humorous attack and retort. It was the one chief relief from the
soberness and intensity of their lives. For example, two of these
clergymen were walking along together on an icy road. Suddenly one of
them slipped, and fell flat. Rev. Upright eyed his brother for a moment
solemnly, and quoted: "The wicked stand in slippery places." Instantly
retorted Rev. Prostrate, "I see they do, but I can't." William Stinson,
born in Ireland, came to Londonderry with his father while still very
young. Thence he migrated to Dunbarton, N. H., where he lived alone in
his log-house, destitute of most of the con. vcniences of domestic life,
and laid there and thus the foundations of a large fortune for the time.
Rev. David McGregor, of Londonderry, called on him there (they had been
boys together), and dined with him. Not having a table, or any thing
that would answer for a better substitute, Brother Stinson was obliged
to make use of a bushel basket placed bottom-side upward. Both were
grateful beforehand for the frugal meal frugally served, and Rev. Mr.
McGregor, being asked, of course, to solicit the Divine blessing,
pertinently and devoutly implored that his host mignt be blessed "in his
basket and his store." This was literally verified in the time to come!
Rev. Matthew Clark
Rev. Matthew Clark, who carried to his grave an unhealed wound from a
sword-cut received in the siege of Derry, was accustomed, even to old
age, and even in the pulpit, to quick and witty turns, which we must
suppose were very effective. At any rate, they are very interesting to
us, accustomed as we are, more or less, to dull preaching. The old
cavalry captain with the black patch over his eye-brow was preaching one
day on the over-confidence of Peter, that he would never deny his Lord,
and his subsequent humiliating fall, and remarked: "Just like Peter, aye
mair forrit than wise, ganging swaggering about wi' a sword at his side;
an' a puir han' he mad' o' it when he cam' to the trial, for he only cut
off a chiel's lug, an' he ought to ha' split down his head!"
This same old warrior of God is said also to have commenced a discourse
from Philippians, 4:13, in the following startling manner: "'I can do
all things.' Ay, can ye, Paul? I'll bet ye a dollar o' that (placing a
Spanish milled dollar upon the desk). Stop! let's see what else Paul
says: 'I can do all things through Christ, which strengtheneth me.' Ay,
sae can I, Paul; I draw my bet," and he thereupon returned the dollar to
his pocket!
This gift of enlivening humor, so common and so much cultivated among
them, afforded a much needed relief to their isolated lives, and
afforded a relief also to their usually downright and dogmatic
expression of their opinions. They were open and above-board in all
their opinions and in all their talk. They did not back-bite with their
tongues. There was biting, a plenty of it, but it was in a forward
movement, fronting the opponent, whoever he was. Subterraneanism was
something these people abhorred. If any one had a ground of complaint
against another, or, what was much the same thing, if he supposed he
had, his method of procedure was not like that of besieging castles in
the Middle Ages, by gradual approaches, but, on the contrary, was
exceedingly direct and personal. The party of the second part was pretty
sure to be the first one to hear of the grievance, and of the quick
feelings excited by it. They seemed to like to fight their own battles
directly, and rarely enlisted substitutes! They were a pugnacious people
among themselves, these Scotch-Irish. Their views were mostly definite,
and sharpened to a point. There was a wholesome breeziness among them,
that is refreshing to look back upon. They were fond of regarding the
Christian course under St. Paul's favorite figure of a warfare; whatever
else they failed to do, they meant to fight a good fight, and to keep
the faith once delivered to them--the present saints.
McCullock, McCurdy, Marble, Anderson, Rev. Geor. Mooar, McKeen, Mack,
Blair, Taggard, Spring, McClellen & Anderson.
In conclusion, let me mention just a few living Scotch-Irish people out
of the New England stock, with whom I chance to be acquainted directly
or indirectly, whose acquaintance I highly prize, and who are each and
all distinguished in their sphere: Hugh McCulloch, born and bred in
Maine, known and honored of all men; Charles J. McCurdy, a nonagenarian
jurist of Lyme, Conn.; Manton Marble, of New York; George W. Anderson,
of Boston; Rev. Dr. George Mooar, of Oakland, Cal.; Miss Philena McKeen,
Andover, Mass.; Mrs. Gov. Fairbanks, St. Johnsbury, Vt.; Robert C. Mack,
Londonderry, N. H.; Senator Blair and Congressman Moore and Acting
Governor Taggart, all of New Hampshire; Professor L. W. Spring, of
Williams College; Major H. B. McClellan, of Kentucky, and Henry H.
Anderson, of New York.
PARTIAL LIST OF AUTHORITIES
1. Lincoln's History of Worcester.
2. Wall's Reminiscence of Worcester.
3. Worcester Records of Births and Deaths.
4. Registry of Deeds, Worcester.
5. Published Inscriptions on Gravestones in Worcester.
6. Parker's Londonderry, N. H.
7. State Papers of New Hampshire, particularly "Towns," vol. 14, and
"Muster-Rolls," vol. 2.
8. Communications from Robert C. Mack, Londonderry, N. H.
9. Holland's History of Western Massachusetts, "Coleraine," "Blandford,"
"Pelham," and passim.
10. History of Peterboro', N. H.
11. McKeen's History of Bradford, Vt.
12. Thompson's Gazetteer of Vermont, "Londonderry," "Landgrove," etc.
13. Caleb Stark's Life of John Stark.
14. American Biography, sub verbis, "Matthew Thornton," "Asa Gray,"
"Charles J. McCurdy," etc., etc., etc.
15. Hugh McCulloch's "Memorials of Half a Century."
16. Green's "Short History of England," as revised by Mrs. Green.
http://www.libraryireland.com/articles/ScotchIrishNewEnglandCongress1890/index.php
Free Irish Reference Library
Latest additions to the Library
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Abbey, Barony of Burren Abbey, or Corcomroe-Abbey (Barony of Burren)
Abbey, Barony of Glenahiry Abbey, or Innislonnagh, or Innislonaghty
(Barony of Glenahiry)
Abbey, Barony of Tyaquin Abbey, or Knockmoy, or AbbeyKnockmoy (Barony of
Tyaquin)
Abbeydarig, Barony of Moydoe Abbeydarig (Barony of Moydoe, County
Longford)
Abbeydorney, Barony of Clanmaurice Abbeydorney (Barony of Clanmaurice,
County Kerry)
Abbeyfeale Improvements in Ireland
Abbeyfeale, Limerick Abbeyfeale (Barony of Glenquin, County Limerick)
Abbeygormagan, Longford Abbeygormagan (Barony of Longford)
Adare Adare, County Limerick
Afterlife, Belief in The Future Life, or Land of the West
Agricultural Economics Agricultural Economics
Agriculture, Irish Agricultural Statistics
America (Irish-America) Irish America
Animal Worship Old Irish Religions: Animal Worship
Anster, Dr. John Dr. John Anster
Antiquities, Irish Irish Antiquities
Antiquities, Irish Irish Antiquities (gold finds at Ballyshannon and
Roscommon)
Antrim Castle Antrim Castle
Ardfinnan Castle Ardfinnan Castle (Tipperary)
Ardglass Ardglass, County of Down
Ards, territory of The Territory of Ards
Armagh Investigation The Armagh Investigation
Armagh, Cathedral Church of The Cathedral Church of Armagh
Armoy, Round Tower of Armoy Round Tower, County Antrim
Arranmore, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Arranmore Island, County
Donegal (1847)
Art, Irish National National Art of Ireland
Artane and Donnycarney, Directory Artane and Donnycarney (from Thom's
Almanac and Official Directory, 1862: County Dublin Directory)
Athcarne Castle, County Meath Athcarne Castle, County Meath
Balbriggan, Directory Balbriggan (from Thom's Almanac and Official
Directory, 1862: County Dublin Directory)
Baldoyle, Directory Baldoyle (from Thom's Almanac and Official
Directory, 1862: County Dublin Directory)
Balleen Balleen Castle, County Kilkenny
Ballina, Famine in Irish Famine Report on Journey from Dublin to Ballina,
County Mayo (1847)
Ballintoy, County Antrim Ulster Towns Directory 1910: Ballintoy, County
Antrim
Ballsbridge, Directory Ballsbridge (Ball's-Bridge, from Thom's Almanac
and Official Directory, 1862: County Dublin Directory
Ballybay, County Monaghan Ulster Towns Directory 1910: Ballybay, County
Monaghan
Ballybofey, County Donegal Ulster Towns Directory 1910: Ballybofey,
County Donegal
Ballycarry, County Antrim Ulster Towns Directory 1910: Ballycarry,
County Antrim
Ballycastle Collieries Ballycastle Collieries, County Antrim
Ballyvourney, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Ballyvourney, near
Macroom, County Cork (1847)
Banagher, Church of The Old Church of Banagher, County of Londonderry
Bangor, Abbot of Abbot of Bangor's Seal
Bangor, School of The School of Bangor - St. Columbanus
Banim, John National Tintings III: John Banim
Bank of Ireland The Bank of Ireland (Dublin)
Bards of Ireland The Bards of Ireland
Bards, Irish Irish Bards
Barrack Bridge, Dublin Old Barrack Bridge, Dublin
Belfast Belfast (with an engraved view by Andrew Nichol)
Belfast 60 years ago Belfast Sixty Years Ago: Recollections of a
Septuagenarian
Belfast Natural History Society Belfast Natural History Society and
Museum
Belleek, County Fermanagh Ulster Towns Directory 1910: Belleek, County
Fermanagh
Bells, Ancient Irish Ancient Irish Bells, or Crotals
Bells, Holy Old Irish Religions: Holy Bells
Belmullet, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Belmullet, County Mayo
(1847)
Bianconi, Charles Individual Exertion.-Mr. Bianconi
Biography, compendium of A Compendium of Irish Biography
Black and Tans The Black and Tans
Black Monday, Origin of Origin of Black Monday
Blacker, William Lieutenant-Colonel William Blacker
Blackrock Castle (Cork) Black-Rock Castle (near Cork)
Blarney Castle Blarney Castle
Bofin, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Bofin and Cleggan, County
Galway (1847)
Bogs, Irish Peat Irish Peat Bogs
Bona Marga Abbey of Bona-Marga (Bun-na-mairge), County Antrim
Boru, Brian Brian Boroihme's Harp
Boundary Question The Boundary Question (Partition)
Bourke, Miles Miles Bourke, Viscount Mayo (and the 1641 Rebellion in
Ireland)
Boyle, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Boyle, County Roscommon (1846)
Brady, Pedigree of Irish Pedigrees: Brady
Braid-island, County Antrim Extraordinary Clerical Longevity
(Braid-island, County Antrim)
Bray, Lough of Lough Bray, County Wicklow
Brooke, Charlotte Miss Charlotte Brooke
Buchinger, Matthew Matthew Buchinger
Bulla, Ancient Irish Ancient Irish Bulla
Burke, Edmund National Biography No. I: Edmund Burke
Burncourt, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Burncourt, Tubrid, etc,
County Tipperary (1847)
Burt Castle Burt Castle, County Donegal
Bushmills Electric Tram Bushmills Electric Tramway (County Antrim)
Butler, Eleanor Tomb of Eleanor Butler, Countess of Desmond
Butt, Isaac Mr. Butt and National Education in Ireland
Butt, Isaac Isaac Butt, Esq., LL.D.
Cambrensis, Giraldus Giraldus Cambrensis
Carleton, William William Carleton
Carleton, William National Tintings II: William Carleton
Carlingford Carlingford
Carlow Carlow College
Carmelite Church The Carmelite Church, Dublin
Carrick-on-Shannon, Famine in Irish Famine Report from
Carrick-on-Shannon, County Leitrim (1846)
Carrickart, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Carrickart, Rutland
Island, and Killybegs, County Donegal (1847)
Carrickfergus Carrickfergus
Carrickfergus Carrickfergus, County Antrim (Witchcraft in )
Carrigadrohid Carrigadrohid Castle, County Cork
Carthusians The Carthusians in Ireland by W. H. Grattan
Castles The Mediaeval Houses or Castles of Ireland
Catholic Record Society of Ireland The Catholic Record Society of
Ireland
Catholics, Irish in America The Falling Off of Irish Catholics in the
United States, and its Causes
Cavan, excursion in An Excursion in the County of Cavan
Cead Mille Failte Cead Mille Failte
Celtic Past In the Celtic Past by Ethna Carbery
Census of 1861, Emigration 1861 Census: Decline of the Population in
Ireland (Famine, Disease and Emigration)
Census of Ireland Census of Ireland (1821, 1831, and 1841 compared)
Chair, Ancient Irish Ancient Irish Chair
Char The Char or Salmo Alpinus
Charities, Protestant The Suppression of Protestant Charities in Ireland
(Irish Foundling Hospitals and Charter Schools)
Charlemont, Earl of James Caulfield, Earl of Charlemont
Chichester, Arthur Arthur Chichester
Church, Irish Some Entries relating to the Irish Church as Calendared in
the Stuart Papers, 1700-1715
Claddagh, Famine in Irish Famine Report from the Claddagh, County Galway
(1847)
Clare, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Kilrush, Kilmurry, Cooraclare,
etc, County Clare
Cleary, Bridget Belief in Fairies and Witches (The Burning of Bridget
Cleary)
Clifden, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Clifden, County Galway
(1847)
Clonmacnois, seal of the Dean Seal of the Dean of Clonmacnois
Clonmel Clonmel: Its Monastery, and Siege by Cromwell
Clontarf Castle A Day's Ramble on the North Side of the City (Fingall
and Clontarf)
Clontarf, battle of The Battle of Clontarf
Colleges, Irish The Battle of the Irish Colleges
Commerce, History of Commercial History of Ireland
Conna Castle Conna Castle, County Cork
Connaught, tour to (1) A Tour to Connaught
Connaught, tour to (2) A Tour to Connaught: Letter II
Connaught, tour to (3) A Tour to Connaught: Letter III
Connaught, tour to (4) A Tour to Connaught: Letter IV (Kinnegad)
Connaught, tour to (5) A Tour to Connaught: Letter V (Gaulstown, and
tobacco growing in Ireland)
Connaught, tour to (6) A Tour to Connaught: Letter VI (Tyrells Pass)
Connaught, tour to (7) A Tour to Connaught: Letter VII (Kilbeggan)
Connemara, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Connemara, County Galway
(1847)
Convict System Political Prisoners and the Irish Convict System
Coote, Sir Charles Sir Charles Coote (and the 1641 Rebellion in Ireland)
Corcomroe Corcomroe Abbey, County Clare
Cork, Corporation of The Privy Council and the Corporation of Cork
Cork, Cove of Cove of Cork
Cork, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Cork, 1847
Corn, antiquity of in Ireland Antiquity of Corn in Ireland
Costume A Chapter on Irish Costume
Coumshenane Lake and Precipice at Coumshenane
Courtstown Castle Courtstown Castle
Crannogs The Lake Homes of the Irish
Creagh, Richard The Last Years of Archbishop Creagh of Armagh
Cromlechs Druids' Altars or Cromlechs in Ireland
Cromwell, Anecdote of Cromwell Outwitted
Crosses, Irish Old Irish Religions: Irish Crosses
Crown, Ancient Irish Ancient Irish Crown
Culdees The Culdees of Druidical Days
Cushendall Directory Ulster Towns Directory 1910: Cushendall, County
Antrim
Customs, Irish Of the Character, Customs, and Habits of this People (The
Irish)
Dalkey Dalkey Sixty Years Ago
Danaans, Tuatha de Irish Magic and Tuatha de Danaans
De Burgh, Richard Richard de Burgh, Second Earl of Clanricarde
De Burgh, Ulick Ulick de Burgh, First Earl of Clanricarde
De Burgo, Edmund Edmund de Burgo
De Burgo, Richard Richard de Burgo
De Burgo, Richard (2nd Earl) Richard de Burgo, Second Earl of Ulster
De Burgo, Walter Walter de Burgo
De Burgo, William William de Burgo
De Courcy, John John, baron de Stoke Courcy in Ireland
De Lacy, Hugh Hugh De Lacy
De Wikeford, Robert Robert de Wikeford, Archbishop of Dublin
Derry, Siege of Notes on the Siege of Derry
Desertmartin, County Derry Ulster Towns Directory 1910: Desertmartin,
County Derry
Desmond, Earl of Earl of Desmond
Desmond, Earls of The Descendants of the Last Earls of Desmond
Devenish, Island of Island of Devenish, Lough Erne, County Fermanagh
Disendowment Disendowment of the Protestant Church: Letter of the Bishop
of Kerry
Donaghmore Donaghmore Church and Round Tower, County Meath
Donegal Castle Donegal Castle
Doona, castle of Castle of Doona
Down, County of Introduction to Bassett's County Down Guide and
Directory, 1886
Down, County of Office Bearers (from Bassett's County Down Guide and
Directory, 1886)
Drennan, Dr. William Two Ulster Patriots (Dr. William Drennan and Mrs.
Martha McTier)
Drishane Castle Drishane Castle, County of Cork
Drogheda Drogheda
Drogheda Wooden House in Drogheda
Drogheda, St. Peter's Ancient Baptismal Font, St. Peter's, Drogheda,
County Louth
Drogheda, Storming of Oliver Cromwell and the Storming of Drogheda,
County Louth, in 1649
Druidism, Beliefs Druidical Belief
Druidism, French French Druidism
Druidism, German German Druidism
Druidism, Isle of Man Isle of Man Druidism
Druidism, Neo Neo-Druidism
Druids, Books on Authorities cited in Irish Druids and Old Irish
Religions
Druids, Irish Irish Druids and Old Irish Religions
Druids, Irish Irish Druidism
Druids, Irish Preface to Irish Druids and Old Irish Religions
Druids, Irish Irish Druids
Druids, Opinions on Opinions on Irish Druids
Druids, St. Patrick and St. Patrick and the Druids
Druids, Welsh Welsh or British Druidism
Dublin Castle Dublin Castle
Dublin Directory 1850 Henry Shaw's Dublin City Directory, 1850
(Alphabetical List)
Dublin, Ancient Houses of Ancient Houses of Dublin
Dublin, Arms of Arms of the City of Dublin
Dublin, Fisheries of The Local Fisheries of Dublin
Dublin, Francis Street Church Francis Street Roman Catholic Church,
Dublin
Dublin, geology of The Geology of Dublin and its Suburbs
Dublin, Simmons-Court Church Simmons-Court (Church of Ireland) Church,
Dublin
Dufferin, Barony of Barony of Dufferin
Dunbrody Abbey Dunbrody Abbey, County Wexford
Duncannon, siege of The Siege of Duncannon
Duncarbery Dun-Garbry (Duncarbery) Castle, County Leitrim
Dundrum Castle Dundrum Castle, County of Down
Dunfanaghy, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Dunfanaghy, County
Donegal (1846)
Dungloe, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Dungloe, County Donegal
(1847)
Dunluce Castle Dunluce Castle
Dunmore, Cave of Cave of Dunmore (Kilkenny)
Dunseverick Castle Dunseverick Castle, County Antrim
Eagle, Irish The Irish Eagle
Easter Rising 1916 The Easter Week Rebellion
Easter Rising, Poets of Pearse, MacDonagh and Plunkett: An Appreciation
Emblems National Emblems
Emblems National Emblems by Terence O'Toole
Emigrants, Number of Number of Irish Emigrants, 1895-1905
Emigration Emigration
Emigration of Protestants On the Emigration of Protestants
Emigration to Canada The Irish Exodus to Canada: Grosse Isle, 1847-8
Emigration to South Carolina Bishop Lynch's Letter on Emigration from
Ireland to South Carolina
Emigration, Australian Australian Emigration Society
Emmet, Robert Robert Emmet
Enniscorthy Enniscorthy, County Wexford
Envoys Plenipotentiary Envoys Plenipotentiary from the Republic of
Ireland
Erris, Famine in Barony of Irish Famine Report from the Barony of Erris,
County Mayo (1847)
Establishment, Church The Isolation of the Church Establishment
Ethnology, Irish Irish Ethnology
Fairies Fairies (Irish)
Fairies, Belief in Belief in Fairies and Devils and the Tortures of Hell
Fairies, Irish The Fairies of the Irish Mythology
Fairy Children Fairy Children (or Changelings) in Ireland
Famine, Great Irish The Potato-rot (during the Great Irish Famine)
Faulkner, George George Faulkner
Fenian Executions The Effect of the Fenian Executions
Fenianism How to Deal with Fenianism
Fenianism Social War in Ireland
Fenianism The Vitality of Fenianism
Fire-Worship Old Irish Religions: Fire-Worship
Fishing in Ireland Fishing in Ireland: The Gillaroo Trout
Fitz-Adelm, William William Fitz-Adelm
Fitz-Gerald, Maurice Maurice Fitzgerald
Fitz-Gerald, Raymond Raymond le Gros: Raymond Fitz-Gerald (Fitzgerald)
Fitz-Stephen, Robert Robert Fitz-Stephen (FitzStephen)
Fitzgerald, Thomas Rebellion of Silken Thomas
Flag, Irish Orange and Green (The Irish Flag)
Flood, Henry National Biography No.6: Henry Flood, Esq.
Fore, Abbey of The Abbey at Fore, County Westmeath
Four Courts The Four Courts
Fourth Regiment of Horse Anecdotes of the Fourth Regiment of Horse
French Invasion The French Invasion of Ireland (extract from the
`Report of the Committee of Secrecy of the House of Commons, 1799')
Furlong, Thomas Memoir of Thomas Furlong
Gaelic Journal The Starting of the Gaelic Journal, November 1882
Gallagher Arms The Arms of the Gallaghers (Gallagher family)
Galway, Warden of The Warden of Galway (The Execution of Walter Lynch)
Germans in Ireland The Germans in Ireland (From Beamish's History of the
German Legion)
Giant's Causeway The Giant's Causeway
Glasnevin, botanic gardens The Botanic Gardens (Glasnevin) and their
Neighbourhood
Glenbeigh, Kerry Irish Improvements (Glenbeigh, Co. Kerry)
Glendalough A Day at Glendalough
Glendalough Glendalough, County Wicklow
Glengariff, Cork Glengariff
Glenties, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Glenties, County Donegal
(1846)
Gods, Irish Old Irish Religions: Irish Gods
Gold mines, Wicklow The Wicklow Gold Mines
Graham, clan Original Communication of Sir Walter Scott, relative to the
Clan Graham
Grattan, Speeches of The Speeches of Grattan (Review by Thomas Davis)
Grey Abbey Grey Abbey (or, Greyabbey), County Down
Griffin, Gerald National Tintings I: Gerald Griffin
Habitations of the Poor On the Improvement of the Habitations of the
Poor in Ireland (Mud and Thatch Cottages or Cabins)
Hall, Mrs S. C. Mrs S. C. Hall (Anna Maria Fielding)
Hamilton, Gustavus Gustavus Hamilton, Viscount Boyne (and the
Enniskilleners)
Highlands (Connemara) The Irish Highlands (Connemara)
Holestone, County Antrim The Holestone, near Doagh, County of Antrim
Holy Cross, Tipperary The Tomb in Holy Cross Abbey, County Tipperary
Holy Cross, Tipperary Holy-Cross Abbey, County Tipperary
Holy Cross, Tipperary The Abbey of Holy-Cross, County of Tipperary
Home Rule Ulster's Preparations for War
Horn, Ancient Irish Ancient Irish Horn
Hospital Fields, Dublin Ancient Monument in the Hospital Fields, Dublin
Howth, the Needles The Needles, Howth, County Dublin
Idols, Worship of Old Irish Religions: Idol Worship
Inch Abbey Inch Abbey, County Down
Inch Castle Inch Castle, County Kildare
Inchiquin, Castle of Inchiquin Castle, County Clare
Inchmore Castle Inchmore Castle (Kilkenny)
Industries, Irish Thoughts on Irish Industries (Alice Stopford Green,
1918)
Iniscattery Iniscattery Island and Round Tower, County Clare
Inish-Keeragh, Legend of An Island Split in Three by a Storm (County
Clare legend)
Inishnameo, Legend of The Island of Lough Cre or Inishnameo (County
Tipperary Legend)
Inishowen, martyr of A Martyr for the Faith in Inishowen
Inniskeel, Donegal Inniskeel (County Donegal)
Instrument, Ancient Irish Ancient Irish Instrument found at Ballymoney,
County Antrim
Ireland, Ancient Ancient Ireland
Ireland, history of Ireland and Her Story
Ireland, National Library for Signs of the Times: The National Library
for Ireland
Irish Brigade The Irish Brigade
irish history famine local studies clare
irish history famine local studies cork
irish history famine local studies waterford
Irish Language Our National (Irish) Language
Irish Language Is the Irish Language Spoken in Africa?
Islandmagee Druid's Altar, Island Magee (Islandmagee, near Larne, County
Antrim)
Iveagh, Barony of Barony of Iveagh
James I James I and Ireland
James II, King Entry of James II. into Dublin
Jaunting Car The (Irish) Jaunting Car
Jerpoint Abbey Jerpoint Abbey, County Kilkenny
Johnstone, Jack A Notable Actor: John Henry (Jack) Johnstone
Keening at Irish Funerals The Irish Funeral Cry (the Ullaloo, Keeners
and Keening at Irish Funerals)
Kells, Kilkenny Kells Priory, County Kilkenny
Kenbaan (Kenbane) Castle Kenbaan (Kenbane) Castle, County Antrim
Kerry, County of Report on the state of the County of Kerry and the
Baronies of Bere and Bantry (1673).
Kickham, Charles J. Charles Joseph Kickham
Kilburn,William William Kilburn
Kilclief Castle Kilclief Castle, County of Down
Kilcullen Kilcullen, County Kildare
Kilkenny Kilkenny
Kilkenny Castle Kilkenny Castle
Killaloe The Episcopal Succession in Killaloe (1326-1525)
Killarney, a legend Killarney (A Legend)
Killternan (or Kiltiernan) Church, Dublin New Church of Killternan (or
Kiltiernan), County Dublin
Killybegs, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Killybegs, County Donegal
(1846)
Kilmallock Kilmallock
Kilsharvan, Church of Kilsharvan, County Louth
Kingstown Railway Ladies' Ankles on the Kingstown Line
Kinsale, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Kinsale, County Cork (1847)
Kinvarra, Galway Tubber Mac-Duach (Kinvarra, County Galway)
Knockeen (Waterford), Cromlech at Cromleach (or Cromlech) at Knockeen,
County of Waterford
Knowledge What Kind of Knowledge would be most Beneficial to the People
of Ireland?
Knowledge, Acquisition of The Prospects and Duties of Irishmen in
Reference to the Acquisition of Useful Knowledge
Labour Movement, Irish British Labour and Irish Needs
Lady's Island, Wexford Lady's Island, County Wexford, in 1833
Land Question, Irish The Ulster Custom
Land Question, Irish Catholic Emancipation and the Land
Land Tenure, Celtic Celtic Land-Tenure
Land Tenures Land Tenures
Landlordism Development of Landlordism
Landlordism, Irish The Secret of Emigration
Laws, Ancient Irish The Publication of the Ancient Irish Laws.--The
Delay
Laws, Ancient Irish The Translation of the Ancient Irish Laws
Lecale Lecale
Leixlip Leixlip and Its Castle
Lia Fail The Lia Fail, or the Stone of Destiny
Limerick Cathedral Bells Limerick Cathedral Bells
Liscarroll Castle Liscarroll Castle, County Cork
Lismore Castle, County Waterford Lismore Castle, County of Waterford
Literature Irish Literature
Literature, Ancient Ancient Irish Literature
Literature, Ancient Irish Ancient Irish Literature
Litton, Edward Edward Litton, Member of Parliament for Coleraine
Longford, insurrectionary Insurrectionary State of the County of
Longford
Lynch, John National Biography No.VII: John Lynch, R.C. Bishop of
Killala
Lyons, William A Remarkable Bishop of Cork (Dr. William Lyons)
MacCarthy Arms The Arms of Mac Carthy (MacCarthy,M`Carthy)
MacCarthy Clan The Grave of Maccaura
Macdonell, Randal Randal Macdonell (Macdonnell), Earl of Antrim
Macdonnell Claragh John Mac Donnell Claragh
MacFirbis, Duald Duald Mac Firbis (MacFirbis) and the Mac Firbis Family
Machinery in Ireland Machinery in Ireland (and the printing of the
Dublin Penny Journal)
Machinery in Ireland What would Machinery do for Ireland?
MacManus, Terence Bellew Terence Bellew MacManus
Macnamara, Pedigree of Irish Pedigrees: Macnamara (No.5)
Macnamara, Pedigree of Irish Pedigrees: Macnamara (No.4)
Macnamara, Pedigree of Irish Pedigrees: Macnamara (No.1)
Macnamara, Pedigree of Irish Pedigrees: Macnamara (No.2)
Macnamara, Pedigree of Irish Pedigrees: Macnamara (No.3)
MacSwiney, Terence Moral Force (by Terence MacSwiney)
Magic, Druidical Druidical Magic
Maguires The Maguires of Fermanagh
Malone, Anthony Anthony Malone
Manufactures Irish Manufactures
Maps, Old Irish Notes on Old Irish Maps
Mayo, Diocese of The Diocese and Abbey of Mayo
McCool, Finn Legend of Fin McCoul
McEagan, Boethius Bishop of Ross: Boethius M'Eagan (McEagan)
Meath, Legend of A Cross raised up in the Air (County Meath legend)
Medical Education Medical Education in Ireland
Mellifont Abbey Mellifont Abbey
Mellifont Abbey, Ruins of Ruins of Mellifont Abbey, County of Louth
Mether, Ancient Irish The Ancient Irish Mether
Monuments, Historical Historical Monuments of Ireland
Moy, River Rare Discovery on the Banks of the River Moy, County of Mayo
Mucross Abbey Mucross Abbey, County Kerry
Munster Munster Outrages
Music, Ancient Irish Antiquity of Irish Music
Music, Revival of Irish The Revival of Irish Music
Mysticism, Druidical Druidical Mysticism
Names, Baptismal The Revival of Irish Names
Nation, The (journal) A Second Year's Work (at The Nation)
Natural History of Ireland On the Natural History of Ireland
Nemid, Legend of Historic Legends of Ireland: Nemid and the Nemedians
Nenagh Castle Nenagh Castle, County of Tipperary
New Ross, Church of St. Mary St. Mary's, New Ross, County Wexford
Newbridge New Bridge (Newbridge), County Kildare
Newgrange New Grange (Newgrange), County of Meath
Northern Ireland, history of Sketches of Olden Days in Northern Ireland
Northern Star The Northern Star
O'Brien, Donald Donald O'Brien, Prince of Thomond
O'Brien, Mortough Mortough O'Brien
O'Brien, Murrough Murrough O'Brien, First Earl of Thomond, and Baron
Inchiquin
O'Cahans The O'Cahans
O'Callaghan, Arms of The O'Callaghan Arms
O'Connellan, Thomas Irish Music: The Harper O'Connellan
O'Connor, Cathal Cathal O'Connor
O'Connor, Feidlim Feidlim O'Connor, Prince of Connaught
O'Connor, Feidlim (2nd) Second Feidlim O'Connor, Prince of Connaught
O'Connor, Roderic Roderic O'Connor, King of Connaught
O'Daly, Arms of The O'Daly Arms (O'Dalys)
O'Dangal's Vision O'Dangal's Vision
O'Doherty, Sir Cahir Sir Cahir O'Doherty
O'Donovan Rossa, Jeremiah Oration of Patrick H. Pearse over the Grave of
O'Donovan `Rossa'
O'Donovan Rossa, Jeremiah Jeremiah O'Donovan (Rossa)
O'Grady, Pedigree of Irish Pedigrees: O'Grady (No.1)
O'Kelly, Kildare O'Kelly and Kildare
O'Leary, John John O'Leary
O'Malley, Grace An Irish Sea-Queen: Some Incidents in the Career of
Grainne O'Mailley
O'Neill, Phelim Phelim O'Neill's Commission from King Charles I.
O'Neills, Arms of The O'Neill Arms (O'Neills)
O'Neills, Coronation Chair Coronation Chair of the O'Neils (or O'Neills)
of Castlereagh
O'Reillys of Brefney (or Breffney) The O'Reillys at Home and Abroad (The
O'Reilly clan, or family, of Breffney)
O'Sullivan Arms The Arms of O'Sullivan
O'Sullivan Beare Irish Devotedness
Orange and Green Orange and Green
Orange Society The Orange Society
Orangeism The Government of Endowed Orangeism
Orangeman What is an Orangeman?
Ormeau Ormeau, County Down
Orr, William William Orr
Ossian Ossian The Bard
Ossian, Poems of Ossianic Poetry
Otway, Rev. Caesar Rev. Caesar Otway
Partition of Ireland Partition in Practice (James Winder Good, 1922)
Pearse, Patrick (Poem by) Renunciation (By P. H. Pearse)
Peasantry, Irish The State of the (Irish) Peasantry
Peasantry, Irish The Habits and Character of the (Irish) Peasantry
Peat Fuel On a New Mode of Saving Turf or Peat Fuel (from Irish bogs)
Pedigrees, Irish (Contents Volume One) Contents page for Volume One of
Irish Pedigrees by John O'Hart
Penn, William William Penn
Penny Magazines Penny Magazines
Petrie, George George Petrie
Place-names Irish Local Names Explained
Plantation of Ulster The Plantation of Ulster
Plunket Arms The Plunket Coat of Arms
Pobble O'Keefe Pobble O'Keefe
Pol-A-Phuca Pol-A-Phuca Waterfall, County Wicklow
Poor Relief Pauperism: Poor Relief in Ireland - Some Suggestions
Population of Ireland Population of Ireland
Population of Ireland (2) Population of Ireland in 1831
Population, decrease of Irish Decrease of Population
Population, Loss of Ireland's Loss of Population
Portlester, Baron Lord Portlester's Chapel: St. Audeon's Church Dublin
Potatoes Potatoes
Poteen The Poteen
Press, Irish The Irish Press
Press, Irish-American The Irish-American Press
Printing and Publishing Printing and Publishing in Ireland (in the early
19th Century)
Prison, Black Dog (Dublin) The Dolocher (a legend of the Black Dog
Prison, Dublin)
Protestants, Irish The Establishment and the Irish Protestants
Proverbs Irish Proverbs
Proverbs of Ulster Rustic Proverbs Current in Ulster
Queen's College The Supplemental Charter
Railways in Ireland Railways in Ireland
Rathlin, a legend The Swan of the Rock: A Legend of Rathlin and Fairhead
Reaping Reaping
Rebellion 1641 The Rebellion of 1641
Rebellion of 1641 The Irish Rebellion of 1641-42
Rebellion of 1798 Ninety-Eight (The 1798 Rebellion in Ireland)
Religions, Early Irish Early Religions of the Irish
Republic, Oaths to The Three Oaths (to the Irish Republic, etc.)
Republic, Proclamation of the Irish Proclamation of the Irish Republic,
April 24th, 1916
Republican Brotherhood, Irish The Suppressed Informations
Republicanism, Irish Irish Republicanism
Resources of Ireland The Resources of Ireland
Rheban Castle Rheban Castle, County Kildare
Richhill, County Armagh Ulster Towns Directory 1910: Richhill, County
Armagh
Rocking Stones, Irish Irish Rocking Stones
Roden, Earl of Robert Jocelyn, Earl of Roden
Roman Trade Ancient Roman Intercourse with Ireland
Roscommon, Abbey and Castle of Roscommon Abbey and Castle
Roscommon, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Roscommon (1846)
Ross-Errily, abbey of The Abbey of Ross-Errily
Rostrevor, County Down Ulster Towns Directory 1910: Rostrevor, County
Down
Round Tower of Swords The Round Tower of Swords
Round Towers Round Tower Creed
Round Towers The Round Towers of Ireland
Royal College of Science The Royal College of Science for Ireland
Royal College of Surgeons, Dublin Royal College of Surgeons
Royal Dublin Society The Royal Dublin Society House, Kildare Street
Royal Irish Institution Picture Gallery of the Royal Irish Institution,
Dublin
Russell, Thomas Thomas Russell (and the 1798 Rebellion)
Saintfield, County Down Ulster Towns Directory 1910: Saintfield, County
Down
Salmon, Migration of (in Ireland) Migration of the Salmon in Ireland
Scarva, County Down Ulster Towns Directory 1910: Scarva, County Down
Scenery, Irish Irish Scenery
Schull, Famine in Famine in Schull, County Cork
Scotch-Irish in New England Scotch-Irish in New England
Scotch-Irish in Western Pennsylvania The Scotch-Irish in Western
Pennsylvania
Scotch-Irish of Carolina Scotch-Irish Settlers of South Carolina, and
Their Descendants in Maury County, Tennessee
Scotch-Irish of Tennessee Scotch-Irish of Tennessee
Scotch-Irish, Virginia The Scotch-Irish in Virginia
Scots, Ancient History of Letter from Charles O'Conor to John Pinkerton
(on the Ancient Scots and Picts)
Scott, Sir Walter Sir Walter Scott's Visit to Ireland
Seaforde, County Down Ulster Towns Directory 1910: Seaforde, County Down
Seal, story of a Remarkable Story of a Seal
Seals, Municipal On the Common Seals and Devices of the various
Municipal Bodies of Ireland (Newry, Drogheda, Carrickfergus)
Seefin Seefin and Its Environs, Historical and Picturesque
Seeoran, Lake of Sudden Disappearance of Two Lakes (County Mayo and
Cavan legends)
Sees, Irish Stuart Nomination to Irish Sees (1686-1766.)
Selskar Abbey Selskar Abbey, County Wexford
Serpents, Faith of Old Irish Religions: Serpent Faith
Shamrock The Shamrock, and other Sacred Plants
Shamrock, Wearing of Wearing the Shamrock and Wearing the Leek
Shannon, River The River Shannon
Sheares, Henry and John Henry and John Sheares (and the 1798 Rebellion)
Shercock, County Cavan Ulster Towns Directory 1910: Shercock, County
Cavan
Shrule, Bridge and Castle Bridge and Castle of Shruel (Shrule), County
Mayo, and the 1641 massacre
Sixmilecross, County Tyrone Ulster Towns Directory 1910: Sixmilecross,
County Tyrone
Slane Abbey Abbey of Slane, County Meath
Sligo, Abbey of Sligo Abbey
Sligo, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Sligo (1846)
Smoking, Antiquity of in Ireland The Antiquity of Smoking in Ireland
(the dudeen)
St. Colman, Legend of St. Colman's Ducks (County Wexford legend)
St. Doulough's Church, Dublin St. Doulough's Church, Dublin
St. George's Church, Dublin St. George's Church, Dublin
St. Lawrence, Armoric de Sir Armoric de St. Lawrence
St. Michan's Vaults The Vaults of St. Michan's, Dublin
Stanihurst, Richard Richard Stanihurst
Sterne, Laurence National Biography No.4: Laurence Sterne
Stone-Worship Old Irish Religions: Stone-Worship
Stranorlar, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Stranorlar, County
Donegal (1846)
Strongbow, Earl Earl Strongbow (Richard de Clare) in Ireland
Sun-Worship Old Irish Religions: Sun-Worship
Superstitions, Irish Old Irish Religions: Irish Superstitions
Surnames Irish Surnames Their Past and Present Forms
Surnames, Celtic Celtic Surnames
Swine Swine
Tara's Hall Tara's Hall
Tara, Hill of The Sacred Tara Hill, Howth Hill, and Ireland's Eye
Templars The Knights Templars (in Ireland)
Templecoran Templecoran Church, County Antrim
Tenant Right Ulster and its Danger
Terenure Terenure
Termon Magrath Castle Termon Magrath Castle
Theatre, Dublin A Retrospect of the Dublin Stage
Thomond Bridge Thomond Bridge, Limerick
Tone, Theobald Wolfe Theobald Wolfe Tone
Topographical Dictionary of Ireland A Topographical Dictionary of
Ireland
Torques Irish Antiquities
Treaty, Anglo-Irish Speech of Arthur Griffith in Dail Eireann on
December 19, 1921, in moving the Approval of the Treaty
Trinity College, Dublin History of the University of Dublin (Trinity
College)
Tully Castle Tully Castle
Tynan, Katharine Recent Irish Poetry
Tynan, Katharine Recent Irish Novels
Ulster Heroes Two Ulster Heroes in America: President Andrew Jackson and
General Sir Edward Pakenham by the Rev. George Hill
Union, Repeal of The History of To-day (Repeal of The Union)
Universities, Irish Irish Priests and Universities
University Education, Irish Early Phases of Irish University Education
University of Dublin The Monopolists of the University of Dublin
Urns, ancient Irish Ancient Irish Sepulchral Urns
Usher, James JAMES USHER (or Ussher), Archbishop of Armagh
Valuation of Ireland The Valuation of Ireland (Ordnance Survey)
Vineyards Cultivation of the Vine in the South of Ireland
Ware, Sir James Sir James Ware
Waterford Quay Quay of Waterford
Waterford, Famine in Irish Famine Report from Waterford, 1847
Wells Old Irish Religions: Well-Worship
Wells A Gossip at the Well
Wentworth, Sir Thomas Sir Thomas Wentworth in Ireland
Westmeath, Legend of A Steeple of Fire in the Air (County Westmeath
legend)
Wexford, Memorials of Memorials of Wexford
Whiskey, Irish Whiskey (Irish Whiskey)
Wills Probate of Wills and Letters of Administration
Wisdom Wise Sayings from the Irish
Witchcraft Witchcraft in Kilkenny
Witchcraft in Kilkenny Witchcraft in Kilkenny
Woodstock Woodstock Castle, County Kildare
Youghal, Collegiate Church of Collegiate Church of Youghal, County of
Cork
Youghal, Collegiate Church of Ancient Tombs in the Collegiate Church of
Youghal, County Cork
Youghal, Raleigh's House Walter Raleigh's House at Youghal, County Cork
Zoological Gardens, Dublin Dublin Zoological Gardens
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Insert:
Rev. James McGregor, one of the Londonderry emigrants, and their pastor
the last ten years of his life, gives the following reasons for their
removal to America: "1st. To avoid oppressive and cruel bondage. 2d. To
shun persecution and designed ruin. 3d. To withdraw from the communion
of idolaters. 4th. To have an opportunity of worshiping God according to
the dictates of conscience and the rules of his inspired Word."
Another small company under the guidance of Rev. James McGregor, who had
spent the previous winter at Dracut, Mass., engaged in teaching, left
that place, and, taking their line of travel up Beaver Brook, joined, by
previous arrangement, the Haverhill party near the southern shore of
Beaver Pond.
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