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Nothing could be more
fitting than that a congress of Scotch-Irishmen should meet in this place
and amidst these surroundings. No spot on this continent testifies in more
emphatic terms of the characteristic virtues and fruitful achievements of
a race celebrated for character and achievement than does this city,
decided in its traits and marvelous in its growth and influence. In
substantial origin, in complexion and history, Pittsburg is Scotch-Irish —
Scotch-Irish in the countenances of its living and in the records of its
dead. Bustling and busy street, where traffic rules and living energies
elbow in the conflict of commerce, and the silent church-yard, with its
names of men that have gone, alike proclaim that the life which now is,
and that which preceded it, is and was the life of the North-of-Ireland
Scotchman— the man of Ulster.
Our ancestors knew the
waters that lave the Giant's Causeway, the outskirts of Derry, and the
quays of Belfast, but the Ulsterman also knew, and his history is linked
with, the Alleghany, Monongahela, and Ohio. His mark is on every soil that
bears witness to thrift and progress; the influence of his character on
every people where civilization has marched; the glory of his deeds, and
the flash of his genius on every page of history that testifies of heroism
and brightens the story of human progress. But he is peculiarly at home
here, on the spot where his pioneer courage conquered savage foe of man
and forest, and where his devotion to the principles of civil and
religious liberty find lasting monument. And yet, strange to say, there is
no such thing as a literature of Scotch-Irish achievement. Coming to the
pleasing task of addressing you on the proud history of our common
ancestry, and amidst many and laborious duties, pressed for time, I found
myself crippled for aid from any source in the utter lack of the gathered
materials of history. The long story of Puritan achievement is embalmed in
classic prose and stirring poetry; the cavalier has found immortal memory
in records many and eloquent, recounting his contributions to the world's
advance, but the sturdy race that has watered every historic field with
its blood, and -whose allegiance is bounded by no lines but those of
liberty, still lacks a historian.
Reference to, and praise of, its character,
its genius, its heroism, and its achievements are to be found on the pages
of many a history, but historian of its record as such, it has none. Plain
proof that in deeds and in action it has had no time to think of diary or
journal, and that its method of speech has been heroic—not by boast but by
result. May I not say for it that its motto has been that of my own class
in college, borrowed from an old Greek author, "ou logoisi all' ergoisi,"
not by words but by deeds.
But just here I catch the query of some
doubter, who says: "What boots it whence we came; are we not Americans,
all?" "Aye," let me answer, "that are we, so proven by a century of
devotion to the principles of American liberty; by our contribution to
their inception and embodiment in constitutional form; to their practical
establishment; to their maintenance and defense on all our battle-fields
of liberty, and by a conscientious and enthusiastic regard for their
present enforcement and their perpetual preservation."
But down deep in the nature of every true man,
as a practical part of his character, lies a substantial regard for the
blood of his ancestry, and underlying the courage and ambition of every
race is a religious respect for its history. Without such principle in
human nature we should have no memoirs like those of Grant and Sherman and
Sheridan; no historians like Hume, Macaulay, or Froude, or our own revered
Bancroft. The present finds its inspiration in the past, its zeal, its
poetry and sentiment, and its animating hope for the future.
Said the most finished of American orators,
Wendell Phillips: "Races love to be judged in two ways—by the great men
they produce, and by the average merit of the mass of the race. ... So
again there are three tests by which races love to be tried. The first,
the basis of all, is courage, the element which says here and to-day,
'this continent is mine, from the lakes to the gulf; let him beware who
seeks to divide it.' And the second is the recognition that force is
doubled by purpose; liberty regulated by law is the secret of Saxon
progress. And the third element is persistency, endurance; first a
purpose, then death or success."
Set aside race history and you make impossible
race judgment; you take away the incentive to race progress; you deprive
the future of achievements possible only as born of the heroic
consummation of the past. And at this point let me not be misunderstood.
He who stands highest in my regard, for whom I have Warmest praise, is not
the original Ulsterman, noble as he was, but his outcome—the American, the
consummate fruit and flower of the transplanted original seed, brought to
perfection under the influences of a hundred years of American history,
life, and experience.
In the art of photography, many faces, by the
proper manipulation of the camera, may be pictured as one, which is the
composite of the many. Features are toned down, characteristics modified,
a general result obtained; the ultimate concentration in one of the whole;
all the faces reduced, as it were, to a common denominator. That is the
American Scotch-Irishman of to-day.
The Scotchman is himself a man of composite
race. Long before the period when his transfer to Irish soil gave birth to
the term "Scotch-Irish," the blood of the Celt, the Saxon, and the Norman
had been mingled so as to run in the same veins. In his character were
combined the virtues and the failings of the various people from which he
had sprung. And humanity knows few virtues of which he was not the
legatee. Celtic daring and thrift, Saxon energy and enterprise—the pioneer
spirit—and Norman pride, all these with a Scotch environment of birth, an
Irish environment of hard experience, have ripened under the sun of
American enterprise and prosperity into the American Scotch-Irishman, who
to-day figures in every sphere where his characteristic virtues count, and
figures always well up to the front.
Prior to the accession to the throne of Great
Britain of James, the first of the Stuarts, Irish history is a record of
turbulence, riot, bloodshed and rebellion. But in the first decade of the
seventeenth century, the last serious attempt on the part of any
individual Irish chieftain to rise against the power of England took
place, and proved a failure. Following thereon, came the flight of the
rebels, the Earls of Tyrone and Tyrconnel, and the forfeiture to the crown
of all their estates. There thus passed into governmental control the
counties of the North of Ireland, which constitute the province of Ulster,
and comprise some eight hundred thousand acres. Here came the Scotchman,
as a colonist and pioneer, to possess this land, to till the soil and to
cultivate, not alone the seeds of annual crops, but his ideas, customs,
and institutions.
Here he came to better his condition, not because he was starving and a
laggard in the race at home, but because he had the ambition and the
enterprise to try a new hazard for a new result. It was the best of
Scotchmen that invaded Ulster, and they took with them the virtues that
moved them to the enterprise.
And here begins the history of the
Scotch-Irishman. I do not mean that the Scotch-Irishman originated here;
far from it. It was at this point only that he was baptized with a name.
The Scotch-Irishman, as we know him, was a growth. Let it be noted that
upon the part of the Scotchman who came to "Ulster there was no
assimilation with the native Irishman; no connection by marriage and
intermarriage; no conformity to local religion or custom ; no sympathy
with local tradition, history, or sentiment; nothing in fact to identify
him with Ireland but the accident of place. Scotland had moved over and
taken possession of Ulster, and Ulster had become, so far as nature would
permit, Scotland.
When the Scotchman went to Ulster he took with him his individuality and
his religion. He had ambition, grit, thrift, tenacity. He was a John Knox
Presbytorian. This made up his religious faith; his political faith
followed as a natural consequence. He believed in individual freedom. His
social unit was the family. Apart from personal characteristics he was
what the religion of John Knox made him. And, my countrymen, do you know
what that was? Standing here, with the gathered sheaves of a century of
republicanism, rich and strong, prosperous and happy, we are fain to
imagine that to our immediate fathers alone was given in charge the ark of
the covenant of liberty, and that they conceived the principles upon which
our government is founded! I say to you, nay. Across the gap of three
centuries of time hear the thunder of the grand old Scotchman, "who never
feared the face of clay," as he proclaims the principles of liberty. "The
authority of kings and princes," said he, "was originally derived from the
people; that the former are not superior to the latter, collectively
considered; that if rulers become tyrannical or employ their power for the
destruction of their subjects, they may be lawfully controlled, and
proving incorrigible may be deposed by the community as the superior
power; and that tyrants may be judicially proceeded against even to a
capital punishment."
Surely startling words and audacious sentiment for Scotland in the
sixteenth century! Seeds sown at St. Giles to bear fruit at Whitehall and
fruit still more abundant across the sea. A hundred years stretch between
them and Charles discrowned and beheaded. They precede by still longer
space that revolution which, in 1688, declared the trusteeship of royalty
and the dominant rights of the beneficiary. Gathering force with years,
these words echo and re-echo from Octarara, from Mecklenburg, from the
valley of Virginia, and from old Independence Hall at Philadelphia. From
the midst of an assemblage, many of whom were Scotch-Irishmen, they burst
into a shout heard round the world, the prelude to the march of armed men,
consecrated to their establishment as the framework of a government of the
people. Plain axioms
of political truth to-day, they have been blood-bought, as has every human
right wrested from the hand of power, from that morning, when blood was
found on the door-posts of Egypt, down to the hour when the last drop was
shed on the battle-fields of our own civil war.
It is not my purpose to rehearse the story of
the Scotchman in Ulster.
His discipline there was that of industry—the
labor necessary with thrift to make a comfortable home; of good morals,
exercised in planting the school and providing for the education of his
children; of persecution and repression in maintaining his religion in the
face of test-oaths and despotic law. His growth was in the line of his
discipline, and thus his virtues were perpetuated, strengthened,
magnified. His courage, loftiness of purpose, his persistency, endurance,
are they not written where all the world may see them in the splendid
heroism of Londonderry and in the red storm of the battle of Boyne Water?
In the providence of God a richer heritage
awaited him across the sea; more fertile fields, with richer returns for
his labor; a wider sphere for the growth and exercises of his virtues; a
broader plane for his heroism, and more magnificent opportunities for his
children. And so the
Scotch-Irishman came to America. "The first great migration from Ulster to
Pennsylvania—and it was to Pennsylvania that nearly all the immigrants
came prior to the Revolution—was from 1717 to 1750. At this time, under
the benign sway of the toleration act of 1689, religious persecutions had
ceased in Great Britain, or at least had become tempered down into
annoying hindrances and exactions. But the long leases which landholders
had granted upon the original colonization had expired, and they took
advantage of the prosperity which had attended the labors of the colonists
and their descendants to advance the rents to such high figures as to be
ruinous to many of the tenantry, and burdensome to all. Having heard of
the better land across the sea, where they could be their own landlords,
where tithes were unknown and taxes light, they at once determined to seek
new homes there. And thither they went." (Judge Veech, "Secular History.")
According to one authority (Proud's History of
Pennsylvania), up to 1729, six thousand Scotch-Irish had come, and for
several years prior to 1750, about twelve thousand arrived annually. In
September, 1736, one thousand families sailed for the Delaware from
Belfast alone.
The second great migration
from Ulster occurred between 1771 and 1773.
"The cause of this extensive emigration was
somewhat similar to that of the first. It was well known that a great
portion of the lands in Ireland are owned by a comparatively small number
of proprietors, who rent them to the farming classes on long leases. In
1771 the leases on an estate in the county of Antrim—the property of the
Marquis of Donegal—having expired, the rents were so largely advanced that
many of the tenants could not comply with the demands, and were deprived
of the farms they had occupied. Thence arose a general spirit of
resentment to the oppressions of the large landed proprietors, and an
immediate and extensive emigration to America was the result. From 1771 to
1773 there sailed from the ports of the North of Ireland one hundred
vessels carrying as many as twenty-five thousand passengers—all
Presbyterians. This was shortly before the breaking out of the
Revolutionary war; and these people, leaving the Old World in such a
temper, became a powerful contribution to the cause of liberty and to the
separation of the colonies from the mother country.
"These Scotch-Irish emigrants landed
principally at New Castle and Philadelphia, and found their way northward
and westward into the eastern and middle counties of Pennsylvania. From
thence one stream followed the great Cumberland Valley into Virginia and
North Carolina. Another powerful body went into Western Pennsylvania, and
settling on the head waters of the Ohio became famous both in civil and
ecclesiastical history, and have given to the region around Pittsburg the
name it so well deserves of being the backbone of Presbyterianism." (J.
Smith Futhey's Historical Discourse.)
The gravitation of the Scotch-Irishman to
America finds its explanation in the traits of his character and in his
ingrained love of liberty. He always wants the best of every thing; he has
that self-confidence which begets the belief that he can get the best of
every thing if he tries; he has the courage to try, the perseverance which
make success the outcome of pursuit, and hence he is the ideal pioneer.
His gravitation to Pennsylvania finds its
explanation in a variety of circumstances. Her fertile soil tempted his
occupancy, for he was an agriculturist. He was clannish. His first love
was for family, his next for his neighbors, and Pennsylvania offered room
for the building of communities. He loved adventure; in Pennsylvania the
savage and the white man still faced each other. But, above all, he was
devoted to the principles of civil and religious freedom, and no other
province offered to him such mild, just, and liberal laws as did the
province of the Quaker Penn.
Turning now for a rapid glance at the history
of Western Pennsylvania, how picturesque it is! Claimed first by England,
her claim was disputed by France, which coveted and meant to have a
territory connecting her Canadian and Louisiana possessions; and so it
came about that in this very place where we now are ensued the struggle
between France and England for the mastery of this Western continent. Here
on this spot, at the junction of these rivers, French arms planted and
defended Fort Duquesne, and not far off is the battle field where English
pretenses went down for the time with the bloody defeat of Braddock.
On yonder hill, with its stately pile, where
justice is judicially administered, fell many a gallant Scotchman
following his gallant Scotch leader, Grant.
And here again, within a
stone's throw of where I stand, the banner of St. George was planted by
the hand of Forbes above the lilies of France, and Fort Pitt erected, so
named in honor of the immortal Chatham, whose genius at a critical time
saved to England her western possessions.
Listen to Mr. Bancroft's description of the
fall of Duquesne (History of the U. S., Vol. IV, p. 313):
' On the 25th of November the youthful hero
(Washington) could point out to the army the junction of the rivers, and
entering the fortress they planted the British flag on the deserted ruins.
As the banners of England floated over the Ohio, the place was with one
voice, named Pittsburg. It is the most enduring trophy of the glory of
William Pitt. America afterwards raised to his name statues that have been
wrongfully broken, and granite monuments of which not one stone remains
upon another; but long as the Monongahela and the Alleghany shall flow to
form the Ohio—long as the English tongue shall be the language of freedom
in the boundless valley which these waters traverse, his name shall stand
inscribed on the gateway of the West."
Following the struggle for this territory
between France and England came the long and vexatious contest as to
boundary lines between Pennsylvania and Virginia. And then came the
Revolution and Indian warfare and the whisky insurrection. Very plain is
it that in so far as he was party to Western Pennsylvania's history, the
Scotch-Irish immigrant had opportunities for the exercise of all his
virtues, and trials sufficient to test all his endurance.
Prior to 1700 it is said that no Englishman or
Frenchman had trodden the shores of the Monongahela, Alleghany, or Ohio.
As early as 1715 or 1720, a few traders ventured west of the Alleghanies,
but the first serious attempt at settlement was the formation of the Ohio
Company in 1748. This was a Virginia enterprise, at the head of which were
Thomas Lee, Lawrence and Augustine Washington, and its purpose was to
settle this western territory and carry on trade with the Indians. A grant
was made by the crown to the company of five hundred thousand acres of
land south of the Monongahela, and the great Kanawha, with the further
privilege of locating also north of that river. Our present interest in
this company consists in these facts, which I quote from "Old Bedstone"
(page 23): ' Mr.
Lawrence Washington, upon whom fell the chief management of the affairs of
this company after the death of Mr. Lee, conceived the very plausible plan
of inviting the 'Pennsylvania Dutch,' and their brethren from Germany to
colonize this region. Their only objection was the parish taxes they would
have to pay to support the Episcopal Church. Mr. Washington exerted
himself to get this difficulty removed ; but high church Episcopacy was
too strong for him, and so his scheme failed, and a large portion of
Western Pennsylvania and Virginia was kept open for a different
race—mainly for Scotch-Irish Presbyterians. Thus the intolerant Episcopal
establishment of Virginia was overruled by the purpose and providence of
God, to conttribute unwittingly to provide a home for many of our fathers;
or, rather, keep open for them such a home. Mr. Washington, in a letter to
Mr. Hanbury, of London, wrote: 'I conversed with all the Pennsylvania
Dutch whom I met, and much recommended their settling. The chief reason
against it was the payment of an English clergyman, whom few understood,
and none made use of him. It has been my opinion, and I hope ever will be,
that restraints on conscience are cruel, in regard to those on whom they
are imposed, and injurious to the country imposing them. England, Holland,
and Prussia, I may quote as examples, and much more Pennsylvania, which
has flourished under that delightful liberty, so as to become the
admiration of every man who considers the short time it has been
settled.'" Following the attempts of the Ohio Company at colonization came
Braddock's defeat. Passing over the consequent period of French
domination, and coming to that of British supremacy again, we find that
there were obstacles still standing in the way of the settlement of
Western Pennsylvania. There were Indian hostility, the question as to
Indian titles, and the controversy between Pennsylvania and Virginia as to
the boundary line between them, the real bone of contention being the
possession of Fort Pitt.
Who does not know the thrilling story of the
conspiracy of Pontiac; that veritable Napoleon of the redmen? And how it
failed, so far as Fort Pitt was concerned? And how, following thereupon,
the settlers resumed their labors and extended their improvements? From
this time forward the march of civilization continued in spite of the
obstacles to which I have already referred, and of which I must again make
mention. The first
town of Pittsburg, built in 1760, and having some 250 inhabitants, was
destroyed in Pontiac's war; but a new town was laid out in 1765.
In that and in the following year, settlements
were made at Redstone and Turkey Foot. From 1760 to 1770 settlements were
rapidly made in various places throughout Western Pennsylvania and
Virginia. A considerable number of emigrants, soon after 1767, settled on
the Youghiogheny, the Monongahela and its tributaries, and in the year
1770-1771, many of the Scotch-Irish from Bedford and York counties, from
the Kittatinny Valley, from Virginia, and some directly from the North of
Ireland, commenced settlements in Washington county. The settlements soon
extended from the Monongahela to the Ohio River. (Old Redstone, p. 30).
From this time forward Western Pennsylvania was, for a long time at least,
characteristically Scotch-Irish.
Mark, now, as significant of Scotch-Irish
character, what was involved in the journey to Western Pennsylvania, in
the conditions then existing there, and in the results that followed upon
its settlement. Two
routes connected Western Pennsylvania with the east; one, Braddock's road,
which led over the mountains from Will's Creek, and the other, that made
by General Forbes's army. Both of them were mountain roads, with all that
that term implies, although some money and care had been spent on the
Braddock route. The
relinquishment of homes already established east of the mountains, and the
penetration of the western wilderness over these roads, the inconveniences
to men, women, and children, with the carriage of household goods ; the
perils of the way from savage beast and still more savage man, illustrate,
in the most emphatic way, those traits of Scotch-Irish character, with
which we have already become acquainted. To the pioneer vision cheap lands
and civil and religious freedom lay beyond the Alleghanies, and therefore
westward his star of empire took its way.
The condition of things in Western
Pennsylvania that confronted the hardy and adventurous immigrants was bad
enough. It was the boast of the Penns that the lands of the Indian should
not be interfered with until his title had been first acquired. No
acquisition of the Indian title to many of the lands taken possession of
by these new-settlers was acquired until by treaty at Fort Pitt in the
spring of 1768, and finally by a treaty in the fall of the same year at
Fort Stanwix. Prior to this time the settlers were harrassed by
proclamations from the. governors of Pennsylvania and Virginia warning
them off their lands, and by the passage of a law by the Pennsylvania
Assembly (1768), punishing "with death without the benefit of clergy" all
who disobeyed the warning. Following the treaty of Fort Stanwix, the Penns
opened their land office in Philadelphia (April 3, 1769), and thereafter
immigrants arrived in large numbers to Western Pennsylvania and Virginia.
But a difficulty still remained threatening
the peace and progress of these parts; a difficulty which forms a
prominent feature and had an important influence in many ways on our local
history—the controversy between Virginia and Pennsylvania as to boundary
lines. Let me try,
briefly, to state it.
In 1681, Charles II granted to William Penn
the province of Pennsylvania, with the Delaware River as its eastern
boundary line, and a western boundary line to be five degrees in
longitude, computed from the eastern. How much of uncertainty there is in
the term "five degrees in longitude " from the windings of a river will be
apparent to the most unobservant.
But, seventy-five years before (1606), James
the First had granted to the London and Plymouth Company the privilege of
making two settlements on any part of the coast of America between the
34th and 35th degrees of north latitude, and under this grant a settlement
had been made at Jamestown; and three years later (1609) he had enlarged
the grant so as to call for a water front 200 miles northward and 200
miles southward from Point Comfort "and all that space and circuit of land
lying from the sea coast of the precinct aforesaid, up into the land
throughout from sea to sea, west and northwest."
True, thereafter (1623), by writ from the
Court of Kings Bench, this company was dissolved and the lands reverted to
the crown; but the grant itself was claimed to have been an assertion of
title to lands included in the subsequent grant to Penn.
In 1632, Charles the First granted to Lord
Baltimore the territory of Maryland, which encroached on the Virginia
grant and was claimed also to be interfered with by the grant to Penn.
It is apparent, therefore, that the Penn's had
two controversies on hand, one as to their boundary with Maryland and the
other as to the Virginia boundary.
With respect to the Maryland line it is
sufficient, so far as our present purpose goes, to say, that the
controversy was substantially ended in 1768, and that thereafter the
boundaries fixed by two English surveyors, Mason and Dixon—historic names,
as they figure in all our subsequent history—marked the settlement of the
controversy. The
Virginia dispute, however, went on until 1780, when terms were finally
agreed upon, and in accordance therewith Mason and Dixon's line extended
became the southern boundary of Pennsylvania.
In the meantime, however, pending this settlement, all this western region
was substantially without law, and called for the daily exercise of the
voluntary virtues of good citizenship. No man knew what title he had to
his home, or whether he had any. Up until March, 1771, the western country
was within the jurisdiction of Cumberland county, and the Alleghany peaks
intervened between the citizen and his court of judicature. How much such
court amounted to it needs no expert in human nature to say. In 1771
Bedford county was created, so as to cover the western country, but
without relief to the legal situation. The mountains still stood between
the litigant and justice to be judicially administered. In 1773
Westmoreland county was created and courts established at Hannastown, but
the jurisdiction of this court was disputed by armed force from Virginia,
and riot and confusion, not judicial action, was the result.
I am trying to avoid details; neither your
patience nor mine will endure them at this time. My simple purpose is to
picture, if I can, the difficulties that interfered with the peace, order,
good morals and civil government of a society composed in largest part of
Scotch-Irish immigrants.
In such a chaos of government, especially in a
rude community where up to this time law had never yet been asserted in
its majesty, the common weal must, depend on the assertion of individual
character, and find its only bulwark in public opinion. Public opinion
under such circumstances assumes the force of law—and public opinion is
but the aggregate of individual views. Indeed, where public opinion and
the law are synonymous terms the law is a superfluity—and law without the
buttress of public opinion is practically a nullity. And when I announce,
what is the fact, that in this Scotch-Irish settlement west of the
mountains, while courts were beyond reach and no law capable of execution
existed, the community dwelt in security—the rights of man were respected,
good morals observed, and peace prevailed, I am simply pronouncing a
eulogy on the character and virtues of the men and women whose allegiance
to the precepts of religion and to the principles of individual right made
them a marked and superior race. Such men and women were the Scotch-Irish
of Western Pennsylvania during all the period of which I speak, and down
to the time when the outbreak of the Revolution gave them other things to
think •of than land titles and state boundary lines.
The first gun fired at Lexington in man's new
crusade for the rights of man found echoing answer at the western
foot-hills of the Alleghanies. It woke the spirit of the slumbering old
Presbyterian, John Knox, and was answered by the heirs of his faith and
courage. The fiery eloquence of Scotch-Irish Patrick Henry set aflame the
hills and valleys of Virginia. The less gifted tongues, but no less
enthusiastic purpose, of the pioneers of Western Pennsylvania, responded
in kind. Leaving field, cabin, and workshop, they came together at
Hannastown, their court-house seat, and first having recited the wrongs
inflicted upon the inhabitants of Massachusetts Bay, they unanimously
resolved: "It is
therefore become the indispensable duty of every American, of every man
who has any public virtue or love of his country, or any bowels for
posterity, by every means which God has put in his power, to resist and
oppose the execution of it; that for us, we will be ready to oppose it
with our lives and our fortunes." And then, with that practical sense
which belongs to the race, they added:
"We will immediately form ourselves into a
military body, to be made of companies, to be made up out of the several
townships under the following association, etc."
And like proceedings were taken at Pittsburg,
then claimed to be in Augusta county, Virginia. Nay, more. I may add that
like proceedings were had and a like spirit prevailed wherever there was a
Scotch-Irish settlement in the colonies; for Mr. Bancroft says: "The first
public voice in America for dissolving all connection with Great Britain
came, not from the Puritans of New England, the Dutch of New York, nor the
planters of Virginia, but from Scotch-Irish Presbyterians."
St. Giles, Whitehall, Londonderry, William of
Orange, Lexington, Hannastown—are they not all chapters in the same
history of man's growth, through struggle, to governmental manhood?
The relation of Western Pennsylvania to the
War of the Revolution was peculiar, and her trials many and harrassing. No
fear was entertained of British soldiers from the east, hut west of Fort
Pitt the English held Detroit and the Illinois country, and between
swarmed savage foes, many of them in the service of English gold.
The rallying point of defense and attack was
Fort Pitt, which played quite as important a part in the war for colonial
independence as had Fort Duquesne in the French War. The story of Western
Pennsylvania's part in the Revolution is one of blood and hardship in many
chapters, each of which is but a repetition of the preceding. Garrisons
lacking supplies, expeditions well planned against the Indians and the
British, but somehow failing of effect, discouragements of all kinds—all
these were frequent, and murders by savages of daily occurrence. Says Dr.
Laming ("History of Alleghany County"), speaking of Indian raids: "The
repetition of these raids, although varying more or less according to
circumstances, was the every-day expectation of the Western population,
and the mere recital of them became monotonous. The population around
Forbes's road, in the Monongahela Valley, in the immediate vicinity of
Pittsburg, and generally throughout the south-western part of the state,
had by this time become considerable. But the draft that was made on them
for the war with England, for the garrisoning of the local forts and
blockhouses, for the various expeditions into the enemy's country, and for
the defense of their own homes, left them little time for the care of
their farms. Yet at no time in the history of the state did this require
greater labor; for although the soil was as yet rich and required little
cultivation, the forests had to be cleared and inclosed, the ground in
most cases to be broken up with strong teams, which were not at the
command of every one, and when under cultivation it required constant
watching to prevent wild animals, such as deer, bear, raccoons, etc., from
destroying large portions of the crop. The life of the frontiersman was
one of great hardship, and though it bred a hardy race, it frequently
taxed them beyond the powers of endurance. The women, too, required
courage equally with the men, for it frequently happened that for weeks
they were left alone with their families in a little 'patch' in the
forests, far from all human succor, and liable at any moment to hear the
war-whoop of the savage, or discover him lurking around the premises,
ready to fall upon his victim."
So far as the connection of Western
Pennsylvanians with the Revolution is concerned, it is wholly lacking in
the romance, "the pomp and circumstance," of glorious war. But Western
warfare was such as to demand upon the part of the colonists just the kind
of fighting material to be found in the Scotch-Irishman, with his peculiar
sturdiness of character and no lack of aversion to fight when he believed
in the justice of his cause; and the fact that this race all along our
borders stood with their faces westward, a cordon between the settled
portion of the country and its savage foes, may be regarded as
providential. Time
will not admit of my saying any thing at length with respect to the Whisky
Insurrection, an episode of note in Western Pennsylvania history.
Prominent actors therein, both on the side of the accused insurrectionists
and on the side of the government, are on record, and their respective
stories are not altogether reconcilable. In the mean between the two
probably lies the truth. Following the establishment of the national
government and the adoption of Hamilton's scheme for the assumption of the
state debt, came the necessity for the raising of national funds in excess
of those receivable from duties upon imports. Hence an excise tax was
levied upon the products of the still. This tax met opposition in "Western
Pennsylvania for several reasons.
An excise tax is per se odious amongst all
people and at all times. This is the verdict of our own history. That of
1791 was specially odious to the people west of the mountains, because,
without a home market for the product of their fields, it was, as they
regarded, absolutely essential to their existence that they should turn
their grain into portable form in the shape of whisky. Hence the excise
was to them an exceedingly burdensome tax, and was at the same time
unequal, in the comparison between them and the great body of the people
not similarly situated.
It represented to the Scotch-Irishman
traditional oppression. "They remembered, or their fathers had told them,
of the exactions and oppressions in the old country under the excise
laws—that their domiciles were entered by excise officers, their most
private apartments were examined, and that confiscations and imprisonments
followed if the smallest quantity of whisky was discovered not marked with
the official brand. When they saw the inspector going round with his
measuring rod, gauging their barrels and their stills and writing the
result in his book, they imagined that the same scenes were to be acted
over again in the wilds of America that their fathers had witnessed in the
old country. To these people no other tax of equal amount would have been
half so odious."—Dr. Carnahan on the Pennsylvania Insurrection, N. J.
Historical Society, vol. VI, 119.
Under these circumstances and in this state of
public sentiment the wild spirits which exist in every community, and
which we know existed in that, set in motion disorderly proceedings,
which, looked upon at first by the intelligent of the community with
passive indifference, grew to such volume as to involve, more or less, the
lovers of law and good order themselves in the verdict of condemnation
which followed. Dr.
Carnahan, a Presbyterian minister, from whom I have already quoted, says:
"At first good men stood aloof, remained at home and attended to their
business, except when taken by force and compelled to assist in erecting
liberty poles and to be present at public gatherings. After the outrages
were committed they were restrained by prudence or timidity from making
known their real sentiments. My own opinion is, that if, when the fury was
at its height, the people of the western counties could have expressed
their opinions by secret ballot, a large majority would have been against
these unlawful proceedings. This opinion, we think, is confirmed by the
fact that in October following, before the fury had subsided, Albert
Gallatin, although he did not reside within the district, was elected a
member of Congress to represent the counties of Washington and Alleghany.
Gallatin was a conservative, opposed to mob law."
So that upon the whole, looking back from this
distance of time, while we may regret that there was any such episode in
our history, we fail to find in it any thing not capable of ready excuse
upon the part of the Scotch-Irish of Western Pennsylvania; the men ''who
brought to the New World the creed, the spirit of resistance and the
courage of the Covenanter."
Since the Whisky Insurrection nothing has
occurred to make Western Pennsylvania's history especially conspicuous.
Among many elements gradually intermingling to produce our present state,
the Scotch-Irishman still abides. The truth is that his history here is
largely the history of Presbyterianism, and that in this community its
marks are plainly to be seen. The sturdy men who molded the public opinion
of our early days, who lighted the fires of patriotism, contributed to
social order, laid the foundations of our commercial and industrial
greatness, founded churches, schools, and universities, were the pioneer
preachers of the Presbyterian Church. Their names are household words in
this community; their memories fragrant. Beatty and Finley, Power, Dodd,
McMillan, Smith and Dr. Herron, Black and Bruce, not to mention others—all
these were strong men, earnest men, masterful men, and their influence yet
remains. In the line
of their teachings, as the result of their labors, directly and
indirectly, a sound system of education has been built up and prevails.
Not to speak of sectarian efforts, the Western University, Washington and
Jefferson Colleges, and kindred institutions, are monuments to their
usefulness. And from these schools have gone forth, from time to time, men
of mark, who in public and in private life have left their impress on
their neighborhood and time.
The sterling qualities of the pioneers are
visible to-day on every hand in this western country. Spreading toward
sunset, their sons have carried the cause of civilization even to the
Pacific coast. The results of their thrift and enterprise surround us on
every hand and call us to witness how great is the debt of gratitude that
is justly their due.
I would not be understood as claiming for them exclusively the glory of
our present prosperity—only a share, but a large one. Other streams, and
many, have combined to make the current on whose magnificent sweep we are
carried. The crowning glory of American character is that it is composite;
it is the result of a happy assimilation, the fruit ripened in the air of
a freedom which rests in the recognition of individual right.
And I believe, furthermore, that the men of
to-day are better than the men of the earlier day, as the civilization of
to-day is an advance upon theirs.
But I affirm that the Scotch-Irishman, whether
of the earlier or the later day, may fearlessly meet the test by which
races love to be judged.
The great men of the race—I do not stop to
name them—have lent luster to the bench and the bar, to medicine, to
theology, to the halls of Congress, and to executive place.
In the hot blast of battle they have never
been wanting when right was at stake.
To the average mass in any community they add
the leaven of their character. Men of no special fame, but full up to the
measure of their task, as cultivators of the field, mechanics, merchants,
they are useful citizens; law-abiding, liberty-loving, God-fearing,
educators of their children; and so long as they remain true to the
ancient land-marks the republic shall be safe.
And so I affirm, also, that you may try the
Scotch-Irishman by the tests by which races love to be tried.
In courage he will measure to the full stature
of a loyal manhood. Nothing of physical hardship can stay his progress
toward better things any more now than it could when he invaded Ulster, or
crossed uncertain seas to face the savage in Western wilds. In the forward
march of civilization to win new conquests he has ever been found leading
the van. His is a
force doubled by purpose. He has ever carried with him the articles of his
belief; he is loyal to the traditions of his history, and after his banner
follow both minister and schoolmaster. There are no doctrines set down in
his curriculum that do not run parallel with the rights of man.
I never think of him that I do not recall the
figure of that grand old man, John Witherspoon, Presbyterian clergyman and
Pennsylvania statesman, in the convention at Philadelphia, when, in the
enthusiasm of his convictions, he said of the Declaration of Independence:
"That noble instrument on your table, which
secures immortality to its author, should be subscribed this very morning
by every pen in this house. He who will not respond to its accents, and
strain every nerve to carry into effect its provisions, is unworthy the
name of a freeman. Although these gray hairs must descend into the
sepulcher, I would infinitely rather they would descend thither by the
hand of the public executioner, than desert at this crisis the sacred
cause of my country."
As to persistency, endurance; first, a
purpose, then death or success. Tell me if the Scotch-Irishman's story in
Western Pennsylvania does not proclaim this as the shibboleth of his
faith? My countrymen,
this is Decoration Day. In the glad sunshine of peace, under summer skies,
and amid the fragrance of flowers, a grateful people is covering, with its
tokens of love and affection, the graves of its patriot dead. Neath the
blossom-strewn turf the "bones are dust, the good swords rust, but the
souls with God, we trust," and the tribute is to honest purpose, high
resolve, and the courage to dare and do for the right, as to each man it
was given to see the right.
On many a battle-field of the civil war, men
faced each other who were sons of the Scotch-Irish immigrants to
Pennsylvania, inheritors of a common history and sharers of its glory.
Borne apart by the accident of fortune, the Scotch-Irishman of the South,
rallying to the support of the Stars and Bars, met the Scotch-Irishman of
Pennsylvania following the Stars and Stripes. In conflict, deadly,
desperate, hand-to-hand, the iron blood of Irish Scotland met its kind,
and men died as their fathers would have had them die. For some the ebbing
tide of life crimsoned the gray, for some the blue. But under either flag
death only added new proof to the verdict of history, that for the
peerless courage that men honor and women love, America owes a meed of
pride for her Scotch-Irish sons.
And now, when the war-drums throb no longer,
and the battle-flags are furled, remembering the race from which we came
only as an inspiration, let us be Americans all, to work out, as I verily
believe God intended we should, the grandest destiny vouchsafed to any
people. |
