Celebration and Controversy in America: At Home with the Scots-Irish Diaspora

Abstract

The chapters in this book explore various perspectives on Ulster Protestant identity and in this chapter we look at a unique subset of this group, specifically those who migrated to America in the eighteenth century. They left on ships from ports such as Coleraine and Londonderry as early as 1718, over a hundred years before the main Irish Famine migration of the 1840s. On arrival in America they were known by several names, but here we will generally refer to them in modern nomenclature as the ‘Scots-Irish’ (see discussion below). In looking at these Ulster settlers we will discover that many of the same issues facing Ulster Protestants also relate to this group. For example, while many scholars recognise the impact and achievements of the Ulster settlers on the formation of the United States, any statements highlighting the remarkable achievements of this group (for example, they gave the USA at least 11 Presidents, several Vice Presidents, State Governors etc.) is swiftly countered by damning mention of their role in the slave trade or their involvement with the Ku Klux Klan. Much as modern mockery is given to claims of an ‘Ulster Protestant culture’, there are many, and for similar reasons, who do not want to see the Scots-Irish raised up and praised, because, quite simply, for some this is seen as setting up a competition with ‘the Irish’ in America, and carrying forward a negative and confrontational distinction between Ulster Protestants and unionists and Irish nationalists and Catholics.