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HISTORY The Scots-Irish are descendants of the Ulster Scots immigrants who travelled to North America from Northern Ireland in the late 17th and 18th centuries. Historically they had settled the major part of Ulster province in northern Ireland. Most had previously lived in Scotland , usually in the Lowlands and Scottish Border Country. The recent "Celtic Thesis" of Forrest McDonald and Grady McWhiney denies the history of their descent from Northumbria ns of the Scottish Border Country and northern England; instead these authors maintain that they were basically Celtic (as opposed to Anglo-Saxon ), and that all Celtic groups ( Scots Irish , Scottish , Welsh and others) were warlike herdsmen, in contrast to the peaceful farmers who predominated in England . Ulster-Scots traditionally were (and are) devout Protestants , loyal to the British Monarch , and eschew the label "Irish" that associates them with their Catholic Irish neighbours. Author James H. Webb uses this thesis in his book ''Born Fighting'' to suggest that the character traits of the Scots-Irish; loyalty to kin, mistrust of governmental authority, and military readiness, helped shape the American identity. Once settled as the dominant group in their section of Ireland, many of the Scots-Irish suffered under the Penal Laws in Ireland, which discriminated against them because of their Presbyterian or other Dissenting forms of Protestantism, and aggravated their historical grievances against England . This alleged anti-English sentiment may have encouraged some to join the Patriotic Cause , though most in the Carolinas were Loyalists . Some historians suggest that their experience in Ulster of being a colonial minority surrounded by a hostile Catholic population, prepared them for life on America's frontier facing the Indians. The Scotch-Irish celebrated their military victories over the Irish Catholics, which had saved their community from annihilation. Of special symbolic importance was the Battle Of The Boyne . The migration from the lowlands and the border country to Ulster occurred largely during the 17th and 18th centuries with the enforcement of Queen Anne's 1703 Test Act (as detailed in the article History Of Scotland and Plantations Of Ireland ). In Ulster however, considerable numbers of Ulster-Scots migrated to the North America n colonies throughout the 18th Century (250,000 settled in the USA between 1717 and 1770 alone). According to Kerby Miller, ''Emigrants and Exiles: Ireland and the Irish Exodus to North America'' (1988), Protestants were one-third the population of Ireland, but three-quarters of all emigrants from 1700 to 1776; 70% of these Protestants were Presbyterians. Other factors contributing to the mass exodus of Ulster Scots to America during the 18th century were a series of droughts and rising rents imposed by English landlords. Finding the coast already heavily settled, most groups of the settlers from Northern Ireland went up into the "western mountains", where their descendants populated the Appalachian regions and the Ohio Valley. Others settled in northern New England , The Carolinas , Georgia and north-central Nova Scotia . In the 2000 US Census, 4.3 million Americans (more than 2% of the white population in the USA) claimed Scots-Irish ancestry, though estimates suggest that the true number of Scots-Irish in the USA is more in the region of 27 million. {Link without Title} Many American Presidents have ancestral links to Ulster, including three whose parents were born in Ulster. Several hundred thousand descendants of settlers from Ulster also live in Canada today. See Orange Order section on The Orange Order in Canada. The Irish Protestant vote in the U.S. has not been studied nearly as much as have the Catholic Irish. (On the Catholic vote see Irish Americans ). In the 1820s and 1830s supporters of Andrew Jackson emphasized his Irish background, as did James Knox Polk , but since the 1840s it has been uncommon for a Protestant politician in America to be identified as Irish, but rather as 'Scots-Irish'. In Canada, by contrast, Irish Protestants remained a cohesive political force well into the 20th century, identified with the Conservative Party Of Canada (historical) and especially with the Orange Order , although this is less evident in today's politics. MORE ON THE TERM SCOTCH-IRISH "Scotch-Irish" is also standard English and the most common term for "Scots-Irish" in North America. It has been used since settlement to describe descendents of Protestant s from the Border Country of England and Scotland that first migrated to Ulster and later settled in North America throughout the eighteenth century. Other names, including " Northern Irish " or "Irish Presbyterians", can also describe these people. There are references to "Scotch-Irish" as early as 1730, and the term was probably first used to distinguish the Ulster-Scots from either Irish Anglican s, Irish Catholics, or immigrants who came directly from Scotland. The word " Scotch " was the favoured Adjective as a designation—it literally means "''...of Scotland''". People in Scotland refer to themselves as Scots or as being Scottish . NOTABLE AMERICANS OF SCOTS-IRISH DESCENT
AMERICAN PRESIDENTS FROM SCOTS-IRISH DESCENT More than one-third of all US Presidents had their ancestral origins in the northern province of Ireland (Ulster). President Bill Clinton spoke proudly of that fact, and his own ancestral links with the province, during his two visits to Ulster. Clinton is one of at least 17 Chief Executives descended from emigrants to the United States from the north of Ireland. While many of the Presidents have typically Ulster-Scots surnames - Jackson, Johnson, McKinley, Wilson - others, such as Bush, Roosevelt and Cleveland, have links which are less obvious. Andrew Jackson 7th President, 1829-37: He was born in the predominantly Ulster-Scots Waxshaws area of South Carolina two years after his parents left Boneybefore , near Carrickfergus in County Antrim . A heritage centre in the village pays tribute to the legacy of 'Old Hickory', the People's President. James Knox Polk 11th President, 1845-49: His ancestors were among the first Ulster-Scots settlers, emigrating from Coleraine in 1680 to become a powerful political family in Mecklenberg County, North Carolina . He moved to Tennessee and became its Governor before winning the Presidency. James Buchanan 15th President, 1857-61: Born in a log-cabin (which has been relocated to his old school in , near Omagh in County Tyrone where the ancestral home still stands. Andrew Johnson 17th President, 1865-69: His grandfather left Mounthill , near Larne in County Antrim around 1750 and settled in North Carolina . Andrew worked there as a tailor and ran a successful business in Greeneville, Tennessee , before being elected Vice-President. He became President following Abraham Lincoln's assassination. Ulysses Simpson Grant 18th President, 1869-77: The home of his maternal great-grandfather, John Simpson, at Dergenagh , County Tyrone , is the location for an exhibition on the eventful life of the victorious Civil War commander who served two terms as President. Grant visited his ancestral homeland in 1878 . Chester Alan Arthur 21st President, 1881-85: His election was the start of a quarter-century in which the White House was occupied by men of Ulster-Scots origins. His family left Dreen , near Cullybackey , County Antrim , in 1815 . There is now an interpretive centre, alongside the Arthur Ancestral Home, devoted to his life and times. Grover Cleveland 22nd and 24th President, 1885-89 and 1893-97: Born in New Jersey , he was the maternal grandson of merchant Abner Neal, who emigrated from County Antrim in the 1790s . He is the only President to have served two terms with a break between. Benjamin Harrison 23rd President, 1889-93: His mother, Elizabeth Irwin, had Ulster-Scots roots through her two great-grandfathers, James Irwin and William McDowell. Harrison was born in Ohio and served as a Brigadier General in the Union Army before embarking on a career in Indiana politics which led to the White House. William McKinley 25th President, 1897-1901: Born in Ohio , the descendant of a farmer from Conagher , near Ballymoney , County Antrim , he was proud of his ancestry and addressed one of the national Scotch-Irish Congresses held in the late 19th Century . His second term as President was cut short by an assassin's bullet. Theodore Roosevelt 26th President, 1901-04: His mother, Martha Bulloch , had Ulster Scots ancestors who emigrated from Glenoe , County Antrim , in May 1729 . Teddy Roosevelt's oft-repeated praise of his "bold and hardy race" is evidence of the pride he had in his Scotch-Irish connections. Woodrow Wilson 28th President, 1913-21: Of Ulster-Scot descent on both sides of the family, his roots were very strong and dear to him. He was grandson of a printer from Dergalt , near Strabane , County Tyrone , whose former home is open to visitors. Throughout his career he reflected on the influence of his ancestral values on his constant quest for knowledge and fulfilment. Richard Milhous Nixon 37th President, 1969-74: The Nixon ancestors left Ulster in the mid-18th Century; the Quaker Milhous family ties were with County Antrim and County Kildare . Ronald Reagan 40th President, 1981-88: Reagan was the second of two sons to John "Jack" Reagan, a Catholic of Irish American ancestry, and Nelle Wilson, who was of Scots-Irish and English descent. Prior to his immigration, the family name was spelled ''Regan''. His maternal great-grandfather, John Wilson, also immigrated to the United States from Paisley , Scotland in the early 1800s . George Herbert Walker Bush 41st President, 1989-93: His Ulster Scots links are through William Gault and Jonathan Weir, his great-great-great-great grandfathers who both settled in Blount County, Tennessee , around the Revolutionary War period. President Bush was made aware of this ancestry during a visit to Knoxville, where Gault is buried in nearby Baker's Creek United Presbyterian Church cemetery. Bill Clinton 42nd President, 1993-01: President Clinton, whose connection is through his Blythe and Ayer ancestors, is of Scots Irish and Irish ancestry. George W. Bush 43rd President, 2001-present: See George Herbert Walker Bush Other occupants of the White House said to have some family ties with the north of Ireland include Presidents Adams, Monroe, Eisenhower, Truman and Carter. SEE ALSO REFERENCES Secondary sources
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