Scotlands Mark on America

SCOTLAND ’S MARK ON AMERICA FR AS E R BLA PM ) . CK. With a Fo re word By JOHN FOOR D P ublis h !! by ! ' Se ction of America s Making Ne w York. 1 92 ! o h 1 921 C pyrig t, B y GE O RGE F RAS E R B L A CK F O R E WO R D It has been s aid that the Scot is never so much at home as when he - is abroad . Under this half j esting reference to one of the character is tics o f our race , there abides a sober truth , namely, that the Scots man carries with him from his parent home into the world without no half - hearted acceptance of the duties required o f him in the land of his — adoption . He is usually a public spirited citizen , a useful member o f society, wherever you find him . But that does not lessen the warmth f o o f or . his attachment to the place his birth , the land of his forbears Be his connection with Scotland near or remote, there is enshrined t in the inner sanctuary of his heart, memories , sentimen s , yearnings , that are the heritage o f generations with whom love of their count ry was a dominant passion , and pride in the deeds that her children have done an incentive to effort and an antidote against all tha t was base n or ig oble . It is a fact that goes to the core of the secular struggle for human freedom that whole - hearted Americanis m finds no j arring note in the f s the sentim ent o the Scot , be that sentiment ever so inten e . In sedulous cultivation of the Scottish spirit there is nothing alien , and , still more emphatically , nothing harm ful, to the institutions under t which we live . The things that nourish the one , engender attachmen the and loyalty to the other . So , as we cherish memories o f the Moth ’ e s ou r C rland , keep in touch with the simple annal o f hildhood s home , s of or the home of our kin, bask in the fire ide glow its homely humor, o f old or dwell in imagination amid the haunts romance, we are the better Americans for the Scottish heritage from which heart and mind alike derive inspiration and delight . It is as difficult to separate the current of Scottish migration to the ou American Colonies , or to the United States that grew t of them , e s E from th larger stream which is ued from ngland , as it is to dis tinguis h during the last two hundred years the contributions by Scots E o f E men from those o f nglishmen to the great body nglish literature . o f ne w 1 790 We have the first census the Republic , in the year , and a n investigator who classified this enumeration according to what he o f conceived to be the nationality the names , found that the total free, o e white, p pulation numb ring contained people of tti o f E nglish origin ; of Sco sh origin, and Irish origin . S COTLAND ’S MARK ON AME R ICA “ The s s tem f c as sificati n is m the y o l o anife stly loose, and distribution o f at o t no . r parent n i nalities en irely at variance with k wn facts _ That pa t e u t i l - c of th pop la ion described as Ir sh was argely Ulster S ottish , the true Irish never having emigrated in any considerable numbers until they felt the pressure of the potato famine, fifty years later . There is ' i m of the excellent author ty for the state ent that , at the outbreak Revolutionary War one-third of the entire population of Pe nns yl - E r vania was o f Ul ster Scottish origin . A New ngland histo ian , t a t 1 730 1 770 quoted by Whitelaw Reid , counts h t be ween and at least half a million souls were transferred from Uls te r to the Colonies ’ more th an hal f of the Presbyt erian population of Ulster— and that at the time of the Revolution they ma de one-sixth of the total popula tion of the nascent Republic . Another authority fixes the inhabitants of Scottish ancestry in the nine Co lonies south o f N e w E ngland at about He counts that less than half o f the entire population C E i t e o f the olonies was of nglish orig n , and hat n arly, or quite one t c a . third of it , had a direc S ottish ncestry These conclusions find powerful support in the number of distin gu is he d men whom the Scots and the Ulstermen contributed to the o Revolutionary struggle, and to the public li fe of the early days f the ’ t - wo e . O t t United States ut of Washing on s wenty brigadi r generals , em nine were o f Scottish descent , and one of the greatest achiev ents o f the war— the rescue of Kentucky and the whole rich territory O t — northwest of the hio , from which five Sta es were formed was that i of General George Rogers Clark , a Scottish nat ve of Albert County, i W C Virg nia . hen the Supreme ourt of the United States was first organized by Washington three of the four Associate Justices were of — - the same blood o ne a Scot and two Ulster Scots . When the first C l t e d hief Justice, John Jay, eft h bench , his successor, John Rutle ge , ’ was an Ulster - Scot ; Washington s first cabinet contained four mem — - bers two of them were Scotch and the t hird was an Ulster Scot . Out of the fifty-six members who composed the Congress that adopted h c t e Declaration o f Independen e eleven were o f Scottish descent . It a o was in response to the appe l of a Scot , John Withersp on, that the D eclaration was signed ; it is preserved in the handwriting of an Ulster- Scot who was Secretary o f the Congress ; it was first publicly a -S re d to the people by an Ulster cot , and first printed by a third ' member of the same vigorous body of early settlers . George Bancroft will hardly be accu s ed of holding a brief for the b t E Scot in American history u , with all his New ngland predilections, “ he frankly records this conclusion : We shall find the first voice pub licl i y raised in Amer ca to dissolve all connection with Great B ritain, m E D ca e not from the Puritans of New ngland , or the utch of New s cot l AND ’s MARK ON AME RI CA 5 a - i t York , or the pl nters of Virginia , but from Scotch Ir sh Presby er ” i s . ian It was Patrick Henry,a Scot, who, k ndled the popular flame i t for independence . The foremost , the most irreconc lable, the mos th t t determined in pushing e quarrel to the las extremity, were hose whom the bishops and Lord Donegal Company had been pleased to drive out of Ulster . The distinguished place which men of Scottish or of Ul s ter origin had asserted for themselves in the councils of the Colonies was not lost when the Colonies became independent States . Among the first of the thirteen origina l States two-thirds were of either Scottish or - i ffi Ulster Scottish orig n . O f the men who have filled the great o ce h i t n -five o f President of t e Un ted States , eleven out of the whole we ty th t ha come under e same ca egory . About lf the Secretaries of the Treasury o f the Government of the United Sta tes have been of the . Scottish descent , and nearly a third of Secretaries o f State But it is perhaps in the intangible things that go to the making of nationa l character that the Scottish contribution to the making of a e . 1 801 o Americ has b en most/notable In , the population f the ut il a -an whole of Scotland was b little over a m lion and a h l f, d behind “ t n n hat there were at leas t eight centuries of natio al history. Behi d r ti t and s that , too , were all the long gene a ons of oil trife in which the Scott ish character was being molded into the forms that Scott and full r Burns made immortal . It is a character o f cu rious cont asts , with s n e t a its tro g predil c ion for theology and met physics on one side , and r m th e . ts for poet y and ro ance on other Hard , dry and practical in i i the f att tude to ordinary af airs of life, it is apt to catch fire from a i m t n sudden enthus as , as if vola ility were its domi ant note and insta has bility its only fixed attribute . And so it come about that side by lvinis fi di i it t r m t side with tomes o f Ca c v n y, here has been t ans it ed to ‘ S cotsme n an equally characte ri s tic product o f the mind of their raceh k e a body of fol song, of ballad po try , of legend and of story in that quaint and co pious Doric speech which makes so direct an appeal to et the no the hearts of men wh her they are to manner born or t.

Load more