This blog is dedicated to a celebration of the Orange and Blue traditions and culture which have been handed down to us from our Scottish and Ulster forefathers who fought and died in defence of Civil & Religious Liberty.
These traditions were started around the 17th century and were sparked by the exploits of brave men who when their lives and liberties were threatened sprang to maintain them by joining King William III Prince of Oranges army which culminated in the battle of the Boyne on the 1st of July in 1690. This great battle on the banks of that river changed the consequent history of not only Ireland but the greatest nation ever to emerge in the world since, namely the United States of America.
"How can this be?" you may ask, why does it matter where these people came from I say this, history is the story of how events major and minor change irrevocably the future course of events. Say for instance King William III had lost the Battle of the Boyne in Ireland in 1690. The subsequent events which produced the exodus of the Scots-Irish or as we here know them the Ulster-Scots would never have happened and none of the people named in the events above would ever have set foot on American soil. What kind of land indeed where would it then have become? I leave you to ponder that question!
There is an abiding myth that has become accepted wisdom that the anti-slavery lobby which resulted in the American civil war was entirely a Northern inspired affair. It is well recorded that there was actually great swathes of the Southern states which were anti-slavery and as many in the North who saw no harm in slave holding. Indeed the point has been well made by several writers on the subject like [b]Whitelaw Reid[/b], that the very first anti-slavery movement started not in the North as is incorrectly assumed, but rather the Ulster Scots states of Carolina and Tennessee a full 20 years before any dissenting voices were heard there.
Also as the first cannon shots were pounding Fort Sumpter beginning the terrible Civil War which was to claim such terrible loss of life and many of those of Ulster Scots stock, whilst seven slave holding states opted for supporting the new Confederacy the other eight slaving states supported Lincolns Northern administration.
Even as early as 1820 a foremost anti-slavery leader, [b]John Rankin,[/b] stated [quote]"it is safer to speak out against slavery in Kentucky or Tennessee than in any Northern states."[/quote]
However a terrible storm was brewing and 41 years were to pass before it broke. Many wise and prominent men on both sides could see the devastating calamity that was fast approaching and in impassioned speeches tried to dissapate the gathering clouds for war. Their vision could forsee the fledging nation being cruelly rent apart as were many families whoes loyalty fell on one side or the other. They also knew that the hate and poisoned fallout of any such conflict would linger and fester for years if not centuries afterwards.
Famed Ulster Scot, [b]Sam Houston[/b] and first Texas governor, was one such visionary who tried to avert the coming cataclysm. Even though a man then in his seventies, he travelled the length and breadth of his beloved Texas, braving threats against his life and hostile audiences, to speak out against seceding from the Union. Even in the North he found opposition from those who thought Texas remaining part of the Union would lead to the spread of slave holding there. In March 1861, at a major meeting of the most influential men in Texas, a momentus vote was taken to decide whether to back a proposal that all the states office holders should swear allegiance to the Confederacy, the new name of the alliance of seceding states. Only one other man there backed the governor, and the vote was carried by 109 votes to 2. After the vote, he refused to take the new oath, and thus ceased to be governor of the state. Shortly following this event the civil war so many feared and had tried to warn against for so long, started and raged on until 1865. It is interesting to note here that as the first shots were raining down on Fort Sumpter heralding the beginning of the long and very bloody conflict eight slave holding states belonged to the North and only Seven to the new Confederacy.
Two years on from the holding of that fateful vote, in 1863 with hostilities at their height, Sam was still outspoken against what was happening and spoke passionately of,
[quote]"my dream of an empire as vast and expansive for a united people as the bounds of American civilation."[/quote]
and also implored any that cared to listen,
[quote]"to resist to the last that worst of all tyranny fraternal hate"[/quote]
a short time later he died following a short illness at his Huntsville farm on 26th July 1863 aged 70.
[b]Ulysses Simpson Grant[/b] commander of the Union army, himself also an Ulster Scot, whoes family hailed from Dergenagh near Dungannon in Co Tyrone echoed, these sentiments at the surrender of General Robert E. Lee at the Appotomattox in 1865. It is recorded that before the war Lee had had the selfsame foreboding as he wrote,
[quote]"I can contemplate no greater calamity than a dissolution of the Union."[/quote]
with the caveate
[quote]"Still a Union that can only be maintained by swords and bayonets, and in which strife and civil war are to take the place of brotherly love and kindness has no charm for me."[/quote]
He would not fight against his own family and held a fierce loyalty towards the state of his birth and so resigned his commission in the American army. The depth of his commitment may be guaged from the fact that he had actually been secretly offered full command of the Union army prior to hostilities commencing, but had turned this extremely prestigious and indeed lucrative offer down on principal.
He like thousands of others at the time, found their families split amongst the opposing sides. Lees brother commanded the northern navy and even [b]President Abe Lincons[/b] wife had three brothers killed fighting for the Confederacy. As the conflict dragged on seemingly interminably, in the North too, war weariness was mounting on the home front. In the midwest particularily, which had been badly hit by the loss of Southern markets and where inevitably, the peace wing of the democratic party were making inroads. Politics which appeared to favour blacks were not likely to win many votes. Indeed, racial prejudice was never far below the surface of Northern opinion. Already there had been race riots in a number of major cities, such as Toledo and Cincinnati, often provoked by Irish and German immigrants, fearful for their jobs. Newspaper editors warned of
[quote]"millions of 'semi-savages' intermingling with the sons and daughters of white families."[/quote]
Others talked of,
[quote]"free labor being 'degraded' by the competition of these blacks, many of whom will have to be supported as paupers and criminals at the public expense."[/quote]
Even [b]Archbishop Hughes[/b] of New York had proclaimed that,
[quote]"Catholics are willing to fight to the death for the support of the constitution, the government and the laws of the country. But if.....they are to fight for the abolition of slavery, then they would turn away in disgust from the discharge of what would otherwise be a patriotic duty."[/quote]
In the same year 1862, Lincons own state of Illinois voted to ban the further settlement of blacks within its borders. Northern soldiers reflected these attitudes, too, and not all of them welcomed the [i]'contrabands.'[/i]
When a delegation of leading free blacks visited the Whitehouse in August to plead the emancipation cause, [b]Lincoln[/b] urged they consider emigration instead. Congress subsequently voted $600,000 to encourage voluntary colonisation of freed slaves and much of it went in resettling 450 black Americans on an island near Haiti, which turned out to be prone to smallpox. When most of them died from it, Washington evacuated the survivors. The same month, August, Lincoln replied to a request from [b]Horace Greeley[/b] at the New York Tribune urging that he turn the war into crusade for freedom with the words:
[quote]"My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union and it is not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slaves I would do it. If I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it. If I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that."[/quote]
'Northern army records of the period confirm that the state which raised the most volunteers for the Union cause was also the largest Ulster Scots settlement namely Pennsylvania. Equally North Carolina similarly the hub of Ulster Scots settlement in the Confedearcy provided the bulk of Southern recruiment. Sadly these states also recorded the highest number of casualties.
[b]General Lee[/b] when asked who made the best soldiers replied,
[quote]"The Scotch who came to this country by way of Ireland because they have all the dash of the Irish in taking a position, and all the stubborness of the Scotch in holding it."[/quote]
[b]Lee[/b] was a man who was in the perfect place to know what he was talking about. Many of the most distinguished of Lees generals were of the Ulster Scots extraction like [b]General Tom Stonewall Jackson[/b] whos family originated from [b]Ballinary House at the Birches in Portadown Ulster[/b] A plaque recording this was erected by the U.S. consulate there on 22nd of July 1967.
[b]General JEB. Stuart (James Ewell Brown)[/b] family had emigrated from Londonderry. His forebears had fought at the siege of Londonderry in 1688-89 defending that great city for the [b]Protestant Williamite[/b] cause.
[b]General Joe Eggleston Johnston[/b] was a son of Ulster born revolutionary war veteran and was hailed as the last Confederate General to surrender in 1865.
[b]General Daniel Smith Donelsons[/b] family came from Co Antrim.
[b]Lt. General Leoidas Polk[/b] whoes family came from Londonderry / East Donegall reigon of Ulster. His cousin [b]James Knox Polk[/b] was the 11th president of the USA in 1845.
While on the Northern side there were men like [b]General David Mcmurtrie Gregg[/b], a son of Co Antrim parentage he was decorated for breaking up a crucial advance by fellow Ulster Scot [b]JEB Stuart[/b] at Gettysberg on 1st July 1863.
[b]General George Brinton McClellan[/b] whoes Ulster born families fought with George Washington in the revolutionary war, earned himself the title of the [b]"Pocket Napolean[/b]".
[b]General Irvin McDowell[/b] descended from [b]Ephriam McDowell[/b] who had arrived from Ulster and settled in the Shanandoah Valley during the mid 18th century.
[b]General Philip Henry Sheridan[/b] a son of Co Cavan folk, went on to command a cavalry corps in the army of the Potomac.
[b]Brigadier General Charles Graham Halpine[/b] Son of an Ulster church minister, was a journalist for the New York Times when he joined the Union army as a private. He went on to pioneer the art of the war corresponsdant and wrote avidly read war articles for them under the nom de plume [b]"Private Miles O'Reilly."[/b] By 1864 he achieved the rank of brigadier general.
The savage war ended with three quarters of a million killed with many thousands of those the Ulster Scots who had distingished themselves in a legendary manner that has become their mark throughout time and in all ages and lands and which as history tends to do, repeated itself in the 20th century a poignant example of which occoured on the [b]1st July 1916 at the Battle of the Somme[/b]. Of the 19000 British killed that day 5500 came from the tiny province of Ulster men of the [b]36th Ulster Division[/b].
What began as a dream of [b]Sam Hustons[/b] emerged from a bloodsoaked nightmare in that [quote]"worst of all tyranny"[/quote] and had exacted a terrible toll on indomintable courage and irrevocable spirit and determination to leap to the defence of all the Ulster Scots hold sacred and deem to be right.
