Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I'm sure there were a few English who did move beyond the established settlements in the colonies, but for the most part it was the mostly Germans and Scotch-Irish who settled in the more easily traversed Cumberland and Shenandoah valley areas. However, it was Scotch-Irish who pushed the frontiers further into the mountainous areas of southwestern Virginia,Tennessee, and Kentucky via the Cumberland Gap. The presence of the powerful Iroquois nation to the north and west proved a deterrent to western expansion for sometime.
My English ancestors moved West with Daniel Boone and lived around Boonesborough when it was settled. They then went from there into Western Missouri and lived further West than any Americans at the time (1807), including the Scots-Irish. There were plenty of folks of English descent who settled the areas of VA, TN, and KY you mentioned. It wasn't the Iriquois that proved a deterent so much as tribes such as the Miami and Potowatomie that kept them from moving further West.
Take a look at this listing of Fort Boonesborough settlers here and you'll see plenty of English surnames:
Thanks for the correction. You are absolutely right about the correct use of Scots-Irish rather than Scotch-Irish. The term "Scotch-Irish" came into common usage only after the lowland Scots came to America to distinguish the largely Presbyterian Scots from the Irish Catholics. I've noticed that many authors use the more familiar Scotch-Irish term.
Another item that is confusing is that the Scotch-Irish were neither Scottish nor Irish. As author Bil Gilbert states in his great book Westering Man, the lowland Scots were a " ... mixed lot of Danes, Angles, and Saxons, who had been pushed north by various post-Roman invasions of Great Britain. Not as a unified people, but as a collection of refugees they had come to settle across the narrow northern neck of the island and were identified as lowland Scots more for reasons of geography than race. For centuries, they were caught between the almost perpetually warring highland Celts to the north and the English to the south. As both participants and sullen bystanders whose welfare was inconsequential to to either side, they were regularly plundered. imprisoned, raped,and massacred. When there were lulls in the conflicts between and with the outsiders, the lowlanders raided, stole from and killed each other."
Sorry for wandering off the original topic, but this is history I can warm up to. Although I have an English surname that dates back to the 1300s, I have a connection to the Ulster Scots by a paternal grandparent. There is no doubt that the English authorities played the lowland Scots off against the native Irish, with a horrific loss of life on both sides. As Bil Gilbert described the lowland Scots, they were the "disposable people."
'Tis a brand belonging to 3M. As you know, "3M" stands for Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing. [With a tip of the hat to my Minnesota friends] Sven, Olie and Lena do many things well; that's just not one of them!
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
