3) God’s frontiersmen. Your Scots-Irish ancestors were always on the move into frontier areas where formal government structure was brand new or did not exist: into New Hampshire and Maine; into Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia, and Ohio; into Pennsylvania and western Maryland; through the Great Valley of Virginia into western North Carolina and Georgia. They organized their own government by agreement or covenant and all signed their names to the documents. Examples include the Mecklenburg Declaration (NC) and the Lost State of Franklin (TN, KY, VA, NC, GA). They traded and intermarried with Native Americans to live among them in peace; they formed commercial alliances to create prosperity.
Sources to search:
- delinquent tax rolls for both real estate and personal property which often state their next place of settlement
- “First Settlers” rosters and certificate programs sponsored by most local genealogy societies and some lineage groups
- quarterlies, journals, and family files of historical and genealogical societies
- Draper Manuscripts Collection
- oaths of allegiance at all levels of government
- military rosters at local forts
- private account books—especially for those who traded with the Indian tribes
- government permits to travel across Indian lands, called “passports.”
- records of the big trading companies in the South–Panton and Leslie (records at West Florida University Special Collections–some files have been microfilmed and sold to other libraries), Buchanans of Greenock and Glasgow (consult Voyages to America by Bernard Bailyn published in 1986).
Seek these sources at the library you most often patronize and online by subject or key word in the search bar. I am constantly amazed what is readily available when I search. Arlene Eakle http://arleneeakle.com
PS Stay close, there are other characteristics which identify your ancestors as Scots-Irish.