An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in AmericaMacLean, J. P. (John Patterson)
History
An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America
MacLean, J. P. (John Patterson)
Scots -- America; Scots -- United States
Georgia was sparsely settled at the time of the Revolution. In 1753 its
population was less than twenty-four hundred. Emigration from the
Carolinas set in towards North Georgia, bringing many Scotch-Irish
families. The movement towards the mountain and Piedmont regions of the
southeast began about 1773. In that year, Governor Wright purchased from
the Indians that portion of middle Georgia lying between the Oconee and
the Savannah. The inducements he then offered proved very attractive to
the enterprising sons of Virginia and the Carolinas, who lived in the
highlands of those states. These people who settled in Georgia have thus
been described by Governor Gilmer: "The pretty girls were dressed in
striped and checked cotton cloth, spun and woven with their own hands,
and their sweethearts in sumach and walnut-dyed stuff, made by their
mothers. Courting was done when riding to meeting on Sunday, and walking
to the spring when there. Newly married couples went to see the old
folks on Saturday, and carried home on Sunday evening what they could
spare. There was no _ennui_ among the women for something to do. If
there had been leisure to read, there were but few books for the
indulgence. Hollow trees supplied cradles for babies."
A majority of the first settlers of East Tennessee were of Scotch-Irish
blood, having sought homes there after the battle of Alamance, and hence
that state became the daughter of North Carolina. The first written
constitution born of a convention of people on this continent, was that
at Watauga, in 1772. A settlement of less than a dozen families was
formed in 1778, near Bledsoe, isolated in the heart of the Chickasaw
nation, with no other protection than a small stockade enclosure and
their own indomitable courage. In the early spring of 1779, a little
colony of gallant adventurers, from the parent line of Watauga, crossed
the Cumberland mountain, and established themselves near the French
Lick, and planted a field of corn where the city of Nashville now
stands. The settlement on the Cumberland was made in 1780, after great
privations and sufferings on the journey. The settlers at the various
stations were so harassed by the Indians, incited thereto by British and
Spanish agents, that all were abandoned except Elatons and the Bluffs
(Nashville). These people were compelled to go in armed squads to the
springs, and plowed while guarded by armed sentinels. The Indians, by a
well planned stratagem, attempted to enter the Bluffs, on April 22d,
1781. The men in the fort were drawn into an ambush by a decoy party.
When they dismounted to give battle, their horses dashed off toward the
fort, and they were pursued by some Indians, which left a gap in their
lines, through which some whites were escaping to the fort; but these
were intercepted by a large body of the enemy from another ambush. The
heroic women in the fort, headed by Mrs. James Robertson, seized the
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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