THE SCOTCH-IRISH IN CENTRAL OHIO
by WILLIAM L. FISK, JR.
Associate Professor of History,
Muskingum College
Historical appraisals of the
contributions of various ethnic ele-
ments to the growth of American culture
have seldom denied recog-
nition to the Scotch-Irish. "The
cutting edge of the frontier," they
rarely hesitated to assume the vanguard
of the westward movement
and made it impossible for the writer of
history to ignore them,
deplore their unrefined
individualism though he might. Their
apologists have made much of the
participation of that hardy stock
in American politics and have delighted
in calling the roll of the
great and near-great of Scotch-Irish
extraction, too often including
both second-generation Ulstermen and
Americans of cosmopolitan
ancestry who had one remote forebear who
sojourned briefly in the
north of Ireland. Likewise Scotch-Irish
cultural activities have been
recorded in lists of the colleges and
academies they established and
the preaching engagements of pioneer
Presbyterian ministers.
Equally interesting and too infrequently
explored are the records
of their reaction to the social
environment of the new West in the
years which followed the passing of the
frontier, the notable ex-
ception being the excellent monograph of
the late J. A. Woodburn.1
The evincement of some peculiar
Scotch-Irish characteristics in the
community life of central Ohio may be
illustrative of the transfer
of culture into the region from the
older settled areas of America
and from abroad.
When the first Scottish Lowlanders
participated in James I's
plantation of Ulster and thus created
the element later to be desig-
nated as Scotch-Irish, economic factors
were prime considerations
in the migration. To sustain him in his
adjustment to the frontier
conditions of his Irish environment the
Scot brought with him the
tough theology of Calvinism. Perhaps no
other religious faith has
ever more nicely integrated man's
spiritual and economic interests,
1 "The Scotch-Irish
Presbyterians in Monroe County, Indiana," in Indiana Histor-
ical Society Publications, IV (1910),
437-522.
112
OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL
QUARTERLY
and it might be conjectured that it was
the thoroughness of that
synthesis in the mind of the Scot that
made it difficult for him to
get along with his easy-going Celtic
neighbors in Ireland. In his
decision to emigrate from Ulster both
economic and religious dis-
satisfaction were powerful determinants,
and when in the eighteenth
century the tide of Scotch-Irish
immigration poured into America
by way of Philadelphia and Charleston,
and to a lesser extent
through other ports, that same economic
drive carried the Scotch-
Irish to the frontier, and with them
went the church of John Calvin
and John Knox. One stream of immigrants
pushed over the Ap-
palachians while others turned south
into the Valley of Virginia,
meeting their kinsmen moving north from
the Carolinas and giving
the whole intermontane and transmontane
region a Scotch-Irish
flavor. Two centuries later Pittsburgh
is still the Scotch-Irish capi-
tal of America, and the folkways of the
new immigration have not
quite obliterated the Scotch-Irish
characteristics of the upper Ohio
Valley.
From the "Forks of the Ohio"
and other points in southwestern
Pennsylvania the Scotch-Irish pioneers
dispersed into the western
lands. In this process the counties of
eastern Ohio lying along the
main lines of travel from Pennsylvania
received a heavy sprinkling
of Scotch-Irish settlers, but in central
and western Ohio the Ulster
stock constituted a much smaller
proportion of the population. In
these parts of the state, however, there
were several scattered locali-
ties where Scottish names were numerous
and one or more branches
of Presbyterianism flourished, giving to
the immediate area char-
acteristics which were typical of Scotch-Irish
society in larger sec-
tions to the eastward. It is possible
that these isolated islands of
Scotch-Irish people manifested the
traits of that stock more clearly
by contrast with the neighboring
settlers than did older communities
where the Ulster breed was in a
majority.
One of the localities of Ohio which was
settled largely by the
Scotch-Irish was along the northern
boundary of Licking County in
Eden and Washington townships and across
the county line in Clay
Township of Knox County. It included the
villages of Utica and
Martinsburg. About 1803 the first
settlers came into the region
around Utica, most of them being
immigrants from the north of
THE SCOTCH-IRISH 113
Ireland or descendants of immigrants. In
1812 a Major Robertson
laid out the village, which was called
Wilmington until 1820.2 In
1806 James Dunlap became the first
Covenanter or Reformed Pres-
byterian to settle there, and in 1810
Robert Kirkpatrick of the same
faith joined him. By 1813 there were
enough Covenanters to organ-
ize a church. Its first minister, the
Reverend Robert Wallace, had
come from Ireland in 1810.3 The early
presence of Reformed Pres-
byterians, whose Covenanter ancestors
had been Scotland's most de-
termined dissenters in the religious
controversies of the seventeenth
century, indicates the strength of
Utica's Scottish heritage. Always
a tiny fragment among American denominations,
the Covenanter
church has never lost its almost
exclusively Scottish and Scotch-Irish
composition. On October 5, 1818, after
occasional preaching had
been held for three years, the
Presbyterian church was organized
with 37 members. The missionary who
crystallized the Presbyterian
element was the Reverend James
Cunningham, a graduate of Jeffer-
son College at Canonsburg, Pennsylvania,
an institution which pro-
vided numerous leaders of western
Presbyterianism.4 In 1841 the
Associate Reformed Presbyterians, a
denomination formed by a
union of Reformed Presbyterians and
Associate Presbyterians or
Seceders, another conservative offshoot
of the Church of Scotland,
established a congregation at Utica.5
It was probably more pre-
ponderantly Scotch-Irish than was the
Presbyterian church, which
often in the West contained many New
England Congregationalists.
Meanwhile the first Presbyterian church
in Clay Township of
Knox County had been established at
Martinsburg in 1806. This
township was later called the leading
Presbyterian township in the
early history of Ohio.6 The
early settlers of Clay Township were
largely from Washington and Greene
counties in southwestern Penn-
sylvania and Belmont County, Ohio. When
the township was or-
ganized in 1825, eleven of the fifteen
township officials had unmis-
takably Scottish names, such as
McCreary, McLane, Pierson, and
2 N. N. Hill, History of Licking
County, Ohio (Newark, Ohio, 1884), 610.
3 W. M. Glasgow, History of the
Reformed Presbyterian Church in America
(Baltimore, 1888), 139-141.
4A. M. Chapin, Historical Sermon (Utica, 1900).
5 W. M. Glasgow, Manual of the United
Presbyterian Church (Pittsburgh, 1903),
13. In 1858 the Associate Reformed
Presbyterian Church, hereafter referred to as the
A. R. P., and most of the remaining
Associate churches united to form the United
Presbyterian denomination.
6 A. B. Williams, Past and Present of
Knox County, Ohio (Indianapolis, 1912),
I, 150.
114
OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL
QUARTERLY
Lyon[s].7 In 1839 an A. R. P.
congregation was organized at
Concord schoolhouse south of Martinsburg
and shortly thereafter
was moved to the village. Typically
Scottish names filled the roster
of this church's membership. Among the
nineteen original mem-
bers of the church were the names of
Reagh, Robertson, Finney,
Francis, Shields, and Wilson. In the
next few years Lyonses, Scotts,
Hendersons, and Campbells were added to
the roll.8
Within the confines of Eden Township of
Licking County there
was no permanent establishment of a
Presbyterian church, but as
in so many areas through which the
Scotch-Irish passed, the best
documentation of their sojourn is the
mute testimony of the earli-
est gravestones in the old cemeteries.
Among the burials before
1840 in Eden Township's oldest cemetery,
the names of Blair, Mc-
Cartney, and Robertson are prominent,
but no Scottish names ap-
pear on the newer stones. Here the old
pattern of Scotch-Irish mi-
gration is recorded, the tarrying of the
pioneer a few years while
the land was new and until his native
individualism and restless-
ness enticed him on into the newer West.
Not only do the records of the
Presbyterian churches give in-
formation about the occupation of a
locality by Ulstermen, but
they afford an insight into some of the
customs of their society as
well, for within these church
organizations the Scotch-Irish pioneer
found his religious and social life, his
political opinions, and even
his law courts. With his penchant for
individualism, both political
and ecclesiastical, he usually felt the
need of more than one branch
of Scottish Presbyterianism in the
community, and he could more
often than not cite the theological
differences which justified in his
mind the continued separation of
Associate Reformed Presbyterians
from Associate Presbyterians and both
from Reformed Presbyterians,
long after the historical reasons for
the cleavage had ceased to exist.
Though all these Calvinistic churches
shared a common Scottish
heritage, and all except the main body
of Presbyterians insisted
upon the exclusive use of the psalms in
public worship without bene-
fit of musical accompaniment, they found
it impossible to forget
their separatist traditions. To deviate
from a rigid adherence to
7 N. N. Hill, Jr., comp., History of
Knox County, Ohio (Mt. Vernon, Ohio,
1881), 437.
8 Session
Records of the Associate Reformed Congregation of Martinsburgh. All
the minutes of the session have been preserved.
THE SCOTCH-IRISH 115
one's own variety of Presbyterianism was
to invite disciplinary
action by elders of the church session,
the governing body of the
local church, in the presbyterian
system, upon a charge of "occa-
sional hearing." Should a
Covenanter be guilty of attending the
service of a Seceder congregation, it
was assumed that he was
tainted with heretical doctrine. In the
records of the Martinsburg
A. R. P. Church, there is an account of
a session meeting in which
a member of the Utica Covenanter Church
presented a minute of
her own session's meeting wherein she
had been charged with the
offense of "occasional
hearing" of sermons in Martinsburg. She
was readily received into the A. R. P.
Church, and although the
clerk of the session was not always
careful to record the congrega-
tion from which a new member was
received, he noted that fact on
this occasion.9 The
importance attached to minute theological dif-
ferences among churches adhering to
similar forms of presbyterian
government, as illustrated by this
incident, is not a little difficult
for a later generation to comprehend.
However, an old-fashioned Presbyterian
church session com-
posed of the ruling elders of the
congregation was a formidable
agent of conservatism, and in
disciplining defection from the estab-
lished code of behavior it could
exercise severity worthy of a Gen-
evan theocracy. The session customarily
met at the semiannual
communion season to examine candidates
for church membership,
grant certificates of
"dismission" to members leaving the church,
and consider any other matters of church
government. Very often
the chief business was discipline of
erring members. The com-
munion season was the most opportune
occasion for the administra-
tion of reproof, for it was then that
the stern Calvinist preachers
dwelt even more at length than usual
upon the awfulness of sin
and the unmerited grace extended to
sinners by the Atonement. Both
the days preceding and following the
Communion Sabbath were
devoted to church services, and the
session met on both. If at its
first meeting the session had reason to
question the conduct of any
chuch member, he was "kept
back" from participation in the sacra-
ment, which, with a Calvinist disdain
for Catholic terminology, the
Presbyterians called a "sealing
ordinance." For the orthodox
9 Ibid.
116
OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL
QUARTERLY
Calvinist it was an awesome thing to be
deemed unworthy to par-
ticipate in the symbols of the
Atonement. If the session's further
deliberation determined the offense
against the law of the church to
be serious, suspension from church
membership was likely to re-
sult. Excommunication was a powerful
weapon of the church ses-
sion, and many a stubborn
Scotch-Irishman who would have re-
garded the degree of interference
exercised by the session in his
private affairs as tyrannical had it
been by the hand of civil au-
thority, found it possible to confess
his fault to the elders and
then endure a rebuke from the pulpit at
the next morning service
in order to be restored to church
privileges.
The great volume of session business
dealt with infractions of
the ecclesiastical code of social
ethics. For example, before one
communion service of the Martinsburg A.
R. P. Church, the session
"heard that Sarah Meharg and her
daughter, Mary Anne, were
guilty of tale bearing, and inquired of
the above persons whether
guilty or not; their declarations
differing widely from reports ses-
sion deemed it advisable to suspend them
for the occasion." Ap-
parently the disciplinary measure was
inadequate for a few months
later the session clerk recorded that
"Sarah Meharg is highly guilty
of contumacy, neglect of the ordinances
of preaching and prayer
meeting and also very criminally
falsifying if not false swearing.
Resolved that Sarah Meharg be and hereby
is suspended from the
privileges of God's house." The
daughter had evidently shown
even less zeal to reform. In her case
the session passed a series of
sober indictments:
1. Resolved that she is guilty of evil
speaking, irreverence in the house of
God and contumacy of the court of
Christ.
2. That she be and hereby is suspended
from the ordinances until she gives
evidence of repentance.
3. That session most affectionately
admonish her to be more circumspect in
future and thereby regain her standing in
the church.
4. That the above resolutions be
published from the pulpit.
The exact nature of the conduct which
thus invited the wrath
of the session is not stated, but it is
exceedingly interesting to note
that the criticisms of the session were
made because of that body's
administration of discipline to another
member who had attacked
THE SCOTCH-IRISH 117
the antislavery sentiment of the
congregation.10 The preaching serv-
ice which followed this meeting of the
session must have held more
than spiritual interest for those
present.
At about the same time the Utica
Presbyterian session was
passing a resolution against
"attending and joining in balls and
dancing parties." On March 23,
1850, it made a statement of the
church's stand on the issues of slavery,
temperance, Sabbath dese-
cration, war, and social recreation,
observing that "much that is
called social recreation [is] a sinful
conformity to the world and
a dangerous tendency." On one
occasion the Martinsburg session
appointed a committee to meet with the
young people of the church
concerning "the sin of
dancing."11 The effectiveness of these meas-
ures is not indicated by the records.
The badge of loyalty to Scotch-Irish
Presbyterianism was
faithful attendance at its services.
Therefore, one of the responsi-
bilities of the session was that of
seeing to it that church members
attended worship services or offered an
acceptable explanation for
their absence. Committees were
frequently appointed to "wait upon"
a member to inquire why he had been
neglecting the ordinances.
Now and then similar committees were
commissioned to admonish
some member about such matters as
"enlarging matters somewhat
beyond the fact" or "rash and
passionate conduct" before members
of the session. In one instance "a
report having come to the ears
of the session that James Lyons had
taken some advantage of a man
in trading horses it was resolved that
James Beall be appointed to
hold an interview with him concerning
said report." Happily for
James Lyons the session was assured of
the integrity of his char-
acter, and he was therefore continued in
church privileges.12
When the session's investigation and
counsel failed to put an
issue at rest, it sometimes became
necessary for the ruling elders to
constitute themselves a court and hold a
formal hearing. The very
fact that these stubborn Scots would
often eschew the services of
the civil courts for those of their own
church session is a com-
mentary both upon the vigor of Scottish
Presbyterian tradition in
mid-century America and the strength of
the religious bond that
10 Ibid.
11 Ibid; Second Session Record Book of the Utica
Presbyterian Church.
12 Martinsburg A. R. P. Church Session
Records.
118
OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
could influence a congregation to choose
this good Calvinist method
of settling its disputes. One
interesting case which taxed the judicial
sagacity of the Martinsburg session
concerned a controversy between
the James Lyons mentioned above and
William Baird over the own-
ership of some sheep. Apparently Lyons'
sheep had strayed across
a line fence and in with Baird's flock,
where their identity could
not be determined. The two men failed to
reach an understanding
about the matter, and since both were
church members, the session
considered the case within its
jurisdiction. Failing to ascertain to
whom the sheep actually belonged, the
ruling elders' first proposal
for peaceful settlement was that the
disputed property be sold and
the money donated to some cause of
benevolence. Pending ac-
ceptance of this disposition of the case
the two men were to be
"kept back from the ordinance
(communion) until piece [sic] be
restored." For years no further
mention of the case appeared, but
at the session meeting preceding the
fall communion of 1855 the
elders reviewed the case mentioning
again their inability to deter-
mine the ownership of the sheep. Lyons
meanwhile had found the
dispensation of ecclesiastical justice
too leisurely and had taken
the law into his own hands, for the
session censured his conduct
in entering his neighbor's enclosure and
"taking the disputed sheep
without permission as calculated to
engender strife among the
brethren" and further viewed with
disfavor his "insinuations against
this court both in its presents [sic]
and before others." Again the
sheep were ordered to be sold, and upon
Lyons' refusal he was sus-
pended from the church. Yet after two
years outside the pale, his
recalcitrant Scotch-Irish spirit yielded
to the Presbyterian yearning
for security within the fold of
Calvinism, and he came before the
session offering to abide by its decision
and seeking reinstatement
to church privileges.13 A
theological system which could exact such
submissiveness from a folk of
independent temperament is not to
be ignored as a formative force in the
history of the Middle West.
The New England tradition was not the
only agency which intro-
duced the Puritan strain of iron into
the forging of American
culture.
It might appear that apparent
preoccupation with the mainte-
13 Ibid.
THE SCOTCH-IRISH 119
nance of a theocratic society would have
precluded much interest
among the Scotch-Irish in the affairs of
the vibrant young nation
growing up around them and reaching out
to the westward, but this
certainly was not the case. The years
when the Scottish Presby-
terian influence was pronounced in
northern Licking and southern
Knox counties fell during the period
when the whole nation was
acutely aware of the magic of the reform
movement. "The word
'reform' played much the same part in
the life of the thirties and
forties that 'progressive' does today.
It was a touchstone which
differentiated people more incisively
than did party allegiance."14
The logic of predestinarian theology
might have dictated a tolerant
aloofness toward these efforts to make
an irredeemably bad world
better, but with a reformer's zeal that
took little account of creedal
reservations these trans-Appalachian
Puritans entered the lists in
behalf of social reform.
The temperance movement had been
gathering momentum, and
the churches had long since abandoned
their earlier indulgence
toward liquor. In fact intoxication was
now a frequent cause for
church discipline. A citation for
intoxication might require a
rather elaborate display of evidence in
a formal trial in order to
establish the validity of the charge.
Illustrative is the case of one
United Presbyterian at Martinsburg who
was arraigned on a charge
of having been intoxicated on the fourth
of July in Mt. Vernon.
With legal solemnity, the session swore
in witnesses and took testi-
mony. Witnesses reported that the
defendant had been seen before
and after his trip to Mt. Vernon and had
been sober on both occa-
sions. However, the next witness was not
so sure on this count,
Perhaps the accused "had had a
dram." Another witness had seen
him in a saloon and had passed by on the
street several times, to
confirm his suspicions it might be
surmised. The weight of the
evidence supported the charge, and the
court ordered the offender
to submit to a public admonition, a
decision he declined as "un-
warranted and unjust." He was
therefore suspended, and at the
next meeting the session appointed a
committee to ask his wife why
she had withdrawn from the ordinances of
the church.15 At Utica
there were similar trials, and twice, in
1843 and 1850, the Presby-
14 Carl Russell Fish, Rise of the
Common Man (New York, 1927), 256.
15 Ibid.
120
OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
terian church there passed resolutions
on the importance of tem-
perance.16
The interest the Presbyterians accorded
the temperance move-
ment was also manifested toward other
reforms of the day. Labor
and women's rights were not compelling
issues in a rural commu-
nity, but here as elsewhere the rising
giant of abolition pushed its
way to the forefront of the reform
crusade. The Scotch-Irish were
almost unanimous in their disapprobation
of slaveholding, but their
propinquity to neighbors of Virginian
extraction both at the nearby
village of Bladensburg and in
northeastern Licking County brought
some attendant tensions. On December 3,
1843, the Presbyterian
session at Utica passed strong
resolutions against slaveholding
wherein they observed that "the
buying, selling, holding, and using
human beings as property is a heinous
sin against God, a violation
of the most precious and inalienable
rights of man and is contrary
to the whole spirit of the gospel of
Christ," and resolved "that we
bear our solemn protest against all
attempts of individuals or
ecclesiastical bodies to make the Bible
teach the doctrine of the law-
fulness of slavery." Although the
elders condemned the Presbyter-
ian denomination for not taking a
stronger stand on the subject of
slavery, they reaffirmed their loyalty
to its tenets.l7
Across the county line the slavery
controversy produced dissen-
sion in the churches. For a short time a
Free Presbyterian church
of antislavery seceders from the Old
School Presbyterian church
existed in Martinsburg. The cleavage
between Scots and Virginians
was evidenced at the time of the Mexican
War with its promise of
territorial expansion in the Southwest.
On one Sabbath in 1846 the
Reverend Henry Hervey, long-time
minister of the Presbyterian
church at Martinsburg, preached on the
evils of war with the result
that the Presbyterians of Bladensburg
withdrew in a body and es-
tablished their own church.18 Interestingly
enough, this congrega-
tion of dissenters has remained intact
to the present day while the
antislavery mother church has long since
lost its separate identity.
In the A. R. P. church here one of the
frequent session trials
succinctly portrayed the attitude of
that congregation on the slavery
16 Second Session Record Book of the Utica Presbyterian Church.
17 Ibid.
18 Hill,
Knox County, 441.
THE SCOTCH-IRISH 121
question. It was the same year, 1846,
when William Lyons, an
Ulsterman by birth, was cited by the
session for forging names to a
remonstrance. Although the nature of the
remonstrance is not clear,
the context of the session minutes
implies that it may have been a
protest against some antislavery project
supported by the church.
When the elders proposed to hear his
defense, he informed them
that if he were to appear before them
they would have to meet at his
house. The last straw was his reply,
when asked why he had been
neglecting the ordinance of prayer
meeting, that there was too much
politics and abolitionism there. This
was too much for the session,
which immediately voted his suspension.
Although Lyons was voic-
ing a sentiment for which few of his
fellow Scotch-Irish Presby-
terians could find any sympathy, his
views were not unusual in this
locality of central Ohio where
Copperhead leanings were numerous
during the Civil War. Possibly the
slavery issue helped to retard
the assimilation of the Scotch-Irish
ethnic group by this neighbor-
hood.
The little Presbyterian churches were
not the only cultural
monuments left by the Scotch-Irish in
their westward trek. The
churches in whose plain but reverent
services the Ulsterman found
his spiritual security always held high
the ideal of a professionally
educated ministry, and wherever the
Scotch-Irish went, they founded
academies and colleges to underwrite the
future maintenance of that
ideal. In the youthful West, whose
society in the early nineteenth
century was chiefly concerned perforce
with affairs economic, the
academic backgrounds of the Scotch-Irish
ministry were impressive.
In central Ohio the guiding figure among
the Associate Reformed
Presbyterians was J. H. Peacock, a
graduate of the Western Univer-
sity of Pittsburgh and Allegheny
Theological Seminary. Both James
Cunningham, the first Presbyterian
minister at Utica, and Henry
Hervey, who for forty years ministered
to the Presbyterian
churches at Utica and Martinsburg, were
graduates of Jefferson
College at Canonsburg, Pennsylvania.19
Men like these often played a dual role
in the Scotch-Irish
settlements of the West. Many times the
man who occupied the
pulpit on the Sabbath stood behind the
professor's desk in the
19 Ibid.
122
OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
classical school on week days. It was a
matter for great civic pride
and maybe a little intellectual snobbery
among the residents of Mar-
tinsburg that their village possessed an
academy. This institution of
which the Reverend Henry Hervey was
president, maintained a clas-
sical curriculum and was designed
primarily for the training of fu-
ture candidates for the Presbyterian
ministry. It is said that over
thirty students who attended Martinsburg
Academy in the years of
its operation from 1838 to 1860 became
ministers, and nineteen be-
came ministers' wives.20
Education was a serious business at
Martinsburg a century ago.
The program of an "Exhibition"
at the Academy on September 4,
1857, is impressive both for the
grandiose themes the students under-
took to expound to their audience and
the time they took in doing
it. The program included both morning
and afternoon sessions
with an hour's intermission. Fifteen
original orations on subjects
ranging from "Our Country-The
Spirit of Advancement" to "Vir-
tue, Our Guiding Star" were
interspersed with six original essays
and several musical interludes, and the
whole was climaxed with
an address to students by Mt. Vernon's
leading public figure of the
day, Columbus Delano. Although
Martinsburg Academy's first
interest was in the preparation of
ministers, it appears to have
been remarkably free from much
theological deflection of the con-
ventional arts and sciences. Several
papers prepared for public
programs at the academy display an
awareness of the liberal arts
tradition and the abiding faith of most
Americans of that genera-
tion in the progress of the nation even
as the Civil War approached.
The Scotch-Irish faith in education also
extended to an interest
in informal intellectual pursuits. In
1847 the Utica Covenanters
had a church library of 52 volumes
supported by subscription and
open to church members. One difficulty
encountered in that project
was the negligence of borrowers in
returning books and paying
fines.21 The earnestness of
the quest for learning and the paucity
of opportunity in rural Ohio was
illustrated by the purple-worded
preamble of the constitution of the
Phrenocosmian Society, a
literary club founded in the
Scotch-Irish section south of Martins-
burg in 1854. "We, the people of
Eden township, Licking county,
20 Chapin, loc. cit.
21 Records of the Utica Reformed
Presbyterian Church.
THE SCOTCH-IRISH 123
Ohio," began the preamble,
"feeling the importance of some asso-
ciation whereby we might cultivate our
minds and improve the
talents which God has bestowed upon us,
think it highly necessary
that a society be formed that we may in
some measure prepare our-
selves for usefulness in this life and
for happiness hereafter. We
also being convinced of the fact that we
will be held accountable
by the ruler of the universe for the
manner in which we spend
our time and talents, feel it our duty
to organize a society." The
Scottish names of Finney, Kirkpatrick,
Lyons, and Wilson appeared
in the list of charter members.22 The
literary society was a com-
monplace in the nineteenth century, but
the sobriety and sense of
responsibility set forth in this
preamble were Calvinist in spirit.
The care with which the minute book was
kept and the Victorian
solemnity of the questions discussed at
the society's meetings demon-
strated an atmosphere of whole-souled
seriousness. Propositions
for debate ranged from "Resolved
that a man will acquire more
knowledge reading than traveling"
to "Resolved that the Negroes
have more right to complain to the
Americans than the Indians."
The ominous "Resolved that the
present signs of the times do indi-
cate the downfall of this republic"
was a timely topic in 1856. An
awareness of other burning issues of the
day was exhibited in dis-
cussions of the prohibition of
immigration and the expediency of
the annexation of Cuba.
This then was a community of some
spiritual and intellectual
vigor. In economic matters the
traditional thrift and canny bus-
iness sense of the Scot appears to have
been a variable quantity
among these people, but socially they
betrayed their distant kinship
with the Celt. Though a blend of ethnic
strains before he came
to the American melting pot, the
immigrant from the north of Ire-
land was a Gael in his clannish devotion
to his family and his
people. Children and grandchildren of
Scotch-Irish immigrants
have remarked upon the line which their
ancestors drew between
themselves and their neighbors who had
come from Virginia.
The maintenance of peculiar cultural
patterns by isolated
ethnic elements is an engaging sidelight
in the growth of American
22 The records of the Martinsburg
Academy have been destroyed. Some papers
pertaining to the school are in the
possession of the writer.
124
OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
culture, but the account of the process
by which the distinctive
heritage of these groups was fused into
the greater American amal-
gam is of at least equal historical
interest. Therefore, an analysis
of the forces which induced the
disintegration of the Scotch-Irish
community in central Ohio may be in
order. In the first place it is
proposed that the small size and
isolation of this Scotch-Irish group
had something to do with its
assimilation. It was natural that
areas to the eastward more thickly
settled by the Ulster stock
would retain Scotch-Irish
characteristics longer than little islands of
that people few of whose neighbors had
any roots in the north of
Ireland. Secondly, the Utica-Martinsburg
locality is almost on the
edge of the prairies, and good land only
a few miles to the west
offered a powerful economic inducement
to migrate. In the upper
Ohio Valley one farm was about as good
as another, and the uni-
versal lure of the West was not
accentuated by the nearby visual
evidence of the superiority of good,
level land. It is not intended
to ignore the numbers of Scotch-Irish
from the older parts of the
country who did go west, but in regions
where the majority of the
people were Scotch-Irish, migration did
not alter the composition
of the population.
The rapid assimilation of the
Scotch-Irish in this region was
inevitable, but it was not accomplished
without resistance. The
Scotch-Irish were prone to seek out their
own kinsmen in other
areas as evidenced by the visiting and
moving between Martinsburg
people and the Scotch-Irish community of
Mt. Perry, some forty
miles to the south. Often when church
members went west, they
attempted to find new homes among people
professing their own
variety of Presbyterianism.
Nevertheless, the forces of Americani-
zation were irresistible. As members
left central Ohio, the Scotch-
Irish churches had difficulty in filling
up their rolls. By 1870
dwindling membership compelled the
United Presbyterian church
at Martinsburg to unite with the
Presbyterians, and in the present
century that congregation has formed a
Federated church with
the ubiquitous Methodists in order to
survive, a merger no Scotch-
Irish Calvinist could have brought
himself to contemplate a cen-
tury ago. At Utica the United
Presbyterian church gave up the
unequal struggle in the 1920's, and now
only the Presbyterian
THE SCOTCH-IRISH 125
church of Utica, which like most other
churches of its denomina-
tion in the West included a complement
of Congregationalists, and
the little Covenanter congregation
continue the Presbyterian system
in the region. Only in the latter are
many Scotch-Irish names
and the traditional forms of
Scotch-Irish worship to be seen.
The Scotch-Irish influence on central
Ohio is now a matter of
history. The quiet work of the years
whereby the Scotch-Irish
character of this community was modified
until it was impercept-
ibly incorporated into the prevailing
pattern of the Middle West
was representative of the efficiency of
the process by which a thou-
sand other communities of originally
homogeneous ethnic origins
were assimilated into American culture.
Without intending it or
knowing it, the Scotch-Irish, whether
they moved on into the beckon-
ing West or continued on in the hills of
central Ohio, gradually
lost the characteristics that had made
them a separate people. Ex-
cept among the Covenanters the dignified
old Scottish psalm tunes,
souvenirs of a proud past of independent
religious thinking, are
heard no longer. Session trials are a
quaint bit of antiquarian lore,
and yet Calvinist discipline, despite
its tendency toward bigotry
and intolerance, is not to be ignored as
a formative force in the
molding of American character. Though
the descendants of the
Scotch-Irish settlers of central Ohio
may have outlived the Calvinist
theology of their ancestors, they have
not lost their pride of line-
age that has made them slow to forget
their roots in the north of
Ireland and that has given them the
assured conviction that theirs
is a goodly heritage.
THE SCOTCH-IRISH IN CENTRAL OHIO
by WILLIAM L. FISK, JR.
Associate Professor of History,
Muskingum College
Historical appraisals of the
contributions of various ethnic ele-
ments to the growth of American culture
have seldom denied recog-
nition to the Scotch-Irish. "The
cutting edge of the frontier," they
rarely hesitated to assume the vanguard
of the westward movement
and made it impossible for the writer of
history to ignore them,
deplore their unrefined
individualism though he might. Their
apologists have made much of the
participation of that hardy stock
in American politics and have delighted
in calling the roll of the
great and near-great of Scotch-Irish
extraction, too often including
both second-generation Ulstermen and
Americans of cosmopolitan
ancestry who had one remote forebear who
sojourned briefly in the
north of Ireland. Likewise Scotch-Irish
cultural activities have been
recorded in lists of the colleges and
academies they established and
the preaching engagements of pioneer
Presbyterian ministers.
Equally interesting and too infrequently
explored are the records
of their reaction to the social
environment of the new West in the
years which followed the passing of the
frontier, the notable ex-
ception being the excellent monograph of
the late J. A. Woodburn.1
The evincement of some peculiar
Scotch-Irish characteristics in the
community life of central Ohio may be
illustrative of the transfer
of culture into the region from the
older settled areas of America
and from abroad.
When the first Scottish Lowlanders
participated in James I's
plantation of Ulster and thus created
the element later to be desig-
nated as Scotch-Irish, economic factors
were prime considerations
in the migration. To sustain him in his
adjustment to the frontier
conditions of his Irish environment the
Scot brought with him the
tough theology of Calvinism. Perhaps no
other religious faith has
ever more nicely integrated man's
spiritual and economic interests,
1 "The Scotch-Irish
Presbyterians in Monroe County, Indiana," in Indiana Histor-
ical Society Publications, IV (1910),
437-522.