Long Lost Cuzzins-The Johnstons- Scottish Immigrants

Welcome to "Long Lost Cuzzins" - A History Of The Johnson Family

Hello, I'm Missi ,  and I am the creator and  webmaster of this site. This site is still under construction, but you will be able to view all of the contents that have been uploaded to the site thus far. Keep checking back periodically for more updates that will be added to the site over time.

The first thing to note about the Scottish Johnstons from which my family members descend, is that they were "Lolanders" as well as being a "border clan." Many of them, including our ancestor Edmund Johnston, who was the first in "our line" to come to Jamestown, VA in 1639, lived in Dumfriedshire, Annandale, which is  right smack dab on the border of Northern England. According to my research, the Scottish Johnstons just wanted to live out thier existence as farmers and such, but from what I can  surmise, they were forced to be a fightin' bunch of people, as they were almost  constantly feuding with the English, and some of the Scottish Highlanders as well.

Will Johnstone writes: "They were also products of a brutal frontier. Centuries of border warfare and scorched-earth campaigns, in which the Scots frequently lost all their possessions to the English, left the borderers disinterested in growing crops. Guerilla warfare evolved into a guerilla existence. The borderers became semi-nomadic, raiding the English and neighboring clans to replenish the cattle and horses which were their chief form of property. The Johnstones were excellent horsemen, and, dressed in a metal helmet (steel bonnet), reinforced leather jacket (jack),a long lance, a cutting sword, and set of pistols, a Scottish Johnstone clansman was well adapted to his world. A monument at the Devil's Beeftub, a vast, sinister-looking hollow near the source of the Annan River, records that the Johnstones used the place "to hide cattle stolen in predatory raids." http://www.clanjohnstone.org

please scroll to view old enlarged Johnson family photos at the bottom of this page

click on the tab avove that says "Johnson Lineage In America" for more fascinating details about the Johnson family which includes military service records, plantation ownership, civil war history in the Johnson family, and more

 

This site exists because one of my long lost cuzzins, Elmo Johnson, wrote and published a 121 page book called "Long Lost Cuzzins" and distributed it to  certain Johnson family members in 1968, which was also the year of my birth.

The book Elmo wrote gives lots of interesting details about the Johnson family that came from Scotland 371 years ago in 1639 and landed on he eastern shore of Virgina only 147 years after Columbus set foot on American soil.

From what I can tell,  Elmo's book is not copyrighted, but I respectfully give him all the credit for the information that I will borrow from his book, and will either be paraphrasing from, or directly quoting from the text that he created. I will also be quoting and paraphrasing from other writers when necessary, and those folks will be credited for thier work as well.

The first question that comes to mind when reading  Long Lost Cuzzins is, WHY did Edmund Johnston come to America?

From what I have read, Elmo did not answer this question, but Steven Akins answers this question best. 

Here is an excerpt from his writing about the Scottish immigrants, some of whom are our ancestors.

Why did they come?
Some were transported, because they had no choice other than prison or execution, the reasons ranging from political prisoners of rebellions, to paupers, to petty thieves and criminals.

Others came because of poverty. They had no hope of ever breaking out of their set place in the Class-system which existed in Britain, but in America, a man could make something of himself, regardless of his background.

Most of these came as bonded-servants, and would be given passage to America, paid by the person who brought them over, and would have to work off their passage upon their arrival as per their contract, a period which often lasted for seven years.

At the end of that time, they were on their own and it was up to themselves to make something of their life in the New World.

"When did the Scottish come to the US?
The first Scots began coming to the New World in the early 1600's, Emigration picked up during the Cromwellian Civil War in Britain, as many Scots from both sides were transported to the American Colonies in the mid-1600's. The Jacobite rebellions of 1715 and 1745 also saw numbers of Scotsmen transported to America, as did the Highland Clearances which came somewhat later. Scottish emigrants who had gone to northern Ireland as colonists of the Ulster plantations in the first half of the 16th century also emigrated to America in the early 1700's. These people, who were referred to as the "Scotch-Irish" were by far the most numerous group of Scottish Colonists to come to America. Between 1715 and 1776 some 250,000 of them arrived, mainly in the Chesapeake Bay region, and settled all along the east coast, particularly in Maryland, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Virginia, North and South Carolina and later in Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky, Arkansas, Texas, Oklahoma, and beyond. A second wave of Scottish immigration came during the late 1800's and most of these Scots settled in the northeastern U.S. in the larger industrial cities, and included such worthies as Andrew Carnegie and Alexander Graham Bell.

the Scottish History timeline may offer some hints as to why our Edmund Johnston left Scotland, but still, I am not sure why he came to the U.S. in 1639

http://www.rampantscotland.com/timeline/1899.htm

 

How were the Scots treated?
The Scots were looked down upon by the English, Dutch and Germans, who saw them as being less civilized, orderly and less interested in bettering themselves materially through hard work. They were thought to be good fighters and in that capacity they were often set out on the frontier to act as a first line of defence against Indian attacks. The Scots quickly disproved the sterotypical views of the English and other colonists by becoming enormously successful in the New World. Among those who signed the Declaration of Independence were a number of Scotsmen, and the names of such political giants as Aaron Burr, Alexander Hamilton, James Monroe, James Buchanan, John K. Polk, William Drummond, Hugh Mercer,and many other Scotsmen echo throughout the pages of American history.

Where did the Scots settle? Why?
The early Scots colonists who arrived in the first half of the 1600's tended to prefer Virginia over New England and a preference for those colonies south of the New England states continued through the time leading up to the Revolutionary War, though numbers of both Scots and Scots-Irish could be found in New York, New Hampshire, Massassachusets, Conneticut and elsewhere. Primarily though, the main concentration of Scottish settlement was from Pennsylvania southward to Georgia.

How did the Scots make a living in the US?
Any way they could, as farmers, soldiers, blacksmiths, cattle-ranchers, lumber men, factory workers, whatever way they could succeed.

What were the roles of different family members?                                                                                                       This was the same as with other ethnic groups, the husband was generally the main provider, the wife the home-maker, mother, nurse, and the children usually did their share to help the family out, whether it was in farming, or working in the factories, or the streets as labourers.

What traditions did they bring to the US?                                                                                                                     They brought their language, which influenced American English to some extent, particularly in Appalachia, but more than anything else, they brought their music, especially fiddle-music, which became what we know today as American "bluegrass" music.

Was the US really the "promised land" for them?
Definately. Most of the Scots who came to America turned out to be far more successful than they would have if they stayed at home. At the worst, they were no worse off than they would have been had they not immigrated. America is the land of opportunity, Britain was a land of privilege, status and class-systems that were carved in stone.

http://www.siliconglen.com/Scotland/11_24.html "

The Long Lost Cuzzins site was created on May 29th, 2010

 
 
 

"The gentle Johnstons in Annan

a thousand years did ride;

A thousand more will bide"

[Sir Walter Scott]