“Circling Dixie” by Helen Taylor

[paulliver]

Reading a history book about America by a British Literature Professor is a strange experience. In the first chapter I felt like I was reading a review of stuff I already knew, until she smacked me in the face with the statistic that 75% of white Southerners at the opening of the Civil War were of Celtic descent (Irish, Welsh, Scots) not English

Comments

[ms_eclectic]

Very interesting...might have to chase this one down and read it. Thank you for sharing.

[little_e_]

The Southern upper class (slave owners), from what I have read, was drawn from western England (the side that lost the English Civil War.) Maryland, for example, was founded as an English Catholic colony. I have often seen it alleged that the Civil War was in many ways a continuation of older British conflicts.

[paulliver]

And the 75% from the Celtic areas could have been more in the lower and middle economic classes of white society... but regardless, it's interesting stuff.

[little_e_]

Yes.
The Irish who settled in the South tended to be more what we now call Scots-Irish, Protestants. A different group from the Irish who came later and settled in the Boston Region.

My family hails from the region, so it's all there in the family tree. Funny, that.