Chasing The Frontier: Scots-Irish in Early America | Larry J Hoefling

Chasing The Frontier: Scots-Irish in Early America | Larry J Hoefling | A serious misnomer

books:

Chasing The Fronti...

	Chasing The Frontier: Scots-Irish in Early America Larry J Hoefling iUniverse, Inc., 2005 - 291 pages average customer review:based on 2 reviews view larger image
	for more information click here

The story of the Scots-Irish is one of the struggles and achievements of an American immigrant group that existed for only a short period, whose descendants continued to make their marks on the young country for generations. From the North of Ireland to the backwoods of the American frontier, the tale of the Scots-Irish includes a massive exodus to the New World, where they founded communities in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, and the Irish Tract of North Carolina during the Revolutionary War era.

Containing nearly six thousand names of documented settlers of the primarily Scots-Irish settlements of Virginia and North Carolina, Chasing The Frontier includes materials from church records, military records, early wills and deeds, and newspapers of the time. For the frontier families, life was a daily test of endurance and hardship, but the Scots-Irish also found time for horseracing, gambling, and socializing, and the migration of this hardy race and the lure of the frontiers of Kentucky and Tennessee led to the founding of churches and state charters, and elections to some of the highest offices in the country.

Chasing the Frontier is a snapshot of everyday life for the pioneering Scots-Irish in early America.

for more information click here

Scots -Irish in Early America

Larry Hoefling leads the reader through the migration of the Scots-Irish from the Scotland lowlands, to Ireland, and then on to America. He provides excerpts from the lives of different Scots-Irish surnames of these early pioneers in America which is invaluable for the genealogist with Scots-Irish ancestry. Mr. Hoefling as been able to merge the history of these people's migration to America, along with a personal look at wills, death records, marriage records, military rosters, and land deeds of these early pioneers. Anyone with Scots-Irish ancestry would find this book an invaluable addition to their collection, and may even find the name of one of their ancestors included in the book.

for more information click here

A serious misnomer

As someone who tries to read every book published on the subject, I was quick to buy this book, and quick to read it, but it proved a major disappointment.

I was expecting a comprehensive treatment of the subject based on the title, but that's not what this is; instead, it is a dreary recitation of the author's family history, limited chronologically and geographically to the author's area of interest. If your area of interest happens to include the Huston family, or the Shenandoah Valley, or early Kentucky, it MIGHT be of interest to you, but it's doubly damned by a schizophrenic narrative style and a serious lack of connection to earlier, better works on the subject.

If you've done any genealogical research, you have doubtless endured long tomes full of names and dates, strung together by a valiant effort to create an interesting historical narrative; that's essentially what this is, and if the surnames and placenames are not relevant to you, it is pure unrewarding drudgery. If they are, you might be interested, but don't expect to be entertained or edified.

for more information click here

products you might be interested in