The Clearances

[gilmore]

The blurb for "Highland Heritage: Scottish Americans in the American South" makes it look like an interesting read. Southerners have always identified with and touted our Scots heritage, real and imagined.

As Florence King, the Southern humorist, says, "When Southerners ask 'Who are they?' they mean 'Who were they?'"

I remember Faulkner describing the ancestor of one of his characters as grabbing his claymore and plaid after Culloden and fleeing to America.

There are those who blame the US Civil War in part on the novels of Sir Walter Scott, which popularized the notions of idealized chivalry, devotion to one's "land" (whatever that means), and lost causes, etc, that ante bellum Southerners had taken to heart.

[macwilkin]

The blurb for "Highland Heritage: Scottish Americans in the American South" makes it look like an interesting read. Southerners have always identified with and touted our Scots heritage, real and imagined.

As Florence King, the Southern humorist, says, "When Southerners ask 'Who are they?' they mean 'Who were they?'"

I remember Faulkner describing the ancestor of one of his characters as grabbing his claymore and plaid after Culloden and fleeing to America.

There are those who blame the US Civil War in part on the novels of Sir Walter Scott, which popularized the notions of idealized chivalry, devotion to one's "land" (whatever that means), and lost causes, etc, that ante bellum Southerners had taken to heart.

She has a whole chapter on this very subject, Gil.

T.