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For the latest news from Scotland see our ScotNews feed at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/
Electric Scotland News
I am going to see if a YouTube video would be a worth while edition to this newsletter by telling you what's in that weeks newsletter and why I chose the selections I have made. Please let me know what you think so I can judge if this should be ongoing project.
This weeks video can be viewed at:
Scottish News from this weeks newspapers
Note that this is a selection and more can be read in our ScotNews feed on our index page where we list news from the past 1-2 weeks. I am partly doing this to build an archive of modern news from and about Scotland as all the newsletters are archived and also indexed on Google and other search engines. I might also add that in newspapers such as the Guardian, Scotsman, Courier, etc. you will find many comments which can be just as interesting as the news story itself and of course you can also add your own comments if you wish.
Police Scotland changes course
The recent launch of Police Scotland’s ten-year strategy, Policing 2026, marked a turning point for Scottish policing on several counts.
Read more at:
http://sceptical.scot/2017/04/police...hanges-course/
Let’s debate different models for student fees and grants
It seems common to assume that we’re faced with a straight choice on tuition fees, where the state either funds the whole of everyone’s tuition costs, or all students have to take out a loan for £9,250 a year.
Read more at:
http://sceptical.scot/2017/05/lets-d...es-and-grants/
Thousands of police on the beat without current background checks
Figures reveal 90% of officers employed by one force have not been vetted in line with current policy.
Read more at:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-cornwall-39206326?
What is the Common Agricultural Policy?
The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is the EU policy to provide financial support to farmers in member states.
Read more at:
https://www.instituteforgovernment.o...ultural-policy
SNP’s 10 years in power are looking more like a lost decade
Evidence is now emerging that the last 10 years were more like a lost decade of stagnation.
Read more at:
https://www.thecourier.co.uk/fp/opin...e-lost-decade/
People's News
News Digest of the People’s Movement May 2017 edition.
Read more at:
http://www.people.ie/news/PN-167.pdf
Overseas investment in Scotland plummets
Research reveals not only that the number of projects and jobs created has fallen sharply, but that Scotland’s share of investment from overseas companies into the UK has also slumped.
Read more at:
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/s...mets-3cmw0p9f2
Victoria Hodgson: What I do in Scottish History
Description of my research is - cultural, social, environmental and economic perspectives of the role and function of monastic institutions in medieval societies on the ‘periphery’ of Europe
Read more at:
https://scottishhistorynetwork.wordp...ttish-history/
Thorium
Britain should become an optimistic nation by backing Thorium for power generation by Tony Trewavas
Read more at:
http://www.thinkscotland.org/todays-...ead_full=13169
There’s a strong economic case for women’s equality
So why so little progress? by Kirstein Rummery
Read more at:
http://www.thinkscotland.org/thinkbu...ead_full=13166
The bird that saved my team from oblivion
By Ron Ferguson
Read more at:
http://www.scottishreview.net/RonFerguson255a.html
UK potential financial liabilities
The European Union’s ever expanding Brexit financial claims against the UK, now apparently northward of €100bn, have raised their head in the campaign
Read more at:
http://www.lawyersforbritain.org/eu-...bilities.shtml
Designing a post-Brexit agricultural policy
Agriculture in the post-Brexit environment throws up a number of questions, of which the most immediate is what the UK intends to implement to replace the EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).
Read more at:
http://www.conservativehome.com/plat...al-policy.html
Twitter delights Scottish users with Saltire emoji
Good news for patriotic tweeters.
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/future-scotl...moji-1-4455918
Audit Scotland lays out five principles for IT project success
The Audit Scotland report pulls together lessons learned from previous reports on IT project failures
Read more at:
https://www.holyrood.com/articles/ne...roject-success
Brexit Flash Cards
Downloadable pithy summaries of some of the reasons why it is right to be leaving the EU and answering some of the questions
Read more at:
http://brexitflashcards.uk/wp-conten...cards-v.04.pdf
Brexit brings the chance to end 40 years of damage to our fishing communities
Oddly enough, the general election has given all of us focusing on Brexit a chance to breathe and look around
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/news/opinion...ties-1-4455558
Family confirm Barra teenager's death
The family of a 14-year-old girl from Scotland have confirmed that she was one of the 22 people killed in Monday's suicide bomb attack at the Manchester Arena.
Read more at:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-...lands-40027796
River Clyde healthier and stench-free
Salmon are able to access parts of the River Clyde for the first time in decades following work to improve water quality and remove barriers.
Read more at:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-...-west-40043491
Atholl Highlanders get set for Blair Castle parade
Final preparations are being made at a Highland castle for the annual parade of Europe’s last private army which was created during Queen Victoria’s travels to Scotland in 1844.
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/regions/inve...rade-1-4456807
Lochalsh junior pipe band are British Champions
Young Highland pipers are just champion – and they proved it when they played their hearts out in a top competition.
Read more at:
https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp...ish-champions/
Electric Canadian
Chronicles of Canada
Added Volume 32: The Railway Builders which now completes this 32 volume set.
I might add that I've found text copies of these volumes so have added a link to them on the page. I also found a page where you can get audio copies so have placed a link to these as well.
You can read this at: http://www.electriccanadian.com/hist...cles/index.htm
The Women's Canadian Historical Society
Added Transactions 25 The Colony of French Emigres in York County, 1798.
You can read this at: http://www.electriccanadian.com/hist...historical.htm
Conrad Black
I've always had a lot of time for Conrad Black and so as he writes from Canada on a number of issues of interest from around the world I'm intending to include links to his writings for you to view. This week we have...
Calling for Trump's impeachment is a cynical attempt to criminalize political differences
http://www.conradmblack.com/1295/cal...t-is-a-cynical
Trump Turns the Corner
http://www.conradmblack.com/1297/trump-turns-the-corner
Electric Scotland
The Forfar Directory and Year Book
A most interesting publication with lots of wee stories and articles. I have now added the 1906 edition which you can read at:http://www.electricscotland.com/history/forfar/direct/
The Scott Monument
The Scott Monument in the East Princes Street Gardens at Edinburgh has "secured the admiration of Europe and the appreciation of the highest judges of architecture in every country." It has the form of a beautiful Gothic spire two hundred feet in height, with Scott's statue underneath the canopy. The monument was erected at a cost of about £16,000, and is adorned with statues of prominent characters in Scott's works, and with likenesses of famous Scottish poets. It was designed by George Meikle Kemp, the son of a shepherd on the Pentland Hills, who when a boy of ten had his enthusiasm stirred by a visit he paid to Roslin Chapel, and subsequently devoted his life to the study of Gothic architecture. Unhappily, the young architect did not see the work completed, for he was one night accidentally drowned in the Union Canal. "The Scott Monument," says the architect's biographer, "has been visited from every land; engravings of it are diffused over the wide earth, and as long as it stands in its majestic and imposing beauty, the pilgrims of future centuries who gaze upon it in silent admiration will connect the builder with whom it commemorates."
You can learn more about the architect at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...emp_george.htm
S—M—I—T—H.
How many possible ways are there of spelling the famous name of Smith? We had imagined that some of the descendants of the original patriarch of that name, who vary it according to their fancy, as Smythe, Smithe, or Smyth, and their foreign relatives, Schmitt, Schmitz, Schmid, and so on, had already rung all the possible changes. But it seems not, as a German resident in Portugal, whose patronymic is Schmitz, has discovered to his cost. He has been writing home to Cologne complaining of the spelling of his name adopted by various Portuguese correspondents. Here are a few of them: Smhytis, Scimithz, Xemite, Chemitiz, and Schemeth. The last has a fine Oriental suggestion about it which is far from displeasing. We willingly dedicate the list to any aristocratic Smythe who may wish to remove himself yet a step further from his rightful clan.
Egypt and Scythia
Described by Herodotus (1866). Added a link to this book due to thinking that the Picts came from Scythia.
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...ist/hist2.html
The Treasure of the Magi
A Study of Modern Zooroastriannism by James Hope Moulton (1917)
Again with there being Scottish Magi connections thought this would make an interesting read which you can get to at :http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...st/hist17.html
What has Devolution done for Scotland
Added a couple of links to our Devolution page which you might find of interest.
You can read these at: http://www.electricscotland.com/inde...devolution.htm
Should Scotland be an Independent country?
A new video and I'd appreciate your comments.
You can view this at:
http://www.electricscotland.org/show...8370#post18370
Francis Hutcheson
His Life, Teaching and Position in the History of Philosophy by William Robert Scott (1900)
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/book...sHutcheson.pdf
The Life of George H. Stuart
Written by Himself (1890). Scots-Irish American
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...e-H-Stuart.pdf
Influence of Scottish Graduates Outside Scotland in the Nineteenth Century
A chapter from the History of Scottish Medicine
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...descotland.pdf
Robert Burns Lives!
Edited by Frank Shaw
Abraham Lincoln & Robert Burns by Alec Ross
I wish to thank the following people for today’s article on two of my favorite heroes, Robert Burns and Abraham Lincoln. First to my editor and good friend Alastair McIntyre for introducing me to the article, and then to Alec Ross for the excellent writing and his permission for the article to grace the pages of Robert Burns Lives! Also I cannot leave out Fiona Grahame, “girl Friday” at The Orkney News, for her cooperation in making this possible.
Standing watch over my library of several thousand books on Burns is an amazingly beautiful bronze bust of our Bard that I had commissioned by an artist in Houston, Texas modeled after one belonging to our Burns Club of Atlanta. This sculptor only wanted to be called “Whisper” as his friends had called him that all of his life due to a medical throat problem. I learned recently that Whisper had passed away, all too young, in his early 50s. I mourn for him quite regularly as I sit at my desk and gaze at his art work just a few feet away.
I carry in my wallet a five-dollar bill featuring President Lincoln that came into my possession over five years ago. It is marked with filthy graffiti which will always remind me that we still have a very long way to go in America before we can claim to be free of racial issues. The only thing uglier than this filth was the bullet Lincoln’s assassin sent crashing through his body. God pity the fool who wrote “abe Lincoln Union TRASH” on that five-dollar bill – he was one of America’s greatest heroes and, as the song says, “He freed lot of people.”
Alec Ross has written one of the best articles I have ever read on Burns and Lincoln showing that each of these men left their legacies of heart and soul for all to share. This chapter could be featured in any of the greatest Scottish books ever written. When I thanked Alastair for sending me this jewel, I simply wrote, “a tremendous article by a gifted writer.” Alec Ross is welcome to send another Burns article anytime his schedule permits. (FRS: 5.24.17)
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/fami...s_lives254.htm
NFU Annual Report
Put up a copy of their 2016 report which makes interesting reading.
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/agriculture/AR16.pdf
Energy Storage with Wind Power
By M.Ragheb which I've added to our Energy Page on the Scottish Innovation Party of our web site at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/inde...nd%20Power.pdf
The Story
As the Robert Burns Lives! story is about Abe Lincoln I thought I'd bring you this story which shows that a statue to him was erected in Edinburgh.
Historians and the Scottish-American Connection
The links between Scotland and America stretch back over three centuries. Perhaps one can officially date them from 1650, when a group of Scots gathered in Boston to create the first Scots’ Charitable Society, an organization to aid fellow immigrants who had fallen upon hard times. Scottish migration to the British North American Colonies during the seventeenth century remained sporadic, but from the early eighteenth century forward, extended bands of Highland and Lowland Scots settled all through Nova Scotia, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and North Carolina. Simultaneously, wave after wave of Scotch Irish migrants from Ulster landed in Philadelphia, making their way down the Appalachian valleys into Virginia and beyond.
Contemporaries were well aware of this Scots and Scotch Irish migration to the Colonies. As James Logan, chief advisor to Pennsylvania proprietor William Penn once observed: "It looks as if Ireland [i.e., Ulster] is to send all her habitants hither; for last week not less than six ships arrived, and every day two or three are coming." These Presbyterians, the Quaker Logan continued, were "audacious and disorderly"; they were "troublesome settlers to the government, and hard neighbors to the Indians."
Since the Scots were often educated, planters in the Chesapeake region frequently hired them as tutors, although they groused at having their children acquire a Scottish accent. The Journal kept by Lerwick émigré John Harrower, who served a four-year indenture as a schoolmaster in Virginia, illuminates this world. At William and Mary, young Thomas Jefferson fell under the sway of Aberdonian William Small, to whom he was ever grateful.
When the American Revolution broke out, at least in the Scotch-Irish version of the story, the Ulster natives leaped at the opportunity to attack the British crown. "Call this war by whatever name you may. . . ," observed one Hessian officer, "it is nothing more or less than a Scotch Irish Presbyterian rebellion." King George allegedly called the conflict "a Presbyterian war," and another official stated that cousin "America has run off with the Presbyterian parson." In spite of these comments, the actual Scotch-Irish population was a bit more divided in their loyalties than legend would have it, especially in the South. Still, the Scotch-Irish generally emerged from the Revolution with an enhanced local reputation.
The same could not be said for the Scots proper. Although famed poet Robert Burns once wrote an "Ode for General Washington’s Birthday," the Scots who had emigrated to Colonial America were seldom convinced by the patriots’ arguments. Many had fought against the Crown only thirty years previously, but when the Revolution broke out, the majority of Scots sided with Great Britain. Of this there is little dispute. In 1776 former Paisley cleric John Witherspoon, then president of the College of New Jersey and a staunch patriot, tried to change this point of view. He gave an address (later printed as a pamphlet) to the "Natives of Scotland residing in America" that noted: "It has given me no little uneasiness to hear the word Scotch used as a term of reproach in the American controversy." Virginian Thomas Jefferson included a condemnation of "Scotch and other foreign mercenaries" in an early draft of the Declaration of Independence, a phrase that Witherspoon discreetly helped remove. However, Jefferson continued to rail at the "Scotch Tories" for over two decades.
During the era of the Revolution, Americans often denounced the Scots. In his 1776 play, The Patriots, Virginia author Robert Mumford named characters "M’Flint," "M’Gripe," and "M’Squeeze." Local pressure either evicted Scots from certain regions (such as the Chesapeake) or forced them to return to Scotland on their own. Flora MacDonald, Scotland’s most famous heroine, left North Carolina for her native South Uist under these circumstances. Perhaps as many as five thousand Scots Tories later migrated to Canada due to their loyalty to the British crown. In the process they became the spiritual founders of Canada. In 1782 the lower house of Georgia passed a resolution declaring that the people of Scotland possessed "a decided inimicality to the Civil Liberties of America." Any Scot found in the region after three days would be "committed to Gaol."
But citizens of the new Republic had short memories and this antagonism quickly passed. Paisley-born naturalist Alexander Wilson observed that he received great cooperation on his southward journey from Philadelphia to gather material for his famed American Ornithology (1807—18). An 1810 traveler to Charleston also noted that the ruling Tory aristocracy of South Carolina consisted of "chiefly Scotchmen." After the Peace of Paris in 1783, one finds little criticism of Scottish people.
From c. 1790 to c. 1860 the Scots and Scotch-Irish immigrants generally split their destinations between Canada and the new American republic. Figures are, unfortunately, inexact, but the majority probably sailed for Montreal and Ontario rather than Philadelphia or New York. Even so, a small but significant number found their way to the various "British colonies" established in Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, and elsewhere. When the American Civil War broke out in 1861, many a Confederate soldier bore a Scotch-Irish surname. On the other side, Chicago and New York each raised a Scottish-American regiment that fought for the Union. New York’s 79th, which modeled its uniforms after the famed Black Watch, remains the most celebrated of these Scots Union military contingents. In 1893 the city of Edinburgh erected a statue of President Abraham Lincoln in the Old Calton Hill Burial Ground, the first Lincoln statue outside the United States. In an impressive ceremony the provost of Edinburgh and the American consul dedicated the ground as a burial place for five Scots soldiers who had died fighting for the Northern cause.
You can read more of this story at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...h_american.htm
And that's it for this week and I hope you all have a good weekend.
Alastair
http://www.electricscotland.com/
Electric Scotland News
I am going to see if a YouTube video would be a worth while edition to this newsletter by telling you what's in that weeks newsletter and why I chose the selections I have made. Please let me know what you think so I can judge if this should be ongoing project.
This weeks video can be viewed at:
Note that this is a selection and more can be read in our ScotNews feed on our index page where we list news from the past 1-2 weeks. I am partly doing this to build an archive of modern news from and about Scotland as all the newsletters are archived and also indexed on Google and other search engines. I might also add that in newspapers such as the Guardian, Scotsman, Courier, etc. you will find many comments which can be just as interesting as the news story itself and of course you can also add your own comments if you wish.
Police Scotland changes course
The recent launch of Police Scotland’s ten-year strategy, Policing 2026, marked a turning point for Scottish policing on several counts.
Read more at:
http://sceptical.scot/2017/04/police...hanges-course/
Let’s debate different models for student fees and grants
It seems common to assume that we’re faced with a straight choice on tuition fees, where the state either funds the whole of everyone’s tuition costs, or all students have to take out a loan for £9,250 a year.
Read more at:
http://sceptical.scot/2017/05/lets-d...es-and-grants/
Thousands of police on the beat without current background checks
Figures reveal 90% of officers employed by one force have not been vetted in line with current policy.
Read more at:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-cornwall-39206326?
What is the Common Agricultural Policy?
The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is the EU policy to provide financial support to farmers in member states.
Read more at:
https://www.instituteforgovernment.o...ultural-policy
SNP’s 10 years in power are looking more like a lost decade
Evidence is now emerging that the last 10 years were more like a lost decade of stagnation.
Read more at:
https://www.thecourier.co.uk/fp/opin...e-lost-decade/
People's News
News Digest of the People’s Movement May 2017 edition.
Read more at:
http://www.people.ie/news/PN-167.pdf
Overseas investment in Scotland plummets
Research reveals not only that the number of projects and jobs created has fallen sharply, but that Scotland’s share of investment from overseas companies into the UK has also slumped.
Read more at:
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/s...mets-3cmw0p9f2
Victoria Hodgson: What I do in Scottish History
Description of my research is - cultural, social, environmental and economic perspectives of the role and function of monastic institutions in medieval societies on the ‘periphery’ of Europe
Read more at:
https://scottishhistorynetwork.wordp...ttish-history/
Thorium
Britain should become an optimistic nation by backing Thorium for power generation by Tony Trewavas
Read more at:
http://www.thinkscotland.org/todays-...ead_full=13169
There’s a strong economic case for women’s equality
So why so little progress? by Kirstein Rummery
Read more at:
http://www.thinkscotland.org/thinkbu...ead_full=13166
The bird that saved my team from oblivion
By Ron Ferguson
Read more at:
http://www.scottishreview.net/RonFerguson255a.html
UK potential financial liabilities
The European Union’s ever expanding Brexit financial claims against the UK, now apparently northward of €100bn, have raised their head in the campaign
Read more at:
http://www.lawyersforbritain.org/eu-...bilities.shtml
Designing a post-Brexit agricultural policy
Agriculture in the post-Brexit environment throws up a number of questions, of which the most immediate is what the UK intends to implement to replace the EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).
Read more at:
http://www.conservativehome.com/plat...al-policy.html
Twitter delights Scottish users with Saltire emoji
Good news for patriotic tweeters.
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/future-scotl...moji-1-4455918
Audit Scotland lays out five principles for IT project success
The Audit Scotland report pulls together lessons learned from previous reports on IT project failures
Read more at:
https://www.holyrood.com/articles/ne...roject-success
Brexit Flash Cards
Downloadable pithy summaries of some of the reasons why it is right to be leaving the EU and answering some of the questions
Read more at:
http://brexitflashcards.uk/wp-conten...cards-v.04.pdf
Brexit brings the chance to end 40 years of damage to our fishing communities
Oddly enough, the general election has given all of us focusing on Brexit a chance to breathe and look around
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/news/opinion...ties-1-4455558
Family confirm Barra teenager's death
The family of a 14-year-old girl from Scotland have confirmed that she was one of the 22 people killed in Monday's suicide bomb attack at the Manchester Arena.
Read more at:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-...lands-40027796
River Clyde healthier and stench-free
Salmon are able to access parts of the River Clyde for the first time in decades following work to improve water quality and remove barriers.
Read more at:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-...-west-40043491
Atholl Highlanders get set for Blair Castle parade
Final preparations are being made at a Highland castle for the annual parade of Europe’s last private army which was created during Queen Victoria’s travels to Scotland in 1844.
Read more at:
http://www.scotsman.com/regions/inve...rade-1-4456807
Lochalsh junior pipe band are British Champions
Young Highland pipers are just champion – and they proved it when they played their hearts out in a top competition.
Read more at:
https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp...ish-champions/
Electric Canadian
Chronicles of Canada
Added Volume 32: The Railway Builders which now completes this 32 volume set.
I might add that I've found text copies of these volumes so have added a link to them on the page. I also found a page where you can get audio copies so have placed a link to these as well.
You can read this at: http://www.electriccanadian.com/hist...cles/index.htm
The Women's Canadian Historical Society
Added Transactions 25 The Colony of French Emigres in York County, 1798.
You can read this at: http://www.electriccanadian.com/hist...historical.htm
Conrad Black
I've always had a lot of time for Conrad Black and so as he writes from Canada on a number of issues of interest from around the world I'm intending to include links to his writings for you to view. This week we have...
Calling for Trump's impeachment is a cynical attempt to criminalize political differences
http://www.conradmblack.com/1295/cal...t-is-a-cynical
Trump Turns the Corner
http://www.conradmblack.com/1297/trump-turns-the-corner
Electric Scotland
The Forfar Directory and Year Book
A most interesting publication with lots of wee stories and articles. I have now added the 1906 edition which you can read at:http://www.electricscotland.com/history/forfar/direct/
The Scott Monument
The Scott Monument in the East Princes Street Gardens at Edinburgh has "secured the admiration of Europe and the appreciation of the highest judges of architecture in every country." It has the form of a beautiful Gothic spire two hundred feet in height, with Scott's statue underneath the canopy. The monument was erected at a cost of about £16,000, and is adorned with statues of prominent characters in Scott's works, and with likenesses of famous Scottish poets. It was designed by George Meikle Kemp, the son of a shepherd on the Pentland Hills, who when a boy of ten had his enthusiasm stirred by a visit he paid to Roslin Chapel, and subsequently devoted his life to the study of Gothic architecture. Unhappily, the young architect did not see the work completed, for he was one night accidentally drowned in the Union Canal. "The Scott Monument," says the architect's biographer, "has been visited from every land; engravings of it are diffused over the wide earth, and as long as it stands in its majestic and imposing beauty, the pilgrims of future centuries who gaze upon it in silent admiration will connect the builder with whom it commemorates."
You can learn more about the architect at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...emp_george.htm
S—M—I—T—H.
How many possible ways are there of spelling the famous name of Smith? We had imagined that some of the descendants of the original patriarch of that name, who vary it according to their fancy, as Smythe, Smithe, or Smyth, and their foreign relatives, Schmitt, Schmitz, Schmid, and so on, had already rung all the possible changes. But it seems not, as a German resident in Portugal, whose patronymic is Schmitz, has discovered to his cost. He has been writing home to Cologne complaining of the spelling of his name adopted by various Portuguese correspondents. Here are a few of them: Smhytis, Scimithz, Xemite, Chemitiz, and Schemeth. The last has a fine Oriental suggestion about it which is far from displeasing. We willingly dedicate the list to any aristocratic Smythe who may wish to remove himself yet a step further from his rightful clan.
Egypt and Scythia
Described by Herodotus (1866). Added a link to this book due to thinking that the Picts came from Scythia.
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...ist/hist2.html
The Treasure of the Magi
A Study of Modern Zooroastriannism by James Hope Moulton (1917)
Again with there being Scottish Magi connections thought this would make an interesting read which you can get to at :http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...st/hist17.html
What has Devolution done for Scotland
Added a couple of links to our Devolution page which you might find of interest.
You can read these at: http://www.electricscotland.com/inde...devolution.htm
Should Scotland be an Independent country?
A new video and I'd appreciate your comments.
You can view this at:
http://www.electricscotland.org/show...8370#post18370
Francis Hutcheson
His Life, Teaching and Position in the History of Philosophy by William Robert Scott (1900)
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/book...sHutcheson.pdf
The Life of George H. Stuart
Written by Himself (1890). Scots-Irish American
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...e-H-Stuart.pdf
Influence of Scottish Graduates Outside Scotland in the Nineteenth Century
A chapter from the History of Scottish Medicine
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...descotland.pdf
Robert Burns Lives!
Edited by Frank Shaw
Abraham Lincoln & Robert Burns by Alec Ross
I wish to thank the following people for today’s article on two of my favorite heroes, Robert Burns and Abraham Lincoln. First to my editor and good friend Alastair McIntyre for introducing me to the article, and then to Alec Ross for the excellent writing and his permission for the article to grace the pages of Robert Burns Lives! Also I cannot leave out Fiona Grahame, “girl Friday” at The Orkney News, for her cooperation in making this possible.
Standing watch over my library of several thousand books on Burns is an amazingly beautiful bronze bust of our Bard that I had commissioned by an artist in Houston, Texas modeled after one belonging to our Burns Club of Atlanta. This sculptor only wanted to be called “Whisper” as his friends had called him that all of his life due to a medical throat problem. I learned recently that Whisper had passed away, all too young, in his early 50s. I mourn for him quite regularly as I sit at my desk and gaze at his art work just a few feet away.
I carry in my wallet a five-dollar bill featuring President Lincoln that came into my possession over five years ago. It is marked with filthy graffiti which will always remind me that we still have a very long way to go in America before we can claim to be free of racial issues. The only thing uglier than this filth was the bullet Lincoln’s assassin sent crashing through his body. God pity the fool who wrote “abe Lincoln Union TRASH” on that five-dollar bill – he was one of America’s greatest heroes and, as the song says, “He freed lot of people.”
Alec Ross has written one of the best articles I have ever read on Burns and Lincoln showing that each of these men left their legacies of heart and soul for all to share. This chapter could be featured in any of the greatest Scottish books ever written. When I thanked Alastair for sending me this jewel, I simply wrote, “a tremendous article by a gifted writer.” Alec Ross is welcome to send another Burns article anytime his schedule permits. (FRS: 5.24.17)
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/fami...s_lives254.htm
NFU Annual Report
Put up a copy of their 2016 report which makes interesting reading.
You can read this at: http://www.electricscotland.com/agriculture/AR16.pdf
Energy Storage with Wind Power
By M.Ragheb which I've added to our Energy Page on the Scottish Innovation Party of our web site at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/inde...nd%20Power.pdf
The Story
As the Robert Burns Lives! story is about Abe Lincoln I thought I'd bring you this story which shows that a statue to him was erected in Edinburgh.
Historians and the Scottish-American Connection
The links between Scotland and America stretch back over three centuries. Perhaps one can officially date them from 1650, when a group of Scots gathered in Boston to create the first Scots’ Charitable Society, an organization to aid fellow immigrants who had fallen upon hard times. Scottish migration to the British North American Colonies during the seventeenth century remained sporadic, but from the early eighteenth century forward, extended bands of Highland and Lowland Scots settled all through Nova Scotia, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and North Carolina. Simultaneously, wave after wave of Scotch Irish migrants from Ulster landed in Philadelphia, making their way down the Appalachian valleys into Virginia and beyond.
Contemporaries were well aware of this Scots and Scotch Irish migration to the Colonies. As James Logan, chief advisor to Pennsylvania proprietor William Penn once observed: "It looks as if Ireland [i.e., Ulster] is to send all her habitants hither; for last week not less than six ships arrived, and every day two or three are coming." These Presbyterians, the Quaker Logan continued, were "audacious and disorderly"; they were "troublesome settlers to the government, and hard neighbors to the Indians."
Since the Scots were often educated, planters in the Chesapeake region frequently hired them as tutors, although they groused at having their children acquire a Scottish accent. The Journal kept by Lerwick émigré John Harrower, who served a four-year indenture as a schoolmaster in Virginia, illuminates this world. At William and Mary, young Thomas Jefferson fell under the sway of Aberdonian William Small, to whom he was ever grateful.
When the American Revolution broke out, at least in the Scotch-Irish version of the story, the Ulster natives leaped at the opportunity to attack the British crown. "Call this war by whatever name you may. . . ," observed one Hessian officer, "it is nothing more or less than a Scotch Irish Presbyterian rebellion." King George allegedly called the conflict "a Presbyterian war," and another official stated that cousin "America has run off with the Presbyterian parson." In spite of these comments, the actual Scotch-Irish population was a bit more divided in their loyalties than legend would have it, especially in the South. Still, the Scotch-Irish generally emerged from the Revolution with an enhanced local reputation.
The same could not be said for the Scots proper. Although famed poet Robert Burns once wrote an "Ode for General Washington’s Birthday," the Scots who had emigrated to Colonial America were seldom convinced by the patriots’ arguments. Many had fought against the Crown only thirty years previously, but when the Revolution broke out, the majority of Scots sided with Great Britain. Of this there is little dispute. In 1776 former Paisley cleric John Witherspoon, then president of the College of New Jersey and a staunch patriot, tried to change this point of view. He gave an address (later printed as a pamphlet) to the "Natives of Scotland residing in America" that noted: "It has given me no little uneasiness to hear the word Scotch used as a term of reproach in the American controversy." Virginian Thomas Jefferson included a condemnation of "Scotch and other foreign mercenaries" in an early draft of the Declaration of Independence, a phrase that Witherspoon discreetly helped remove. However, Jefferson continued to rail at the "Scotch Tories" for over two decades.
During the era of the Revolution, Americans often denounced the Scots. In his 1776 play, The Patriots, Virginia author Robert Mumford named characters "M’Flint," "M’Gripe," and "M’Squeeze." Local pressure either evicted Scots from certain regions (such as the Chesapeake) or forced them to return to Scotland on their own. Flora MacDonald, Scotland’s most famous heroine, left North Carolina for her native South Uist under these circumstances. Perhaps as many as five thousand Scots Tories later migrated to Canada due to their loyalty to the British crown. In the process they became the spiritual founders of Canada. In 1782 the lower house of Georgia passed a resolution declaring that the people of Scotland possessed "a decided inimicality to the Civil Liberties of America." Any Scot found in the region after three days would be "committed to Gaol."
But citizens of the new Republic had short memories and this antagonism quickly passed. Paisley-born naturalist Alexander Wilson observed that he received great cooperation on his southward journey from Philadelphia to gather material for his famed American Ornithology (1807—18). An 1810 traveler to Charleston also noted that the ruling Tory aristocracy of South Carolina consisted of "chiefly Scotchmen." After the Peace of Paris in 1783, one finds little criticism of Scottish people.
From c. 1790 to c. 1860 the Scots and Scotch-Irish immigrants generally split their destinations between Canada and the new American republic. Figures are, unfortunately, inexact, but the majority probably sailed for Montreal and Ontario rather than Philadelphia or New York. Even so, a small but significant number found their way to the various "British colonies" established in Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, and elsewhere. When the American Civil War broke out in 1861, many a Confederate soldier bore a Scotch-Irish surname. On the other side, Chicago and New York each raised a Scottish-American regiment that fought for the Union. New York’s 79th, which modeled its uniforms after the famed Black Watch, remains the most celebrated of these Scots Union military contingents. In 1893 the city of Edinburgh erected a statue of President Abraham Lincoln in the Old Calton Hill Burial Ground, the first Lincoln statue outside the United States. In an impressive ceremony the provost of Edinburgh and the American consul dedicated the ground as a burial place for five Scots soldiers who had died fighting for the Northern cause.
You can read more of this story at: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...h_american.htm
And that's it for this week and I hope you all have a good weekend.
Alastair
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