1625: The King is Dead, Four Spiritual Revivals Begin in Ulster & Scotland – "ministers who had suffered for their faith under James VI"

King James VI & I is held in (probably too) much esteem in traditional smaller evangelical circles in Northern Ireland. There are many 'King James Only' congregations, that is congregations who have a policy of only ever using the 1611 Authorised Version of the Bible which James commissioned. It is of course majestic language from a defining moment in time. Alongside the works of Shakespeare, the KJV or AV pretty much standardised the English language.

James' translation team drew very heavily upon earlier Reformed versions, most notably by the English translator William Tyndale (1535), and the Geneva Bible (1560) which James wanted to swamp out of circulation. There have of course been many newer translations, in particular over the past 100 years. But the KJV / AV is the one which is easiest to memorise. Maybe that's just through repetition.

However conservative-minded people from within the Reformed community have not always held King James in such high esteem. Rev Dr James Aitken Wylie (1808–90; Wikipedia here) was a Scottish theologian and historian, the son of a Seceder minister, and eventually joined the Free Church of Scotland. His lavish four volume The History of Protestantism (1878) is a Europe-wide epic. He also wrote a three volume The History Of The Scottish Nation (1886). Wylie, towards the end of his life, was shaping the narratives of both faith and nation.

In Wylie's view, it was the death of King James VI & I (on 27 March 1625) that was the spark which ignited the chain of interconnected spiritual revivals which broke out in Ulster and Scotland. Wylie has this to say –

“...the year of the king’s death was rendered memorable by the rise of a remarkable influence of a spiritual kind in Scotland, which continued for years... preachers had found no new Gospel, nor had they become suddenly clothed with a new eloquence; yet their words had a power they had formerly lacked; they went deeper into the hearts of their hearers, who were impressed by them in a way they had never been before... the moral character of whole towns, villages and parishes was being suddenly changed...”

For Wylie, the key to the revivals was this: “...it was distinctly traceable to those ministers who had suffered for their faith under James VI...” Unsurprisingly, the ministers involved in the revivals, and the regions where revival was so strongly experienced, were all closely linked to Ayrshiremen James Hamilton and Hugh Montgomery who had settled west of Scotland farming families across into Antrim and Down. This was one community with a group of ministers who travelled back and forth, softly separated by the waves of North Channel.

The four revivals were –

1. Stewarton, Ayrshire 1623–1630

2. Sixmilewater, County Antrim 1625–1634

3. Kirk O’ Shotts, north Lanarkshire, 1630

4. Holywood, County Down 1632/1633

"the author of two Scottish ballads unsurpassed for tenderness and pathos" - the life of William Motherwell (1797–1835)

This Scottish poet, who wrote in both English and Scots, is a new name to me. He was born in Glasgow the year after Robert Burns died, and shared a mutual friend - Robert Archibald Smith - with fellow poet Robert Tannahill. He edited a five volume set of Burns' work with James Hogg the 'Ettrick Shepherd'. Interestingly it seems that Motherwell was an Orangeman.

The Spenserians website has a number of 19th century biographies of Motherwell (link here), and the Allpoetry website has a selection of his work here, some of which is to me very good. The quote I've used in the title of this post is from this bio by James Grant Wilson. Motherwell's Wikipedia page is a bit of a hatchet job though (link here) with some pretty bizarre assertions. 

• The Harp of Renfrewshire (orig 1819; 1873 edition is online here)

• Minstrelsy Ancient and Modern (1827; is online here)

• Poems, Narrative and Lyrical (1832; is online here)

• The Works of Robert Burns, five volumes edited by James Hogg and William Motherwell (1834; volume I is online here)

• William Motherwell's Cultural Politics by Mary Ellen Brown (2001; is online here)

Longhouse

I found this photo again recently, from 2004, a lovely and once-famous old local farmstead. It's gone now but it was one of the many that inspired me when gathering ideas for what we would eventually buildWith modern regulations to comply with and a different shape of site, ours turned out a bit differently. We tried to keep the 'longhouse' notion as best we could, and of course the classic red doors.

Islandmagee Ulster-Scots 'gunrunning' aftermath postcard, 1914

I am reading a lot just now about Islandmagee and I found this again this evening. Multiple complexities here in the aftermath of the Larne gun-running of 1914. Scanned from a book of vintage Ulster postcards, published by Linen Hall Library.

Informers and agents everywhere – G.K. Chesterton's 'The Man who was Thursday'

"A poor man has much more interest in good government than a rich man. A poor man must stay and be misgoverned; a rich man has a yacht". – G.K. Chesterton

Chesterton (1874–1936) was a renowned writer, still held in high regard today. He was firstly a 'high church' Anglican and later a Catholic theologian. The photo above is of his grave at Beaconsfield in Buckinghamshire, very close to where my in-laws live, and I had hoped to visit it this past summer but coronavirus banjaxed those plans. He is very quotable and has multiple fans on Twitter, tweeting little chunks of Chesterton every day.

Last summer I read his gripping 1908 novel The Man Who Was Thursday (Wikipedia here). It's set in London, and is about a man who is approached by the police to infiltrate an anarchist group who are plotting a terror campaign. He very quickly rises through the ranks to take a seat at the top table of the organisation, where an odd collection of individuals all have codenames which are the days of the week. He becomes 'Thursday'.

As the novel develops it turns out that every single one of these anarchists is also a police agent or informer. It's never been out of print and has been dramatised by BBC Radio Four (iPlayer link here), and also a movie as recently as 2016.

In recent weeks in Northern Ireland we numerous revelations of informers within armed groups of all political shades, from away back at the very start of our Troubles right up to the present day. A sizeable segment in the Radio Ulster current affairs discussion programme Talkback just today was about this story. There have of course been decades of stories like these seeping out. All of which begs the question – if each of those groups was so riddled with agents, then who was pulling the strings, for what reasons, and why was it allowed to drag on for so many bloodied years?

Some have claimed that our conflict was a social experiment and that Northern Ireland was a kind of laboratory where new strategies could be tested. 

Whatever the truth is, I doubt we will ever really find out. As a noted journalist wrote back in January in an article on the subject – "The central truth about Northern Ireland, which stands as the primary enabler that makes the utterly impossible often perfectly probable, is that it is a society based on lies. Everyone lies there. Everyone. They lie to themselves, they lie to one another, they lie to their children, they lie to their friends, they lie to their enemies. Lies are the currency of almost all intellectual exchanges..."

The Ulster Covenant and Charlotte, North Carolina – 12 September 1912

"When the Scotch-Irish have a case of conscience they have it bad" – The Charlotte Observer of North Carolina reporting on the Ulster Covenant, September 1912 –  connecting it back to Scotland's National Covenant of 1638 and their own Mecklenburg Declaration of 1775.

 

Tyler Childers 'Long Violent History'

 This is a very interesting contextual video to Tyler Childers' new fiddle album

'A crack' with Paddy O'Neill – James Craig, their wives, and the importance of relationships

If coronavirus wasn't dominating the phone-in shows, the forthcoming centenary / centenNIal of Northern Ireland would be. It manages to squeeze in between the gaps every once in a while. This recent article by Professor John Wilson Foster is excellent. Today, in looking for something else, my eye caught this extract from St John Ervine's Craigavon, Ulsterman, his biography of James Craig the first Prime Minister of Northern Ireland.

Craig and Patrick O'Neill were political opponents, but they were also personal friends. O'Neill was a hotelier in Warrenpoint, and evidently their wives shared a mutual regard too. You can see in the page image below, Craig "liked the man and did not let their differences divide them".

This is an important reminder that relationship can transcend political difference. I hope that in all of the political history we'll get next year, much of which will be divisive and will be deployed by spokespersons to justify century-long events and present-day positions, that there will be also be room to acknowledge that stories like this happened too.

There has not only ever been conflict. Those who insist there was usually benefit in some way from persuading others of that claim.

Shamrock, Rose and Thistle – Northern Ireland Parliament Medal – 22 June 1921

A Dublin view of Ulster-Scots, 1914

Rev. Augustine Dillon Cosgrave (1865–1936) was Dublin born and bred, and a member of the Carmelite order. He was a noted historian and his 1906 volume A History of Ireland in the Nineteenth Century (online here) has lots of very interesting material. It's good to read deeply within your own community, but also to read widely beyond it. His perspectives on key events of that century are quite different to the ones I have absorbed.

The 1914 article below, which is on JSTOR here, looks brilliant, showing his understanding that 'Ulsterisms' are overwhelmingly 'really Scotticisms ... a Scotsman may easily be taken for an Ulsterman, or vice versa, if his place of origin be judged by his speech alone ... to a Dubliner, all Ulstermen, whether judged by speech or character, are like Scotchmen'.  

His observation that there is a 'homogeneity of speech which seems to be shared by Ulstermen of all creeds and politics' I think is still largely true a century later, but with regional variations within.

The Catholic Standard of 1 May 1936 paid tribute to Cosgrave as 'not only one of Dublin's most familiar and best-loved figures, but also one of the foremost authorities on its history and antiquities' and went on to say that he 'specialised in modern languages, in which he was highly accomplished'. So his linguistic observations on the Scots influence on Ulster's speech is significant.

He died aged 72, as a result of an accident, and was buried at Glasnevin Cemetery.

Thomas Carnduff - "our utter lack of interest in history ... the fault lies with the Government"

"A great failing many Ulster people have is our utter lack of interest in the history and legends attached to almost every strip of land in the North. The fault, perhaps, doesn't lie with the people but with the Government. They have yet to produce a school book giving the reader an outline of Ulster history. A country without history is somewhat like a man without a name; he is born, lives, dies, and is forgotten."

– Thomas Carnduff, from an article entitled "I Think This Stage-Ulsterman Stuff Is About Played Out" in the Belfast Telegraph, 18 November 1942.

From just a few searches in the online British Newspaper Archive I am finding a quite different Carnduff than the standard biographies portray. I have only posted a few here, inspired by his article in The Bell in July 1942 – which it turns out was based on a Belfast Telegraph article from four years earlier on 9 July 1938, which was entitled 'The Literature of Orangeism is No Sham'.

Every editor has either conscious or unconscious bias. With his Blue Plaque on Belfast's famous Linen Hall Library, I think Carnduff has been edited selectively, reduced to a smaller thinker than he was, and a rethink is overdue, by someone capable of doing so. But when you send someone panning for gold, make sure they know what gold looks like.

But his point is key - Northern Ireland was 21 years old, into its second generation, and the Government still had not published a history. 

Thomas Carnduff - 'Ulstermen All' - Belfast Telegraph, 3 August 1923

 

Thomas Carnduff - 'Wake Up Ulster' - Belfast Telegraph , 6 August 1927

Here Carnduff shows that he must have been drinking from the same fountain as Rev. W.F. Marshall, ticking all the classic boxes - a rallying cry in the early years of Northern Ireland's existence. 

Thomas Carnduff, 'Belfast' in 1942, and giving yourself room to critique

The photo below is of the home turf of Thomas Carnduff (1886–1956), Belfast's Sandy Row, as famously photographed by Bill Kirk in 1974 (see article on Culture Northern Ireland here). Two years after I was born this is how people there lived. Staunchly unionist, yet utterly neglected by what some would claim was 'their' state.

[An important recent Radio Ulster interview, with a 92 year old lady called Ruby and her son Paul, of the Fountain Estate working class unionist community's experiences in Londonderry in 1968 is similarly shocking and stereotype-shattering – link here] 

The handful of editions of The Bell that I acquired recently are full of content that is intriguing and stimulating. I have never got around to reading any Thomas Carnduff (1886–1956) until now, but this piece I have posted below is a rich vein of thought. It's 32 years before the photograph above. I'm not on-side with all of Carnduff's perspectives, but he has the guts to praise and stoutly defend aspects of life in Belfast, and also the wisdom to leave space to critique aspects of it too. Kirk's photographs show reason enough why. 

One of the difficulties around the forthcoming centenary/centennial of Northern Ireland and the Irish Free State is that the Ulster-Scots were, and are, on both sides of the line, and have never been unthinking supporters of any state wherever in the world they have travelled. As Carnduff hints here "one long chapter of municipal independence and disagreements with the lawful demands of the King's representatives" – centuries of experiences which have been mined in Scotland and forged in Ulster.

The marking of 2021 poses challenges which need to be thought through, within Northern Ireland and also for our neighbours within today's Republic of Ireland. Having spent some time over the years with the self-described "minority community" on the other side of our presently-soft border, their experiences need to be acknowledged. Those experiences tend to be swiftly glossed over by the establishment-endorsed narratives, but many of those folk will still speak today of "keeping our heads down". I am just an interested spectator and a visitor though, I have no family there. Those who do are key in finding the right and respectful approach. 

These are not the only perspectives that can be viewed for the centenary/centennial. And there aren't just "two sides" to be told – there are thousands, millions even, of stories.

Carnduff is interesting here. I need to read more of his.

"The Realm of Strathclyde"

More information here. "Strathclyde is a serious micronation in western Europe.  She has her own elected King, written constitution, elected government, elected parliament, and is recognised by at least 16 other micronations around the world. She has her own laws and is heavily influenced by and committed to human rights, and to John Stuart Mill's idea of liberty, which is protected through our constitution".

It is very possible that one of my friends is pranking me.  

"Ninian and Nendrum – Whithorn and the Early Church in east Ulster"

I picked up a booklet recently of this title, being the content of the Tenth Whithorn Lecture given on 15 September 2001 by the late Dr Ann Hamlin O.B.E. (1940–2003), edited by Malcolm Fry, and published by The Friends of Whithorn Trust. Dr Hamlin worked for the Archaeological Survey of Northern Ireland, which was then part of the Department of the Environment.

Nendrum is one of Ireland's most important early monastic sites - it was 'lost' for centuries except for ancient manuscript records. It was finally located by the meticulous antiquarian and historian Bishop William Reeves in 1844, and then was literally uncovered by a team of local archaeologists, farmers and contractors almost 100 years ago, in June 1922. You can read a report of the "repair and preservation" of Nendrum online here, including an interesting list of all of those who donated funds to the project. 

The early Christian communities' connections across the North Channel and Irish Sea were many, thanks to the ancient kingdoms, such as Dal Fiatach, which also had connections on each side. (The sites of Whithorn and Nendrum are marked on the map above).

St Ninian (Wikipedia here) was Scotland's first saint; he began his missionary work at Whithorn in AD397. He died in AD432 (according to some sources he died in Ireland) – which is traditionally given as the year that St Patrick began his work in Ireland. A passing of the baton if you will. Around a century later, St Finnian, who was of the 'royal' family of Dal Fiatach, is best known for his work at Movilla near Newtownards – he studied at both Nendrum and Whithorn. St Columba was one of Finnian's pupils, who of course founded the world famous monastery on the western Scottish island of Iona.

The 1927 Stormont Debate – Tommy Henderson, Liquor and Ice Cream

The story of Northern Ireland's relationship with alcohol is far bigger than I ever expected. Regulars here will have seen a range of posts on the topic over the last few years. The new Northern Ireland Parliament passed an Intoxicating Liquor Act in May 1923. Its introduction was led by the Prime Minister Sir James Craig, who was himself the son of a whiskey millionaire. It was speculated that £4.5m of tax revenue would be lost, but that "Ulster would be wealthier in a real and substantial way".

In November 1927 the Parliament saw the second reading of the Intoxicating Liquor and Licensing Bill. Four new Nationalist members were in the House that day for their début debate, during which the 1923 act was praised by some of the members - "the people of Northern Ireland were not a drunken people and that was partly due to the Act of 1923".

Nationalist MP for Fermanagh and Tyrone, Thomas Harbison is reported as saying that –

"... he did not believe that temperance legislation would ever make people temperate. The only way to make people temperate was to teach the children at their mother's knees and afterwards in their respective churches. They could never work a moral revolution by legislation. The only way to make men temperate was by giving them liberty, for if they curtailed men's liberties there was something in human nature that caused them to rebel against coercion ..."

Independent Unionist Colonel Philip James Woods said that "... visitors to hotels should have the same liberties in Ulster as they had in England". He was also concerned at the threat to "... personal liberty that police should have the right to go in and inspect clubs. The man in the street had not been considered, only the trade and the temperance party were consulted."

But the most revealing response was from the man pictured above, the renowned Independent Unionist Tommy Henderson – check this out from the Belfast News-Letter:

The Belfast Telegraph report that same day expanded on Henderson's point about class – "the Government supporters could always get as much drink as they wanted ... the eating of ice-cream was more dangerous than a drop of decent liquor".

Henderson was at least partly correct. The restrictions on 'decent liquor' by official alcohol licensing laws had led to a sharp increase in the illicit production of sub-standard illegal stuff – not the romance of poteen, but the home-made horror of a drink nicknamed Red Biddy which was a mix of cheap wine and methylated spirits. A year earlier, Nationalist MP "Wee"Joe Devlin (who also had a background in the drink trade) had warned of the social problems that the invention of Red Biddy was causing, and said in a Stormont debate "in the name of temperance you are poisoning the public of Ulster, and soon you will have no constituents left" (Lurgan Mail, 13 November 1926). 

Below is a report from the Western Morning News from 24 October 1927, less than two weeks before the debate, given by the chairman of Dunville's on seriousness of the issue. Whisky sales were declining so of course he had a commercial interest at stake. (It is interesting that he said that poteen production had been exported from Ireland into Scotland and England.)

What will we leave behind?

I'm now about 18 months away from 50, and I can see that the older generation that I looked up to is slipping away. Many of them already have. I love my community, but in general it seems to be pretty useless at what the management consultants call 'succession planning'. Perhaps that is a symptom of Protestant individualism.

Community organisations, businesses, church congregations and even families seem to me to be very vulnerable, because the previous generation took little interest in developing a new generation and in building them up, to one day smoothly hand over the reins of responsibility. 'Leaders' are ageing and the younger ones seem immature, ignored, consequently apathetic and inexperienced, and out of their depth. I once heard a 'celebrity pastor' online saying astutely that the young men drift away when the older men take no interest in them. Change will come, but it will be sudden and not prepared for. 

Soon it will be up to me and my generation to carry on. But I fear we are ill-equipped to do so. There are two types of organisations. One is a large network of influence. The other is a tiny empire of control. I fear that our previous generation has preferred the latter, at the expense of the former. 

You need to delegate and develop others.
You need to cultivate and maintain relationships.
You need to bring the capable and interested people along.
You need to give them opportunities and resources to learn from.
You need them to be confident enough to show what they can do.

In a political context, a smart friend also once wryly observed to me that Ulster unionism has never had innovators, just traitors. The suspicion and fear of change is a whole other dimension.

When I look in the mirror, I wonder what of permanence has been done in the past generation? What will we, and I, leave behind for the next?

Leaving the Scotch-Irish out of the story of the American Revolution

This is a really interesting interview, but I am surprised at the assertion that the concepts of individual liberties, and that revolution is justified, only emerged out of the blue in 1765 with the Stamp Act. A basic understanding of the role of the Scotch-Irish in the Revolution, their ideology and their inherited communal memory and experience makes them perhaps the key 'people group'* from the Old World who could easily defy the tyrannical crown and assert their community's rights and independence. They had done so before many times over, they gloried in those memories, and were willing to do so again if they had to. They had been pushed across the Atlantic and were willing to go further. Liberty before Loyalty is the core concept of the Ulster-Scots, from at least 1500s Scotland and perhaps much earlier. They took it with them to America.

* PS the English non-conformists had similar experiences, but not to the same extent

Murray's of Belfast, Glasgow and London – 'Scotch Plaid Mixture' Tobacco