Publisher's Synopsis
The year was approximately 1740 when Isaac Taylor and his wife, Isabella, stood on the deck of their small vessel, looking for the last time on Northern Ireland as it slipped slowly into the mist and ocean haze. They had committed their lives, their hopes, and the future of their 5 children to the wilderness of the New World.
The Taylors, the Scots-Irish and the Settling of America begins with the historical background for Isaac's and Isabella's momentous decision. Opening with William the Conqueror's invasion of England and the hazy origins of the Taylors, the first chapter culminates in the succession of English monarchs, repeated wars, crop failures and religious persecutions that led Isaac and Isabella along with so many of their fellow Scots-Irish to abandon their native lands in Ulster and set sail for America.
Most of the ships transporting Scots-Irish emigrants to the colonies sailed up the Delaware River to dock at Philadelphia. Looking for land, these new arrivals travelled the trails to the interior and fanned out along the frontier into Pennsylvania, Virginia and the Carolinas, pioneering the routes that subsequent waves of settlers were soon to follow.
Isaac and Isabella followed the trail known as the Indian Road. Little more than a blazed trail, the Indian Road led west from Philadelphia to York where it crossed the Potomac and turned south into the heavily forested wilderness of the Shenandoah Valley. They purchased land in Virginia, cleared the forest, built a cabin, joined with scattered settlers to form a militia for self-defense and became charter members of the the Timber Ridge Presbyterian Church. Danger was a constant companion on the frontier and the Presbyterian religion that the settlers brought with them from Scotland and Ulster served as a bulwark against the uncertainties of life.
One of the greatest threats facing isolated settlers was the ever present possibility of Indian attacks; close friends perished but Isaac and his family survived these skirmishes and the ensuing frontier conflict known in America as the French and Indian War. Their descendants surged westward across the Appalachians, fought the British in the Battle of King's Mountain, helped establish the short lived State of Franklin, and marched in 1814 with Andrew Jackson to New Orleans. Subsequent generations continued westward, settling Central and West Tennessee and subsequent generations also faced the bitter, bloody, and divisive turmoil of the Civil War.
The history of the Taylors follows a line of male descent, and is amplified by vignettes of related branches of the family to provide a broader perspective into life on the frontier, the drive for independence, westward migration across the Appalachians, Tennessee politics and the Civil War. Vignettes are enhanced with quotes, newspaper articles, wills, and letters.
The final chapter relates the childhood, early political life and World War II recollections of Judge Andrew T. Taylor, the author's father. These recollections include vignettes of his family, adolescence, early political life and his deployment in World War II to join the British 8th Army fighting Rommel in North Africa.
Pioneers, farmers, freethinkers, land speculators, preachers, iconoclasts, soldiers, politicians, lawyers, judges and physicians, the Taylors represent only a single family but their stories encapsulate the stories of thousands and provide a window into the lives and generations of tens of thousands of Scots-Irish who emigrated from Northern Ireland to America between 1717 and 1770. Such stories bring the past into focus and connect us to our historical and cultural roots; in the process, these stories serve as a bridge to future generations and, for some, provide an anchor for the present.
The color version of the book includes larger maps, color images and is printed on higher quality paper than the non-color version
