Rebels and revivals: Ulster immigrants, western Pennsylvania Presbyterianism and the formation of Scotch-Irish identity, 1780--1830

Presbyterians of Irish origin settled in western Pennsylvania in large numbers between 1780 and 1830, migrating both from colonial-era settlements east of the Appalachian Mountains and directly from the north of Ireland. Migration transplanted networks of family, friends, neighbors and coreligionists, and with them, a distinctive ethnoreligious culture. These migrants and their culture reflected a precapitalist worldview created through the matrix of work, worship and play in specifically northern Irish settings. The peasant culture they transferred from the margins of Europe to the American backcountry became transformed by migration, resettlement and developments in the host nation. In the process, Irish Presbyterians migrants defined and redefined themselves and their understandings of their religious faith and practices.;Irish immigrants settled in Pennsylvania's western valleys during the Early Republic recreated many of the same varieties of Presbyterianism existing contemporaneously in Ireland. Immigrants found meaning in doctrinal controversy and competition among rival Presbyterian denominations as they re-conceptualized old-country beliefs and practices in an American setting. Presbyterians of Irish origin both took part in the earliest stirrings of the Second Great Awakening and rejected and reviled revivalism. Contention over the meanings of Irishness, Americanism, republicanism and Presbyterianism took place along a shifting grid of creedal loyalty and social class. Religious institutions promoted community harmony and ethnoreligious cohesion, as changing American conditions confronted migrants' culture. Immigrants sought independence through land ownership; capitalism and state policies favoring market expansion frustrated immigrant expectations while opening new opportunities. Contrary to the exhortations of clergy and elders, many Presbyterians of Irish origin took part in the Whiskey Rebellion and in oppositional politics. The coalescence of Irish experience, ethnoreligious values and lower-class status decisively shaped the group's identity and politics during the Early National Period. Challenging and expanding our understanding of ethnicity, Presbyterian immigrants initiated the region's Irish-American fraternal organizations. The acceptance and imposition of market values resulted in the weakening and abandonment of formerly normative "Irish" cultural practices, reflected in the emergence of a temperance movement. The persistence of older norms found expression in Sabbatarianism. In becoming "American" participants in the Market Revolution, Presbyterians gradually became "Scotch-Irish."...