Born Fighting: How the Scots-Irish Shaped America |  | Author: James Webb
Publisher: Broadway
Category: Book
List Price: $15.95
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Rating:  153 reviews
Media: Paperback
Edition: 1st
Pages: 384
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 7.9 x 5.2 x 0.9
ISBN: 0767916891
Dewey Decimal Number: 973.049162
EAN: 9780767916899
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Product Description
More than 27 million Americans today can trace their lineage to the Scots, whose bloodline was stained by centuries of continuous warfare along the border between England and Scotland, and later in the bitter settlements of England’s Ulster Plantation in Northern Ireland. Between 250,000 and 400,000 Scots-Irish migrated to America in the eighteenth century, traveling in groups of families and bringing with them not only long experience as rebels and outcasts but also unparalleled skills as frontiersmen and guerrilla fighters. Their cultural identity reflected acute individualism, dislike of aristocracy and a military tradition, and, over time, the Scots-Irish defined the attitudes and values of the military, of working class America, and even of the peculiarly populist form of American democracy itself.
Born Fighting is the first book to chronicle the full journey of this remarkable cultural group, and the profound, but unrecognized, role it has played in the shaping of America. Written with the storytelling verve that has earned his works such acclaim as “captivating . . . unforgettable” (the Wall Street Journal on Lost Soliders), Scots-Irishman James Webb, Vietnam combat veteran and former Naval Secretary, traces the history of his people, beginning nearly two thousand years ago at Hadrian’s Wall, when the nation of Scotland was formed north of the Wall through armed conflict in contrast to England’s formation to the south through commerce and trade. Webb recounts the Scots’ odyssey—their clashes with the English in Scotland and then in Ulster, their retreat from one war-ravaged land to another. Through engrossing chronicles of the challenges the Scots-Irish faced, Webb vividly portrays how they developed the qualities that helped settle the American frontier and define the American character.
Born Fighting shows that the Scots-Irish were 40 percent of the Revolutionary War army; they included the pioneers Daniel Boone, Lewis and Clark, Davy Crockett, and Sam Houston; they were the writers Edgar Allan Poe and Mark Twain; and they have given America numerous great military leaders, including Stonewall Jackson, Ulysses S. Grant, Audie Murphy, and George S. Patton, as well as most of the soldiers of the Confederacy (only 5 percent of whom owned slaves, and who fought against what they viewed as an invading army). It illustrates how the Scots-Irish redefined American politics, creating the populist movement and giving the country a dozen presidents, including Andrew Jackson, Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Ronald Reagan, and Bill Clinton. And it explores how the Scots-Irish culture of isolation, hard luck, stubbornness, and mistrust of the nation’s elite formed and still dominates blue-collar America, the military services, the Bible Belt, and country music.
Both a distinguished work of cultural history and a human drama that speaks straight to the heart of contemporary America, Born Fighting reintroduces America to its most powerful, patriotic, and individualistic cultural group—one too often ignored or taken for granted.
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Showing reviews 1-5 of 153
 Born Fighting : How the Scots-Irish Shaped America January 31, 2005
John C. Duff (Olney, MD)
36 out of 38 found this review helpful
I had to log on and write a review of James Webb's brilliant and wonderful book " Born Fighting : How the Scots-Irish Shaped America." I bought the book in November, and after skimming through it and reading the first two chapters, I immediately ordered a copy for my father as a Christmas present. After finishing it, he told me it was the greatest present he had ever received, and that many of Webb's passages brought tears to his eyes. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in American History, and for those millions of Scots-Irish Americans unaware of their heritage this is a must-read.
In "Born Fighting" author James Webb chronicles the millennial struggle of the Scots-Irish people from fighting to preserve their independence against the Romans and the English, through their migration to Ireland, then to the hardscrabble Appalachian frontier and beyond. Webb describes how the values of these fiercely independent, determined and impoverished people pervaded the society and culture of America, and how their influence is reflected in such diverse institutions as NASCAR auto racing, country music, the evangelical movement, the U.S. Armed Forces, and American Democracy itself.
Weaving distant history with personal family history, Webb details the struggle of these proud, impoverished people through their oppression by and resistance to the Romans, the English, the Irish Catholics, the Anglo-American pseudo-aristocracy of the Colonies, and the latter's successors, the so-called "Eastern Establishment." Through it all, the Scots-Irish survive oppression, scorn, war and poverty by drawing on their bottom-up, rather than top down social and political structure, and their collective fighting spirit to triumph. Webb's wonderful personal stories of his own family history cannot help but resonate with those Scots-Irish of today with similar backgrounds and experiences. It certainly did with me.
Until I read this book, like many of the millions of Americans of Scots-Irish descent, I never knew I had an ethnic heritage. I am now glad to know that not only do I have one, it is a proud one and storied one. I owe a debt of gratitude to Webb for imparting this to me through this magnificent book.
My father used to tell us as children that we were "Scotch-Irish." I didn't know what that meant at all until I took European History in high school. As an adult, I did some genealogical research on my family, gleaning what seemed to me to be loosely connected facts from church and census records. "Born Fighting" was invaluable in providing some context to what little I was able to learn.
Along with my aunt, I traced my family history to the mid-1700s in western Virginia, through my Great-Great Grandfather who enlisted in the Confederate Army in Charlottesville, VA on the day after First Manassas. He served in the 57th Virginia Infantry, part of Gen. Pickett's division at Gettysburg that was virtually wiped out on the third and decisive day of that bloody battle. My aunt found a picture of him at the Gettysburg Battlefield Visitors Center in his uniform, of which I have a copy.
My father, the son of a five-and-ten-cent store manager in the Depression-era South became the first of our Scots-Irish family to graduate high school. If that wasn't enough his high school grades got him into an Ivy League school, borrowing, washing dishes, waiting tables, and tending bar to pay his tuition and earn his degree. His sacrifice and hard work smoothed the road for his four children, two of whom are lawyers, one an economist, and the other a mathematics teacher. After reading this book, my father told me he had always been ashamed of his modest "white trash" or "redneck" background, but having read this book he could finally be proud of who he is and where he came from.
I have a 4 year old son and I am going to give him a copy of this wonderful account of our ancestors as soon as he is old enough to appreciate it. I want him to know what I now know about the hardships and difficulties of our ancestors and how they got us to where we are now. Their story has made me appreciate how far we have come.
To Mr. Webb, I say thank you for telling the story of our colorful and prominent ethnic heritage, and the role our forebears played in the evolution of our great republic.
A must-read on American politics today! January 3, 2005
HollyQuinn (DC)
14 out of 14 found this review helpful
As a first generation immigrant to this country, this book should be required reading in all classrooms across America. Born Fighting reveals that revisionist history is being taught in schools today - among other things, that the Civil War was primarily about slavery, that affirmative action primarily benefits the descendants of American slaves, and that all whites in America are the same. The over-emphasis on political correctness today is the threat to the freedom that America represents, where America's history is vilified rather than remembered and honored, for both the good and the bad (primary example being the Confederate flag as a symbol of slavery rather than of those who justifiably and honorably fought for freedom). Born Fighting has made me appreciate more that the freedoms America provides are privileges rather than entitlements. We need to honor the Scots-Irish and others who fought to build this country and continue to fight for this country and yet are often overlooked when it comes to reaping the benefits accorded to newer immigrants, who generally don't appreciate fully the sacrifices of its past history. One need only look at the faces of the fallen soldiers in Iraq and where they came from to understand what James Webb is trying to tell us.
WITH BOTH BARRELS AND A BOWIE KNIFE January 5, 2005
Joel T. Leggett (Beaufort, South Carolina United States)
18 out of 20 found this review helpful
That pretty much sums up the combative attitude of the Scotch-Irish, the people chronicled in James Webb's latest book, Born Fighting. Mr. Webb retells the history of this fiercely independent and combative people from their earliest conflicts with Rome at Hadrian's Wall through their blood soaked settlement of America's backcountry right up to the present day. In retelling the story of the Scotch-Irish Mr. Webb provides a unique insight into what some have called America's warrior subculture. These are the people who fill the ranks of our military and fight our wars. They have provided this country with its finest pioneers and fighting men, men like Stonewall Jackson, Andrew Jackson, Sam Houston, Davy Crocket, Daniel Boon and Jim Bowie just to name a few.
Nevertheless, the Scotch-Irish have contributed more to this country than just martial prowess. As Mr. Webb points out:
"This people gave our country great things, including its most definitive culture. Its bloodlines have flowed in the veins of at least a dozen presidents, and in many of our greatest soldiers. It created and still perpetuates the most distinctly American form of music. It is imbued with a unique and unforgiving code of personal honor, less ritualized but every bit as powerful as the samurai code. Its legacy is broad, in many ways defining the attitudes and values of the military, of working class America, and even of the particularly populist form of American democracy itself. And yet its story has been lost under the weight of more recent immigrations, revisionist historians, and common ignorance."
The ignorance that Mr. Webb refers to explains why the story of the Scotch-Irish has previously been overlooked. However, this ignorance is also due to one of the most pronounced traits of the Scotch-Irish, their individualism. According to Mr. Webb:
"In their insistent individualism they are not likely to put an ethnic label on themselves when they debate social issues. Some of them don't even know their ethnic label, and some who do don't particularly care. They don't go for group identity politics any more than they like to join a union. Two hundred years ago the mountains built a fierce and uncomplaining people. To them, joining a group and putting themselves at the mercy of someone else's collective judgment makes about as much sense as letting the government take their guns. And no body is going to get their guns."
This individualism is particularly pronounced in the area of religion. Mr. Webb states, "Their religion was a harsh and demanding Calvinism that sowed the seeds of America's Bible Belt, its on-your-feet independence instead of on-your-knees rituality offending English Anglicans and Irish Catholics alike."
Aside from simply providing a well written account of the history of the Scotch-Irish, James Webb has given us a fascinating cultural analysis of a demographic that has more influence in this country's culture and politics than is popularly recognized. In fact, in the December 27th edition of National Review Mackubin Thomas Owens stated in his review of Born Fighting that Webb "may have written the most important political book of 2004." After reading this book I would unreservedly agree and enthusiastically recommend it to all.
Regarding the gentleman below who accuses Mr. Webb of claiming that "pure Scotch-Irish fighters are lurking in them hills today," I would submit that he has not read this book, or if he did he did not do so closely. Mr. Webb devotes a significant portion of his book discussing the assimilative nature of the Scotch-Irish. In fact he states that the willingness of the Scotch-Irish to intermarry with others of different nationalities and backgrounds is one of their distinguishing cultural features.
Should be required reading before graduation from college February 23, 2008
David M. Dougherty (Arkansas)
21 out of 24 found this review helpful
Webb's book is a landmark treatise that puts Griffin's silly works into the trash heap. Like anyone who is 1/8th black is called "black", anyone 1/8 Scotch-Irish is Scotch-Irish (or Scots-Irish or Scot-Irish) if you prefer. He could have chosen to use Teddy Kennedy as an example of New England paternalism of blacks using the Scotch-Irish as the cause for all their misery, but he was above that. But the clear indictment of the Yankee elites is there. Like even George Will, supposedly "Mr Conservative" wrote when he betrayed his eastern elitism when referring to Virginia, "Where a slaveocracy once existed, northern dynamism has taken hold..." Webb puts all this condescendation where it belongs.
This is a personal book, full of family and personal experiences, but all this is probably necessary to create the image of the Scotch-Irish whom the elites overlook to the point of not recognizing their existence.
I could offer some criticisms, but I won't. The book is what it is, and as such deserves the highest rating. Read the bad reviews to learn why you must purchase and read this book. They approach hysteria in fear of this refutation of political correctness and what will probably eventually doom this American Republic.
There are not enough Scotch-Irish left to maintain the culture in the face of overwhelming media, academic and elite propaganda, and the future is not something I wish to contemplate.
Scots-Irish History February 19, 2005
Dixie L. Lackey (Strawberry, AZ USA)
17 out of 19 found this review helpful
If you are one of the million's of Scots-Irish whose ancestors migrated to America during the 18th century this is a "must read". It's a well-written history of these people. It goes back to when the Roman's invaded Britan and were stopped from going beyond the Hadrian's Wall where the Scots would stand their ground, refusig to let the Roman's into Scotland.
It described for me the traits imbedded deep within m soul, and told me why I am the way I am.
It brings to life the journey my grandfather (five generations back) made with three brothers from the Ulster plantation of Ireland in 1774. The hardships the must have faced from the time they landed on the shores of Maryland and made their journey along the trails of the Appalachian Mountains to North Carolina just in time for service in the American Revolutinary War.
Let me say "Thank you" James Webb for taking the time and making the effort to write this book. You are a great author with a wonderful story to tell. Dixie Lackey, Strawberry, Arizona
Showing reviews 1-5 of 153
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