My 4th great-grandfather Isaac's FALLIS Pioneer Cemetery near Bellbrook, Greene County, Ohio FOLLIS Families
in the United States of America
by descendant Stanley J. Follis
Page: Home • Scots-Irish

FOLLIS Family Scots-Irish

Offsite Internet Links Open in New Windows!

For now this is mostly links to Scots-Irish web sites. My aunt Helen and uncle Paul remembered their father Milo FOLLIS recalling our FOLLIS family as being Scots-Irish. A distant cousin in the 1900 Federal Census listed his ancestry as Scots-Irish. I have done some research in this area, although more could reveal additional family information. I plan to add specific family information as time permits. You can always do a Google or other internet search to find more information.

One Ancestry.com FALLIS posting mentions FALLIS' coming from "Fermanagh Ireland having moved there from Scotland during the Plantation Era about 1600's." Plantation Era is sometimes used to describe the time when Scots-Irish moved from Scotland to Ireland.

Did the Whiskey Rebellion in 1794 have anything to do with my FOLLIS ancestor's movement from Virginia to Kentucky then Ohio? This was an uprising in western Pennsylvania where whiskey makers rebelled against General Washington over whiskey taxes. The 5,000 protestors were put down by about 13,000 militia which led to mass migration of Scots-Irish to Kentucky and other western and southern territories to avoid taxes on whiskey which was used as a form of currency. Interesting there is a Redstone Fort in Fayette County, Pennsylvania as a cousin line of FALLIS is found in the Quaker Redstone Meeting group which I believe is also in this county?

Book Born Fighting by James WEBB

I have to wonder if James Webb is related to my Virginia WEBB families. The Pioneer's Creed: The Cowards Never Started. The Weak Died Along the Way. Only the Strong Survived. States "those who cannot articulate their ethnic origins are doomed to a form of social and political isolation. My culture needs to rediscover itself, and in so doing to regain its power to shape the direction of America".

He lists well know Scots-Irish Daniel Boone, Lewis and Clark, and Davy Crockett who were in Kentucky and Ohio a few decades before my FOLLIS and FOREMAN ancestors followed their lead. Kit Carson, Presidents Andrew Jackson, Ulysses S. Grant, Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton. George W. Bush may even had a Kentucky born Scots-Irish ancestor. Scots-Irish formed the bulk of the Confederate Army and a good part of the Union Army in the Civil War, providing some of the greatest generals and soldiers of later wars. Stonewall Jackson, Nathan Bedford Forrest, Ulysses S. Grant, George S. Patton. Sgt. Alvin York the most remembered hero of World War I. Audie Murphy the most decorated soldier of World War II and David Hackworth the most decorated veteran of the Korea and Vietnam. The heavily Scots-Irish people of West Virginia ranked first, second, or third in military casualties in every U.S. war of the twentieth century. West Virginia's casualty rate was twice that of New York and Connecticut in Vietnam and even more in Korea.

NASCAR racing traces its roots to the daring moonshine runner of the Appalachian Mountains during prohibition. Country music is at the heart of Scots-Irish culture. It was widespread in remote and distant mountains until WSM radio took it national in the 1930's through the Grand Ole Opry. A native African instrument, the banjar made with a gourd, became the banjo. Mark Twain, Horace Greeley, Edgar Allan Poe, Margaret Mitchell and Larry McMurtry are well known writers. Tallulah Bankhead, Ava Gardner, Andie McDowell, Jimmy Stewart, John Wayne, Robert Redford and George C. Scott are well known Scots-Irish entertainers.

Scots-Irish is a culture of isolation, hard luck, and infinite stubbornness, mistrusting, even hating aristocracy. Hillbilly's Scots-Irish were dominant in the South and Ohio Valley in the hills and mountains. Scots-Irish were often lumped together with WASP White Anglo-Saxon Protestant's who are distinctly different people. Many lump the Presbyterian Scots-Irish in with the Irish who were mostly Catholic. My ancestors are of the first wave of 250,000 to 400,000 Scots-Irish who principally came from Ulster in the late 1690's to early 1700's. Many came after 1717 and the Revolution.

William the Conqueror led the Norman Conquest of England crossing the English Channel from France defeating the Saxon's in 1066 in the Battle of Hastings. William was born in Falaise, France which some researchers claim as a source for my surname FOLLIS. I think the Roman coin follis is more inspiration for the Foulis Castle in Scotland thought to date to 1154 and perhaps my surname. Four years later William, the bastard son of the Duke of Normandy, started a vicious slash and burn policy that led to the building of fortified military posts eventually leading to stone castles of later centuries.

Hadrian's Wall