Ships Log Help - (Recommendations)

[Woods-walker]

I am looking for some research suggests on tracking ships passenger logs for immigrants arriving from Scotland/Great Britton into Philadelphia or NY in the mid 1700's. The person I am trying to track was from Scotland- is it likely he would have sailed to America from England and not Scotland?
I ve exhausted all avenues I am aware but don't want to spend the $ to access the additional features of ancestry.com.
He was born in 1740 in Scotland and the first record I am able to find on him in America is in Amherst Virginia in 1758.
Thanks in advance

 

[lupaglupa]

The US didn't require passenger manifest lists prior to 1819 so what is out there is very hit or miss. There are a number of sources you can find online that have ship's passenger lists but they are very limited from my experience. Many or even most ships that came in didn't keep lists or they had them but no one else kept them. The fact that you are uncertain as to the port and the year makes it even harder.

Can you find a place like a library that has access to Ancestry?

 

[Woods-walker]

Thanks for taking time to answer my post @lupaglupa .
I used to have an ancestry account and was able to trace a CW Soldiers family back to his g-grandfather and have traced it forward to descendants living in Texas today.
The first record I found on his g-grandfather were in Amherst Virginia.
The sir name is Scottish, so I started trying to trace it back further with ancestry.com but I felt I needed to get to the (costly) Europeian files.
So I stopped and canceled my account.
I ve gone to the free familysearch with about the same results as I paid for ancestry.com.
I ve exhausted my on line passenger list searches and did find a matching , but uncertain, record of an entry into the port of Philadelphia. The name was correct, the time period was within the time period, But no ship name and not sure it's the same person.
This isn't a real big deal with me. I finished my first published book last year and am considering starting a new one on the family of a fascinating CW soldier I ve spent 20 years researching. I am thinking of opening the manuscript with the g-grandfather and thought it would be fitting to tell as much as possible about him. But I have an alternative start if I can't start it that way.
So I was looking for suggestions on how I might track down the actual ships name.
Your information makes sense and perhaps I need to face the fact that I am at an impossible impasse.
Thank you very kindly for your insight

 

[Fairfield]

Well, you certainly are at a challenging impasse. @lupaglupa is right: there are precious few passenger lists from that time. But there are some--mostly by ship line. May we ask the name of this elusive ancestor?

 

[Woods-walker]

Well, you certainly are at a challenging impasse. @lupaglupa is right: there are precious few passenger lists from that time. But there are some--mostly by ship line. May we ask the name of this elusive ancestor?

Michael Montgomery 1740-1768. Married Margaret Reid 1743-1810 in Amherst Virginia. Next in line was a son John 1758-1838. I have more if you would like.
Thanks for asking

 

[Fairfield]

Michael Montgomery 1740-1768. Married Margaret Reid 1743-1810 in Amherst Virginia. Next in line was a son John 1758-1838. I have more if you would like.
Thanks for asking

Thank you, that's fine, thank you. The immigrant's name and dates are a good starting point.

Having lived in Scotland, married to a Scottish historian, I can add another wrinkle to your problem--along with an initial supposition. Wrinkle: in the mid 1600's, a branch of Clan Montgomery was established in Ulster (Ireland) and clan members were among what we call the "Scots-Irish" and the Brits call the "Ulster Scots". The supposition is that Clan Montgomery in Scotland was on the wrong side at Culloden (1746) and were unlikely to have been among those Scots deported to the Colonies; therefore it is arguably more likely that Michael Montgomery was Scots-Irish.

The Reids were a Scottish family (as opposed to a clan), members of Clan Robertson. They also established a line in Ulster. The name often was spelled "Ried".

 

[Woods-walker]

Extremely interesting! I knew nothing of that background. Thanks so much.
So Michael married a Scott when he got to Virginia.
Are you saying many Scots were forced deported to the colonies? Why?
What construed a clan as opposed to a family? So sorry of my ignorance.
Thank you again for that fascinating information.

 

[lupaglupa]

@Fairfield has great advice - there was a lot of immigration into Philadelphia by the Scots Irish in the mid 1700s. That's when a big group of mine came over. They didn't take to being relocated to Ulster! The history of all of this is fascinating and well worth a look up.

 

[Fairfield]

Extremely interesting! I knew nothing of that background. Thanks so much.
So Michael married a Scott when he got to Virginia.
Are you saying many Scots were forced deported to the colonies? Why?
What construed a clan as opposed to a family? So sorry of my ignorance.
Thank you again for that fascinating information.

After the Scottish loss at Culloden (1746), a good many Scots were deported. There are lots of their descendants in the South, in New Hampshire and in Canada. HOWEVER, Clan Montgomery was on the government's side and (therefore) it is unlikely that they were among the deportees. That is why I am working from the assumption that your ancestors were Scots-Irish.

I found a Virginian heritage site that stated that a famine in 1740 forced many of the Scots-Irish to emigrate to Virginia (among other places). They mostly landed in Philadelphia and traveled overland to the Shenandoah Valley (having gone to college in that area, I know that Amherst/Lynchburg is right in that area). I'm now using a research wiki to find specific sources and information in that area.

One thing I did stumble upon--which I ought to have thought of before--is the existence of the Amherst Historical Society. It doesn't seem to have much of a web presence (I kept finding myself in Amherst, Ohio) but it does have a splendid appearing building; a telephone book ought to be helpful.

I also found that there is still a GenWeb page for Virginia that is being maintained. There were several queries about the Montgomerys but the queries were very old.

A Scottish clan is a large group of related people almost always claiming descent from a single individual. It consists of septs and families (often with a different surname--for example, Reid being a division of Clan Robertson). Most clans have at least one tartan design--often several (canny Scottish merchants sell one group to Scottish-Americans and the other to Scottish-Canadians). You'll have to be getting yourself a kilt in the Montgomery tartan :

 

[Fairfield]

https://ancestralfindings.com/scots-irish-research/

 

[lupaglupa]

There are some great (and funny) historic records of the reactions the pious Quakers had when the bawdy and feisty Scots Irish arrived in Philadelphia. They drank, they brawled - the women's skirts showed off their ankles! The Quakers were NOT amused and found land for them in the mountains pretty quickly. After the Revolution many who fought in the war were given land grants as a reward for their service in Alabama and Tennessee. That's what got my ancestors from PA to TN.

 

[Woods-walker]

@Fairfield has great advice - there was a lot of immigration into Philadelphia by the Scots Irish in the mid 1700s. That's when a big group of mine came over. They didn't take to being relocated to Ulster! The history of all of this is fascinating and well worth a look up.

Thanks. I ve gotten very interested in it and will start my self education on the subject. I do feel somewhat better knowing it's not likely I will ever know the name of the ship or when it arrived. I ve spent considerable time on a loss cause but it now makes me feel better knowing the data likely isn't there.

 

[Fairfield]

I've been plowing through records, including online trees, but I am very unfamiliar with southern sources. Because I am used to DAR records and Revolutionary Land Grants, I admit to concentrating on these. As far as I can tell, there were two men named "Michael Montgomery" in that area of Virginia--father and son. Michael Sr. was born sometime around 1710-1720 (he may belong to the death date) while Michael Jr. was born sometime around 1740 in Virginia. I hate this sort of thing. Online trees (almost certainly inaccurate) credit Revolutionary service to Michael [Jr.] but no one has joined DAR of this line. Looking at DAR records (both directly and via the Lineage Books as well as SAR applications), the Montgomerys of the right time and area were from County Tyrone in Ireland. Now County Tyrone is one of the counties of Ulster.

The online trees (which I wouldn't rely on if I were you) state that your Montgomery family came from "Nearthern, Scotland". I am pretty sure that there is no such place. I wonder if "Neathern" might be a mistranscription of "Northern Ireland" (which is another name for Ulster) plus fact that this person was Scottish rather than Irish.

The records of Amherst County don't go back far enough--but it looks like your ancestors were there when it was Albemarle (and those records are in Charlottesville).

Sitting in New England and unfamiliar with the records, I have three suggestions: first, contact the Amherst (VA) Historical Society. That's the easy one. Secondly, go to FamilySearch--go to "SEARCH" on the top banner. It's a drop-down menu; choose the last option "Research Wiki" and, on that search bar, enter "Amherst, Virginia" which will give you a whole page of prominent and pokey sources (some are hyper-linked). Thirdly, while you are on FamilySearch, in that same drop-down menu, enter option "Images"; and, on that search bar, enter Albemarle, Virginia: up will pop some 177 sets of records (some excellent, some not so good)--all hyperlinked.

As you go into each source, check its sources. The historian who seems to have done a lot of work in that time & area was a man named John Frederick Dorman; he published in Virginia historical journals (not available in central Maine) but possibly on Jstor or Hathi (online) or in a genealogy library.

This will keep you busy for some time to come and, when you unravel this ancestral mystery, I'm pretty sure that I can get you a presentation slot at the next annual convention of the Maine Genealogical Society (on colonial record-finding).

 

[Woods-walker]

After the Scottish loss at Culloden (1746), a good many Scots were deported. There are lots of their descendants in the South, in New Hampshire and in Canada. HOWEVER, Clan Montgomery was on the government's side and (therefore) it is unlikely that they were among the deportees. That is why I am working from the assumption that your ancestors were Scots-Irish.

I found a Virginian heritage site that stated that a famine in 1740 forced many of the Scots-Irish to emigrate to Virginia (among other places). They mostly landed in Philadelphia and traveled overland to the Shenandoah Valley (having gone to college in that area, I know that Amherst/Lynchburg is right in that area). I'm now using a research wiki to find specific sources and information in that area.

One thing I did stumble upon--which I ought to have thought of before--is the existence of the Amherst Historical Society. It doesn't seem to have much of a web presence (I kept finding myself in Amherst, Ohio) but it does have a splendid appearing building; a telephone book ought to be helpful.

I also found that there is still a GenWeb page for Virginia that is being maintained. There were several queries about the Montgomerys but the queries were very old.

A Scottish clan is a large group of related people almost always claiming descent from a single individual. It consists of septs and families (often with a different surname--for example, Reid being a division of Clan Robertson). Most clans have at least one tartan design--often several (canny Scottish merchants sell one group to Scottish-Americans and the other to Scottish-Canadians). You'll have to be getting yourself a kilt in the Montgomery tartan :
View attachment 396568

Fairfield - you have been wonderful and so full of great advice. But, Hoot mon! I am Irish. And not related to the Montgomery clan. LoL .
My sir name is Gallahan. The following is a glossary of my interest in Montgomery——
We have a farm in Spotsylvania Virginia where fighting occurred on May 10 1864. A young 24 yo soldier and an original member of The University Grays (University of Mississippi) - Company A, 11th Mississippi Infantry fell mortality wounded that afternoon. He wrote a heart wrenching "death bed" letter to his father as he lay dying. The letter was written about 200 yards from the east side of our house. You can hear the letter read if you search YouTube... "JR Montgomery death letter". There are several versions on YouTube with the PBS version being the most accurate and the US National Park Service version the most inaccurate. Here's the link to the PBS version

.
The reading , accurately states, his father - Allen Montgomery came to Virginia in search of his sons grave but was unable to find it. All versions say his grave was never found. That isn't true, a local amateur historian has found the grave site and I have checked his work and found it accurate and authentic.
I have studied James Robert (JR) Montgomery's entire family and his service career for over 20 years and feel I know as much about him and his family as anyone. I ve even tracked down descendants and spoken with two living in Texas.

I am planning my next book based on this family's story and it is indeed a touching story! I am missing two items I would like to include in the manuscript, although neither are essential. One being, knowing more about Michael what ship brought him here and why he decided to come to the colonies. The other being exactly where JR's family lived in Madison county Mississippi. I have made one trip there and located the family burial site (my CivilWarTalk avatar) where JR asked his father to bury his body. I ve been trying to track the homestead site on line but am unsuccessful. I ve asked the court clerks office in Madison MS for help - to no avail. So I need to go to the Courthouse there to search the land records. But thanks to your insight on the Amherst Historical Society, my next stop is Amherst since I am only 2 and 1/2 hours drive from there and we're a little over an hour Charlottesville.
I also appreciate the advice about following on line research others have done. That's what I ve been doing and one in particular that you mentioned was my baseline. I can now take it with the idea it might or might not be accurate.
I saw the reference to "Nearthern, Scotland" that you mentioned when searching several years ago. Like you said, I could not find it anywhere and was beginning to think there is no such place.
I can't express to you my gratitude. I will keep you informed after I return from Amherst.
Regards. Dennis

 

[Fairfield]

The letter is most moving. I'm sure that it grieved the father while giving him sad comfort at the same time. Looking at "Find a Grave," it looks as though the young man eventually came home. One last bit of advice: nail down those early Montgomerys before you even think of "jumping the pond".

https://homepages.rootsweb.com/~smalljd/ri/ri-albemarle-va.htm (Abstracted wills for colonial Albemarle County---do a "find" search on Montgomery...esp. interesting was Michael Montgomery's connection with a Reid will)

https://www.werelate.org/wiki/Early_Settlers_of_Southwest_Virginia-Chronological_List (list of early settlers in southwestern VA with assoc. information--again, easiest to do a "find" search on Montgomery)

As is appropriate here, as my Scottish friends would say: "Best of British"!

 

[Woods-walker]

The body still rests at Spotsylvania Courthouse and was never returned home. In 2016, I took some dirt from what I believe is his grave site and placed it on his mother's and father's graves and some from their graves and placed it on his when I returned home.
The father, Allen, also lost a son at Vicksburg, and one following the war. He was killed by lighting. Only two daughters survived to become adults. One never married. The younger married a former soldier from Georgia. She had two children, both died as infants.
The only know relatives I could find were from Allen's brother, who moved to Texas. Allen's wife and oldest child died before the war.
I will take your advice . Thanks again. You've been of great help.

 

[Lubliner]

I know this; https://archive.org/ is an easy to navigate on-line library that should have plenty of books such as the links @Fairfield provided.
Lubliner.

 

[Woods-walker]

Thanks Lubliner. From what I am gathering, my up-hill climb has only begun. Now I ve also learned there are rock slides and crevices ahead. LOL

 

[Fairfield]

The body still rests at Spotsylvania Courthouse and was never returned home. In 2016, I took some dirt from what I believe is his grave site and placed it on his mother's and father's graves and some from their graves and placed it on his when I returned home.
The father, Allen, also lost a son at Vicksburg, and one following the war. He was killed by lighting. Only two daughters survived to become adults. One never married. The younger married a former soldier from Georgia. She had two children, both died as infants.
The only know relatives I could find were from Allen's brother, who moved to Texas. Allen's wife and oldest child died before the war.
I will take your advice . Thanks again. You've been of great help.

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/20300619/james-robert-montgomery

The family may have erected a cenotaph (empty grave) to be a monument to their son. We have a lot of those in Maine: bringing a body home was unfeasible but the family still wanted him to be remembered.

 

[Woods-walker]

It's a somewhat odd case that I will explain when when I get home tonight