the Irish pioneers in
the Carolinas are found in every conceivable connection, in the
parochial and court records, in the will books, in the minutes of the
general Assembly, in the quaint old records of the Land and
Registers' offices, in the patents granted by the colonial
Government, and in sundry other official records. In public affairs
they seem to have had the same adaptability for politics which, among
other things, has in later days brought their countrymen into
prominence. Florence O'Sullivan from Kerry was surveyor-general of
South Carolina in 1671. James Moore, a native of Ireland and a
descendant of the famous Irish chieftain, Rory O'More, was governor
of South Carolina in 1700; Matthew Rowan from Carrickfergus was
president of the North Carolina Council during the term of office of
his townsman, Governor Arthur Dobbs (1754 to 1764); John Connor was
attorney-general of the Province in 1730, and was succeeded in turn
by David O'Sheall and Thomas McGuire. Cornelius Hartnett, Hugh
Waddell, and Terence Sweeny, all Irishmen, were members of the Court,
and among the members of the provincial assembly I find such names as
Murphy, Leary, Kearney, McLewean, Dunn, Keenan, McManus, Ryan,
Bourke, Logan, and others showing an Irish origin. And, in this
connection, we must not overlook Thomas Burke, a native of "the City
of the Tribes", distinguished as lawyer, soldier, and statesman, who
became governor of North Carolina in 1781, as did his cousin Aedanus
Burke, also from Galway, who was judge of the Supreme Court of South
Carolina in 1778. John Rutledge, son of Dr. John Rutledge from
Ireland, was governor of South Carolina in 1776 and his brother
Edward became governor of the State in 1788.

But there were Irishmen in the Carolinas long before the advent of
these, and indeed Irish names are found occasionally as far back as
the records of those colonies reach. They are scattered profusely
through the will books and records of deeds as early as 1676 and down
to the end of the century, and in a list of immigrants from Barbados
in the year 1678, quoted by John Camden Hotten in the work already
alluded to, we find about 120 persons of Irish name who settled in
the Carolinas in that year. In 1719, 500 persons from Ireland
transported themselves to Carolina to take the benefit of an Act
passed by the Assembly by which the lands of the Yemmassee Indians
were thrown open to settlers, and Ramsay (_History of South
Carolina_,