Scottish Munn

There are several reasons why the Scots left their homeland. Some because living on the rocky hills was a hard way of life. Perhaps, the main underlying cause was related to a changing way of life. The old Clan system had been lost due to having lost a war with England. A change was made and enforced. The heads of the clan, which was in the beginning the head of each family, were moved to England and no longer were the directing influence in the family This was the result of the Battle of Culloden. This bloody battle destroyed the Highland way of life forever.

The Class system was a family affair; “Clan” means “Children”. The Highland Chief controlled the land, and felt a father’s responsibility for his tenants. They in turn cultivated the land, and fought for the Chief. Each Clan was both a family and an army. But Culloden destroyed all of them. Clan warfare was forbidden, and the Kilt was banned.

The Scots at first came out of Argyll. Later, the Kintyre peninsula; and the isle of Jura and Islay, and Buto. About 1770, they came in droves from Isle of Skye. They brought their customs and their own Gaelic language with them. Even the slaves spoke Gaelic. The story is told of the Scotswoman who stood at the railing and looked at the shore as her ship pulled into the port of Wilmington. There she saw her first Negroes. Turning to the Captain, she asked, “What they were?” “Oh,” said the Captain, “everybody turns black like that after a few months in this climate!”

As she left the ship, she was delighted to overhear two men conversing in the Gaelic tongue. Assuming they were fellow Scots, she drew nearer, only to discover that their skin was black. She turned away, but was stopped by a friendly Negro lady, who embraced her and greeted her with “Coud Milo Failto!” (Which means: one hundred-thousand welcomes!) She turned and ran back up the gang plank and demanded that the Captain take her back to Scotland, immediately, if not sooner!

There is a story told even to the present day by one branch of our Munn Clan, that the earliest of that Clan were owners of boats and sea captains. After a while, they brought their families over to the Carolinas and Virginia, but whenever it came time for a new baby to be born, the wife was taken back to where there were doctors. After this was over, they were returned to America. Another tradition: the wealthier sent their sons back to Scotland for schooling.

About this time, the struggle with England over taxes and lack of equal representation began. By the reading of the official records of the states of Carolinas, the present day America will be shocked that not all Americans were in favor of this conflict. Truly, it became a civil war, in which brother fought against brother. In North Carolina, where the Munns congregated the largest, most leaned towards England, as you can understand by the Oath of Allegiance that the men had to take if they were given permission to leave Scotland.

OATH OF ALLEGIANCE

First, they had to slash a considerable gash in their arm, to secure an adequate source of blood for writing (those frequently became inflamed and made terrible scars that continued to be a reminder of the Oath that they had taken.) The following is a typical oath so taken:

I, Mac Alpine Munn, do swear and as I shall answer to God at the great day of Judgment, I have not, nor shall I have in my possession any gun, pistol or arm whatsoever, and will never use PLAID, TARTAN, OR ANY PART OF HIGHLAND GARB.

That I will defend HIS MAJESTY THE KING AND SUPPORT HIM in any measure he may take. And should I break this, my solemn oath, MAY I BE CURSED in all my undertakings, family and property; may I never see my wife, children, father, mother or other relations; May I be killed in battle as a coward and lie without christian burial in a strange land, far from the graves of my forefathers and kindred. May all this come across me if I break my oath.

(Signed)

Saddled with such a vow, it is no wonder that when the days of the American Revolution came, the Harnett Highlanders (Northern part of old Cumberland County, North Carolina) faithfully answered Royal Governor Martin’s summons” and marched to another Cullodon at the Widow Moore’s Crook Bridge on February 27, 1776. Unfortunately, there is no known list of those who died there, neither ToryorWhig.

There is at least one Munn so involved. He did not die but his neighbors, with state permission seized his property (he was a merchant) and he was ordered out of the country. James Munn (not my direct line) and this former merchant, Alexander Munn, left and were given property by the British in Nova Scotia. Alexander stayed only a short while, and he again appears in the Barbeque Church (Presbyterian) area within a year or so, for he was on the census. (At the time of writing in April 1972, the exact connection between those two groups of Munns is not known.)

James, Neill, John, Daniel-emigrants under above terms settled some 15-17 miles east of what would become Fayetteville, North Carolina. With them was an unknown Duncan Munn, who was not the son of the above James by whom I have come. That Duncan may have been a brother of the emigrants.

The Barbeque Area Church was located was some 30 miles northwest of what would become Fayetteville. None of the above took out land grants with that other area of Munns except Daniel, who sold his Resucks Swamp property and secured land in the Barbeque area. The connection is not known.

THE SURNAMES OF SCOTLAND:

MUNN. From (Mac) MUNN, qv. Sir John Mun was procurator-fiscal of vicars of the choir of Glasgow, 1551 (Protocols, I) LAMONT. The Cian MacEarcher (I.E. from some Farquhar chief, earlier than the northern Farquharsons’ ancestor) were the immemorial of their part of Argyllshire center on Castle Toward in Cowal. A chief or his son in the 13th Century seemingly acquired a special judicial rank that earned the clan, or its earliest branch, the new name Law-man, hence Laumon, Lamont and other variations. The clan lost power and territory to Campbells and other neighbors, through marriages and less gentle means. A Duncan monument recalls the 1646 capture and destruction of Toward Castle, with the subsequent massacre of many principal Lamonts on the excuse of their adherence to the royalist cause. The chief ’s seat thereafter became Ardlamont at the other end of the Kyles of Bute.

Derivative names included MACMUNN and MUNN

CREST: CLAN LAMONT Of great antiquity. The clan held considerable lands in Argyllshire which were later reduced by the encroachment of the Campbells and other clans. Their territory laterally was confined chiefly to Cowal. In the 13th century the monks of Paisley were granted lands in Kilmun and Kilfinan.

Crest: A dexter hand couped at the wrist, proper Badge: Crab-apple tree, Dryas Septs: Black, Brown, Lamb, Lamond, Lamondso, Lucas, Luke, MacClymont, MacGilledow, MacGillegowie, MacLymont, MacPatrick, MacSorley, Turner, White (Ne’er Shall Be, a McGillwary Genealogy by Marjorie McWaters 929:271:175W)

CLAN STEWART OF BUTE SEPTS

MacMunn, Munn–In 1506, a MacKilmon or MacMunn was, by King James IV, granted a few charter lands of Kerrymanach, in Bute. His descendants appear to have been dependents of the Stuarts of Bute. In 1646, Angus MacIllmun met his death along with the Lamonts at Toward. (Clans, Septs, and Regiments of the Scottish Highlands)