Early NC, SC, GA, AL Church History
Why Some became Presbyterian http://www.magoo.com/hugh/cahans.html#abbeville
In the early decades of the seventeenth century, intermarriage of the Ulster Irish with the newly arriving Scots, and conversion of the Irish of Ulster to Presbyterianism, seem to have been common. In her book, The Catholics of Ulster (Basic Books 2001), Professor Marianne Elliot implies that much of the Catholic gentry disappeared from Ulster, not because they were exiled and dispossessed by their Protestant neighbors, but because they were converted. There were legal pressures to convert to the Church of Ireland. Conversion of the Irish in the 1700s, however, became less frequent, probably because such a conversion lead to ostracism of the Catholic. In The Scotch-Irish—A Social History (Chapel Hill, The University of North Carolina Press, 1962), James G. Leyburn says that intermarriage between Catholics and Presbyterians was rare—at least after the first part of the eighteenth century. There is much debate and little agreement on the subject.
Catholics in Ireland were restricted from owning property, holding office, and voting, during the 1700's. Some of them renounced their religion and converted to the Church of Ireland in order to enjoy such rights, but the advantage of converting to Presbyterianism was not as great. See the Qualification Rolls index 1793-1796, and Convert Rolls 1703-1800 from Irish LDS Microfilms.
A study by G. B. Adams concludes that a significant number of the native Irish population of east Ulster converted to Presbyterianism shortly after the early infiltration by the Scots—even before the plantation of Scots. Adams, in his article Aspects of monoglotism, at page 84, says:
"a considerable part of the old irish population [in east Ulster] seems to have been absorbed into one or other of the reformed churches, usually into presbyterianism, which in the seventeenth and early eighteenth century must have had a considerable Irish-speaking membership. The association of Irish language survival with strongly Roman Catholic area belongs to a later period and to central and west Ulster."
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Hopewell Presbyterian Church Members from Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina & South Carolina (Long Canes area of McCormick County South Carolina until Feb 1 1760) (moved to Waxhaws area after Indian raid)
Presbyterian Churches established by Dr. Clark in South Carolina Around Abbeville
Long Cane & Cedar Spring Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church (Fort Boone congregation) South Carolina
Queensborough Township, Jefferson County, Georgia (Presbyterian)
Emigration from County Monaghan Aboard the Needham in 1773
Emigration by Reverend William Martin in 1772 (from County Atrim Ireland to Charles Town South Carolina via "Pennsylvania Farmer")
Duncan Creek Presbyterian Church McCrory brothers helped build the church & Finney family in Cemetery
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Book for sale about Rev William Martin and his 5 ships to SC from County Atrim Ireland