40
THE ANCIENT NORTHMEN, RIDDELL ANCESTRY.
contemporary with their earliest settlements in England and Scotland,
but whether from those branch-families or cadets of some of the houses
of France, cannot be determined now with certainty. The first mention
of the Riddell name found in Ireland is in a pamphlet published at Down-
patrick in 1842, which is entitled, "Notices of the Most Important Events
Connected with the County of Down." In this book there is an account
of the first settlement of the English in Ulster under Sir John de Courcy,
dated A. D. 1177, and among the names of families that were settled in
the province at that time were Savages, Whites, Bensons, and Riddells.
It cannot be known whether this family continued as residents of Ireland,
but it may be presumed that they were only nominal possessors, as none
of the more recent families in that country can be traced to so remote a
period in settlement. There is abundant evidence to prove that members
of the family from England and Scotland held commissions in Ireland at
a date long anterior to the colonization of Ulster by the Scottish Pres-
byterians, but no evidence to show that these men were permanently dom-
iciled there.
In the year 1603 King James commenced the undertaking of settling
six counties in the Province of Ulster, in the north of Ireland, with Scot-
tish subjects. James had been successful in crushing the Irish rebellion,
and having confiscated two million acres of land, conceived the idea of
sending his own countrymen to settle and occupy the newly acquired pos-
session. It was some time, however, before he could successfully execute
the plan, as the Scotch people did not view the project with favor and
were unwilling to move their families into Ireland. But inducements of
such a character were eventually held out by the government that a small
colony emigrated from the northwest coast of Scotland in 1612 and
planted themselves in Ulster; these were Presbyterian families from the
County of Argyle, and it is very probable that families of Riddells accom-
panied their countrymen to the new settlement. During the following
twenty years many ministers with their congregations crossed the Channel
and established themselves in the Province of Ulster; from these new
tributaries from Scotland the colony began to flourish, and the ratio of
migration was augmented to such an extent that in a few years many
hundred families were scattered through the north of Ireland.
This intrusion of Scottish subjects upon their confiscated lands excited
intense hatred in the Catholic Irish; and those who had been ruined in
their estates in the wars of King James only waited a favorable time to
make an attempt to recover what they had lost, and rid their country of
their Presbyterian neighbors. The Irish not only hated the king, but all
his subjects from Scotland, especially those who were known to have
taken part in the wars. As was customary in those days, James rewarded
his soldiers with grants of land in Ulster, and among that number were
three brothers, namely, Hugh, James, and Robert Riddell, presumably de-
scended from the Roxburghshire family, or some of its numerous branches
in Scotland, but possibly of the "Riddells of Kinglass," a distinct family.
Of these brothers, James was an officer of rank in the army of King
James, and all three had fought from principle as Presbyterians through
the wars. James Riddell had a grant of land (three townlands) in the
County of Armagh, in the Province of Ulster; Hugh Riddell received a
grant bordering on the Counties of Tyrone and Donegal, not far from
that of his brother before mentioned; while Robert Riddell, the third
brother, settled on land further south near the city of Dublin. From
