Facts and traditions collected for a family record

PERSECUTIONS IN SCOTLAND AND IKELAND. 23
also that Mary MacKonnel was a zealous Christian Reformer and Cove-
nanter.
In the year 1703, there were five M'Connells who signed their names
to a petition in connexion with the Rev. John M'Millan in Balmaghie.
All the parishes in which the many M'Connells lived in Galloway,
prior to the year 1700, were in the midst of these persecutions between
1640 and 1689. This district was the scene of the labours of many
very excellent divines, who boldly upheld the principles of the Reform-
ation, and whose piety and noble self-sacrifice gained the affection of
their parishioners.
About the year 1640, there was the well-known Samuel Rutherford
in Anwoth, John M'Clelland in Kirkcudbright, John Livingstone in
Stranraer, and Robert Blair in Ayr. The three latter came over to
Scotland in the year 1638, being driven from their charges in Antrim
by the Bishop of Down. Many Presbyterian families left the north of
Ireland at the same time, owing to the keen persecutions there, and
settled in Galloway and Ayrshire.
History or the Presbyterian Church in Ireland. By James Seaton Reid,
1834. Vol. I., p. 205.
" The western parts of Scotland became at this period, a.d. 1637, a seasonable
asylum for the oppressed people in Ulster. Many attempts were, indeed, made
by the Scottish bishops, now in the plenitude of their power, to prevent this
influx of persons, whom they knew to be opposed to their arrogant authority ;
but without success. Numbers removed thither, compelled to abandon Ireland,
where fines and other punishments began to be inflicted without mercy on the
non-conformmg laity. These strangers in their native land sojourned principally
in the shires of Ayr and Galloway, where they were harboured, and many of them
kindly entertained by the faithful people of that country. The celebrated David
Dickson, minister at Irvine, afterwards a distinguished ornament and pillar of the
Church of Scotland, was conspicuous for his attentions to the exiled brethren."
Page 220.
" The following ministers were settled in charges in their native country,
shortly after their flight from Ireland : — Early in the year 1638, Mr Blair was