The Long Journey of “Scotch John” Michie
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Founded in 1966, the Louisa County Historical Society is 50 years young with 2016. One of the Historical Society’s proudest achievements is the relocation and restoration in 2013 of an 18th Century farmhouse originally built by Robert Michie in historic Green Springs, a Western District of Louisa County.
Since 2013, the two-story, 16’ by 16’ Michie House has been permanently re-situated on the grounds of the Sargeant Museum on Fredericksburg Avenue in Louisa, and it has been fully restored to the condition it likely was in when it was originally built in 1790. There’s even an amazing backstory to the Michie House, and that’s the tale of Robert’s father, “Scotch John” Michie.
Transatlantic Journey & Virginia Homesteads
From Jacobite exile in Scotland to 10,000 acres in the Virginia Piedmont:
Michie Family Lineage
The diagram below illustrates the descent from Clan Farquharson in the Scottish Highlands through the American Revolution:
Michie Lineage Tree
The Historical Account
On January 16, 1716 at age 30, John Michie was deposited from a dank and cramped British prison transportation ship onto a frozen wharf at the Port of York, Crown Colony of Virginia. He was accompanied by 112 other Scots recently convicted of treason by a Liverpool Court as a result of their participation in the Jacobite Rebellion of 1715. Once in the New World, John Michie would work his way along the York, Pamunkey, South Anna, and North Anna waterways until he was financially able to build a large family homestead just south of the town of Louisa. By the time of his death in 1777, “Scotch John” Michie owned over 10,000 acres of prime land in Louisa and Albemarle Counties.
The story begins with John Michie’s birth in 1685 in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. The reigning monarch of Great Britain at the time was Charles II of the Stewart dynasty. John’s father, Robert Michie, had married Margaret Farquharson. The Farquharson family was one of the most powerful clans in Scotland and the Michies were a notable sub-Clan to them. In 1714, after the Stewarts’ permanent fall from power, a Stewart Pretender to the throne whipped up civil unrest in Scotland. Colonel John Farquharson mustered a force including John Michie. In the late summer of 1715, this army invaded England and was defeated at Preston. Nearly 300 Scots including Michie were taken prisoner and sentenced to transportation to North America.
After a two-month sail shackled across the Atlantic, Michie disembarked at the Port of York. He had not agreed to indentured servitude. Utilizing trade skills in carpentry and ironworking, he found employment at the Port of York and later at Scotchtown Plantation in Western Hanover County under Charles Chiswell. From 1716 to 1728, working up the York River Valley, Michie associated with prominent Virginia leaders including Mann Page, Christopher Carr, John Poindexter, and Nicholas Meriwether. In 1732, Michie began construction on his family homestead on the South Anna River between Beaver and Harris Creeks.
During the American Revolution, Robert Michie served as a colonel in the Virginia Continental Militia under the Marquis de Lafayette. His older brother William enlisted in the Continental Army in 1775 and was with Washington’s Army at Valley Forge when word of Scotch John’s death reached him in the winter of 1777. William returned to establish Michie Tavern just outside Charlottesville near Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello. Robert Michie established his homestead in Green Springs, where in 1790 he built the 16’ by 16’ house now preserved at the Sargeant Museum.
Original Publication
- Originally published in The Lake Anna Breeze, February 2, 2016.
- Original Article Link