A SHORT CLAN HISTORY: (For an alternate history of the Ewing name (MacEwen) check out the Clan MacLachlan Website and Thor Ewing's Clan Ewing article)
The most persistent tradition in the families of the Ewing Clan is that our family stock is from the Cymric Lowland Scot (current DNA testing seems to indicate this is error, most Ewings tested so far appear to be of Highland Gaelic stock. See the testing results here: Ewing Surname Y-DNA Project), and it is certain that we trace our descent back to Glasgow and to the Highland/Lowland border region east and west of Loch Lomond, including Stirlingshire and Dunbartonshire. John, James, Thomas, William, all our family names, coming down from hundreds of years ago, are the Christian names of the Lowlands borne by Ewings; while at the same periods others bearing similar names were in the border Highlands. Hence, the tradition of our Lowland origin is historically sustained.
One of the first "modern" records of this family was gathered and edited from the best available "old" manuscripts by Bishop Alex P. Forbes,D.C.L. The lives of Saint Minian and Saint Kentigern published in volume five of The Historians of Scotland in 1874. Saint Kentigern was the first Bishop (sixth or seventh century) and then patron saint of Glasgow, Scotland. It was said that Glasgow Cathedral was built close to the place where he had been interred. Saint Kentigern's mother was Thaney, daughter of King Leudonus and his father was the son of King Ulien (or Eugenius or Ewen or Ewing, all of which have been used interchangeable) of the Strathclyde kingdom.
The Ewing Clan is not on record as an active clan by the Lord Lyon of Scotland, but has a long history of service to Scotland.
A portion of the clan emigrated to Northern Ireland in the vicinity of Londonderry and there were in service to William of Orange, Prince of Holland, and then King of England against the former King James II of England. Then after withstanding the siege of Londonderry, in March of 1689 by the armed forces of the deposed King James II, one Ewing was knighted and another was presented with a silver hafted sword by King William III. The sword was brought to America by a Ewing grandson and was worn during the American Revolution. After this the sword was stolen and never recovered.
In the early 1700's the ship Eagle Wing and the ship Rising Sun brought many members of the family with their cousins (Porters, Gillespies etc.) to the shores of America.
"Just a word about the old ship Eagle Wing is worthwhile. History says that she began to ship Scots hither as early as 1635, and that in September, 1636 she brought 140; and that for more than a hundred years she was plowing the deeps, bearing first and last many thousands of the best blood to our shores. For heroism and service and for the part her passengers took in founding this government, the Eagle Wing shades the Mayflower into a speck on the horizon of the local history of New England." (From Clan Ewing of Scotland by Elbert William R. Ewing, published in 1922.)
Copied from The Clan Ewing in America brochure.
Song: Scotland the Brave: Midi file sequenced by Barry Taylor. From the website "Folk Music of England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales and America"