The family name Moore came from a small village near Newtonards, Co. Down, called Morvilla where most of the earliest Moores are buried. You can see Scotland from that point and there's some indication we were driven out during religious persecutions. Our first identifiable ancestor, John Moore helped build the third oldest Masonic Hall in Ireland , and the first the Presbyterian church in Newtonards in the early 1800's and then left for Nova Scotia where he again helped build the first Presbyterian in that region. He carried with him a Masonic document called a "De Mittimus" which introduces him to other Masons and gives his accomplishments. When My brother , my Dad and I when to Ireland last year, we were able to match the handwriting on the De Mit with the actual minutes of the Masonic Lodge for that time. We frankly didn't know we were Northern Irish until that trip. My father's mother was Swiss-English (Spalede-Fossey) and my Moms mother was Cornish (Benbow)and her father was Scottish (Glasson). So one eighth of me is not British Isles. A member of my family has served in every war America has been involved in, with both my Dad and I serving in Viet Nam (He in 1954, with the French, and I in 1969). I suspect that nationality is a function of where your blood was spilled, and not where it sprang from...