AHC: Make the Reivers a kind of bandit-colonial force

I had an idea which might be kind of ASB. The Reivers were a group of raiders and pillagers who lived on the Anglo-Scottish Borders. Now, what if rather than crushing them, they become the heart of a united British identity, with 'reiving now taking place at sea against the Spanish or whoever. They then settle in the New World where reiving takes a new form as Wild West banditism. By the present day, The Reiver is a British stereotype and romanticised, rightly or wrongly, by Britons today.
 
Well the bit about the New World happened quite a bit IOTL. 18th century immigration to the Appalachian region drew heavily from the border region.
 
Do a search for "Roger's Rangers" during the French & Indian Wars. He recruited heavily from the frontiersmen that settled the edges of the American colonies. Many of these folks were Scots-Irish.
 
To be fair, they were used as a colonial force - they were the ones who settled Ulster, and they really did a number on establishing a British identity there :p.
 
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