was settled directly from England by way of Perth Amboy, Elizabeth,
and Freehold in the north. South Jersey was settled from Pennsylvania.
There were a few German communities scattered throughout the
north-central part of New Jersey, but, on the whole, the State can be
counted as purely English.
The case of Pennsylvania was somewhat different. The original settlers
on the west bank of the Delaware, around Philadelphia, were English
Quakers with a certain number of Welsh, who probably were for the most
part Nordic. This section was the most cultured and important part
of Pennsylvania. Philadelphia was the port of entry of two important
migrations in the eighteenth century. First, the Ulster Scots, who
came in great numbers after 1720. In fact, most of the Ulster Scots
in America entered the colonies through Philadelphia and, to a less
extent, through Charleston, South Carolina. These late comers found
the desirable land along the Delaware had been taken up, so they
moved westward to the Indian frontier. They were a restless, brave,
and pugnacious people, and immediately assumed the burden of the
Indian fighting, often without the support or even the sympathy of the
Philadelphia Quakers. They were numerous and soon spread along the
foothills and valleys of the Appalachians southwestward through western
Maryland and Virginia into North and South Carolina, whence they again
crossed the ridges westward, until, by the time of the Revolution, they
had laid the foundations of Kentucky and of Tennessee. They were, of
course, pure Nordics and of North England and Lowland Scotch origin.
They had resided for two or three generations in North Ireland. Being
fervent Presbyterians, they had not mingled with the Catholic Irish.
In 1790 these Ulster Scots in the colonies numbered about 200,000 and
the pure Scots about 300,000 and taken together they were, next to
the English, the most important element. They were, as said above,
pre-eminently pioneers and Indian fighters and the same fact appears in
the history of practically every frontier of British colonies during
the next century. They were a highly selected group when they first
went to Ireland, which was at that time to all intents a frontier.
Since that time the Scots and the Ulster Scots have everywhere shown
the characteristics of the ideal pioneer. They played a predominant
part in the settlement of the southern part of the Middle West.
The next most important racial element was the Germans. In fact, it
was the only non-British element of importance in the colonies. At
the time of the Revolution the Germans numbered about a quarter of a
million and by 1790 they have been computed to have been about 9 per
cent of the total population of the colonies. They settled in the
districts of Pennsylvania immediately west of Philadelphia around York
and Lancaster, where they are to be found today. They were a peaceful
and industrious people, and have to some extent retained their language
and customs down to the present time. A very few of them joined their
neighbors, the Ulster Scots, in the migration to the Southwest. They
were not particularly loyal to the American cause during the Revolution
nor in the preceding French Wars, and their presence in the colonies
excited much hostility. They were refugees, who had fled down the
Rhine from Alsace and the Palatinate to escape the French when Louis
XIV invaded and devastated their country. With them were many refugees
from German-speaking Switzerland together with Hussites from Moravia.
While there were some Lutherans and Calvinists among them, most of the
"Pennsylvania Dutch," as they were called by the English colonists,
belonged to small and obscure sects. Dunkards, Schwankenfelders, Amish,
and Mennonites still maintain their special religious communities.
Their language is Alemannish and this German dialect is still spoken in
Alsace and Switzerland. In addition to their colonies in Pennsylvania,
there was a small settlement of Moravian Brothers in the western part
of North Carolina.
Maryland was originally settled under a charter to Lord Baltimore as a
refuge for English Catholics, but from the beginning these latter were
very few in number and by 1690 were so thoroughly outnumbered that they
were deprived of the franchise.
Virginia, the most important of the colonies next to New England, if
the latter be taken as a whole, was pure English in the tidewater
district, that is, as far west as Richmond. Beyond were many Ulster
Scots, who, it must be remembered, were very largely English.
North Carolina was much the same, except that the Ulster Scots were
relatively more numerous.
South Carolina had an English planter aristocracy and was much purer
English and had less Ulster Scotch than her northern neighbor. It had
also a considerable French Huguenot element, by far the largest and
most influential in the colonies. These Huguenots, while not very
numerous, were nearly all men of culture and social standing and played
a large part in the development of the country.
Georgia was substantially of the same racial complexion as South
Carolina.
V
THE PURITANS IN NEW ENGLAND
Taking up the settlement of the colonies more in detail, we may
commence with New England. The first inhabitants of Massachusetts were
pre-dominantly from the eastern half of England. This contains the
counties in which Nordic influence had probably been the strongest, and
the early settlement of Massachusetts was by an overwhelmingly Nordic
stock, judging alike by place of origin and by family and personal
names. A study of the origin of the pioneers of Plymouth, Watertown,
and Dedham shows that two-thirds of them came from a region along the
English coast between London and the Wash and mostly from the southern
part of that stretch of territory.
Although given an important position by historians because of its
priority and the romantic incidents connected with its founding,
Plymouth Colony, because of its small size, played only a minor part in
the early development of the American nation. Its settlers, as shown by
the detailed accounts available concerning many of them, were people of
the lower and middle classes, mostly of good character but attracting
to their numbers also adventurers and men of more doubtful quality.
Within five or six years after the landing at Plymouth Rock, the
Plymouth settlers were already outnumbered by other settlers in New
England, while Plymouth itself was the parent of a number of other
settlements that outstripped it. During the decade 1630-40 it became
a province of eight small towns, seven of them stretching for fifty
miles along the shore of Cape Cod Bay, from Scituate to Yarmouth,
with Taunton lying twenty-five miles inland. The entire colony would
probably have moved to the Connecticut River valley, had not the
competition of settlers from Massachusetts Bay been too strong.
Two generations after the original settlement there the number of
inhabitants of Plymouth was no greater than it was at the start.
In the decade of 1620-30 there was a rapid but sporadic settlement of
small towns on or near the Massachusetts coast, but the first great
migration was that represented by the arrival of Governor Winthrop's
fleet in Massachusetts Bay in 1630. The new arrivals settled Boston,
Charlestown, Medford, Watertown, Roxbury, Lynn, and Dorchester. During
the next decade the Puritan emigration from England continued, again
largely from the northern and eastern counties, overwhelmingly of as
nearly pure Nordic stock as Great Britain could show.
[Illustration: Showing Highlands and Lowlands of Scotland.]
The difference in antecedents of the Massachusetts Bay Colony from
that of Plymouth is reflected in the differences in geographical and
social origin. The Pilgrim Fathers, as every one knows, took their
start from Scrooby in Yorkshire at the point where this county joins
Lincolnshire and Northamptonshire, under the leadership of Bradford,
the local postmaster and Robinson the clergyman. The capital for the
enterprise was almost all subscribed in London, and only one-third
of the first settlers were members of Robinson's congregation. The
part of Scrooby and Holland in that colony has therefore often been
exaggerated. The English founders of the Massachusetts Bay Colony were
on the other hand not merely religious dissenters, but powerful members
of the Puritan nobility. The group attracted to their enterprise was
therefore one of a somewhat wider social outlook. It was distinguished
for the same reason from most of the later emigration.
The people who settled in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in the decade of
1630-40 doubtless had every desire to better their condition, and their
zeal in seizing land from the Indians showed that they were able to
put this desire into effect successfully. Their motive in emigrating,
however, was more political than was that of many later colonists, most
of whom came frankly to find fortune in a new country.
There were among them a sprinkling of members of the important county
families and even a few representatives of the Puritan gentry. Alumni
of Cambridge were liberally represented among the clergy, together
with a few from Oxford, although few other professional men seem to
have been in the group. Many of the settlers were from families of
merchants, among whom Puritanism had made great progress in England.
The bulk, however, consisted of more or less well-to-do yeomen and
artisans.
Since a large part of this Puritan migration, which probably amounted
to 20,000 between 1620 and 1640, came in groups often following their
local clergymen, it is fairly easy to determine from what parts of
Great Britain the early population of Massachusetts came. The evidence
all indicates that little of it was from the far north of England
where Puritanism had made comparatively slight progress. The greater
proportion of the settlers came from the Puritan stronghold of East
Anglia comprising the counties of Suffolk, Essex, Norfolk, and eastern
Hereford. Next to this was the emigration from Wessex including Dorset,
Somerset, and eastern Devon. Following came contributions from Kent,
from the midland counties of Buckingham, Northampton, and Leicester,
a considerable group from the borders of Wiltshire, Hampshire, and
western Berkshire with some from as far west as Gloucestershire near
the Welsh border. A large Boston group came from Lincolnshire (which
was the home of the ancestors of the Boston-born Benjamin Franklin)
and of course there was a strong contingent from London, which was
largely Puritan and Presbyterian. Towns in Massachusetts tended to
be settled by people who were all from the same region in England;
and as the expansion of Massachusetts was very largely in the form of
congregations from given towns, these populations often kept together
for a long time. Frequently the town's name indicates the old home.
Thus Gloucester was settled by men from that county and Dorchester was
named for the town in Dorset from which its early settlers came with
the Rev. John Maverick, although it contained an element of Lancashire
people from the neighborhood of Preston, Liverpool, and Manchester.
[Illustration: Ulster Scot and New England origins--1, heaviest; 2,
heavy; 3, light; 4, very light; 5, uncertain; 6, English definitely
present.]
Along with the desire of these settlers to better themselves, to
acquire the ownership of land, and to seek fortune in new countries,
the disturbed political conditions in Great Britain particularly
urged Puritans to migrate. British documents of the period throw many
sidelights on the nature and scope of this movement. Thus Lord Maynard,
in a memorandum to Archbishop Laud in 1638, laments "the intention of
divers clothiers of great trading to go suddenly into New England." He
hears daily of incredible numbers of persons of very good abilities
who have sold their lands to depart and says there is danger of divers
parishes being impoverished.
Since some of them liked the Massachusetts government no better than
the one at home, the tide of emigration turned strongly toward the West
Indies, the British islands of which were rapidly filled with Nordic
stock. The history of Nordic settlement in the West Indies is little
known and is exceedingly instructive in connection with a study of the
peopling of the New World. Bermuda was colonized in 1612, Saint Kitts
in 1623, Barbadoes and Saint Croix in 1625, and Nevis three years
later. By 1640 Massachusetts had about 14,000 settlers; but Saint
Kitts had almost as many and Barbadoes decidedly more. The number of
Englishmen who migrated to the West Indies was perhaps three times as
large as the number who went to all New England.
Down to the end of the eighteenth century the West Indies were
flourishing, populous, and wealthy, but these islands then ceased to
have any world-wide importance--not merely because of economic and
agricultural changes, such as affected the sugar industry, but because
the white man in the tropics could not compete on even terms with
the Negro. It will be pointed out later that these islands are now
virtually Negro territory, and they have become centers of emigration
into the United States of a black population of low economic and
social status--the Nordics having died out, or lost their original
characteristics, or gone elsewhere.
From 1640 the emigration from Great Britain to New England almost
stopped and the tide turned the other way; many settlers in
Massachusetts either returning to England or going to the West Indies.
The natural increase of the population from then on accounts for most
of the growth of the New England colonies. Even here, however, the Bay
State fell behind Virginia in rate of increase of white population.
[Illustration: PURITAN EMIGRATION FROM ENGLAND
1620 TO 1640
SHOWING A TOTAL OF ABOUT 67,300
_New England 17,800_
_Maryland and Virginia 9500_
_West Indies including Bermuda about 40,000_]
Almost as soon as they had established themselves around Massachusetts
Bay, groups of settlers began to push out in all directions, partly
to get better or cheaper land, and partly to get greater independence
of action. In this way the settlement of Connecticut was begun as
early as 1634. In the next year emigrants arrived in Connecticut from
Dorchester and Watertown in Massachusetts and in 1636 from Newton.
They established settlements in the Connecticut River valley bearing
the names of the Massachusetts towns from which they came until the
names of Windsor, Wethersfield, and Hartford were substituted. In 1638
came the settlements at New Haven, Guilford, Milford, and elsewhere.
Stratford, Fairfield, Norwalk, and Stamford were established not many
months later as a challenge to the Dutch from New York who regarded
that part of Connecticut as their own domain. By 1640, at least a
couple of thousand settlers were in Connecticut; Hartford, New Haven,
and New London becoming in their turn the main gateways of immigration
into the whole back country. The settlement of New England was, in
general, however, from south to north, proceeding along the river
valleys.
The fisheries and the excellent supply of timber for naval construction
led to scattered settlements on the coast of Maine even earlier. The
lack of navigable rivers delayed penetration into the interior--but
during the seventeenth century the Massachusetts people had settled
along most of the river valleys. Even to this day the interior of Maine
is very largely backwoods. This territory was claimed by Massachusetts
as a part of its own dominion, from which it did not separate until in
1820 when it was admitted as an independent State to offset Missouri in
Henry Clay's famous compromise.
As Indians were gradually dispossessed, the population of Massachusetts
continued to push westward. In 1676 the end of King Philip's War
removed the fear of Indians for a time and led to particularly active
movements of population inland. Meanwhile settlements had been made in
New Hampshire and Rhode Island. The first settlement in New Hampshire
had been made by David Thomson, a Scotsman who established himself on
the coast; but its population came from Plymouth Colony and later from
other parts of Massachusetts. The spread of the English in the New
Hampshire mountains and forests, where the Indians continued hostile
for a long time, was slow, and even at the time of the Revolution,
New Hampshire contained few settlements of any size. The greatest
development came toward the end of the period here considered. In
1700 it held but 5000 or 6000 souls. Up to 1760 only the coast towns
had any considerable population, but the peace of 1763, which finally
removed the French and Indian menace, resulted in a rapid penetration
of settlers largely from Connecticut. In the next fifteen years 30,000
people are said to have entered New Hampshire from Connecticut alone,
and a hundred new towns had been planted.
Rhode Island already had a few settlers before Roger Williams founded
Providence (1636), though that is generally regarded as the beginning
of the colony. Portsmouth was founded in 1638, Newport and Warwick in
1639, and in 1644 these settlements were united under one government.
Because of its small size, Rhode Island plays in a sense only a minor
part in the history of the formation of the early population of North
America. But it served as a place of entry for colonists from all
sources, and it likewise attracted settlers from the other colonies,
due to its conspicuous policy of political and religious toleration. In
another way the small size of Rhode Island led to its being a source
of colonization. Its available land resources were so small that large
families soon exhausted them and there was no recourse except to get
out of the colony. It was therefore an incubator for colonists and
furnished more emigrants in proportion to its population than did other
colonies which had greater resources wherewith to care for their own
people. It may be said that while Massachusetts is the parent of all
New England, the whole of New England is in some sense a parent of
Rhode Island. In either case, the racial homogeneity of the population
is conspicuous, the little groups of settlers who represented other
than Nordic stock being insignificant in numbers however much they may
appeal through sentiment to the pride of their descendants.
Vermont was settled late, its main occupation not coming until after
the Revolution. At first a part of New Hampshire, it attracted
occasional settlers from that State and its neighbors, but there could
hardly be said to have been a permanent settlement until Brattleboro
was founded in 1740.
The settlement of Massachusetts west of the Connecticut River began
in 1725, when the Berkshires were invaded and Sheffield established.
Settlers steadily pressed north and west, and gradually took possession
of the territory between the Connecticut River and Lake Champlain. The
Connecticut River was the first American frontier, as Alaska was the
last.
At the time of the Revolution Vermont was very much of a frontier, in
which a lawless and defiant lot known as the Green Mountain Boys held
possession and yielded allegiance to no one. Within six weeks after
the collapse of Shays's Rebellion, more than 700 families are said
to have migrated from western Massachusetts into Vermont. Many New
England soldiers who had fought over this ground in the Revolution had
marked it as offering desirable home sites, and came into it to take
up land and clear it, to bring their families, and establish isolated
settlements which gradually coalesced into something like a settled
country. The increasing influx of New Englanders led to the surrender
of New York's claims on the territory, so that it took its place as
an independent State in 1791, the first to be added to the original
thirteen.
The picture of New England then is that of a community which received
the bulk of its foundation stock in a very short period of time, 1620
to 1640, and almost wholly from a single source; that is, England,
and specifically from the most Nordic districts of England. It was
no mere figure of speech when Captain John Smith bestowed upon the
region the prophetic name of New England. During the eighteenth
century, scattered groups of other origins came to add themselves
to the descendants of these early settlers; but in most cases they
represented only drops in the bucket. Doubtless one of the reasons why
the study of genealogy and the pride of ancestry have flourished most
conspicuously in New England is that so large a proportion of the old
population traces its ancestry back to the same period and to the same
group of people. Even as early as the Revolution, the great bulk of the
settlers of New England represented families that had been four or five
generations on American soil.
If there was a conspicuous absence of immigrants of very distinguished
families into New England at that time, it may be said, on the
other hand, that the general level was sound and intelligent. The
immigrant population of New England was composed of a small group of
families dominant in business and the professions, and an overwhelming
proportion of representatives of the English yeomanry, owners of small
freeholds, whose sons often sailed ships or went to the fisheries. This
same type made up the bulk of the population of the middle colonies
and peopled the back country of the southern colonies. As most of the
settlers in New England in the early migration were men who brought
their families, the foundation stock thus established was on a better
level than that in some other colonies where men arrived without
bringing wives and therefore were forced to marry women of any kind
whom the colony could furnish. The definitely Nordic character of New
England stock, its early establishment, and the survival of the able
and vigorous in a region where nature took a heavy toll of weaklings,
have produced in New England a population that has left its stamp on
subsequent American history as has no other group.
As to the Ulster Scots we must bear in mind that the Irish question was
as serious a thorn in the side of English statesmen in the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries, as it was before or since, and numerous
attempts were made to alleviate the situation, if not to end it, by the
colonization of Protestant people in Ireland. In 1611, James I began
to encourage the emigration of people from the lowlands of Scotland,
particularly from the western part, and from the north of England,
into Ulster. He looked forward to establishing in Ireland a staunch
Protestant population that might ultimately outnumber the Catholics
and become the controlling element politically. For this reason the
settlers were picked with some care. The plan succeeded so well that in
a generation or a little more, about 300,000 people had been colonized
in the northern part of the island, and by the end of a century their
number had risen to nearly a million.
These are the "Scotch Irish" of American history. The name is a
grotesque misnomer suggesting to the popular mind a sort of hybrid
origin and hybrid character which has no basis in reality. They were
not Irish in any sense of the word, and while most of them were Scotch
a great many were English. They are designated in this book as "Ulster
Scots."
Following the planting of Ulster in the north of Ireland, there was a
heavy British emigration into the east of Ireland. This was due partly
to economic factors and partly to the desire of Cromwell, in his turn,
to solve the Irish problem by colonization, after the precedent which
James I had established. These English Protestants in eastern Ireland
have too often been ignored. They, too, had nothing in common with the
older Roman Catholic population of the eastern part of the Island. Many
of the Protestant "Irish" were Quakers.