From Strangers to Citizens : The Integration of Immigrant Communities in Britain, Ireland, and Colonial America, 1550-1750

Sussex Academic Press. Very Good/Very Good. 2001. Hard Cover. Sm 4to 1902210859 Dust jacket complete. Brown cloth with bright gilt titling spine. No ownership inscription. 57 illustrations. xxiv, 567 pages clean and tight. Between 1550 and 1750 scores of thousands of immigrants, many of them religious refugees escaping persecution on the Continent, settled in Britain and its colonies, and in Ireland. They brought with them their formidable energies and talents and quickly assimilated themselves into the host society. These papers, originally delivered at a London conference commemorating Edward VI's charter to the 'strangers' church', discuss the experiences in their new homes of the many immigrants who settled in Britain, Ireland and across the Atlantic in the early modern period. While most studies usually concentrate on one particular ethnic or national group, these essays examine a wide variety - Dutch, Flemish, German, Huguenot, Jewish, African, Arab and Levantine - over the entire period. The essays range from considerations of trends towards integration in the immigrant communities to case-studies of individual immigrants; from studies of popular attitudes and government policy to examinations of the immigrant communities themselves and their structures for self-sufficiency. The immigrants contributions to art, scholarship, manufacturing, theology and politics are also explored. The authors, from five continents, include famous historians and post-graduates presenting results of new research. Their essays confirm the importance and extent of the immigrants' contributions, and provide ample testimony to their largely peaceful and constructive integration into the national life of their chosen country. .