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Irish-Catholic Immigration to America

Irish-Catholic immigrants came to America during colonial times, too, and not all Irish-Catholic immigrants were poor. For example, wealthy Charles Carroll immigrated to America in 1706. His grandson, Charles Carroll of Carrollton, signed his name to the Declaration of Independence.

Ireland's 1845 Potato Blight is often credited with launching the second wave of Irish immigration to America. The fungus which decimated potato crops created a devastating famine. Starvation plagued Ireland and within five years, a million Irish were dead while half a million had arrived in America to start a new life. Living conditions in Ireland were deplorable long before the Potato Blight of 1845, however, and a large number of Irish left their homeland as early as the 1820s.

In fact, Ireland's population decreased dramatically throughout the nineteenth century. Census figures show an Irish population of 8.2 million in 1841, 6.6 million a decade later, and only 4.7 million in 1891. It is estimated that as many as 4.5 million Irish arrived in America between 1820 and 1930.

Between 1820 and 1860, the Irish constituted over one third of all immigrants to the United States. In the 1840s, they comprised nearly half of all immigrants to this nation. Interestingly, pre-famine immigrants from Ireland were predominately male, while in the famine years and their aftermath, entire families left the country. In later years, the majority of Irish immigrants were women. What can these statistics tell us about life in Ireland during this period?

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Irish - Irish-Catholic Immigration - Immigration...- Classroom Presentation | Teacher Resources - Library of Congress

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Irish-Catholic Immigration to America Irish-Catholic immigrants came to America during colonial times, too, and not all Irish-Catholic immigrants were poor. For example, wealthy Charles Carroll immigrated to America in 1706. His grandson, Charles Carroll of Carrollton, signed his name to the Declaration of Independence.

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Irish Immigration: Beyond the Potato Famine

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How do shifts in population change a place? Ireland sent immigrants to the American colonies early in their settlement. Charles Carroll was a signer of the Declaration of Independence. In the 1840s, the Irish potato sent waves of migrants who could afford passage fleeing starvation in the countrysid…

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A New Surge of Growth | German | Immigration and Relocation in U.S. History | Classroom Materials at the Library of Congress | Library of Congress

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German immigrants boarding a ship for America European Reading Room
German immigration boomed in the 19th century. Wars in Europe and America had slowed the arrival of immigrants for several decades starting in the 1770s, but by 1830 German immigration had increased more than tenfold. From that…

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Steamers carried Irish emigrants to Liverpool where their transatlantic voyage began

In the middle half of the nineteenth century, more than one-half of the population of Ireland emigrated to the United States. So did an equal number of Germans. Most of them came because of civil unrest, severe unemployment or almost inconceivable hardships at home. This wave of immigration affected almost every city and almost every person in America. From 1820 to 1870, over seven and a half million immigrants came to the United States - more than the entire population of the country in 1810. Nearly all of them came from northern and western Europe - about a third from Ireland and almost a third from Germany. Burgeoning companies were able to absorb all that wanted to work. Immigrants built canals and constructed railroads. They became involved in almost every labor-intensive endeavor in the country. Much of the country was built on their backs.

Letter to the London Times from an Irish Immigrant in America, 1850

I am exceedingly well pleased at coming to this land of plenty. On arrival I purchased 120 acres of land at $5 an acre. You must bear in mind that I have purchased the land out, and it is to me and mine an "estate for ever", without a landlord, an agent or tax-gatherer to trouble me. I would advise all my friends to quit Ireland - the country most dear to me; as long as they remain in it they will be in bondage and misery.

What you labour for is sweetened by contentment and happiness; there is no failure in the potato crop, and you can grow every crop you wish, without manuring the land during life. You need not mind feeding pigs, but let them into the woods and they will feed themselves, until you want to make bacon of them.

I shudder when I think that starvation prevails to such an extent in poor Ireland. After supplying the entire population of America, there would still be as much corn and provisions left us would supply the world, for there is no limit to cultivation or end to land. Here the meanest labourer has beef and mutton, with bread, bacon, tea, coffee, sugar and even pies, the whole year round - every day here is as good as Christmas day in Ireland.

Anti-Irish sentiment permeated the United States during the Industrial Revolution. The prejudice exhibited in advertisements like this one sometimes led to violent outbursts.

In Ireland almost half of the population lived on farms that produced little income. Because of their poverty, most Irish people depended on potatoes for food. When this crop failed three years in succession, it led to a great famine with horrendous consequences. Over 750,000 people starved to death. Over two million Irish eventually moved to the United States seeking relief from their desolated country. Impoverished, the Irish could not buy property. Instead, they congregated in the cities where they landed, almost all in the northeastern United States. Today, Ireland has just half the population it did in the early 1840s. There are now more Irish Americans than there are Irish nationals.

In the decade from 1845 to 1855, more than a million Germans fled to the United States to escape economic hardship. They also sought to escape the political unrest caused by riots, rebellion and eventually a revolution in 1848. The Germans had little choice - few other places besides the United States allowed German immigration. Unlike the Irish, many Germans had enough money to journey to the Midwest in search of farmland and work. The largest settlements of Germans were in New York City, Baltimore, Cincinnati, St. Louis and Milwaukee.

With the vast numbers of German and Irish coming to America, hostility to them erupted. Part of the reason for the opposition was religious. All of the Irish and many of the Germans were Roman Catholic. Part of the opposition was political. Most immigrants living in cities became Democrats because the party focused on the needs of commoners. Part of the opposition occurred because Americans in low-paying jobs were threatened and sometimes replaced by groups willing to work for almost nothing in order to survive. Signs that read NINA - "No Irish Need Apply" - sprang up throughout the country.

The Know Nothing Party's platform included the repeal of all naturalization laws and a prohibition on immigrants from holding public office.

Ethnic and anti-Catholic rioting occurred in many northern cites, the largest occurring in Philadelphia in 1844 during a period of economic depression. Protestants, Catholics and local militia fought in the streets. 16 were killed, dozens were injured and over 40 buildings were demolished. "Nativist" political parties sprang up almost overnight. The most influential of these parties, the Know Nothings, was anti-Catholic and wanted to extend the amount of time it took immigrants to become citizens and voters. They also wanted to prevent foreign-born people from ever holding public office. Economic recovery after the 1844 depression reduced the number of serious confrontations for a time, as the country seemed to be able to use all the labor it could get.

But Nativism returned in the 1850s with a vengeance. In the 1854 elections, Nativists won control of state governments in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Hampshire and California. They won elections in Maryland and Kentucky and took 45% of the vote in 5 other states. In 1856, Millard Fillmore was the American Party candidate for President and trumpeted anti-immigrant themes. Nativism caused much splintering in the political landscape, and the Republicans, with no platform or policies about it, benefited and rode to victory in the divisive election of 1860.

German Immigration to Texas
The first permanent German settlements in Texas date back to the early 1830's, and the upsurge in German immigration in the 1840's resulted in such towns as Fredericksburg and New Braunfels. By the mid 1850's, the populations of San Antonio, Houston, and Galveston were about one-third German.

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The Five Points Site: Rediscovery of a 19th-Century Neighborhood
The demolition of city buildings provides opportunities for archaeological investigation, and this website proves the value of digging into our past. Five Points was a mixed residential, commercial, and industrial neighborhood in New York City through several waves of immigration. The documentary record pictures Five Points as a frightening slum, but the archaeological record shows a thriving, working-class neighborhood. Both views are shown on this fascinating website.

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Views of the Famine
How did it feel to watch your children starve while your fields were barren? To get on a boat to a foreign land with little or no money because it was your only chance to survive? This website documents the Great Potato Famine of Ireland through contemporary articles from the Illustrated London Times, the Cork Examiner, and other publications. There is also a nicely organized master picture list and comprehensive list of online resources.

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Irish and German Immigration [ushistory.org]

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European Emigration to the U.S. 1891 - 1900

Italian emigration was fueled by dire poverty. Life in Southern Italy, including the islands of Sicily and Sardinia, offered landless peasants little more than hardship, exploitation, and violence. Even the soil was poor, yielding little, while malnutrition and disease were widespread.

Background
By 1870, there were about 25,000 Italian immigrants in America, many of them Northern Italian refugees from the wars that accompanied the Risorgimento—the struggle for Italian unification and independence from foreign rule. Between around 1880 and 1924, more than four million Italians immigrated to the United States, half of them between 1900 and 1910 alone—the majority fleeing grinding rural poverty in Southern Italy and Sicily. Today, Americans of Italian ancestry are the nation's fifth-largest ethnic group.

Italian-American workers shore up a subway tunnel under New York's East River.

Source: Destination America by Charles A. Wills

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Destination America . When did they come? | PBS

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European Emigration to the U.S. 1891 - 1900 Italian emigration was fueled by dire poverty. Life in Southern Italy, including the islands of Sicily and Sardinia, offered landless peasants little more than hardship, exploitation, and violence. Even the soil was poor, yielding little, while malnutrition and disease were widespread.

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Italian - The Great Arrival - Immigration...- Classroom Presentation | Teacher Resources - Library of Congress

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Most of this generation of Italian immigrants took their first steps on U.S. soil in a place that has now become a legend-Ellis Island. In the 1880s, they numbered 300,000; in the 1890s, 600,000; in the decade after that, more than two million.

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The Nation of Polonia

Poles first came to prominence in American life during the Revolutionary War. The colonies' battle for independence from Britain fired the imagination of adventurers and freedom fighters from around the world, and more than 100 Poles came to fight on the side of the rebels. Two of them- Count Kazimierz Pulaski and Tadeusz Kósciuszko-had experience in the independence struggles of their homeland and were recruited by Benjamin Franklin to help lead the fledgling American army. Both played pivotal roles in the colonists' victory and were hailed as heroes of the new republic. Towns and counties throughout the U.S. now bear their names, and Pulaski Day celebrations are held every year in Polish American cities.

The Polish people's own fight for independence was less successful, and their national identity came under harsh attack. By the 19th century, the ancient state of Poland had been conquered and divided up by three imperial powers-the Russian, Prussian, and Austro-Hungarian empires. Although they were separated by distance and political barriers, Poles were unified by a belief in their own independence, in their freedom to worship as Roman Catholics, and in their distinct identity as a people. The difficulty of maintaining this identity under hostile imperial regimes led many Poles to seek freedom overseas.

The first permanent settlement of Poles in U.S. sprang up on the Texas plains, where a few hundred men, women, and children from Silesia founded the town of Panna Maria in 1854. The small farm community grew and thrived, and soon more and more Poles were making their way to the shores of America.

At the turn of the 20 th century, Polish immigration exploded. Imperial repression, land shortages, and chronic unemployment made life more and more untenable for the Poles of Europe, and as the 19 th century waned they left for America by the thousands, then by the hundreds of thousands. Exact numbers are difficult to come by, given the many different routes Poles took to the U.S., but the 1910 census found more than 900,000 new immigrants who spoke Polish. After World War I, Poland regained its independence, and immigration began to slow. Even so, it is estimated that more than 2 million Poles had immigrated by the 1920s.

Not all intended to stay. Many of the earlier Poles were known as za chlebem, or "for-bread" immigrants, who came planning to earn a nest egg and return home. Whatever their intentions, most Polish immigrants ended up remaining in the United States. However, they still kept one eye on their homeland and passionately guarded their language, faith, and sense of themselves as Poles.

Life in Polonia

As Poles poured into the country, they came together in communities that preserved many aspects of the Polish way of life.

Most Polish immigrants had come in search of a decent livelihood, and so were drawn to the areas of the country where good work was available. In Poland, owning land had been a great source of pride, and many Poles struck out for farm country, founding agricultural towns in the mid-Atlantic states and New England. The Great Lakes region reminded some recent immigrants of home, and Polish names soon dotted the maps of Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Michigan.

America's cities were the destination of most Poles, however. Heavy industry had played an aggressive role in recruiting throughout Europe, and new Polish immigrants were drawn to jobs in the factories, steel mills, slaughterhouses, and foundries of the U.S. industrial belt. Chicago, Pittsburgh, Buffalo, Milwaukee, Detroit, New York, and Cleveland became anchor cities of the new Polish communities, and Polish was spoken in the mines of Appalachia and the Alleghenies.

Wherever they settled, Polish immigrants went about building communities that were fiercely committed to the preservation of their national heritage and culture. A national network of Polish-language newspapers, social clubs, and, eventually, radio and television stations helped keep the Polish language alive. Parochial schools were built within walking distance of every Polish neighborhood, and more than 900 Polish Catholic churches were founded. Polish music, dance, literature, and folklore were all kept alive through many decades in an English-speaking land. Polish American communities might be widely scattered, from Krakow, Wisconsin, and Wilno, Minnesota, to Bucktown in Chicago and Cleveland's Fleet Avenue. However, Polish Americans always made it clear that, while they were citizens of the United States, they were also loyal to Polonia-the community of Poles worldwide.

That loyalty was galvanized by the dark decades of the Second World War and by the Cold War tensions that followed it. Millions of Poles in Europe perished or lost their homes during World War II, and thousands fled the Soviet takeover of Poland that followed it. Polish Americans opened their homes to any refugees who were able to escape, and they once more agitated for their country's freedom. When that freedom finally came with the fall of the Soviet Union, countless family reunions took place, as European Poles met long-lost relatives and Polish Americans set foot on Polish soil for the first time.

Today, Poles are moving to the United States again, as a generation newly freed from foreign domination seeks its fortune overseas. They find a country shaped by the achievements of the Polish Americans that came before them, such as the poet Czeslaw Milosz, the conductor Leopold Stokowski, the baseball player Stan Musial, and the politicians Barbara Mikulski and Edmund Muskie. New Polish American communities are now rising up in New York, Detroit, and Chicago, sometimes occupying the same city blocks as their predecessors did a century before, and keeping the spirit of Polonia alive.

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Polish/Russian - The Nation of Polonia - Immigration...- Classroom Presentation | Teacher Resources - Library of Congress

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The Nation of Polonia Poles first came to prominence in American life during the Revolutionary War. The colonies' battle for independence from Britain fired the imagination of adventurers and freedom fighters from around the world, and more than 100 Poles came to fight on the side of the rebels.

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Definition of Push and Pull factors of Russian Migration to America
This article explains the Push and Pull factors of Russian Migration to America for kids. What are Push and Pull Factors that relate to Russia and what do they mean? The push and pull definitions are as follows:

Push factors are the reasons why people left Russia, such as persecution, fear, natural disasters, poverty and unemployment

Pull factors are the reasons why people moved to the United States of America in search of freedom, safety, stability and new opportunities

Push and Pull factors of Russian Migration to America for kids: Political, Economic, Social & Environmental Reasons
The push and pull factors of Russian Migration are dictated by economic, political, environmental and social reasons. Discover specific events in the history of Russia that prompted Russian people to leave their homes to start a new life in America.

Examples of Push and Pull factors of Russian Migration to America

Examples and List of Push and Pull factors of Russian Migration to America

Push Pull factors of Russian Migration for kids: Pull Push factors of Russia
To discover the full story of the Pull Push factors of Russia go to Russian Immigration to America for comprehensive facts, laws and history.

Push and Pull factors of Russian Migration: Political Examples of of Push and Pull factors in Russia
Find examples of Political Push and Pull factors such as significant historical events in Russian history such as wars, revolutions such as the Russian Civil War (1918-1922) , political autocracy and violent conflicts such as the Cholera Riots and the Pogroms which prompted the migration of Russian people to escape political or religious persecution .

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push and pull factors of russian migration

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Push and Pull factors of Russian Migration

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Find EXAMPLES of Push and Pull factors of Russian Migration for kids. List of Push and Pull factors of immigration from Russia to America. Economic, political, environmental, social Push and Pull factors of Russian Migration to America for kids, children, homework and schools.

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Virtual Field Trip to Ellis Island | Scholastic.com

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Teach about immigration with this webcast from Ellis Island, brought to you by Scholastic and the National Park Service. Tour the historic immigration station, meet Park Rangers, and discover the history of immigration in America.

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See all the wonderful things Samantha Famigletti has made

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See all the wonderful things Samantha Famigletti has made