Could your immigrant ancestors pass the test???

[catnhatnh]

Because I received some recent e-mails from a family member and guess what-under the conditions they listed my family could never be "Americans"...

Among other prerequisites they seem to think that all past immigrants had a sponsor, a residence, and a job waiting. Not bloody likely if your bog-trotting ancestors were escaping the potato famine. At best they worked "across the water" (England) and earned enough after sending most home to starving relatives-those few still alive-for passage on ships forever after referred to as "coffin-ships". They arrived with NOTHING save the strength to face signs reading "NINA" (no Irish need apply) and a determination to grab a better life.

Hater E-mails now extol them for their perseverance and drive and how well they "assimilated" forgetting a century of Irish (and Italian,and etc.) ghettos and gangs. They forget the fight for prosperity and respect. They forget how eagerly each group scrimped and saved and eagerly imported relatives of both working age and elderly to the land of opportunity...

Of course when my "Wretched Refuse" arrived, the ports were open-the upper classes both needed and welcomed cheap labor just as the upper classes need and want cheap labor from the South now. And then and now the media-electronic now but yellow rag newspapers then-excoriated the newcomers for taking jobs from "Americans".

But then and now without jobs from the wealthy or today corporations this "land of opportunity" would be just another worthless dead end.

Just know that the whole while they revile the (Irish, Italian, Polish, Mexican) immigrants and blame them for the ills you suffer and they cause,it was never about patriotism or being a "real" American. As it was then, it is now about percentage points on the bottom line.

[mmonk]

1. Doubt it. They came here before there was a United States.

[Catshrink]

5. Mine too.

The latest one of my ancestors arrived was 1775, the earliest was 1635.

[catnhatnh]

7. Honest to God?

As in no one anywhere in the past 235 years married anyone whose family had not been here that long??? Because that would be not impossible but extremely rare.

[enlightenment]

19. Not really. My latest ancestor arrived here in 1800 - the earliest in the 1640s.

Families marrying into families that have been here for a long time. It happens.

[pipi_k]

44. Same for me...nearly all my ancestors arrived in Canada

from the late 1500s to mid 1600s and lived there till mid to late 1800s when they came down to live in New England.

Not one of them married into a family that hadn't already been in North America for 200 years or more, and there were even some intermarriages with the Aboriginals of Canada, so my family genealogy goes way back.

French Canadians tended to congregate in their own little communities and marry other French Canadians whose families had been in NA for many generations, even as recently as the mid 20th Century...at least in my own family.

[Catshrink]

50. I have to look at my data

for the side lines, but for the direct line, yep. From memory:

One of my mom's ancestors was at Jamestown and was in the House of Burgesses. Unfortunately he got tossed out and heavily fined for slandering another. They lived in VA.

Another of mom's arrived in 1776 - we have his arrival record in NY but can't find where he was in Ireland. They settled in Western PA.

Dad's family arrived in 1680's with an "anchor baby" being born in 1685. They settled in Virginia (Albemarle Co.) and NC (Cumberland, I think).

Another of Dad's was here in the early 1700's and I think was also in VA. The brother of one in this line was one of the plantiffs in the Marbury vs. Madison case.

[mmonk]

8. Very good. I'll have to go back and check the dates of mine.

My family was connected to one of the Eight Lords Proprietors (I suppose that was cheating).:)

[nadinbrzezinski]

10. I am impressed

First or Second Charter?

(And I know MOST people would have no clue what this is)

[mmonk]

18. 1st from Charles II.

Carolina had settlements from migration through a previous charter (Virginia) but in 1663, Charles II granted Carolina to those that helped him secure the thrown. A second charter was later granted to clarify boundaries in the 1st. My family crest is on historical signs on the Albemarle Highway (which is weird to see).

[nadinbrzezinski]

21. You realize just how many folks

round these parts have no clue what we are talking about?

And yes I asked because Virginia was the first colony (hell Massachusetts Bay got permission from the Virginia colony and a grant of land)... Virginia got three grants and as you said Carolina two. Of course there is Maryland, set aside for Catholics after the civil war to move to... so they could take the lands away from them for proper protestant families... the history of the early colony is... shall we say colorful?

[mmonk]

26. Yes, very colorful. Each colony with its own flavor of events.

This is the family member responsible for my family being here. So I'm here because he was rewarded in 1663. No heroic struggle to tell to get here.:)

[nadinbrzezinski]

27. If we evah decide to try that monarchy

again... you got a leg up... Duke... I am really impressed now

:hi:

Well there is this very distant chance that my family, on dad's size, is related to the Polish Royal Family (which I doubt, personally) and of course my husband is a good Irish mutt.

:-)

[mmonk]

40. I thought about challenging North Carolina's claim to the Albemarle

Sound region of NC and South Carolina's claim to Monck's corner so we can receive the appropriate royalties but I get the feeling both might get thrown out in court.;-) :hi:

Sounds as if your family's bloodlines are just as fine.

[csziggy]

35. Cool - my ancestors moved in after yours lost control

At least the ancestors on Mom's side of the family: German Palatines, French Huegonots, Scots-Irish from Pennsylvania. They lived in the Carolinas until the 'West' was opened, then they moved to Alabama and pretty much stayed. One family tried to move to Arkansas, but the father died so they went back to live with the wife's brother in Alabama.

One of the books on the Germans has a scan of a paper confirming that the guy was free - he had been an indentured servant and had served out his commitment, but had to get permission before he could buy property. I'm starting to collect the names of the ships they came over on and where they came from. Many had moved to England before coming to America. A change - some of the Quakers a century earlier moved to Holland from England before coming over.

[mmonk]

41. Then I guess it may have been good that mine lost control.

:hi:

[csziggy]

48. Good for me - not for the many slaves they ended up owning

Not a point of pride for me with my ancestors.

[nadinbrzezinski]

9. Indentured laborers, aka white slaves?

Just curious, been readying into that less than well explored aspect of US Colonial history trying to put together a cogent history of labor that is more than just the facts ma'am.

[catnhatnh]

14. I have both English and German ancestors as well...

but can't find when the German part came across-possible Pennsylvania Dutch...(in fact Deutch) but the English side is also fairly obscure and could easily have been a later indenture. I know Damn well none of the oral tradition links us to the colonies as founders or illuminaries...

[nadinbrzezinski]

16. Most indentures barely made it

after they got their freedom. But by the time 1776 rolled around two thirds of the population were indentures or descendants of them.

Things they don't teach in HS. And they included a few Germans and Poles too, as well as Dutch.

One article I have been making my way through is from 1901 and it is a detailed (and the most detailed by the way) list of indentures. The next book dedicated to it is called White Slavery... and it was published in the early 2000... yes it was mentioned by some historians, but mostly in detail there is this one hundred year gap... maddening yes.

[csziggy]

36. I said above that some of mine were indentured.

A family of German Palatines were committed to ten years service. The parents died while still working off their servitude, but the two sons made it. Within a year of becoming free, they were buying land and ended up wealthy planters. Which of course, meant that they became slave owners.

It is weird knowing that my ancestors were slave owners and I just do not understand how someone who had been only marginally better than a slave could own other humans like that. I read their wills and they are leaving the slaves to their heirs the same way they leave their livestock. I'm not sure I want to understand how they could justify this while being 'religious' since so many of my ancestors in those families were ministers.

[Richard Steele]

23. Mine as well. I've said it often: They had no permission to come here, they just had GUNS.

Like every Caucasian in this nation, I'm descended from illegal immigrants.
Culturalocentrically sociopathic, Gawd-lovingly GENOCIDAL illegal immigrants.

They weren't like the polite & helpful 'illegal immigrants'
we have today, those nice Mexican, Russian, & Chinese folks
who build our suburbs, maintain our lawns, living rooms & infants,
deliver exotic foreign cuisine to our doors at the lift of a phone
and buff our fingernails until we can bask in the glory
of five tiny simultaneous purple reflections of our glorious white faces...

No, my ancestors weren't helpful like that.
They just pretty much strolled into the Western Hemisphere
and KILLED anyone who had anything
that looked like it was worth taking.

[catnhatnh]

29. Great Post!

Since the Siberian land bridge (theory "A") or before (theory "B") they came for better and grabbed all they could use. From Indians adopting the invaders horses to JP Morgan when an improvement in lifestyle or financial reward could be found it was embraced. I can find no real merit to primogeniture but merit only in social tendencies toward the greater general welfare...

[csziggy]

38. Actually when most of our ancestors came over, the first big die off was over

In the 1600s, it was too soon after the first decimation of the American Indians by disease for there to be much in the way of resistance. They had lost somewhere between 50 to 90% of their population so they were spread thin and the cultures had bee deeply disrupted. Think of Europe after the Black Death, but half the remaining people.

The big clashes between the whites and the Indians did not happen until later when the Indian populations were recovering and their social structure was rebuilding. Even then, they might have been willing to negotiate with the whites, but the French and British tried to use various groups for their own purposes. Then one of the bloodiest periods of the American settlements began - King Philip's War was a very bad time for both whites and Indians and pretty much set the stage for the later extermination of the Indians.

My ancestors took advantage by settling the lands cleared by pushing back and killing the Indians. While I am impressed by their bravery in moving into new territory, I am not proud of the acts that let them do it.

[eowyn_of_rohan]

46. YUCK! Speak for your own ancestors!

Nobody - not even the earliest immigrants to arrive on this continent had "permission" to come. "Culturalocentrically sociopathic, Gawd-lovingly GENOCIDAL illegal immigrants"??? Historically inaccurate and offensive to stereotype all early immigrants in such a disparaging manner. People came and still come here for many different reasons -- THEN and NOW, people are a blend of good and bad, selfish and selfless, warhawk and pacifist et al. There have been Caucs brutally murdered by Native Americans and vice versa. I have examples of both in my family tree. Not all Caucs came here "illegally" because there were no immigration laws in the early days, and criteria for immigration has changed over time.

[csziggy]

34. Most of mine did too

The earliest on the Mayflower,a few more that century, a whole large bunch that left Europe because of religious persecution in the 1700s, though we do have a few that arrived after the Revolution - one family around 1830, and my great-grandfather from Wales in 1852. Unless you want to count the period when my grandmother's family moved to Vancouver Island for a few years and then returned to Michigan.

I'm working on the genealogy crap now for my Mom, so it is all really fresh in my mind.

[JitterbugPerfume]

2. back in the 1700s

my ancestors were most likely illiterate Irish German and Englishmen

[eowyn_of_rohan]

47. Actually, in the 1700s they very likely WERE literate

but their descendants may not have been because they had little opportunity for education. With their families migrating into unsettled areas they were so focused on survival that "schooling" took a back seat

[EFerrari]

3. When my mom and her sibs came here in the 50s, they did have those things.

But that's because their dad was in government and knew rich people. If not for that, I might be selling Chiclets to tourists in downtown San Salvador right now.

[Skittles]

4. nope; my ancestors made it on their own

but since they were Norwegian and lily-white they probably whould not need to pass the hater-test

[catnhatnh]

6. See-this is so controversial I received an un-recommend...

because apparently even on a "Democratic" board the idea that others may want an opportunity your own ancestors were given is evil-not natural...

[nadinbrzezinski]

13. More than one I am afraid

You have touched on a fascinating part of US History, and some of it actually quite controversial.

[dalaigh lllama]

11. It took my German immigrant ancestors 100 years to "assimilate"

They came over in 1731, and the first one with an "American" name was fourth generation.

Here's a contemporary opinion from the 1700's on the influx of Germans to America:

"Those who come hither are generally of the most ignorant Stupid Sort of their own Nation…and as few of the English understand the German Language, and so cannot address them either from the Press or Pulpit, ’tis almost impossible to remove any prejudices they once entertain…Not being used to Liberty, they know not how to make a modest use of it…I remember when they modestly declined intermeddling in our Elections, but now they come in droves, and carry all before them, except in one or two Counties...In short unless the stream of their importation could be turned from this to other colonies, as you very judiciously propose, they will soon so out number us, that all the advantages we have will not in My Opinion be able to preserve our language, and even our Government will become precarious."

And more:

"Why should Pennsylvania, founded by the English, become a Colony of Aliens, who will shortly be so numerous as to Germanize us instead of our Anglifying them, and will never adopt our Language or Customs, any more than they can acquire our Complexion."


Can you guess who said this?

[catnhatnh]

15. No but I would love to know...

must be 19th century...

[dalaigh lllama]

28. No, it was the early 1700's

There was a HUGE influx of Germans into Pennsylvania from the early part of that century up until the Revolution. The above quote was by Benjamin Franklin, of all people! He also didn't care for the Germans' "swarthy complexions."

[catnhatnh]

30. Thank You so much....

...Do you mean that Icon had warts past his immoral fleshly behaviors???

[dalaigh lllama]

51. Yes, indeed. Quite an unsightly one, too.

:D

[XemaSab]

33. So the Germans can take a tan

as opposed to the pinkish English complexion or the ghostly Scandinavian complexion? :rofl:

[dalaigh lllama]

52. Yeah, I thought it was funny (peculiar, not funny haha)

I don't associate "swarthy" with Germans. I think America inherited that old-time British attitude that no one was as wonderfully "white" as they.

[proud2BlibKansan]

12. Mine were illegal

They snuck in because they couldn't afford the fare.

My mom's family had money and came from England and founded a town in the Midwest.

I went to Ellis Island and looked them up. My mom's family was listed. My dad's - the illegals - were not.

[Chulanowa]

17. One side of my family came here on boats

Welsh and Irish nobodies packed into boats and basically thrown onto the beach.

The other half had been here for the last twelve thousand years, at least.

[FBI_Un_Sub]

20. Some were illegals

1. Maternal grandma - illegal, she was an "unaccompanied minor" -- came over with her two orphaned sisters.
   
2. Maternal grandpa - illegal as heck. He was a deserter from the Czarist Army. He was well educated and supported himelf as an ESL teacher. (Grandma was one of his students)
   
3. Paternal grandma. - Only legal.
   
4. Paternal grandpa - illegal - unacompanied minor.
   

[treestar]

22. Most people's ancestors would not have been able to come legally

if restrictive laws like today's were in effect.

[catnhatnh]

24. From the movie "Stripes"...

We're Americans, with a capital 'A', huh? You know what that means? Do ya? That means that our forefathers were kicked out of every decent country in the world. We are the wretched refuse. We're the underdog. We're mutts! Here's proof: his nose is cold! But there's no animal that's more faithful, that's more loyal, more loveable than the mutt. Who saw "Old Yeller?" Who cried when Old Yeller got shot at the end?

[yowzayowzayowza]

25. The Bering Strait Immigration Station was closed at the time. n/t

[DatManFromNawlins]

31. Hmmm...

Only one of my ancestors arrived in Louisiana after it was a state, and he was brought over specifically because there was a need for his teaching skills, being the son of a headmaster who was a son of a headmaster. He arrived here in 1853. The rest were French and German immigrants who arrived in the 1700s. Of the Germans, there were appx. 64 Germans who settled what is now known in Louisiana as the German Coast, mostly in what is today St. Charles, St. John, and St. James parishes. They were brought here by John Law's company, under the idea that they were going to be working and living in a tropical paradise. Out of the 400+ who boarded those boats, those 64 survived. Of the 64, I can trace my lineage back to 26 of them. The one German who wasn't on those boats had actually arrived earlier, his name was Michael Zeringue (Zeringher). He was brought to New Orleans by request of the King of France to supervise construction in the city, and was the master builder during the construction of the original St. Louis church. As for the other Frenchmen, they were exiled from Canada after the Treaty of Paris, and before there WAS a USA.

[XemaSab]

32. The two immigrant ancestors I know about

One came here from Ireland via Switzerland under suspicious circumstances, and was later murdered for his wages up in a camp in the Sierras during the Depression. He was a sketchy guy.

The other one came here from Sweden at the age of 12 with his adopted siblings who all died of the flu within two years, and he never really pulled it together. He was probably schizophrenic, and there are real horror stories about what an asshole he was.

Seriously, if I was INF I wouldn't have let either one roam about the countryside unsupervised. :P

[Maru Kitteh]

37. My maiden name is Green and my mother's was Mincer (Mintzer) Jewish and Irish

Yeah - *everybody* wanted us here.

[pinboy3niner]

39. Faith and begorrah, thanks for starting an interesting and educational thread

I can't compete with the royalty and early settlers described here or Nadine's fascinating history lessons, but I'll try to share what little I know about my Irish and Welsh blue-collar roots.

My paternal Irish grandmother, Beatrice White, came from County Cork by ship with a sister in 1900, first landing briefly in Canada before entering the U.S. Her father was First Mate on a steamer that plied the British Isles, and she was the oldest of his twelve children.

Beatrice's first husband (she outlived three) was a Welsh coal miner in PA (my paternal grandfather). She was an expert seamstress, and lived most of her life in Chicago as a prized seamstress and supervisor. She retired to Tucson, AZ, living with a son there until she passed--at the age of 97--not long after that son died of cancer. Grandma Bea loved to play Canasta (and I loved playing it with her when I was young), and she had the brogue 'til her dyin' day.

My maternal side was all Irish. I know even less about their history, though I think they came over well before Beatrice. I knew my great grandparents, the O'Connells of Chicago, when I was very young, but I remember little about them. Their daughter, Hannah O'Connell, married my grandfather, Jack Dempsey (not the boxer) and they lived in Chicago on the next street from Mayor Daley in an Irish neighborhood that I think was called, "Bridgeport" (which struck me as wishful thinking, because I never saw a bridge or a port around there, only the stockyards, which made their presence known by the powerful stench from the slaughterhouse). I remember my grandparents always had a carton of cow's blood in the icebox--for the iron.

My grandfather served as head usher at the local Catholic church for 50 years. Whenever Grandpa Jack said he was going to take the dog for a walk, we knew he was headed to the neighborhood tavern on the corner. He'd head home after a few drinks and usually wind up flat on his butt on the curb when he tried to step off. That's where the dog came in. It was only through the superheroic efforts of the little terrier that Grandpa Jack made it to his feet--and home--again.

That's it. Knowing so little about my family's immigration to America, I cheated and threw in irrelevant stories. But hey, I enjoyed that nostalgic detour, and if anyone enjoys the reading half as much as I enjoyed the telling I'll feel vindicated. :)

[eowyn_of_rohan]

42. Criteria for immigration to the "colonies" and the USA has gone through many changes

All depends on when and where your ancestors arrived

[AngryAmish]

43. Yes

My grandfather tried to come over. X-rayed at Ellis island and denied. TB.

So my folks came across decades later. Sponsors, job and residence.

Worked out fine for them.

[WeDidIt]

45. People forget about the "Know Nothing" party, the teabaggers of their day

The Know Nothings was a nativist movement and damn, they hated the Irish.

[Javaman]

49. probably not...

the majority came over in the 1840's and at the turn of the century.

My German side came over in the 1840's due to the potato famine (it wasn't only in Ireland) and the Italian side came over because they wanted something better than the church controlled poverty of Southern Italy.

My Italian grandfather was lucky in that he could spell his name and spoke a few words of english.

My German great-grandfather wasn't so lucky. He couldn't read or write. The family "name" changed to a more American version aka Smith. And Karl to carl.

During both times, strong backs were required, so they both were able to find jobs fairly quickly.

Others weren't so lucky.