Quote:
Originally Posted by Arragonis
Aha, that wasn't clear, in my mind anyway - see below. I'm kind of comparing 1650s brutal civil war with 1790s genteel England...
You are presenting me with an episode of history I am not too familiar with but seems very interesting in terms of the people involved and who profited, or indeed the link between them and what happened to people who Cromwell found undesirable at the time and had removed.
I am aware that lots of people did leave the UK because of the persecutions but I haven't read enough about what happened to them.
|
I should have been more explicit. Those Irish, Scots and English who came over ca. 1600 onwards didn't do so willingly in the vast majority, and they died like flies, well before their terms of servitude were finished. Those who survived tended to re-locate to America as social mobility was better. (See "redlegs").
Many, if not most, Americans of European ancestry are of either British or German stock . . and most, probably two-thirds, did so under legalized slavery: indentured servitude, up until the American Civil War. It is a myth of this country that their ancestors arrived freely; the obfuscating term "servant" was used for any and all under this duress, black or white. (see also "kidna
bbed" and "redemptioners").
.