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Perspective: European Immigrant
Most historians agree that no single factor explains all of the migration to North America that occurred in the nineteenth century. But many of the peaks in the numbers of immigrants directly followed some of the above-mentioned changes in their homelands. Beginning in 1829, immigration totals to British North America jumped from13,307 to 30,574. Higher numbers were reached in each of the years from 1833 to 1836, years coinciding with industrialization, land consolidation, and urban growth in Britain. Between 1846 and 1854, some 400,000 immigrants, mostly Irish, came to the British colonies in America.2 They left home after agricultural opportunities went into decline and the disastrous Potato Famine ruined local economies. Previous Irish immigrants in North America were also "pulling" friends and relatives to America by sending them descriptions of a better life and travel funds.
| Edwin C. Guillet, The Great Migration: The Atlantic Crossing by Sailing-Ship since 1770 (Toronto: Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1937). |
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Priest's Blessing, ca. 1850. Irish emigrants receive their last religious consolation in the homeland. They are preparing to journey to North America to start a new life. |
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