During the 17th century the colonies were largely English, but in the 18th century the immigrants were chiefly of other races, nearly all the countries of northwestern and central Europe being represented. Already an im portant and valuable, although not large French element had been introduced into the popula tion, through the coming of the Huguenots, who, especially in the years following the Re vocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685), found their way into nearly all the colonies, but were especially numerous in South Carolina and New York. A number of their descendants became prominent during the Revolutionary period. A few Germans seem to have come to America with the Swedish and Dutch settlements, but it was not until the founding of Pennsylvania that any considerable numbers arrived. Their migration has been divided into three well-de fined periods. The first from 1683 to about 1709, during which there was a small immi gration into Pennsylvania of perhaps a few score a year, of certain religious sects chiefly Mennonites. The second period, 1709-27, opens with the coming of the Palatines, thousands of whom, in consequence of the ravaging of the Palatinate by war and the prevailing religious and economic tyranny, had taken refuge in England in 1709 with the hope of being aided to America. Queen Anne's gov ernment sent some of them to the Carolinas but more than 3,000 were transported to New York, where most of them in a few years settled in the Mohawk and Schoharie valleys, but a few hundred dissatisfied with their treat ment eventually found their way into Penn sylvania. About 1710 Swiss Mennonites and Palatines began to come directly to Penn sylvania, followed by Dunkers and various other sects. By the close of the second period a conservative investigator places the number of Germans in this colony alone as between 15,000 and 20,000. During the third period, 1727 to 1775, the number of immigrants reached enormous proportions. While a few hundred Germans and Swiss found their way directly to some of the southern colonies, especially to the Carolinas 4nd Georgia, by far the greater number came to Pennsylvania. A careful esti mate by Kuhns of the number passing through the port of Philadelphia, based upon the lists of arrivals during this period, gives an aggre gate of nearly 70,000. Almost one half of these fall within the six years 1749 to 1754. So numerous were the German immigrants that the English and colonial authorities were at times alarmed for the safety of the colony. As will be noted later many of the Germans found their way subsequently to other colonies, but the majority of the authorities agree that in 1775 they comprised about one-third of the total population of Pennsylvania, or about 100,000. Most of these later immigrants did not come for religious reasons, as was the case with the sectaries of the earlier periods, but they were chiefly of the peasant class, who were seeking relief from the burdens of feudalism. They were an honest, industrious, simple and deeply religious people. Content with their new-found prosperity they took little part in colonial politics. Settling together they largely comprised the population of certain counties. So conservative were they and tena cious of their customs and language, that whole communities of their descendants to-day speak a dialect commonly known as Pennsylvania Dutch.
Another equally important non-English ele ment introduced into the colonial population was that of the Scotch-Irish, or better, the Scotch Presbyterians from Ulster, Ireland. Here their ancestors had made their homes for two or three generations, but driven by the religious bigotry of the Established Church, the commercial jealousy of England and the oppression of the landlords, they now sought a refuge across the sea. The emigration began about the opening of the 18th century, but as sumed considerable proportion by 1718. It is estimated that between 1725 and 1768 the num ber of emigrants rose from 3,000 to 6,000 annually. In consequence of the famine of 1740 it is said 12,000 left Ireland annually for several years for America. It is estimated that fully 50 per cent of these were pure Irish as well as Scotch-Irish. Between 1771 and 1773 some 30, 000 departed. Froude says °that ships could not be found for the crowds that wanted to go.)) As a result of this emigration about one-half of the Presbyterian population of Ulster came to America. Some of these went to New Eng land, several thousand sailed directly to Virginia and the Carolinas, but by far the great majority landed first on the shores of the Delaware and took up their settlements on the frontiers of Pennsylvania and spread from there southward. This colony has been rightly called the seed plot of frontier emigration, for beginning about 1732 a constant stream pf emigrants, composed of Germans and Scotch Irish folk, flowed to the South and Southwest along the great valleys into the western portions of Maryland, Virginia and North Carolina. Eventually the Scotch-Irish pene trated even' further into South Carolina and Georgia. This sturdy and God-fearing people
formed the chief element in the population of the frontier counties from Pennsylvania to Georgia, overflowing into what later became Kentucky and Tennessee. It is estimated that the Scotch-Irish comprised about one-sixth of the colonists at the Revolution. The other provinces of Ireland contributed a large quota of the immigrants to the colonies. During the Revolutionary War 38 per cent of the American armies under Washington consisted of these men or their descendants.
The British colonists were in general a sub stantial and highly moral folk, but it appears to be true that among the indentured servants there was a considerable number of transported criminals. Some political offenders were sent to America, chiefly Scotch prisoners of war. A few hundred captured at the battles of Dunbar and Worcester in 1650 and 1651 were sent to New England. Again, following the suppres sion of the uprisings in Scotland in 1678 and 1716 and after the battle of Culloden in 1746 companies of Scotch prisoners were sent re spectively to Virginia, Maryland and South Carolina. But recent investigation seems to indicate that by far the larger number of con victs sent to America were not political offend ers. Some criminals were sent to the colonies in the earlier period, but the practice be came• more common after the English statute of 1670 and especially after the act of 1718, by both of which transportation to America was permitted in place of capital punishment for certain crimes. The records of Old Bailey alone indicate that between 1717 and 1775 not less than 10,000 were transported. Doubtless in many of these cases there were mitigating circumstances. Proof exists that all the middle and southern colonies served to some extent as penal settlements, but the most of the prisoners appear to have been shipped to Virginia and Maryland. Stith in his History of Virginia,' published in 1747, wrote °Virginia has come to be reputed another Siberia, or a hell upon earth?' Scharf estimates the number of ban ished criminals in Maryland at 20,000, one-half entering after 1750. But the servant class was not recruited chiefly from the criminals. The majority of them were honest immigrants, who redeemed their passage to America by being bound out as indentured servants. This class was very considerable in both the southern and middle colonies. They were more numerous and important than slaves in the South during the 17th century, and formed a very con siderable and important factor in the economic life of the middle colonies in the following cen tury. Pennsylvania had an especially large number, mostly German and Irish. In addi tion to the whites, representing almost all the various branches of the Teutonic and Celtic races, there was another large foreign element imported into the colonies, namely, the African negroes, who were held as slaves. Although first introduced into Virginia as early as 1619, they were not numerous during the first half of the century. In the last half, however, they rapidly increased in Virginia and Maryland, so that by the opening of the new century they probably equaled the number of indentured servants in these colonies, and the African slave trade became as important branch of foreign commerce. The growing demand for slave labor on the plantations in all the southern colonies led to a great increase in their number. Bancroft places the total slave population of the English colonies as 59,000 in 1714. 78,000 in 1727, 310,000 in 1760 and about 500,000 in 1775, or approximately one-fifth of the total population. Fully four-fifths of these were in the colonies south of Pennsylvania and com prised about one-third of the inhabitants of that section. Here was a racial element destined in time to affect materially the development of the life and thought not only of the South, but also the political and social history of the whole country.
The steady growth of the colonies during the 18th century is indicated by the following figures. According to the report compiled by the Lords of Trade in 1721 the population had increased to a half million. Dexter, a very careful investigator, estimates that by 1743 it had reached 1,000,000, by 1767, 2,000,000, and was about 2,500,000 at the opening of the Revo lutionary War. His figures are in substantial agreement with those of Bancroft. It is prob able that about one-third of the population in 1775 were immigrants. The stream of immigra tion was interrupted by the war, but began again after the return of peace. There is, how ever, almost no data and even estimates appear to be lacking for the period of the Confedera tion. It has been estimated that the number of immigrants to the United States in the decade following the first census of 1790 was about 5,000 per annum. This may serve as a rough basis for calculating the number for the pre ceding decade, although it is hardly probable that it was as large during the unsettled years of the °Critical Period?) See also POPULA TION.