Archives For history
The Acadians – settlers, pioneers in a new land allied with and intermarried into the Native population of seaboard Nova Scotia beginning in 1603. They lived in harmony, developing their farms and then, roughly 150 years or 6 generations later, in 1755, they found themselves evicted, ruthlessly and forcibly deported, losing absolutely everything. They became landless refugees, living off of the benevolence of strangers…or dying. The Acadian diaspora was born. You can view a timeline here.
Marie Rundquist, Acadian and Native descendant, genetic genealogist, researcher and founder of the original AmerIndian project visited the Acadian homeland this past summer and is graciously sharing her experience through some of her photography and narrative.
This cross, located on the beach near Grand Pre where the Acadians were herded onto ships, is a priceless icon of our Acadian ancestry and represents all of our ancestors who were forcibly…
View original post 5,286 more words
For Irish emigrants, the exile motif had extraordinary potency. At its heart lay two related beliefs: that the emigrants had been banished by the British rather than leaving voluntarily, and that the wounds inflicted by British misrule continued to plague them abroad, explaining their ongoing exploitation and poverty. Neither of these beliefs could withstand close scrutiny. Ireland was a British colony, to be sure, but with the exception of the Famine era, British policies rarely played a direct role in Irish emigration. And, despite their initial poverty, the American Irish prospered within a couple of generations; in the British settler colonies they did even better.