Foreign born by state, 1860

[TDAS04]

The states are shaded according to the percentage of the population in each that consisted of foreign born right before the Civil War, according to the 1860 US census.  

In descending order from darkest to lightest green:

30% or higher=darkest green  
25-29%
20-24%
15-19%
10-14%
5-9%
0-4%=lightest green

Not yet a state=gray

Virginia and West Virginia are the same color since they were one state.

Thoughts?  What sticks out to you?

[Del Tachi]

The numbers in the South are a bit lower than I expected simply because, even though the slave trade ended in 1808, I thought that there would be more older, "foreign-born" slaves still kicking in 1860.  Granted, these would probably be house slaves rather than field slaves.   

[bedstuy]

The numbers in the South are a bit lower than I expected simply because, even though the slave trade ended in 1808, I thought that there would be more older, "foreign-born" slaves still kicking in 1860.  Granted, these would probably be house slaves rather than field slaves.   

Do you think they even kept data on the nationality of slaves?  I bet not.

[Mechaman]

The states are shaded according to the percentage of the population in each that consisted of foreign born right before the Civil War, according to the 1860 US census.  

In descending order from darkest to lightest green:

30% or higher=darkest green  
25-29%
20-24%
15-19%
10-14%
5-9%
0-4%=lightest green

Not yet a state=gray

Virginia and West Virginia are the same color since they were one state.

Thoughts?  What sticks out to you?

If I'm reading the map rightly, it looks like Minnesota, Wisconsin, and California all have higher percentage foreign born than New York does.  Which isn't so shocking, given that New York had millions living in the state at the time and those three states had only a few hundred thousand.  I'm guessing this is also somewhat of an indicator of the difference between the large German and Scandinavian immigrant waves, which went further inland into the frontier for farms and land, versus the largely Irish immigration that settled in the urban areas in the Mid Atlantic and lower New England states, though there was a significant population of that group in California.

I must admit, I am a little surprised at how light green Maine and New Hampshire are at this point in time, especially compared to Vermont.  Though I guess when you consider the ties between Vermont and parts of Canada, maybe not so much.  They've always had a substantial French Canadian population, if my memory serves me correctly.

Texas and Louisiana kind of stick out like sore thumbs in the South, for obvious reasons.  I'm guessing if one was a Catholic immigrant who happened to be south of Mason-Dixon Louisiana was preferable to other states due to it's roots and Texas had it's fair share of Mexicans and other groups.

And then of course we get to the elephant in the room: the South.  Very little industry at the time (outside of the urban areas), slavery dominated economy (emphasis, as this put many free farmers at a disadvantage), highly elitist hierarchy (especially so in the Carolinas and Virginia) that limited voting rights and other issues, and just in general was not an attractive destination for many immigrants.

I might comment more, but I'll just leave saying a map says a thousand words.  This one does so, quite appropriately.

[TDAS04]

Nationwide, the census reported that 13% of the US population consisted of the foreign born in 1860.  

The three states in the darkest shade--those with at least 30%:
California-39%
Wisconsin-36%
Minnesota-34%

Of course, those states had few people at the time.  New York clearly had the largest total immigrant population.  In terms of percent of population, New York ranked fourth among the states, with 26%.

[Del Tachi]

The numbers in the South are a bit lower than I expected simply because, even though the slave trade ended in 1808, I thought that there would be more older, "foreign-born" slaves still kicking in 1860.  Granted, these would probably be house slaves rather than field slaves.   

Do you think they even kept data on the nationality of slaves?  I bet not.

At the very least they could of called them "foreign-born"

[jimrtex]

The numbers in the South are a bit lower than I expected simply because, even though the slave trade ended in 1808, I thought that there would be more older, "foreign-born" slaves still kicking in 1860.  Granted, these would probably be house slaves rather than field slaves.   

Do you think they even kept data on the nationality of slaves?  I bet not.

The 1860 Census reported nativity of free persons.  About 1% of free coloreds were foreign born.  I only found tables identifying the nativity of free coloreds for larger cities (Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Cincinnati, St.Louis, and New Orleans).  Of those cities 1.9% of free coloreds were foreign born.  Only 4.4% of those foreign born were born in Africa, or less than 1/10 of 1%.

Major Cities:
Free Colored: 78,427
    Foreign Born 1,509
       Born in Africa  66

Most of the foreign-born free colored were born in the West Indies, British North America (Canada), or Europe.  These would be quite unlikely to have been brought into the United States as slaves, and later manumitted.

Someone who was brought to the United States at age 14 as a slave in 1808, would be 66 in 1860.   I'm assuming most slaves were between 14 and 30.  Over 30 they have begun to lose their value as field hands, and regarded as too old to train for anything else.  Preteens would be dependent, and only included if they were caught up in a slave raid.

About 1.2% of slaves in 1860 were over 70 (age was reported by 10-year group).  So let's say that 2% were old enough to have been born in Africa and sold in the US before 1808.

But of slaves born in 1794, age 14 in 1808, and age 66 in 1860, what percentage would have been born in Africa?  Between 1800 and 1810, 120,000 slaves were sold into the US, while the increase of slaves was 300,000, or a 180,000 natural increase.  Making up numbers, let's say 270,000 births and 90,000 deaths.   So perhaps 30% of the increase was due to the slave trade.

But mortality would have been higher among new slaves, compared to native-born slaves,  So let's say that they were around 25% of those who made it to 1860.  That means around 0.5% of slaves in 1860 were African-born.  They might be more concentrated in the Deep South, but even there slaves were only a slight majority of the population.  So overall, African-born slaves likely contributed 1/2% or less of the total population in any state.

[Del Tachi]

Wait...so...do we have info on the race of foreign-born populations?

Could a majority of the African-born population living in the United States in 1860 be non-Black?

[Chunk Yogurt for President!]

Wait...so...do we have info on the race of foreign-born populations?

Could a majority of the African-born population living in the United States in 1860 be non-Black?

Wouldn't surprise me at all because there were a lot of white South Africans who came during the Gold rush IIRC.

[TDAS04]

My 8th grade history textbook (which I still have) contains two maps using 1860 census data.  One shows the percentage of each state's population consisting of German immigrants, and the other map displays the same with the Irish.  The maps don't show the West, not even the existing states of California or Oregon.

The map of German immigrants:

In descending order from darkest to lightest shade of green:
8% or higher
4-7%
2-3%
0-1%

I'll do the map of the Irish-born in my next post.

[TDAS04]

Irish immigrants by state, 1860:

Again, in descending order from darker to lighter green:
10% or higher
5-9%
2-4%
0-1%

[jimrtex]

Wait...so...do we have info on the race of foreign-born populations?

Could a majority of the African-born population living in the United States in 1860 be non-Black?

Only free persons had their nativity recorded.  This would include whites, blacks (free coloreds and mulattoes), Asians (largely Chinese in California), and (civilized) Indians.

But for the most part the racial categories were only broken down into native born or foreign born.  So for example, 2 of the 2690 free coloreds in Alabama were foreign born. There is no information on the nativity of the 435,080 slaves.  There were 5 free Alabamians born in Africa.  But we don't know their race (though at least 3 must be white, since only 2 of the free coloreds were foreign-born).

The only instance where there is a cross-tabulation of race and place of birth is for the largest cities: Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Cincinnati. Chicago, St.Louis, and New Orleans.

As I noted, of the 78,427 free colored in those cities, 1509 were foreign born, with 66 born in Africa.  The overwhelming share of the foreign-born were from the West Indies or British North America (Canada), with smaller numbers from Europe.

If a similar share of slaves were African-born, that would be around 5,000, which would far exceed the number of free persons, white or black, born in Africa.  And the share of slaves born in Africa might be greater than the share of free coloreds born in Africa.  For a black to be born in Africa, with rare exceptions, they would have had to been brought into the country before 1808, and probably at least 14 years-old, though there would have been some children.

They would have been likely sold into the Deep South, where their chance of either escape or manumission was slight.  If they survived until 1860, they would still be slaved.

[jimrtex]

Wait...so...do we have info on the race of foreign-born populations?

Could a majority of the African-born population living in the United States in 1860 be non-Black?

Wouldn't surprise me at all because there were a lot of white South Africans who came during the Gold rush IIRC.

There were 13 African-born persons in California in 1860.

There might be some such as Emperor Norton, who were born in Britain, lived in South Africa, and later moved to the United States.  Of course Emperor Norton was not a US citizen.

[jimrtex]

In 1860, there were 526 free persons born in Africa.

If we look at southern states, it is difficult to determine whether these were free colored or whites.  For example, in Georgia there were 591,588 whites, of which 11,643 were foreign born (1.97%).  There were 3500 free colored, of which 28 were foreign born.

There were 16 African born.  But there were also 78 born in the West Indies.   Slavery was abolished in the British West Indies in 1833.  So, some former slaves may have migrated to the United States.  But some former slave owners may have also moved, in hopes of re-establishing themselves in the United States.   Slavery was also abolished in South Africa in 1833, so it is possible that some white South Africans moved to the United States as well.  Of the 94 Georgians born in the West Indies and Africa, at least 66 were white.

16 of the 28 foreign-born free colored were in Savannah, which as a port may have attracted persons from the West Indies.   They may have sailed to Savannah as crew, or become stranded, or perhaps as servants.

A majority (56%) of the foreign born in Georgia were from Ireland, almost of whom were white.  21% were from Germany, 10% from England, 4% from Scotland 2% from France.  While countries like these must account for the bulk of the white immgrants, we can't be sure that it accounts for all of them.

We do have some more specific information about larger cities.  126 of the African-born both white and free colored were in Massachusetts.  Of the 9602 free colored, 2262 were in Boston, but the rest were dispersed throughout the state.  The three largest counties were Suffolk, Bristol, and Berkshire.  New Bedford was almost 7% black.

Of the 611 foreign born free colored, 338 were in Boston.  But of those, 249 were from Canada, 40 from the West Indies, 20 from England and only 10 from Africa.  Slaves of Loyalists were transported to Canada after the revolution, particularly to Nova Scotia.  Many of these may have trickled down to Boston.

10 of the 126 African-born were Bostonian-free colored.  9 were Bostonian whites.  Were the other 107 among the 272 foreign-born free-colored not in Boston; or were they among the 196,043 foreign-born Massachusetts whites not in Boston?

There were 66 African-born free-colored in the large cities of Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Cincinnati, Chicago, St.Louis, and New Orleans.  But there were also 62 African-born whites in those cities.  In New Orleans, there were 3 African-born whites, and 32 African-born free colored, which might suggest that most of the African-born in the South were free colored.  But in New York City, African-born whites outnumbered African-born free colored 36 to 8.

So in the free population, African-born coloreds probably outnumbered African-born whites, but probably not a huge preponderance, but perhaps 2:1.

There were around 40,000 slaves over 70 in 1860.  They would have been old enough to have been brought to the US before 1808, when the slave trade ended.  If 5% were born in Africa, that 2000 would far exceed the 526 African-born free persons, both white and free colored. 

So among all persons born in Africa, blacks exceeded whites.

[DINGO Joe]

While New Orleans wasn't Ellis Island, it was a major port and processing center for immigrants.  Waves of Germans, Irish, to a lesser extent Slavs and even lesser extent Islenos came through.  And of course, later, the Italians.  There's a local subculture/accent called "Yat" that sounds like the lost tribe of Brooklyn.

[jimrtex]

While New Orleans wasn't Ellis Island, it was a major port and processing center for immigrants.  Waves of Germans, Irish, to a lesser extent Slavs and even lesser extent Islenos came through.  And of course, later, the Italians.  There's a local subculture/accent called "Yat" that sounds like the lost tribe of Brooklyn.

Of course you mean Castle Garden rather than Ellis Island which did not open until 1892.  Incidentally, Castle Garden was run by New York state.  The move to Ellis Island was part of the federal takeover of immigration.

In 1860, Louisiana had more foreign-born whites than Arkansas, Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina combined.  80% were in New Orleans including:

24,385 Irish, which was 86% of the Louisiana Irish;
19,729 Germans, which was 80% of the Louisiana Germans;
10.515 French, which 70% of the Louisiana French; Louisiana had 14% of the USA French.
3,042 English, which was 76% of the Louisiana English;
1,390 Spanish, which 77% of the Louisiana Spanish; Louisiana had 43% of the USA Spanish;
896 Italian, which was 79% of the Louisiana Italian; Louisiana had 11% of the USA Italian;
796 West Indians, which was 69% of the Louisiana West Indians; Louisiana had 16% of the USA West Indies population;
600 Swiss, which was 68% of the Louisiana Swiss.

So Louisiana attracted a significant share of Latin Europeans.

Among foreign-born free coloreds, there were 213 West Indians, 40 French, 23 German, 13 Irish, 5 Spanish, and 3 English.

I've heard that the accent is closer to Baltimore than Brooklyn.

[DINGO Joe]

Never knew about Castle Garden.

To me, the accent is overwhelmingly Brooklyn.