"Including none at all"

Comments (4)

1. Long before our Nation’s independence, weary settlers sought refuge on our shores to escape religious persecution on other continents.

   There may have been some early settlers who fled religious persecution but not many. That’s a great myth.

   One set of my ancestors were Dutch settlers in the Hudson valley. They were members of the Dutch Reform Church – the same church they belonged to in the Netherlands.

   Another set were “Puritans” who settled in Connecticut. They belonged to the same Protestant churches that they left in England and the relatives they left behind suffered no obvious persecution – indeed, they took over the government during the civil war!

   As far as I can tell, my “Puritan” ancestors were more interested in setting up their own system of religious persecution in the new world than in fleeing persecution in England.

   Settlers in other parts of the 13 colonies included large numbers of Catholics from England and Protestants from Germany and I don’t think it’s fair to claim that they were motivated to emigrate because of religious persecution.

2. Thank you for posting this. I would have missed it otherwise.

3. Could you explain your last question? How is it a “cynical move to appeal to the light and dark skinned black community”?

   1. I was being ironic.

Comments are closed.