Distributed for University of Wales Press
Wales, the Welsh and the Making of America
A systematic account of the contributions of Welsh immigrants to the United States.
This book is the first systematic attempt to both recount and evaluate the considerable, though undervalued, contributions of Welsh immigrants to the development of the United States. Vivienne Sanders recounts the lives and achievements of Welsh immigrants and their descendants within a narrative outline of American history that emphasizes the Welsh influence upon the colonists’ rejection of British rule, as well as upon the establishment, expansion, and industrialization of the new American nation.
This book is the first systematic attempt to both recount and evaluate the considerable, though undervalued, contributions of Welsh immigrants to the development of the United States. Vivienne Sanders recounts the lives and achievements of Welsh immigrants and their descendants within a narrative outline of American history that emphasizes the Welsh influence upon the colonists’ rejection of British rule, as well as upon the establishment, expansion, and industrialization of the new American nation.
288 pages | 24 halftones | 5 1/2 x 8 1/2 | © 2021
History: American History, British and Irish History
Reviews
Table of Contents
List of Figures
Acknowledgements
Introduction Wales, the Welsh and the Making of America
Chapter 1
Madoc – explorer and discoverer of North America?
•Madoc and the early colonisation of America
•Madoc’s descendants: the Welsh Indians
•“Madoc fever” in America
•“Madoc fever” in Wales
•Opposition to the Madoc story
Chapter 2
The Welsh and the colonisation of North America
•Welsh Quakers, Penn and Pennsylvania
•Welsh settlers in Delaware in South Carolina
•The Welsh contribution to education in the colonies
•Conclusions
Chapter 3
Richard Price and the American Revolution
•Price and the taxation of the American colonists
•Price’s Observations on the Nature of Civil Liberty
•Price and the American Declaration of Independence
•Price’s invitation to America
•Price and the American Constitution
•Richard Price: conclusions
Chapter 4
The Welsh American military contribution to the American War of Independence
•Charles Lee
•“Mad” Anthony Wayne
•Daniel Morgan
•Welsh American Loyalists, neutrals and the case of Daniel Boone
•Conclusions
Chapter 5
The Welsh American political contribution to the American Revolution
•The search for Welsh American contributions to the American Revolution
•Robert Morris
•A lost Founding Father – Button Gwinnett
•Thomas Jefferson
Chapter 6
Meriwether Lewis, James Monroe and the American West
•Lewis – background
•The aims of the Lewis and Clark expedition
•The expedition’s relations with the Indians
•Other problems on the expedition
•Lewis’s achievements
•Lewis’s life after the expedition
•James Monroe and the American West
Chapter 7
The Welsh go West
•Getting to America
•Why emigrate from Wales?
•The Welsh on the East Coast
•From the East Coast to the West
•Life in the West
•Conclusions
Chapter 8
Welsh Americans and the American Civil War
•Jefferson Davis
•Welsh American contributions to the Union victory
•The Welsh contribution to a Civil War that helped make America
•The perils of ethnic history
Chapter 9
The Welsh and the industrialisation of America
•Oliver Evans
•Industrialisation
•Iron and steel (Rhys Davies and the Tredegar Ironworks, David Thomas “father of the anthracite industry”, William R. Jones, James J. Davis, Welsh ironworkers, the manufacture of machinery)
•Coal (The Welsh and eastern Pennsylvania, Welsh miners in Ohio, Welsh miners on the mineral frontier, the Welsh and labour unions)
•Industry and business (Griffith J. Griffith)
•Slate and granite (Hugh W. Hughes)
•Copper and tinplate
•Conclusions
Chapter 10
Assimilation and the vanishing Welsh
•How and why the Welsh assimilated
•The acceptance of the Welsh – a myth?
•Welsh, Welsh American or American?
•John L. Lewis and the American Dream
•Frank Lloyd Wright
Chapter 11
Wales, the Welsh and the making of America – conclusions
•A special people?
•“Nauseating” Welsh writers
Bibliographical essay
Index
Acknowledgements
Introduction Wales, the Welsh and the Making of America
Chapter 1
Madoc – explorer and discoverer of North America?
•Madoc and the early colonisation of America
•Madoc’s descendants: the Welsh Indians
•“Madoc fever” in America
•“Madoc fever” in Wales
•Opposition to the Madoc story
Chapter 2
The Welsh and the colonisation of North America
•Welsh Quakers, Penn and Pennsylvania
•Welsh settlers in Delaware in South Carolina
•The Welsh contribution to education in the colonies
•Conclusions
Chapter 3
Richard Price and the American Revolution
•Price and the taxation of the American colonists
•Price’s Observations on the Nature of Civil Liberty
•Price and the American Declaration of Independence
•Price’s invitation to America
•Price and the American Constitution
•Richard Price: conclusions
Chapter 4
The Welsh American military contribution to the American War of Independence
•Charles Lee
•“Mad” Anthony Wayne
•Daniel Morgan
•Welsh American Loyalists, neutrals and the case of Daniel Boone
•Conclusions
Chapter 5
The Welsh American political contribution to the American Revolution
•The search for Welsh American contributions to the American Revolution
•Robert Morris
•A lost Founding Father – Button Gwinnett
•Thomas Jefferson
Chapter 6
Meriwether Lewis, James Monroe and the American West
•Lewis – background
•The aims of the Lewis and Clark expedition
•The expedition’s relations with the Indians
•Other problems on the expedition
•Lewis’s achievements
•Lewis’s life after the expedition
•James Monroe and the American West
Chapter 7
The Welsh go West
•Getting to America
•Why emigrate from Wales?
•The Welsh on the East Coast
•From the East Coast to the West
•Life in the West
•Conclusions
Chapter 8
Welsh Americans and the American Civil War
•Jefferson Davis
•Welsh American contributions to the Union victory
•The Welsh contribution to a Civil War that helped make America
•The perils of ethnic history
Chapter 9
The Welsh and the industrialisation of America
•Oliver Evans
•Industrialisation
•Iron and steel (Rhys Davies and the Tredegar Ironworks, David Thomas “father of the anthracite industry”, William R. Jones, James J. Davis, Welsh ironworkers, the manufacture of machinery)
•Coal (The Welsh and eastern Pennsylvania, Welsh miners in Ohio, Welsh miners on the mineral frontier, the Welsh and labour unions)
•Industry and business (Griffith J. Griffith)
•Slate and granite (Hugh W. Hughes)
•Copper and tinplate
•Conclusions
Chapter 10
Assimilation and the vanishing Welsh
•How and why the Welsh assimilated
•The acceptance of the Welsh – a myth?
•Welsh, Welsh American or American?
•John L. Lewis and the American Dream
•Frank Lloyd Wright
Chapter 11
Wales, the Welsh and the making of America – conclusions
•A special people?
•“Nauseating” Welsh writers
Bibliographical essay
Index