Immigrants and the Population of America

The first American Census taken in 1790 listed 2,345,844 people of English origin; 188,589 of Scottish origin, and 44,273 of Irish origin. However, the portion of the population which was described as Irish were largely Ulster-Scottish. The true Irishman never emigrated in any considerable numbers until they felt the pressure of the potato famine some fifty years later.

Interestingly, at the outbreak of the Revolutionary War one-third of the entire population of Pennsylvania was of Ulster-Scottish origin. A New England historian (quoted by Whitelaw Reid)…