Three Rivers
Hudson~Mohawk~Schoharie
History From America's Most Famous Valleys

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Early Eighteenth Century Palatine Emigration
A British Government Redemptioner Project to Manufacture Naval Stores
by Walter Allen Knittle, Ph.D.
Department of History
College of the City of New York
Published Philadelphia, 1937

Preface

This monograph is written from the view-point of the British government. This attitude is not only proper because the so-called "American" colonies were then British in name as well as in fact, but also because the Palatine emigration was carried out under the auspices of the British government. Indeed, the British government itself engaged in the manufacture of naval stores, putting the Palatines to work at its own expense, consonant with the mercantilist aims of the times. The subject therefore may be described as remarkable because in dealing with the Palatines the British government exhibited in practice the mercantilist theories on immigration, naval stores and colonies.

This study would have been impossible without the aid and encouragement of many scholars. Acknowledgment in this brief space can be made only to a few of the many. Important suggestions and advice were given generously by President Dixon Ryan of Union College, Professor Charles M. Adnrews of Yale University, Professor Robert G. Albion of Princeton University, Mr. Victor H. Paltsits of the New York Public Library, Mr. Albert Cook Myers of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania and Mr. Henry S. Borneman, Secrtary of the Pennsylvania-German Society.

I Am particularly indebted to Professor William Thomas Morgan of Indiana University, who gave me my first graduate training and who introduced me to my present subject. He has been my most active and interested contributor. To Professor W. T. Root of Iowa University I must express my thanks for an amicable division of this subject with which one of his graduate students was engaged. To Professor Edward P. Cheyney I am grateful for sponsoring this study before the faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Pennsylvania. Professor Henry R.Mueller of Muhlenberg College, whom I am so fortunate to count among my teachers, has given the manuscript the benefit of careful reading. Dr. Dison Ryan Fox has not only extended to me the advantage of his editorial wisdom, but he has also written the introduction to this book. To him I am deeply grateful.

I must also express my appreciation of the great patience and many courtesies extended to me by the librarians of these institutions: the University of Pennsylvania Library; the Columbia University Library; Library of the College of the City of New York; the Historical Society of Pannsylvania; the Holland Society of New York; the Huntington Library of San Marino, California; the Widener Library of Harvard University; the Yale University Library; the Library of Congress; the Pennsylvania State Library; the Moravian Library at Bethlehem, Pennsylvania; the Morgan Library, New York City; and the New York State Library; the English Public Record Office and the British Museum. I wish that I could acknowledge the many others who contributred, but the list would seem endless. To them I express my sincere appreciation.

I am also grateful for a grant-in-aid from the Oberlaender Trust Fund of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (Dr. Wilbur K. Thomas, Director), which permitted me to conclude satisfactorily my research in Ireland and England. This organization of American citizens also contributed toward the publication of this volume.

The errors, which I hope are few, are necessarily of my own making. The interpretation must be attributed to me only.

W.A.K.

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