CELEBRATING our Shared Roots

For hundreds of years, settlers have been arriving on your shores. Many came from Britain, having made the perilous ocean crossing in the hope of a better future. A large proportion of British emigrants came from farming communities. They “travelled blind” in the hope of setting themselves up as farmers in the new and promising land of America.

Life for the poor in Britain during the 17th, 18th and early 19th centuries was full of hardships. Many opted to leave their roots behind to set sail for a land that they had never seen anything of, except perhaps for a few drawings in a newspaper. Poorer people could not afford to take risks, not unless they truly had nothing to lose, and it seems that for many of Britain’s rural poor, that was the case.

Prior to mechanization, vast numbers of people were employed in agriculture in the U.K., but the land often belonged to the privileged few. Most farm workers were paid very little, lived in poverty and could only dream of owning their own land. Many farmers were tenants rather than owners of their farms. They paid rents to the local landed