Out of all the ethnic groups in the world, the English were the ones who played the most pivotal role in immigrating to the United States. Not only were they the ones who established colonies in which the United States cultivated from, their “offspring formed the largest component of the Republic and the foundations they laid influenced all subsequent newcomers” (Chao, Spencer). The first settlement of the English to the United States arrived in 1607, where they came looking for better opportunities for work. They settled in Jamestown, Virginia. Since there were not many means of medication and health supplies at the time, many of the new settlers died from sickness and famine during the winter of 1609-1610. This did not stop the English from settling in the New World, however. “The survivors were encouraged to stay in Jamestown by the arrival of new settlers and supplies the following June” (Chao, Spencer). The colony of Jamestown flourished, and soon later became the capital of Virginia, the first capital in the United States of America.
Immigration to New England started to pick up with the resettlement of Pilgrims in 1620, and from 1630-1640, a great amount of Englanders migrated to the United States which marked the period of the Great Migration. They established this settlement on the Massachusetts Bay. “During this time, Massachusetts\'s population skyrocketed with the migration of approximately 21,000 immigrants to New England, about a third of them being Britons” (Chao, Spencer). However, by 1660, immigration from Britain to the New World was strictly discouraged, causing the rapid migration to quickly decrease.
In the 1700’s, Britain started to restrict emigration from England to the United States, and by 1775, an outbreak of violence stopped immigration from Britain completely. From then on, only a few British immigrants made their way to the United States.
Nowadays, people can come to the United States from Great Britain with no difficulty. While England is very similar to the United States in the sense that they have a vast amount of ethnic groups and diversity, people coming to live in America from the UK notice a great difference between the social groups from each country. America, according to Gabrielle Donnelly, a London magazine journalist, is a place where people can be themselves and be accepted for the things that many people in England would otherwise look down upon. While there are many ethnic groups in England, ancestry is looked at in a much different manner there than it is in America. “Americans believe in celebrating their ancestors, wherever they came from, romanticizing them with a gleeful abandon that simply would not be countenanced in understated England” (Donnelly, 49). The English would never see the point in sharing each country in their lineage, whereas Americans take great pride in that.
Although she lived all of her life in England, she did not meet many English people until she went away to university. This was because her family wedged closely to their Catholic convent while she was growing up, which consisted mostly of people of Irish descent. This caused an identity problem for her since she did not know which nationality to attach to. She writes, “We didn’t know quite which nationality we were, and were split among ourselves, between those who regarded us still as Irish, the race of our forebears, and those who insisted as firmly that a century of English living had rendered us Brits” (Donnelly, 47).
As mentioned before, in England it is very important to identify with one nationality. She experienced her biggest culture shock, even more so than the one she experienced when moving to America, when she went away to college. Many of her peers there acted unreceptive to her background and creed. She wrote, “I find too many of them [Brits] to be repressed emotionally, rigid socially, and actively—and often most offensively—hostile toward both my race and my religion” (Donnelly, 48). This was an issue that troubled her greatly.
While Donnelly was raised and did particularly well professionally in England, she never felt at home there. This was not realized until she moved to Los Angeles for two years. The idea of being a strong, independent woman, for example, is not looked too highly upon in England. “Americans—unlike the English—both admire and respect strong women” (Donnelly, 49). Being a strong opinionated woman with a clever retort, often made many of the men and women in England feel distinctly nervous around her
These are many of the reasons why Gabrielle Donnelly claimed America as her new home. She was able to be more herself there and at the same time found a bit of happiness within her that she never felt while growing up. She did not have the happiest of family lives, and until she met her husband Owen, she never felt the true meaning of family.
Even though she had an accent that still linked her to England, a place where she did not want to be connected to any longer, she was adapting quite well to her new American life. At first, many people commented on her accent out of pure wonderment, however, after a while, the more she assimilated to the American way, the more people overlooked her accent and took her on as a fellow American. Donnelly writes,
“The longer I am in America, the less often my accent is commented on. I look—as indeed I am—so thoroughly at home here, my bearing, my clothes, my frame of reference, even the expressions on my face having become so completely assimilated into my new culture, that my unusual vowel sounds are often overlooked.” (Donnelly, 52)
Another thing she noticed about Americans that set them apart from the English was that Americans believed “in treating themselves well, spending more money on themselves, ordering more food in their restaurants, and taking more luggage on their vacations than any European would dream of” (Donnelly, 49). These are the type of qualities that attracted her, and many others, to America. She wanted to be who she was and not have to feel trapped under the un-open-mindedness of the English.
Gabrielle Donnelly fortunately experienced only positive things when transitioning to American life, though that is not always the situation for everyone. Assimilating to a new culture and accepting new values as your own is always a tough task to do. According to Samuel P. Huntington’s book, Who Are We?, Immigrants today are not assimilating into American culture like they have in the past. Today they keep their language, their culture, and often their foreign citizenship as well (Huntington, 37). Huntington also mentions how nationality matters—and that, despite the universalism central to our values, America is different from other countries. America offers new beginnings for many people throughout the world, and offers a way of life that you could only dream about in other countries. The people in America are also strong and well accustomed to the idea of immigrants. “Americans, by definition, are survivors, descendants separated by one generation or by ten of those who had imagined a better life, had the courage to pursue the vision, and the strength to realize it” (Donnelly, 48). And that is what makes America a special place.


Works Cited
1. Chao, Adam, & Spencer, Daniel. (n.d.) Immigration: The English. Retrieved
March 12, 2006, from http://library.thinkquest.org/20619/English.html.
2. Donnelly, Gabrielle. (2000). Coming Home. In Danquah, Meri Nana-Ama (Eds.),
Becoming American: Personl Essays by First Generation Immigrant Women (45-54). New York: Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data.
3. Huntington, Samuel P. (2004). Who Are We?: The Challenges to America’s National Identity.
Washington: Simon & Schuster.

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