Description
Book SynopsisIn a field where primary sources are thin and difficult, Abandoning America is an excellent tool for reference and research. The book is fully annotated and offers a substantial introduction providing for further historicalcontext. CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title Abandoning America brings together the biographies of hundreds of people who crossed over to New England in the 1630s but later braved the Atlantic again to return home. Some wentback quickly, disenchanted or discouraged. Many invested everything to make New England a success, yet after ten or twenty years resolved to leave America - against a backdrop of civil war and Cromwell's commonwealth in England, and personal dilemmas about family ties, health and prospects. The book retrieves their forgotten life-stories from thousands of scattered fragments of evidence in early New England records and British archives, often starting fromsome incidental, passing, reference. The result of this scholarly detective work is a remarkable and evocative collection of personal histories, of people overlooked in the onward march of American history. Their anxieties and aspirations speak eloquently about the experience of being a New Englander, for those who stayed on as well as for those who left. The book traces settlers' lives with an eye to the information historians look for. It is a richoriginal resource for scholars of early America and the English Revolution - for research on religion in England and New England, Atlantic migration, and much more. SUSAN HARDMAN MOORE is Professor of Early Modern Religion at the University of Edinburgh.
Trade ReviewSelected as a CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title of 2014 * . *
Richly documented, the volume will serve as a valuable resource for students of Anglo-American religious and cultural history. ... A broader...audience is likely to be attracted to it by fascinating insights into the world of values, feelings, dilemmas and the vicissitudes of very real people living unusual lives almost four hundred years ago. For all those reasons, Abandoning America deserves a place on reference shelves of academic, school and public libraries. * POLISH JOURNAL FOR AMERICAN STUDIES *
Mining More's carefully culled subset of settlers abandoning America will doubtless result in unexpected delights. * NEW ENGLAND QUARTERLY *
A seminal and exceptional reference. ... Highly recommended. * CHOICE *
