Letters across Borders: The Epistolary Practices of International Migrants

319 Pages·2006·2.351 MB·English

by  Bruce S. Elliott, David A. Gerber, Suzanne M. Sinke (eds.)

Letters across Borders
The Epistolary Practices of
International Migrants
Edited by
Bruce S.Elliott,
David A.Gerber,
and
Suzanne M.Sinke
Published in association with the
Carleton Centre for the History of Migration
LETTERSACROSSBORDERS
© Bruce S.Elliott,David A.Gerber,and Suzanne M.Sinke,2006.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2006 978-1-4039-7101-2
Portions of David Gerber’s essay were previously published as “Acts of
Deceiving and Withholding in Immigrant Letters,”Journal of Social History,
39 (Winter 2005):8–23.The editors gratefully acknowledge the permission
of The Journal of Social History.
Miguel Angel Vargas’s essay is reprinted in translation from “Communication
epistolar entre trabajadores migrantes y sus familias,”Aztlán(2000),UCLA
Chicano Studies Research Center,with permission of The Regents of the
University of California.Not for further reproduction.
All rights reserved.No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any
manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief
quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
First published in 2006 by
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ISBN 978-1-349-53263-6 ISBN 978-0-230-60107-9 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9780230601079
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Letters across borders :the epistolary practices of international
migrants / edited by Bruce S.Elliott,David A.Gerber,and Suzanne M.Sinke.
p.cm.
Includes papers presented at the international conference,“Reading
the Emigrant Letter:Innovative Approaches and Interpretations,”
sponsored by the Carleton Centre for the History of Migration and
hosted at Carleton University in Ottawa,Canada,in 2003.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1.Emigration and immigration—History—Congresses.
2.Immigrants—Correspondence—Congresses.I.Elliott,Bruce S.II.Gerber,
David A.,1944– III.Sinke,Suzanne M.IV.Carleton University.Carleton
Centre for the History of Migration.
JV6011.L36 2006
305.9(cid:2)06912—dc22 2006041594
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Design by Newgen Imaging Systems (P) Ltd.,Chennai,India.
First edition:August 2006
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents
List ofIllustrations v
List ofTables vi
Notes on Contributors vii
Introduction 1
Bruce S.Elliott,David A.Gerber,and Suzanne M.Sinke
Part I Limits and Opportunities
1. How Representative are Emigrant Letters? An Exploration ofthe
German Case 29
Wolfgang Helbich and Walter D.Kamphoefner
2. The Limits ofthe Australian Emigrant Letter 56
Eric Richards
3. Marriage through the Mail:North American Correspondence
Marriage from Early Print to the Web 75
Suzanne M.Sinke
Part II Writing Conventions and Practices
4. Irish Emigration and the Art ofLetter-Writing 97
David Fitzpatrick
5. “Every Person Like a Letter”:The Importance of
Correspondence in Lithuanian Immigrant Life 107
Daiva Markelis
6. Epistolary Communication between Migrant Workers
and their Families 124
Miguel Angel Vargas
iv CONTENTS
Part III Silences and Censorship
7. Epistolary Masquerades:Acts ofDeceiving and Withholding in
Immigrant Letters 141
David A.Gerber
8. Reading and Writing across the Borders ofDictatorship:
Self-Censorship and Emigrant Experience in Nazi and
Stalinist Europe 158
Ann Goldberg
Part IV Editorial Interventions
9. “Going into Print”:Published Immigrant Letters,Webs of
Personal Relations,and the Emergence ofthe Welsh
Public Sphere 175
William D.Jones
10. As ifat a Public Meeting:Polish American Readers,Writers,
and Editors ofAmeryka-Echo,1922–1969 200
Anna D.Jaroszyoska-Kirchmann
Part V Negotiations ofIdentity
11. Negotiating Space,Time,and Identity:The Hutton-Pellett
Letters and a British Child’s Wartime Evacuation to Canada 223
Helen Brown
12. The Ukrainian Government-in-Exile’s Postal Network and
the Construction ofNational Identity 248
Karen Lemiski
Part VI Letters and the State
13. Immigrant Petition Letters in Early Modern Saxony 271
Alexander Schunka
14. “To His Excellency the Sovereign ofall Russian Subjects in
Canada”:Emigrant Correspondence with Russian Consulates
in Montreal,Vancouver,and Halifax,1899–1922 291
Vadim Kukushkin
Index 306
Illustrations
6.1 A Migrant Worker’s Letter 127–128
11.1 Photograph ofJohn Hutton with Doris and Bobbie Pellett 226
11.2 John Hutton Drawing:Eating Corn-on-the-Cob 228
11.3 Postcard ofColchester from Fred Hutton to John Hutton 235
12.1 Ukrainian National Council Postal Usage 256
12.2 Displaced Persons Camp Cover 257
12.3 Ukrainian National Council Postcard 262
13.1 Bohemian Soldier’s Wounds,from a Petition Letter 284–285
Tables
1.1 Educational Level ofDirect Donors Compared to
German General Public 33
1.2 Educational Level ofDonors Relative to that of
Letter-Writers 35
1.3 Motivation for Emigration Relative to Educational
Level ofDonors 36
1.4 Occupation ofFathers ofEmigrants Relative to Educational
Level ofDonors 37
1.5 Occupation and Training ofMale Emigrants in Germany 39
1.6 German States ofOrigin as Reported in the 1870 U.S.Census 43
1.7 Place ofResidence by Census Region as Reported in the
1870 U.S.Census 44
1.8 Proportion ofImmigrants Living in Farm Households,1870 45
1.9 Proportion ofImmigrants Residing in Cities ofover
100,000 Inhabitants,1870 45
1.10 Occupational Breakdown,1870,German-Born
Males Age 21(cid:3) 46
1.11 Average Wealth Figures,1870,German Males Age 21(cid:3) 47
1.12 Average Wealth Figures,1870,German Male Household
Heads Age 21(cid:3) 47
1.13 Age in 1870 Census,All German-Born Individuals 48
1.14 Ethnicity ofSpouse,All German-Born Family Heads 49
6.1 Distribution ofthe Community by Families according to the
Number ofConstituent Members 125
6.2 Distribution ofFamilies by Experience with
International Labor Migration 1992 125
6.3 Structural Elements Present in the Texts/Letters and their
Frequency 129
6.4 Paper Size ofthe Texts/Letters 129
6.5 Paper Type ofthe Texts/Letters 130
6.6 Length ofthe Texts/Letters 130
6.7 Monthly Letter Exchange between November 1990 and
July 1991 132
6.8 Distribution ofthe Corpus by Familial Relation between
Correspondents 132
Notes on Contributors
Helen Brown is a member of the Department of History at Malaspina
University College in Nanaimo, British Columbia, where she teaches
Canadian History and the History ofModern Childhood.She is the author
of“Financing Nanaimo Schools’Local Resistance to Central Control,”in
School Leadership: Essays on the British Columbia Experience, 1872–1995,
ed.Thomas Fleming (Mill Bay: Bendall Books,2001).She serves on the
editorial board ofthe Canadian Bulletin ofMedical Historyand is currently
working on a book on the Hutton-Pellett letters.
Bruce S.Elliottis Professor of History at Carleton University in Ottawa.
Asdirector ofthe Carleton Centre for the History ofMigration,he organ-
ized the 2003 conference, Reading the Emigrant Letter: Innovative
Approaches and Interpretations. Recent publications include “‘Settling
Down’: Masculinity and the Rite of Return in a Transnational
Community” in Emigrant Homecomings, ed. M. Harper (Manchester
University Press, 2005), 153–183, and “Regional Patterns of English
Immigration and Settlement in Upper Canada” in Canadian Migration
Patterns from Britain and North America,ed.B.Messamore (University of
Ottawa Press,2004),51–90.
David Fitzpatrick is Professor of Modern History at Trinity College,
Dublin,where he has taught since 1979.Born in Australia,he is a graduate
of the Universities of Melbourne and Cambridge, and a Member of the
Royal Irish Academy.His works include Politics and Irish Life,1913–1921:
Provincial Experience of War and Revolution (1977); Irish Emigration,
1801–1921 (1984); Oceans of Consolation: Personal Accounts of Irish
Migration to Australia (1995); The Two Irelands, 1912–1939 (1998); and
Harry Boland’s Irish Revolution (2003). He is preparing a history of the
Orange Order.
David A. Gerber is Professor of History at the University at Buffalo
(SUNY),where he teaches American History.As an historian,his principal
interest has been the study of personal and social identities among
immigrants and ethnic groups.He is the author of Authors oftheir Lives:
The Personal Correspondence of British Immigrants to North America in
viii NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS
theNineteenth Century(New York University Press,2006) and a number of
essays on aspects ofthe history ofthe personal correspondence ofimmigrants.
Ann Goldberg is Associate Professor of History at the University of
California,Riverside.Her areas ofexpertise are Modern Europe,Germany,
and Gender History.She is the author of Sex,Religion,and the Making of
Modern Madness(Oxford University Press,1999) as well as of articles on
anti-psychiatry at the turn of the twentieth century, and on gender and
race in the Stefan George literary circle in the Weimar Republic. She is
currently writing a book on defamation law and the politics of honor in
nineteenth and twentieth century Germany.
Wolfgang Helbichobtained a BA in History at Princeton in 1958 and his
Dr.Phil.at Berlin’s Free University.He taught North American History at
the Universities ofHeidelberg and later Bochum until 2000.His publica-
tions in German, English, and French cover German and Canadian
(Auswandererbriefsammlung including Québec) History but center on the
United States in the nineteenth century.He built up the largest existing
collection ofGerman immigrant letters (from North America),formerly
in Bochum (Bochumer Auswandererbriefsammlung), now in Gotha
(Nordamerika-Auswandererbriefsammlung),with the cooperation ofWalter
Kamphoefner, out of which grew the scholarly editions mentioned by
thelatter below.
Anna D. Jaroszyoska-Kirchmann is Associate Professor in the
Department of History at Eastern Connecticut State University in
Willimantic. She is the author of The Exile Mission: Polish Political
Diaspora and Polish Americans, 1939–1956 (University of Ohio Press,
2004) and a number ofarticles on postwar political immigrants.She is vice
president ofthe Polish American Historical Association and serves on the
editorial board of Polish American Studies. Her current research project
involves a study of letters to the editor in a Polish language newspaper,
Ameryka-Echo,between 1889 and 1969.
William D. Jones is Senior Lecturer in Welsh History at the School of
History and Archaeology, Cardiff University, Wales, where he teaches
Welsh and British History. He is a specialist in nineteenth and early-
twentieth century Welsh emigration and Welsh communities overseas.
Heis the author of Wales in America: Scranton and the Welsh,1860–1920
(1993) and (with Aled Jones) Welsh Reflections: Y Drych and America,
1851–2001(2001).
Walter D.Kamphoefnerearned his PhD at University ofMissouri-Columbia
in 1978 and is Professor of History at Texas A&M University, where he
teaches in the fields of immigration, urbanization, and quantitative
methods.He has published widely in the field ofimmigration and ethnicity,
NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS ix
including his monograph, The Westfalians: From Germany to Missouri
(Princeton University Press,1987).With Wolfgang Helbich,he has coedited
a collection ofarticles and German and English versions oftwo immigrant
letter anthologies, including News From the Land of Freedom: German
Immigrants Write Home(Cornell University Press,1991).
Vadim Kukushkinis a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of History
and Classics at the University ofAlberta.His dissertation explored patterns
of Ukrainian and Belarusan immigration from the Russian Empire to
Canada.He is currently working on a project that examines the relation-
ship between immigrants and the Canadian justice system on the Prairies.
He is coeditor of the book Mikhail Klochko: Soviet Scientist, Cold-War
Defector,Canadian Storyteller(Penumbra Press,2002).
Karen Lemiski,after completing undergraduate studies at the Canadian
Institute ofUkrainian Studies (University ofAlberta),received her PhD in
History from Arizona State University with her dissertation focusing on
issues ofUkrainian nationalism.In recent years,her research has focused
on Ukraine’s medieval past and connections to Byzantium.She is currently
the director of Pegasus Press, an academic publisher of student texts in
Medieval and Renaissance History.
Daiva Markelis is Assistant Professor of English at Eastern Illinois
University,where she teaches courses in writing,linguistics,composition
theory,and myth and culture,and also directs the Writing Center.Her aca-
demic publications,creative nonfiction essays,and fiction have appeared
in Written Communication, Women and Language, Writing on the Edge,
Other Voices,The Cream City Review,The Chicago Reader,and The Chicago
Tribune Sunday Magazine.
Eric Richardswas born in Wales and educated at Nottingham University.
He has been Professor of History at Flinders University in Adelaide since
1975.His recent books include:Patrick Sellar and the Highland Clearances:
Eviction, Homicide and the Price of Progress (1999); The Highland
Clearances: People, Landlords and Rural Turmoil (2000); and Britannia’s
Children: Emigration from England,Wales,Scotland,and Ireland since 1600
(2004).He has also been editing the six-volume series on the history of
Australian immigration entitled Visible Immigrants (Pandanus Books,
Canberra).
Alexander Schunka holds a doctoral degree in Modern History. After
working as a research assistant at the University ofMunich,he now teaches
at the University of Stuttgart, Germany. His publications include books
onthe social knowledge ofthe early modern rural population and on migra-
tion in seventeenth-century Europe. He has published articles on Early
Modern German and Ottoman History and is currently preparing a book