Still using the book series Cavaliers and Pioneers as a data source, I counted the Thomas head rights in the period 1695 to 1732. There were 37 male Thomases and 13 female Thomases. It would appear to me that these numbers approximate the ratio of the number of males and females in that area at that time. Of course, some of the Thomas immigrants may have had no head rights, but it would seem to me that there is no reason that the Thomases without head rights should differ merely on the basis of sex.
Therefore, I conclude that the English immigrants (or citizens of Great Britain) were predominantly male and probably unmarried individuals. Our records, though, for the Germans show that the sexes were divided more evenly because the German immigrants were family members where the entire family came.
Very few of the Germans had their transportation paid by a civil authority. As has been pointed out by others here, the numbers of English convicts numbered in the tens of thousands. The Germans who had their transportation prepaid were not convicts but were people who were burdens on the home village. Sometimes a village found that the cheapest answer to supporting a family would be to send the family to the American Colonies. There is no exact count on the numbers, but most of them would have been sent to Pennsylvania where the ships were more apt to go.
Thus, the typical German immigrant to Virginia was more likely to be a family man who wanted to own land. It is often true that he had little material wealth. It is amazing to us that they would undertake the trip with as little money as they had. They had a faith, though, they would find the means to survive. And they had a belief that would be leaving their children in a better situation than they could in Germany.
Take some pity on the people who had English ancestors. If they can’t match us in the excellency of their ancestor’s motives, don’t hold it against them. Probably you have a few English in your tree but you needn’t be ashamed of them.
[This may be all for a few days; we’ll see.]
(21 Dec 05)
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.