Margrit Schulte Beerbühl

The “forgotten majority” of German merchants in London between the end of the Hanseatic League and the end of the Napoleonic Wars became the largest mercantile Christian immigrant group in the eighteenth century. Using previously neglected and little used evidence, this book assesses the causes of their migration, the establishment of their businesses in the capital, and the global reach of the enterprises. As the acquisition of British nationality was the admission ticket to Britain’s commercial empire, it investigates the commercial function of British naturalization policy in the early modern period, while also considering the risks of failure and chance for a new beginning in a foreign environment. As more German merchants integrated into British commercial society, they contributed to London becoming the leading place of exchange between the European continent, Russia, and the New World.

German Merchants in London, Naturalization, and Global Trade 1660-1815

The Forgotten Majority

Stefan Manz

John R. Davis

The volume questions traditional nation-centred narratives of the Empire as an exclusively British undertaking by concentrating on the transnational networks of German migrants, pursued over more than two centuries in a multitude of geographical settings within the British Empire.

German Migrants in the British Empire, 1670-1914

Transnational Networks

Heike Knortz

Hinter Migrationsprozessen wird sehr viel schneller als hinter anderen historischen Vorgängen das Schicksal des Einzelnen greifbar. Für dessen und gegebenenfalls auch seines Herkunftslandes Interessen wird nicht selten Partei ergriffen, obwohl Forschung dem Anspruch nach werturteilsfrei sein sollte. Nicht zuletzt in Folge der „Flüchtlingskrise" von 2015 hat sich demgegenüber ein spürbares Bedürfnis nach wirtschaftswissenschaftlich und wirtschaftshistorisch fundiertem Orientierungswissen entwickelt, das die historische Migrationsforschung bisher nicht zu befriedigen vermochte. Anliegen des vorliegenden ersten Bandes wie auch der Schriftenreihe insgesamt ist es deshalb, entsprechende Forschungslücken durch das Beschreiten innovativer, auch Diskussion provozierender Wege zu überwinden. In present and past migration processes the fate of the individual becomes tangible much faster than in many other historical processes. Hence, it is not uncommon that people take sides with the migrant and possibly also of his or her country of origin, even though the academia should refrain from biased judgements. Not least as a result of the "refugee crisis" of 2015, a noticeable need for orientation knowledge based on economics and economic history has developed, which historical migration research has not been able to satisfy so far. The aim of this first volume, as well as of the series as a whole, is therefore to overcome the corresponding gaps in research by taking innovative and provocative paths in order to stimulate discussion.

Margrit Schulte Beerbühl

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