Five Million Newcomers.

In the forty years before the Civil War five million newcomers reached America's shores. Most came from northwestern Europe and the British Isles, fleeing famine, wars, revolutions, and religious persecution. News of the discovery of gold in California in 1848 brought thousands of immigrants from China as well. The greatest period of immigration to the United States occurred between 1847 and 1857, when 3.3 million people arrived. Between 1865 and 1875 another 3.5 million landed in American seaports. In all nearly ten million newcomers arrived in the United States during the 1850s, 1860s, and 1870s. The two largest groups were the Irish and the Germans, who composed nearly three-quarters of all immigrants residing in the United States in 1860. About 60 percent of all immigrants were men. The disparity between males and females was perhaps greatest among Chinese immigrants, of which men outnumbered women 16 to 1 in 1860. The ratio was about...