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License Agreement on scientific materials use.
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Catholics of Saint Christopher and Montserrat and the question of their expulsion from the Virginia colony in the 1620s-1640s
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Egor Pavlovich Makarov
Samara State Technical University
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Submitted:
July 28, 2026
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Abstract.
The aim of the article is to determine the validity of the historiographical thesis concerning the religious nature of the expulsion of Irish Catholics from the Virginia colony, who subsequently founded a settlement on Montserrat Island in 1632. The paper undertakes a critical analysis of the testimonies of Father Andrew White and Governor Leonard Calvert from 1634, based on a complex of documentary sources such as Virginia charters, Council of the Colony minutes, transportation patents, and Jesuit correspondence. The scientific novelty lies in proving for the first time in Russian historiography the absence of documentary evidence for a formal act of expulsion. Religious discrimination against Catholics in Virginia was systemic and enshrined in charters requiring an oath of supremacy, which made it impossible for them to obtain the status of free settlers. The article demonstrates that Irish Catholics, present in the colony since the 1620s as indentured servants and artisans, were not subjected to deportation. Their relocation to Saint Christopher and Montserrat is interpreted as a conscious choice in favor of jurisdictions compatible with their religious identity. The research results introduce corrections to the historiography of early colonial America, offering a more nuanced interpretation of the mechanisms of religious exclusion, distinct from the simplified "expulsion thesis."
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Key words and phrases:
колониальная Виргиния
ирландские католики
Монтсеррат
Сент-Кристофер
религиозное исключение
colonial Virginia
Irish Catholics
Montserrat
Saint Christopher
religious exclusion
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