TY - BOOK ID - 85473352 TI - Abandoning America : life-stories from early New England PY - 2013 SN - 1782041249 1843838176 PB - Woodbridge, Suffolk : Boydell Press, DB - UniCat KW - New England KW - Northeastern States KW - History KW - England KW - Emigration and immigration KW - Religion KW - Angleterre KW - Anglii︠a︡ KW - Inghilterra KW - Engeland KW - Inglaterra KW - Anglija KW - England and Wales KW - HISTORY / Europe / Great Britain / General. KW - American History. KW - American colonial history. KW - American history. KW - Atlantic migration. KW - Biography. KW - Christianity. KW - Church history. KW - Civil War. KW - Cromwell's Commonwealth. KW - Early America. KW - Early Modern Religion. KW - Early New England. KW - England. KW - English Revolution. KW - Family Ties. KW - History of Christianity. KW - Immigration. KW - New England. KW - Oliver Cromwell. KW - Personal Dilemmas. KW - Puritanism. KW - Religion. KW - Return. UR - https://www.unicat.be/uniCat?func=search&query=sysid:85473352 AB - Abandoning America brings together the biographies of hundreds of people who crossed over to New England in the 1630s but braved the Atlantic again to return home. Some went back quickly, disenchanted or discouraged. Many invested everything to make New England a success, yet after ten or twenty years resolved to leave America behind. They reached their decisions in the context of dramatic events in England - civil war, fresh opportunities in Cromwell's commonwealth - and against a backdrop of personal dilemmas about family ties, health, prospects and profit. The stories of these people are usually overlooked because they are at odds with the onward march of American history. Abandoning America reconstructs, from thousands of fragments of evidence, the story of individual lives: not only magistrates and ministers, merchants and dissidents, but also wives and widows, servants, apprentices, military men, surgeons, shoemakers and shopkeepers. The book traces settlers' lives with an eye to the information historians look for. In a field where primary sources are thin and difficult, Abandoning America is an excellent tool for reference and research. The book is fully annotated and offers a substantial introduction providing for further historical context. SUSAN HARDMAN MOORE is Senior Lecturer, School of Divinity at the University of Edinburgh. ER -