How four British migrations defined America [View all]

They came from different places and with different ideas, which still resonate today.

'Early British settlement of the American colonies came in four distinct waves, from different places. Puritans, Cavaliers, Quakers, and Borderers had their own ideas of what America should be. Some of the cultural fault lines in today's America can be traced back to those differences.

How many Americans are of British descent? It’s a surprisingly difficult question to answer. Is that because, in an age of hyphenated identities, the founding one is still the default? Or has that identity become so amalgamated that it is now irrelevant? Perhaps the correct answer is: a bit of both.

In the 1980 Census, 61.3 million Americans (32 percent) self-reported British ancestry; most claimed English descent (26 percent), followed by Scottish (4 percent), and tiny amounts of Welsh (