Italians in the United Kingdom
    Notable Italian Britons Frankie Dettori · Lawrence Dallaglio · John Florio Benjamin Disraeli · Dante Gabriel Rossetti   | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
|---|---|
| Wales · Peterborough · Manchester · Glasgow · Chelsea · South Kensington · Bedford · Westminster · Kensington | |
| Languages | |
| British English · Italian (and related forms) | |
| Religion | |
| Predominantly Roman Catholic · Anglican | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Italian, English, Scots, Welsh, Maltese, Gibraltarians |
Italian Britons also known as Britalians, are British citizens whose ancestry originates in Italy. The phrase may refer to someone born in the United Kingdom of Italian descent, someone who has themselves emigrated from Italy to the United Kingdom or someone born elsewhere (eg the United States) who are of Italian descent and have migrated to the UK. More specific terms used to describe Italian British people include: Italian English, Italian Scots and Italian Welsh.
According to the 2001 census a total of 107,002 Italian-born people are currently living in the United Kingdom, of whom 38,694 reside in London.[1] The British Embassy recently estimated that 19,000 Britons reside in Italy, and 150,000 Italians reside in the UK. [2]
Roman Britain
The Romans were the first Italians to settle in the British Isles who came as far back as AD 43, when Emperor Claudius invaded.
Fifteenth to eighteenth centuries
According to historian Michael Wayatt, there was "a small but influential community" of Italians "that took shape in England in the fifteenth century initially consisting of ecclesiastics, humanists, merchants, bankers, and artists."[3] In the aftermath of the English Reformation, amongst other religious refugees from the European continent, many Italian Protestants found Tudor England to be a hospitable haven, and brought with them cultural Italian ties. The fifteenth century also saw the birth of a pivotal Italo-Englishman in the form of John Florio, a famed language teacher, lexicographer, and translator. The Titus family is another significant group that settled in England in the time of the Renaissance.
The arts flourished under the Hanoverian dynasty and this attracted many more Italian artists and musicians to Britain.
Second World War
When the dictator Benito Mussolini declared war on the Allies in May 1940, angry mobs attacked Italian restaurants and ice-cream parlours. Many Italians living in Britain were interned. Amongst some of the Italians interned were Mussolini's left-wing opponents who had fled to Britain after being involved in anti-fascist activities in Italy.
Italians were held in various camps all over the country. Eventually, like other refugees, they would appear before tribunals individually, which had them classified into one of three groupings: A class aliens were interned, B class aliens were allowed to leave the camps but had certain restrictions placed upon their movements, and the vast majority of refugees, identified as C class aliens, were allowed to go free. The Home Secretary, Sir John Anderson, ordered the arrest of over 2,000 male aliens living in coastal areas on 12 May 1940. A few days later all B class aliens were placed into internment camps. The author, H. G. Wells, joined the campaign against this, and accused the Home Office of being run by "Nazi sympathisers". He pointed out that a large number of those interned had a long record of being involved in anti-fascist activities in Germany and Italy. Many of these people were deported to Canada and Australia after the War Cabinet had decided to export them.[4]
The 1,500 ton SS Arandora Star set sail from Liverpool bound for Canada early on 01 July 1940. On 02 July at 07:00 am the ship was torpedoed 125 miles west of Ireland by the German U Boat 47 under the command of Korvettenkapitän Günther Prien. The Arandorra Star sank within 30 minutes, with a loss of over 700 lives. The sinking was, and still is, the most tragic event in the history of the Italian community: no other Italian community in the world has suffered such a blow.[5] On the 19 July the Home Secretary, wrote a letter to Lord Halifax, the Foreign Secretary, in which he made it clear that he realised mistakes had been made in selecting Italians for the Arandora Star.[6] Lord Snell was charged with conducting a government inquiry into the tragedy. He recognised that the method of selecting dangerous Italians was not satisfactory and the result was that among those earmarked for deportation were a number of non-fascists and people whose sympathies lay with Britain.[7]
Post-War to the present
The region of the country containing the most Italian Britons is London, where there are over 50,000 people of Italian origin live [1], Manchester, where 25,000 Italians live [2], Bedford, where there are over 14,000 people of Italian origin living,[8] and Peterborough has the highest concentration of Italian immigrants in the UK. This is mainly as a result of labour recruitment in the 1950s by the London Brick Company in the southern Italian regions of Puglia and Campania. By 1960 approximately 7,500 Italian men were employed by London Brick in Bedford and a further 3,000 in Peterborough.[9] In 1962 the Scalabrini Fathers, who first arrived in Peterborough in 1956, purchased an old school and converted it into a church named after the patron saint of workers San Giuseppe. By 1991 over 3,000 christenings of second-generation Italians had been carried out there.[10]
Famous Italian Britons
References
- ^ Born Abroad: An immigration map of Britain British Broadcasting Corporation (retrieved 24 August 2007)
- ^ Bilateral Relations British Embassy, Italy
- ^ Wyatt, Michael The Italian Encounter with Tudor England: A Cultural Politics of Translation (Cambridge Studies in Renaissance Literature and Culture No.51) Cambridge University Press, December 2005
- ^ Italians In Britain Spartacus Educational (retrieved 24 August 2007)
- ^ Colpi, Terry The Italian Factor: the Italian Community in Great Britain (pp.115-124) Mainstream Publishing, Edinburgh, 1991
- ^ Foreign Office File FO 916 2581 folio 548
- ^ Foreign Office File FO 371 25210
- ^ Bedford's Italian question British Broadcasting Corporation (retrieved 24 August 2007)
- ^ Colpi, op. cit. (p.149)
- ^ Ibid. (p.235)
See also
- Romano-British
- Ethnic groups of the United Kingdom
- British-Italian relations
- List of Italian Britons
- Italian diaspora
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