Thread by @DrAlakbarov

It’s often said that Scotland’s greatest export has been her people.

The term "New Scots" was primarily used to describe people of any background who have immigrated to Scotland since the 1945 as modern immigrants. #migration #history

During 1930s, many Italians who arrived in the city set up in business in the catering trades, selling ice cream, confectionery, tobacco, and fish and chips.

The Union of Italian Traders, set up in 1928, had a membership of 1,000 in Scotland ten years later.

On 10 June 1940 Italian dictator Benito Mussolini declared war on Britain. This sparked off anti-Italian riots, resulting in widespread damage to Italian shops. In Glasgow, the worst incidents took place in Maryhill, Govan and Tradeston.

Adult male Italians were interned on the Isle of Man, leaving wives and children to manage businesses as best they could. Gradually the men were released, and things improved when Italy changed sides following the overthrow of Mussolini in 1943. #lifeofanimmigrant

Harsh economic conditions forced many Italians to emigrate in the later years of the 19th century. Glasgow was the third most popular destination for those who came to Britain. A high proportion of those who settled in the city came from the region around Barga in Tuscany.

In the early 1880s, many Lithuanian immigrants came to Scotland as they could not afford the journey on to America, others were even duped into thinking they had arrived in America.

When they arrived in Scotland, mostly at the port of Leith, the Lithuanians split into two groups, the Jewish immigrants settling in the Gorbals and the Catholic Lithuanians heading for the smelting works of North Ayrshire, the mines of West Lothian and, Lanarkshire.

Lanarkshire always formed the centre of the Lithuanian community in Scotland, not only did the bulk of the population settle there, but the area also contained the resident Lithuanian priest and the Lithuanian Social Club.

One of the main focal points of the community across Scotland was an annual pilgrimage to the grotto at Carfin - where the Lithuanians have their own plaque. Whether this is true or not, by 1914 over 4,000 Lithuanians had settled in the area.

Even in late 1890s, local media tried to blame the Lithuanians and they were accused of being ‘most filthy in their habits of life’ and a danger to the health of the local community. Drunkenness was also highlighted.

The advent of the First World War brought about the collapse of the Lithuanian community in the west of Scotland. Furthermore, some 400 women and children left for Lithuania in 1920 and after this the community disintegrated.

Even a figure such as Keir Hardie, founding father of the Labour Party, led a fierce, xenophobic campaign against the Lithuanians. Hardie, as a leader of Ayrshire miners, wrote a racist article about the Poles and Lithuanians.

Keir Hardie on Poles and Lithuanians:

"What object they have in doing so is beyond human ken unless it is, as stated by a speaker at Irvine, to teach men how to live on garlic and oil, or introduce the Black Death, so as to get rid of the surplus labourers." #xenophobia

The first Chinese restaurant in Glasgow was the Wah Yen in Govan Road, opened by Jimmy Yih in the late 1940s.

It opened at a time when there were very few Chinese people living in the city. In fact, only three Chinese families were living in Glasgow in 1953.

It wasn’t really until the 1960s-70s when significant numbers of Chinese immigrants made Glasgow their home.

The Chinese community in Scotland, originating from both Mainland China and Hong Kong, numbers just over 12,000 people, with the most significant population in Glasgow.

The first officially recorded Chinese person in Scotland was William Macao.

He journeyed from China to the Black Isle in the 1770s, and then on to Edinburgh where he lived for over 50 years, rising to become a senior sccountant at the Board of Excise.

Nothing is known of Macao’s life in China, not even his Chinese name. His account begins with his arrival in Scotland around 1775 with David Urquhart, a retired East India Company surgeon.

In 1793 Macao married Helen Ross, who came from a well-established Ross and Cromarty family, and they had two daughters and one son before Helen died in 1802.

He died on 31 October 1831, aged seventy-eight, and is buried in St Cuthbert’s graveyard.

Interestingly, the first visitor to Macau was a Scot, William Carmichael, in the 16th century, but it was not until 1719 that the next noted Scot visited the country.

The Paddy's Market.

The market’s name was taken from the huge influx of Irish immigrants making new homes in Glasgow in the 19th century.

According to a study that was conducted in Scotland back in 2014, ethnic diversity was growing, with the report finding that one in six Scottish households contained two or more multi-ethnic nationalities.

There has also been a rise in international cuisine in Scotland with more and more varieties of different restaurants serving up Middle Eastern, Polish, Spanish, Chinese, Italian, Thai, Greek, Japanese, Iranian and Turkish foods.

Today in Scotland, more than 170 different languages are spoken – from Punjabi to Polish, and Cantonese to Gaelic.

All these different people contribute to making Scotland a great place to live, work, study, visit or do business in!

During the 19th century, however, Bridgegate became a slum where many poor Irish immigrants settled. In the 1870s the City of Glasgow Union Railway Co swept away many of the original buildings while building the approach lines to St Enoch Station.

Charles Frank was born in Vilkomir in Lithuania around 1865 and later emigrated to Glasgow.

In 1910 he opened a shop at 67 Saltmarket, where he made and sold photographic, optical and mechanical and electrical appliances.

Staff at Fogell's bakery and grocery shop in Hospital Street in the Gorbals, 1962.

Many of the Jews living in the Gorbals at that time had emigrated from Eastern Europe and enjoyed gossiping or reminiscing about der heim (home) in a familiar language.

Mrs Rachel Hamilton (nee Johnston), nicknamed "Big Rachel", was originally from Ireland but lived in Partick.

She worked as a labourer in Tod & MacGregor shipyards, as a forewoman navvy at the Jordanhill Brickworks and latterly as a farm worker at Anniesland.

The wedding of Rose Kirsh and Simon Michaelson, 8 June 1899.

Michaelson was born in 1875 in Haasemput which is thought to have been in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. He ran a shop in Wishaw and in 1906 was one of the founder members of the Queen's Park Synagogue.

Glasgow's Nigerian community held a reception for new arrivals in February 1993. Committee members of the Nigerian National Union's Glasgow Branch were there to meet them, along with Bailie Tommy Dingwall, pictured shaking hands with Branch President Dr Wilson Herbert.

A Polish airman feeding pigeons in George Square, c 1941.

The Polish First Army Corps, under the leadership of General Sikorski, was set up with its base in Scotland.

In 1954 the Polish Social and Educational Society, also known as the Sikorski Polish Club, was established in Glasgow to meet the needs of the Polish community. The club celebrated its fiftieth anniversary in 2004.

Mansur Hussain and members of his family were pictured for the March 1992 issue of Glasgow City Council's newspaper The Bulletin.

A small Asian community became established in Glasgow in the 1930s, mainly in the Gorbals area.

Many of Glasgow's Asians can trace their origins to the Punjab, which straddles the border between India and Pakistan. Pollokshields, Govanhill, Garnethill and Woodside were popular destinations for the new arrivals, many of whom have established businesses in these areas.

Vietnamese immigrants pictured outside their new home in Dalilea Drive, Easterhouse, in the February 1982.

In 1981 many Vietnamese "boat people" were rescued from the South China Sea, having fled Vietnam in a variety of small boats, many of them unseaworthy.

A number of families were allocated council houses in the Easterhouse area. They expressed appreciation for the help they received in acquiring basic household furniture and other essentials from churches, the Salvation Army and local residents.

And finally, The Belgian Refugee by Norah Neilson Gray.

Also known as The Belgian in Exile, this oil painting was completed c 1915 and depicts a man from Liege who fled to Scotland when his country was invaded by Germany during the First World War.

I'm gonna make a separate thread about post 1990s immigration to Scotland.