They were called the scum of the earththus the newcomers are designatedthey proved to be the salt of the earth. It is little known. as pointed out by Arthur Meier Schlesinger. professor of history at the University of Iowa. that thousands of thieves and criminals were sent by Great Britain to the Thirteen Colonies. It was quite common to open alnishouses and Jails and send the inmates to America. Out of such immigrants came our Revolutionary heroes and Colonial Dames. The populatiol of the Colonies was just as piebald and less homogeneous than it is today. Of the most prominent colonial New Yorkers neairly all were nonEnglishSchuyler was Dutch.