Puneet Varma (Editor)

Baltic people in the United Kingdom

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Baltic people in the United Kingdom are those born or raised in the UK, or residents, who are of Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian origin. Baltic nations are a part of the wider region of Northern Europe and cooperate with the Nordic countries.

Contents

Overview

Baltic countries together three countries on the south-eastern coast of the Baltic sea:

  •  Estonia - linguistically tied to Finland, while culturally and historically to Sweden and Denmark (Tallinn, the capital of the country, was built by the Danes), also Russia and Germany. Estonia is one of the least religious countries in Europe, before Lutheran Protestantism.
  •  Latvia - linguistically and culturally tied to Lithuania and Germany, historically to all its neighbours as well as Sweden, Poland and Germany. Like in the UK, the major religion is Protestantism with a significant number of Catholics and atheists.
  •  Lithuania linguistically and culturally tied to Latvia, historically to Belarus, Poland, Ukraine and Germany, as well as Sweden, Denmark and Russia. Vast majority of the population is Catholic, with significant minority of atheists and Protestants. Once had an important Jewish community.

    • History, population and settlement

    In the early 20th century, many Latvian and Lithuanian refugees began to settle in Glasgow and at its height in the 1950s, there were around 10,000 in the Glasgow area.

    During the first period of Estonian independence in the inter-war years, Great Britain, and, especially, London, became a magnet for many young people from Estonia wishing to learn English. This was made easier by a bi-lateral agreement drawn up by the British (Agreement A), which allowed foreigners to live with English families and get board and lodging in return for housekeeping duties. After the initial influx, the number of Estonian immigrants gradually reduced as people were more able to find work and, as a result, they gravitated to a few towns and cities, in particular London, Leicester and Bradford, with smaller communities in and around Bolton, Manchester, Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Nottingham, Bournemouth and some north of the border in Scotland. In the early 1950s, many Estonians left to live in other countries, leaving less than 6000 in Britain.

    Significant numbers of Baltic people moved to the UK in 1947 under a government backed scheme called 'Westward Ho'. The first group of Displaced Persons (DPs) from the British zone of occupation of Germany arrived in the UK in 1947, called the 'Balt Cygnets'.

    References

    Baltic people in the United Kingdom Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA