Maltese in Algeria

I am posting this here because I will need it in a future post. It highlights the position of the Maltese immigrants in Algeria:

"The Maltese, the poorest of the arrivals and a previously colonized people under British rule, were placed at the bottom of this settler hierarchy. They were targeted by terrible anti-Maltese sentiments as early as the 1840s, and these have lasted in some circles to this day in France." http://www.lafayette.edu/news.php/view/9155/

and

"The difficulty of finding work at home, coupled with the decrease in trade with foreign countries, made the Maltese worker look to emigration as a solution to this double problem. Maltese had been emigrating to the lands bordering on the Mediterranean for many years and there were Maltese colonies in Egypt, Tripolitania, Tunisia and Algeria" Malta Migration

and

"Like all newcomers, the Maltese in Algeria did at first encounter hostility from the French. Continental Europeans looked down on other Europeans who came from the islands such as the Sicilians and the Maltese. It is true to admit that most insular Europeans were poor and illiterate. Some did have a criminal record and were only too ready to carry on with their way of life in other parts of the Mediterranean where their names were not publicly known" Malta Migration

and

"Following the departure of the Knights of Malta (1798), the ensuing Anglo-French struggle in the Mediterranean led to considerable prosperity of the Maltese economy. However, by 1813 the economic boom was at an end. By the 1820s famine was rife. A cholera epidemic in 1837 killed nearly 5% of the population and the subsequent quarantine restrictions closed all Mediterranean ports to Maltese imports and produced great hardship. The conditions of life were miserable." http://www.maltamigration.com/settlement/mma/chapter1-2.shtml

and

"The Maltese who crossed over to Algeria did establish a good rapport with their French rulers. Although poor and illiterate they were able to improve their lot through sheer hard work. Like their countrymen in Egypt, they realised the importance of a good education and they made sure that their offspring received that kind of education which in Malta they never got." MaltaMigration

and

"The first free Maltese settlers came to Australia during the late 1830s. The Maltese did not leave home because of political or religious oppression. Most of them wanted to build a better economic future for their children and for themselves..." English and Maltese in Malta:
History, Language Usage and Attitudes by Nadine Angermann (http://www.tu-chemnitz.de/phil/english/chairs/linguist/documents/angermann_malta.pdf)

and

"Meanwhile, however, the French made Algeria an integral part of France, a status that would end only with the collapse of the Fourth Republic in 1958. Tens of thousands of settlers from France, Spain, Italy, and Malta moved in to farm the Algerian coastal plain and occupy significant parts of Algeria's cities. These settlers benefited from the French government's confiscation of communal land, and the application of modern agriculture techniques that increased the amount of arable land.Algeria's social fabric suffered during the occupation: literacy plummeted,while land confiscation uprooted much of the population." http://www.wikipedia.org/

and

"Upon experiencing the primitive conditions in Algeria, colons with means fled home to France, or, at least, to Algiers or Oran, where they felt protected...

Many of the colons who remained in Algeria complained bitterly about the deficiencies of their situations...

Many colons soon became ill with local diseases...

By 1834, the Maltese were third in number of immigrants to Algeria, outnumbered only by Spaniards and Sicilians. Algeria was for many years the most important destination for Maltese migration within the zone of the Mediterranean. (14) By 1847, the number of Maltese living in Algeria calculated to 4,610 people, so many that the Maltese church dispatched two Catholic priests during Lent to deliver sermons in Maltese. By 1850, about half of all Maltese emigrants chose Algeria as their final destination. Most Maltese emigrated because of the high population density and unemployment on Malta and adjacent archipelago islands. Most were agricultural workers, which fit the needs of Algerian colonies" http://www.semp.us/publications/biot_reader.php?BiotID=487

and