A considerable number of these indentured servants were Irish, who, in the 1630s, began to be recruited to work in the English West Indies (Bridenbaugh 1972: 14) ... and decided to improve their economic and social conditions.
"[4] In March 1638, Archbishop of Tuam Malachy Ó Caollaidhe sent two priests, Ferdinand Fareissy and David O’Neill, to accompany "six hundred Irish of both sexes [who] came to those parts, thanks to a safe and functional communication line, recently established."
In its aftermath, around 10,000 Irish and an unknown number of English, Welsh, and Scots were transported as convicts and prisoners of war to colonies in British North America, including Saint Kitts and Nevis.
While Irish immigration continued, the rise of the Atlantic slave trade in Africans brought indenture wages down and forced many to leave the islands for mainland North America.
The earliest surviving Irish emigrant letter from the New World comes from the Blake brothers on Barbados and Montserrat, conventionally carrying messages home to Galway of the good living to be made in a new land.