any Protestants in the Palatinate, speaking a distinctive Germanic variety in what is today southwest Germany, were left destitute by the religious and political upheaval that tore through their home territory in the early 18th century. Thousands made their way to Rotterdam, hoping to make it to England, where Parliament had promised sanctuary and where many set up an encampment outside London. As fears of the refugees mounted, the English transported nearly 3,000 German Palatines in ten ships to New York in 1710, where they were quarantined on Governors Island in horrible conditions. Some later came to live in the city, then centered on lower Manhattan, including famed journalist John Peter Zenger, while a larger number of others went on to found farms and settlements in New York's Mohawk Valley, beside the Native Haudenosaunee people.