Cornish Americans (Cornish:Amerikanyon gernewek)^[2] areAmericans who describe themselves as havingCornish ancestry, an ethnic group ofBrittonic Celts native toCornwall and theScilly Isles, part of the United Kingdom. Although Cornish ancestry is not recognized on theUnited States Census,Bernard Deacon at theInstitute of Cornish Studies estimates there are close to two million people of Cornish descent in the U.S., compared to half a million in Cornwall itself and only half of those Cornish by descent.^[3]

Tangier Island is an island in lowerChesapeake Bay inVirginia: some inhabitants have aWest Country accent that traces back to the settlers (including the Cornish) who arrived there in the 1600s.^[4]

The coincidence of the decline of themining industry inCornwall in the 19th century and the discovery of large amounts of mineral deposits abroad meant that Cornish families headed overseas for work. Each decade between 1861 and 1901, a fifth of the entire Cornish male population migrated abroad – three times the average for England andWales. In total, the county lost over a quarter of a million people between 1841 and 1901.^[5]

Large numbers of Cornish people moved to the United States, and while some stayed in New York City and otherEast Coast ports after arriving, many moved inland to mining areas inCalifornia,Wisconsin,Pennsylvania andMichigan (theUpper Peninsula.) One such area wasMineral Point, Wisconsin, in which the largest group of immigrants were Cornish miners attracted to the lead mining opportunities, and by 1845 roughly half of the town's population had Cornish ancestry.^[6] Today theCornish town ofRedruth is twinned with Mineral Point.

Mineral Point, Wisconsin servesCornish food, such aspasties and figgyhobbin,^[7] and Cornish pasties are sold at ex-Cornish mining towns in America, especially inButte, Montana^[8] and theUpper Peninsula of Michigan.

InCalifornia, statues and monuments in many towns pay tribute to the influence of the Cornish on their development.^[9] In the city ofGrass Valley, the tradition of singing Cornish carols lives on and one local historian of the area says the songs have become "the identity of the town". Some of the members of today's Cornish Carol Choir are in fact descendants of the original Cornish gold miners. The city holdsSt Piran's Day celebrations every year, which along with carol singing, includes aflag raising ceremony, games involving the Cornish pasty, andCornish wrestling competitions.^[10] The city is twinned withBodmin in Cornwall.

Cornish culture continues to have an influence in theCopper Country of northernMichigan, theIron Ranges of northern Michigan, Wisconsin andMinnesota, andButte, Montana.^[8]

There were many famousCornish wrestling champions from the U.S.^{[11][12][13][14]} including many world champions.^{[15][16][17][18][19][20]}

Cornish immigrant miners are depicted in the TV seriesDeadwood, speaking theirnative language, even though Cornish had died out in the 18th century before a revival in the 20th century; the actors in the relevant scenes are, in fact, speakingIrish, a fellow Celtic language, but not mutually intelligible as Irish/Gaelic is from a different branch of theCeltic languages, whereas Cornish being much closer to, and a part of the same branch, as the still thrivingWelsh andBreton, and the now extinct Brittonic languages of Great Britain such asCumbric andPictish.^[21]

Legends of the Fall, a novella by American authorJim Harrison, detailing the lives of a Cornish American family in the early 20th century, contains several Cornish language terms. These were also included in the Academy Award-winning film of the same name starringAnthony Hopkins as Col. William Ludlow andBrad Pitt as Tristan Ludlow.^[22]

Several notable Americans were either born in Cornwall or have family connections to the county.

• Mark Twain –Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), better known by hispen nameMark Twain, was an American author andhumorist. He is noted for his novelsAdventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885), called "theGreat American Novel", andThe Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876). The Clemens family originally came fromLooe, Cornwall^[23]
• Richard Bullock – became a legendary figure of theWild Westcowboy era. His quick-shooting deeds working on theDeadwood stage gained him thenickname "Deadwood Dick"
• Colin Trevorrow – anAmericanfilm director andscreenwriter. The surname Trevorrow originates in the village of Ludgvan near Penzance^[24]
• Jayne Mansfield – an American actress working both on Broadway and in Hollywood. Her ancestors moved from Cornwall toPen Argyl to work slate^[25] Her daughter is the actressMariska Hargitay
• Edie Falco – an American television, film and stage actress. Her ancestor was a Cornishmaster mariner, fromPenzance^[26][27]
• Dirk Kempthorne –United States Secretary of the Interior,Governor of Idaho,United States Senator representing Idaho, andMayor of Boise, who has immigrant ancestors from Cornwall^[28]
• Rick Rescorla – a retiredUnited States Army officer of Cornish birth who served with distinction inRhodesia as a British soldier and theVietnam War as an American officer. Rescorla wasWorld Trade Center security chief for the financial services firmMorgan Stanley, and died in theattacks of September 11, 2001, while leading the evacuation efforts
• John Spargo – a Cornish-born American socialist writer andmuckraker
• William Williams – a Cornish immigrant toSaint Paul, Minnesota who was convicted of the 1905 murders of hishomosexual lover and the latter's mother. His hanging was botched and Williams remains the last person executed by the State ofMinnesota
• Natasha Trethewey – anAmericanPulitzer Prize-winning poet^[29] who was madeUnited States Poet Laureate and alsoPoet Laureate of Mississippi in 2012. Her father, Eric Trethewey (from Canada), is also a poet and professor of English atHollins University^[30]Trethewey is aCornish language-derived surname^[31]
• Elizabeth Arden –Florence Nightingale Graham (December 31, 1884 – October 18, 1966), who went by the business name Elizabeth Arden, was a Canadian-American businesswoman who built a cosmetics empire in the United States. At the peak of her career, she was one of the wealthiest women in the world. Her mother was Cornish, her father Scottish, having met in Cornwall^[32]
• Harry S. Truman – Truman, the 33rd President of the United States (1945–1953), may have been a descendant of the CornishTremayne family although he himself disliked this theory, preferring an Anglo-Saxon origin. The President said that he believed the "Tremaine thing is a lot of bunk" but conceded, "Maybe I'm wrong. Anyway as I've told you so long as we don't find Captain Kidd, Morgan the Pirate or J.P. [Morgan] either, for that matter, in 'the line' I'm satisfied."^[33]
• Rutherford B. Hayes – the 19th President of the United States (1877–1881), was descended from Thomas Burgess, an emigrant fromTruro, Cornwall, toSalem, Massachusetts in the 17th century^[34]
• Franklin D. Roosevelt – the 32nd President of the United States (1933–1945), was, like Hayes, a descendant of Thomas Burgess, whose grandmother happened to be a Trethewey^[35]
• Donald Bertrand Tresidder was the fourth president ofStanford University, serving from 1943 until his sudden death in 1948. He also had a longtime association withYosemite National Park
• Samuel Pasco –U.S. Senator from Florida,Florida State Representative, andClerk of Court ofJefferson County. Born inLondon to Cornish parents

• Celtic Britons
• Cornish language
• Cornish emigration
• Cornish Australians
• Notable Cornish wrestlers from the United States
• Mining in Cornwall and Devon
• Celtic music in the United States
• List of people from Cornwall
• British American
• Scottish American
• Scots-Irish American
• Welsh American
• Breton American
• Dumnonia
• Kernow
• Maps of American ancestries
• Pen Argyl, Pennsylvania

• Cornish, Joseph H.The History and Genealogy of the Cornish Families in America. Higginson Book Company. 2003. ASIN: B0006S85H6.
• Ewart, Shirley.Highly Respectable Families: the Cornish of Grass Valley, California 1854-1954 (Nevada County Pioneers Series). Comstock Bonanza Press. October 1998.ISBN 978-0-933994-18-8.
• Magnaghi, Russell M.Cornish in Michigan (Discovering the Peoples of Michigan Series). Michigan State University Press. October 2007.ISBN 978-0-87013-787-7.
• Payton, PhilipThe Cornish Overseas. Cornwall Editions Limited. April 2005.ISBN 978-1-904880-04-2.
• Rowse, A. L.The Cornish in America. Redruth: Dyllansow Truran. June 1991.ISBN 978-1-85022-059-6.
• Todd, Arthur C.The Cornish Miner in America: the Contribution to the Mining History of the United States by Emigrant Cornish Miners: the Men Called Cousin Jacks. Arthur H. Clark (publisher). September 1995.ISBN 978-0-87062-238-0.
• White, Helen M.Cornish Cousins of Minnesota, Lost and Found: St. Piran's Society of Minnesota. Minnesota Heritage Publications. 1997. ASIN: B0006QP60M.

• The Cornish American Heritage Society
• California Cornish Cousins
• Pennsylvania Cornwall Association
• The Cornish Society of Greater Milwaukee
• Pasties in Wisconsin, by Dorothy Hodgson

• Cornish diaspora in the United States
• American people of Cornish descent
• Cornwall-related biographical lists
• Cornwall-related lists

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