Patrick Was Likely From Ulster When He Ran Away

In the northern counties of Ulster, however, a different attitude (than very hesitant to leave family) held sway with a sizeable proportion of people.

Presbyterians, most of whom had Scottish ancestry, had also suffered discrimination in Ireland but they were not inhibited to the same degree by 'ancestral' connection with the soil. They sincerely believed they would find tolerance, freedom and happiness in North America.

They were also, to varying extents, more economically independent than their Catholic neighbours. Many were artisans, shopkeepers, or young professionals, and some worked in the Irish linen trade. These early waves of Irish emigration were often in response to economic peaks and troughs.

Up to 1720, when New England was the destination of choice for most, the flow was steady but numbers were not large. Numbers rose at the end of that decade and then dropped again.

A famine in the early 1740s saw renewed interest in Atlantic passage, and Irish emigration never really subsided afterwards. In 1771-1773, more than 100 ships left the Ulster ports of Newry, Derry, Belfast, Portrush and Larne, carrying some 32,000 Irish immigrants to America. Meanwhile, a similar number set sail from Dublin, Cork and Waterford alone. Some of these would certainly have been Catholics. By 1790, the USA's Irish immigrant population numbered 447,000 and two-thirds originated from Ulster.
Back in Ireland, the population had grown from only 2.3 million at mid-century to as much as 5 million by 1800. The vast majority lived in poverty.