English
The surname 'Colbert' is of English origin. It is a baptism name derived from the phrase 'the son of 'Colbert', not found in records as a personal name until the nineteenth century, Chiefly in the county of Devenshire, England. Public and Civil registry archive's confirm that the surname 'Colbert' and or it's variant's, date as far back as the nineteenth century where it is recorded in the Commercial London Directory of 1870, and the Return of Owners of Land for the county of Devonshire (commonly known as the Modern Domesday Book) in eighteen hundred and seventy-three. Historical archive's have been unable to definitely determine the exact period of settlement in North America but It is believed that the forefather's of this surname were part of the exodus of migrants that followed the Treaty of Peace signed in Paris in 1763, when great Britain obtained ownership of the whole of North America east of the Missisipi River excepting New Orleans. The chief reasons causing working class people to emigrate were, poor crop yields, high unemployment, and the misconception that America was a land of golden opportunity. It is has been estimated that after 1769 some 20,000 persons a year migrated to the Americas from the British Isles. Although the name is not recorded in England until late in the nineteenth. Today, 'Colbert' is the 'One thousand four hundred and twenty-second' most common surname in North America.