These eleven essays consider aspects of the Huguenot diaspora during the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, thereby broadly reflecting the research interests of Walter Utt (1924–85) to whom tribute is paid in the preliminary sections of the volume. Although there are contributions on Germany (Andrew C. Thompson), the Pays de Vaud (Vivienne Larminie) and North America (Paul McGraw), the majority of the essays focus on England and the experience of the Huguenots escaping persecution in Louis xiv's France, which culminated in the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685.

In his introductory essay Trim considers the forging of a Huguenot identity and in particular the way in which this was shaped in exile by the collective memory and experiences of the refugees and their descendants. He also discusses the resurgence of interest in the diaspora during the nineteenth century, with the foundation of learned societies dedicated to academic and genealogical research on the Huguenots as well as their depiction in popular culture. Paul McGraw argues that there was a similar fascination in North America, even though the Huguenots constituted an ‘underrepresented but arguably over-emphasised group of religious refugees’ (p. 285). In Larminie's essay and Randolph Vigne's study of the testamentary evidence collected by the nineteenth-century genealogist Henry Wagner, the ‘memory’ discussed is more personal. They examine the testimonies and bequests made by the Huguenots, which reflected their current situation but also their connections and aspirations for their homeland. The polemical use of memory through the series of historical models and precedents that a small circle of Huguenot authors connected with William iii's court used to recount their plight forms the basis for David Onnekink's study. Elsewhere in the volume the focus on history and memory is less pronounced and the essays provide detailed studies on the Huguenots and particular aspects of their communities.

There is however another theme that runs through a number of essays, which is how the established Church and other religious groups responded to the treatment of the Huguenots as well as to the new settlements established in the late seventeenth century. As Gregory Dodds argues, the French king's persecution of the Huguenots served in English polemical tracts of the 1670s and 1680s as a warning of the dangers of Catholicism, a theme which was also taken up in New England by Cotton Mather (McGraw). But for some, such as Richard Baxter, the measures taken against the Huguenots had echoes in the English government's treatment of the Dissenters. In such circumstances, how could the policies of Louis xiv be condemned? It was, however, as Lisa Diller argues, part of contemporary British culture to be anti-French, denouncing Bourbon tyranny and papist superstition, although the attempt to articulate a Protestant national identity instead was more complicated and even the 1689 Act of Toleration was regarded with a certain wariness. It was one thing to condemn French persecution of Protestant co-religionists but quite another for some Anglican churchmen, such as Archbishop Secker, to embrace with enthusiasm the foundation of Huguenot congregations in England. Between 1681 and 1687, the new churches had to be conformist, which meant that worship had to follow a French translation of the Book of Common Prayer. However this represented a hybrid form of Anglicanism, which accommodated some Reformed sensibilities, and was associated with the Savoy Church that had been established in London in 1660. As Robin Gwynn shows tensions and disputes emerged between these congregations and certain churchmen, including enthusiastic Huguenot ministers who had been newly ordained in the English Church, as attempts were made to eradicate any evidence of divergence from Anglican religious practice. The refugees resisted liturgical innovations that did not conform to their memories of Reformed worship. As a result, when a choice could be made by congregations, there was a move against conformity. Ironically, in New England, Cotton Mather was concerned about how easily the majority of American Huguenots, in spite of having been persecuted for their faith in the past, were able to become members of the Anglican Church. Writing in 1725, he encouraged ‘French Protestants not to forget the importance of their mission and its place in the whole of Christianity’ (p. 295).