HIST 1301 Part One
2: England’s Colonial Experiments
In the Seventeenth Century
“The settlement of our colonies was never
pursued upon any regular plan, but they
were formed, grew, and flourished, as
accidents, the nature of the climate, or the
dispositions of private men happened to
operate.”
—Edmund Burke, Member of Parliament, 1757
Virginia
The First Successful English Colony
England’s first successful
American colonies were
established during the reign of
King James I.
In 1606 King James I chartered the Virginia Company
The Virginia Company Charter
The Virginia Company Seal
The “London Company” was to
settle the southern portion of
Virginia and the “Plymouth
Company” the northern portion.
In December 1606 the Susan Constant, the Discovery
and the Godspeed set sail from Blackwall, London.
Virginia Monument, London, England
It took six months to reach North America.
May 1607: Jamestown is established by 105 men and boys.
Between 1608 and 1609 six
hundred new colonists arrived,
including several women.
The colonists were employees of the Virginia Company, bound to
service for seven years in return for transportation, food, and shelter.
Capt. John Smith was the colony’s de facto leader during its first two years.
Matoakah or “Pocahontas,” a daughter of Chief Wahunseneka
(or Powhatan), probably did NOT rescue Smith.
“Then as many as could layd hands on him, dragged him to them, and thereon laid his
head, and being ready with their clubs, to beate out his braines, Pocahontas the
Kings dearest daughter, when no intreaty could prevaile, got his head in her armes,
and laid her owne upon his to save him from death: whereat the Emperour was
contented he should live.”
--John Smith, The Generall Historie of Virginia, New England & the Summer Isles (1624)
An accident forced Smith to
leave Jamestown in 1609 and
return to England.
“Sleeping in his Boate, accidentallie, one
fired his powder-bag, which tore the flesh
from his body and thighes, nine or ten
inches square in a most pittifull manner;
but to quench the tormenting fire, frying
him in his cloaths he leaped overboord
into the deepe river, where ere they could
recover him he was neere drowned.”
--John Smith, The Generall Historie of Virginia, New
England & the Summer Isles (1624)
The winter of 1609-1610 was very bad.
“The palisades [were] torn down, the
ports open, the gates from off the hinges,
and the empty houses rent up and burnt,
rather than the dwellers would step into
the woods a stone's cast off from them to
fetch other firewood. And it is true, the
Indians killed as fast without, if our men
stirred but beyond the bounds of their
blockhouse.”
--William Strachey
It became known as “The Starving Time.” All
but 60 colonists died.
“And one amongst the rest did kill his wife, powdered her, and had eaten part of her
before it was knowne, for which hee was executed, as hee well deserved; now whether
shee was better roasted, boyled or carbonado'd, I know not, but of such a dish as
powdered wife I never heard of. This was that time, which still to this day we called the
starving time; it were too vile to say, and scarce to be beleeved, what we endured.”
June 1610: Just as the survivors headed out to sea, the
new governor, Lord De La Warr arrived with supplies
and more colonists.
“Lord la Ware…then Governour of the
Countrie, met them with…ships
exceedingly well furnished with all
necessaries fitting, who againe returned
them to the abandoned James towne.”
In 1565 Sir John Hawkins introduced
tobacco smoking in England and Sir
Walter Raleigh helped popularize it.
Sir John Hawkins
So in 1612, when
colonist John Rolfe
successfully grew
West Indian
tobacco in Virginia,
there was already a
market for it.
The English had at last found the “gold” they were looking for! By
1617, Virginia tobacco exports to England totaled 20,000 pounds.
By 1675, annual exports of Virginia tobacco to England
totaled 10 million pounds, on which taxes totaling £100,000
were paid to the British government.
7 min. 37 sec.
1613: Pocahontas is kidnapped by the English. She
becomes a Christian and is baptized “Rebecca.”
April 1614: Pocahontas marries John Rolfe at Jamestown.
1616: Pocahontas and John Rolfe go to England.
March 1617: Pocahontas dies in Gravesend, England.
1618: A 50-acre "Virginia Headright" is offered to any person who
transports himself to the New World. Colonists also receive 50
acres for each dependent and/or servant transported.
“That for all persons…which…shall go into Virginia with the intent
there to inhabite. If they continue there three years or dye after they
are shipped there shall be a grant made of fifty acres for every
person … which grants shall be made respectively to such
persons…at whose charges the said persons going to inhabite in
Virginia shall be transported…”
--Virginia Company Great Charter of 1618
1619: A Momentous Year for Virginia
The first Africans (19
altogether) arrive on a
Dutch ship.
The House of Burgesses meets
for first time.
1622: Indians attack English settlers in an unsuccessful
effort to drive them out of Virginia.
By 1624, when it became a Royal
Colony, there were 47 permanent
settlements in Virginia.
The First New England Colonies
Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay
Late 1620: 102 English “Pilgrims,” travel to America aboard the
Mayflower. About half are Separatists who previously spent
several years living in the Netherlands.
The Pilgrims intended to settle in
Virginia but a storm blew the ship
off course and they ended up in New
England instead.
November 21, 1620: While anchored off Cape
Cod, the “Pilgrims” sign the “Mayflower
Compact” establishing a “civil body politick.”
They name their settlement
“New Plymouth”
5 min. 13 sec.
Plymouth Rock
The “Pilgrims” Arrive
But half the colonists die during the first winter.
Spring 1621: The arrival of Samoset and Squanto
“About the 6th of March a certain
Indian came boldly among them, and
spoke to them in broken English, which
they could well understand, but were
astonished at it.”
--William Bradford, Governor
Fall 1621: The first Thanksgiving
6 min. 28 sec.
"Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might
after a special manner rejoice together after we had gathered the fruit of our labors.
They…killed as much fowl as…served the company almost a week…Many of the
Indians coming amongst us, [including] their…King Massasoit, with some ninety men,
whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer,
which they brought to the plantation and bestowed on our governor, and upon the
captain and others."
–-Edward Winslow, in a letter to a friend in England
Puritans, who wanted to change the
Church of England, established the
second New England Colony –
Massachusetts Bay.
King James I: “I will make them
conform themselves, or I will
harry them out of the land!”
The “Great Migration” of
English Puritans began in 1629.
By the end of 1630, about 2,000
people had arrived in
Massachusetts Bay Colony.
By 1640, about 20,000 Puritans had
immigrated to “New England.”
In America, their churches were
called “Congregationalist” and
their style of worship was called
“The New England Way.”
“Hee shall make us a prayse and glory, that men shall
say of succeeding plantacions: the lord make it like
that of New England: for wee must Consider that wee
shall be as a Citty upon a Hill, the eies of all people
are uppon us; soe that if wee shall deale falsely with
our god in this worke wee have undertaken and soe
cause him to withdrawe his present help from us, wee
shall be made a story and a byword through the
world.”
--John Winthrop, Governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony
6 min. 46 sec.
The government of Massachusetts Bay was a
theocracy in which civil law was based on the Bible
and there was no freedom of religion. Everyone was
required to conform to Puritan beliefs. Dissenters
were punished, oftentimes severely.
“If we should change…to mere democracy, first we
should have no warrant in scripture for it: for there
was no such government in Israel ... A democracy is,
amongst civil nations, accounted the meanest and
worst of all forms of government. [To allow it would
be] a manifest breach of the 5th Commandment.”
--John Winthrop, Governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony
Religious Liberty for All
The Founding of Rhode Island
1636: Puritan dissenter Roger Williams founds
“Providence Plantations” in present-day Rhode Island.
“God requireth not an uniformity of Religion to be inacted and inforced in any civill
state…true civility and Christianity may both flourish in a state or Kingdome,
notwithstanding the permission of divers and contrary consciences, either of Jew or
Gentile.”
--Roger Williams, The Bloody Tenet
1637: Puritan heretic Anne Hutchinson is also banished from
Massachusetts: founds town of Portsmouth (in present-day Rhode Island).
6 min. 02 sec.
1644: Portsmouth and Providence Plantations join together
as Colony of Rhode Island.
During the Colonial era, Rhode Island was the only colony to allow
complete religious liberty for Christians and non-Christians alike. In 1658
a Jewish congregation began openly meeting in Newport, Rhode Island
and in 1763 they built Touro Synagogue.
2 min. 25 sec.
The First Middle Colony
From New Netherland to New York
1609: Englishman Henry Hudson explores what is now the coast of
New York and New Jersey for the Dutch West India Company.
1614: The Dutch West India
Company establishes New
Netherland. In 1624 the first
colonists arrived.
1626: Dutch governor Pieter Minuit buys
Manahatta (Manhattan) Island from the
Indians for 60 guilders worth of trade
goods (less than $600).
New Amsterdam was the capital of New Netherland.
New Amsterdam was situated on the
southern tip of Manhattan Island.
New Amsterdam,
was an important
center of trade
where Slaves,
beaver skins, and
other commodities
were bought and
sold .
“Peg Leg” Pieter Stuyvesant was the last Dutch
Governor of New Netherland (1647-1664).
1649: King Charles I is defeated by a Puritan army
after several years of civil war. He is executed.
1649 to 1660: England is a Puritan republic.
Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell
The Houses of Parliament (above).
1660: The “Restoration.” (of the
monarchy). Charles II, son of Charles I,
becomes King of England.
1664: Charles II grants land in America
to brother, the Duke of York (future
King James II).
The Duke’s land grant includes
New Netherland!
August 27, 1664: Four English warships
sail into New Amsterdam’s harbor.
The Dutch surrender without firing a shot!
English governor Richard Nicolls renames
city and colony “New York.”
Dutch who swear allegiance to King Charles II
are allowed to remain in New York.
12 min. 53 sec.
Catholics and Quakers
The founding of Maryland and
Pennsylvania
In 1634, George Calvert, Lord
Baltimore, founds Maryland as a
refuge for Roman Catholics.
In 1649 the Maryland colonial legislature passed an “Act of Toleration,”
granting religious liberty to all Christians. In 1692 the law was changed to apply
to Protestants only. In 1702 the Church of England became the official church.
In the late 1640s, Englishman George Fox established The Religious Society
of Friends or “Quakers,” who were considered “heretics” by the established
church. They met in secret to avoid persecution.
In 1681, in order to settle a £16,000 debt, Charles II
granted land between New York and Maryland to a
prominent Quaker named William Penn.
Penn named his colony Pennsylvania and
in 1682 founded the city of Philadelphia.
Pennsylvania lay west of New Jersey and north of Maryland.
Unlike many English leaders, Penn treated the Indians
fairly and paid them for their land. He also permitted
religious liberty for all Christians.
9 min. 47 sec.
The Rest of the English Colonies
1662: The Royal Colony of Connecticut is founded
by Puritans from Massachusetts Bay.
1663: Charles II grants the Carolinas to Eight “Lords
Proprietors.” In 1712, North and South Carolina are divided..
Some of the earliest inhabitants come from the island of Barbados.
1664: The Duke of York conveys East and West Jersey to two
friends, Sir George Carteret and Lord Berkeley.
In 1702, East and West Jersey
become “New Jersey.”
In 1679, New Hampshire separates from Massachusetts
Bay to form a new colony
Delaware (formerly New Sweden) is part of Penn’s grant until
1703 when it became a separate colony.
Georgia is founded in 1733 by James Oglethorpe, as a refuge for English poor.
By the early 1700s, there were 13 English colonies in North America.
NEW ENGLAND:
Massachusetts,
Connecticut, Rhode
Island, and New
Hampshire.
MIDDLE
COLONIES: New
York, New Jersey,
Pennsylvania, and
Delaware.
SOUTHERN COLONIES:
Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina,
South Carolina, and Georgia.