New Colonies
Here is a paragraph-by-paragraph summary of the main points from the provided notes:
The Search for El Dorado
Paragraph 1: Sixteenth-century Europeans viewed the Caribbean as a place of true and imagined wonders, leading explorers to believe bizarre stories and seek mythical sights like the "fountain of youth."
Paragraph 2: Indigenous peoples used stories of rich, distant lands to deflect Europeans, giving rise to the myth of El Doradoâa legendary city of gold named Manao supposed to exist in central South America.
Paragraph 3: Numerous Spanish explorers searched through the treacherous jungles, rivers, and mountains of the Amazon and Orinoco basins for this golden city, resulting in many deaths.
Paragraph 4: In 1584, Spaniard Antonio de Berrio established a small colony at St Joseph in Trinidad and explored the Orinoco River, finding only forests and indigenous populations.
Sir Walter Raleigh
Paragraph 5: Driven by the El Dorado myth, Sir Walter Raleigh, a well educated man, gentleman of the court, writer and a poet, explored the damp Orinoco jungles on behalf of Queen Elizabeth I.
Paragraph 6: Prior to this, Raleigh's 1584 North American settlement ("Virginia") failed, though he successfully popularized tobacco smoking in England.
Paragraph 7: In 1595, Raleigh sailed to South America, destroyed the Spanish settlement of St Joseph in Trinidad, and successfully used the newly discovered Pitch Lake to seal his ships before heading up the Orinoco.
Paragraph 8: Raleigh made two disastrous, unsuccessful trips up the Orinoco; during the second in 1617, his men attacked a Spanish fort, his son was killed, and he found no gold.
Paragraph 9: Upon returning to England empty-handed, Raleigh was executed in 1618 because he had violated King James Iâs peace efforts by attacking Spanish outposts.
Settlers in the Guianas
Paragraph 10: By the early seventeenth century, European arrivals shifted from restless adventurers, like Raleigh, de Berrio, Drake and Hawkins, to permanent English, French, and Dutch settlers seeking unoccupied lands.
Paragraph 11: Settlers were drawn to the Guianasâa massive territory between Spanish Venezuela and Portuguese Brazilâwhere the English, French, and Dutch united for defense and planted crops like tobacco, cotton, and maize.
Paragraph 12: French settlers arrived first in 1607, followed by a mix of national efforts; the Dutch were the most successful with permanent settlements by 1616 and 1624, while English failures drove England to look toward the Lesser Antilles.
The 'Caribbee' Islands
Paragraph 13: Spain largely ignored the smaller islands between Puerto Rico and Trinidad because they deemed them too small and feared the fierce defense of the native Kalinago.
Paragraph 14: Known as the Caribbee Islands, passing European ships used them to gather supplies and trade with the Kalinago, who remained highly defensive to avoid the enslavement suffered by the Arawaks.
Paragraph 15: The Kalinago aggressively resisted European colonization by plundering plantations, attacking ships at sea, and capturing Europeans and Africans, making initial seventeenth-century settlement efforts incredibly difficult.
Thomas Warner and St Kitts
Paragraph 16: After failing in the Guianas, English Captain Thomas Warner visited St Christopher (St Kitts) in 1622 on his return voyage to England.
Paragraph 17: Warner found St Kitts pleasant, easily defensible, and successfully befriended the local Kalinago chief, Tegramond.
Paragraph 18: Warner secured financial backing in England and returned to St Kitts in 1624 to establish the first permanent English West Indian settlement, earning the island the title "Mother colony of the British West Indies."
Paragraph 19: French settlers led by Pierre d'Esnambuc arrived soon after and agreed to divide the island with the English, forming a defensive pact against the Kalinago and Spanish that helped the settlement survive.
Paragraph 20: Early settlers lived in rough log houses, faced harsh conditions and destructive hurricanes, and utilized white servants and Black slaves for the most difficult plantation labor.
Paragraph 21: Relations frayed as growing settler numbers alarmed the Kalinago; in 1626, a Kalinago woman named Barbe warned Warner of a planned indigenous attack on the Europeans.
Paragraph 22: The English and French launched a preemptive night massacre, killing Chief Tegramond and driving the Kalinago off the island, leaving only a few enslaved Carib women by 1630.
Paragraph 23: Alarmed by foreign expansion, a Spanish fleet led by Admiral Fadrique de Toledo destroyed the St Kitts and Nevis settlements in 1629, though the colonists quickly rebuilt once the Spanish departed.
Paragraph 24: Despite frequent boundary disputes between the French and English, St Kitts served as a vital base for both nations to launch further colonization efforts across the eastern Caribbean.
Paragraph 25: Other English colonies emerged nearby, including Bermuda in 1609, which established a Legislature in 1620 that stands as the second oldest governing body in the British Commonwealth, followed by Barbados in 1639.
Paragraph 26: In 1629, English Puritans fleeing religious persecution settled Providence island (near Nicaragua), mirroring the 1620 Mayflower Pilgrim voyage to Massachusetts.
Paragraph 27: The first attempt to settle the Bahamas occurred in 1645, focusing initially on salt production and later on cotton and tobacco.
The French Islands
Paragraph 28: Prompted by success in St Kitts, the French government formed the Compagnie des Iles d'Amerique in 1635 and appointed Chevalier de Poincy to govern and expand their West Indian possessions.
Paragraph 29: The company claimed multiple islands (including Guadeloupe and Martinique), leading to fierce territorial conflicts and wars with both England and the native Kalinago.
Paragraph 30: Despite fighting the powerful Kalinago for five years under commanders d'Olive and du Plessis, the French eventually established prosperous colonies in Martinique and Guadeloupe.
The English in Barbados
Paragraph 31: The failed Guiana settlements indirectly prompted the English colonization of Barbados, which had previously only been mapped by the Spanish and visited by the Portuguese (who left pigs for meat).
Paragraph 32: In 1625, English Captain John Powell claimed the uninhabited, fertile island for England, leading his employer, Sir William Courteen, to finance a settlement effort.
Paragraph 33: On February 20, 1627, Henry Powell landed 80 settlers and ten captured African slaves at Jamestown (now Holetown) to establish the colony.
Paragraph 34: Because the previous indigenous inhabitants had long since deserted the island, the first English settlers faced no hostile local forces.
Paragraph 35: Due to its eastward position, Barbados was naturally protected from foreign naval attacks, but the settlers struggled severely with food shortages during the "Starving Time" of 1630â1631.
Paragraph 36: The colony survived with help from the Dutch Governor of Essequibo, who sent 32 Arawaks with crops (like yams and cassava) and later taught the Barbadians how to cultivate sugar cane.
Paragraph 37: As the colony expanded, a second group of 64 settlers funded by the Earl of Carlisle landed at "Indian Bridge" (now Bridgetown) in 1628.
Paragraph 38: This triggered violent ownership disputes between the Courteen-Powell faction and the Carlisle-Wolverston faction (resulting in a governor being shot) until Carlisle was legally recognized as the owner, restoring peace.
The Dutch Trading Posts
Paragraph 39: The Dutch entered the Caribbean primarily seeking salt to preserve fish and meat back in Europe, eventually sourcing it from Venezuela after ties broke with Spain.
Paragraph 40: This salt trade provoked clashes with Spain but allowed the Netherlands to build a massive commercial network, earning them the title "Traders of the Caribbean" with about 800 trading vessels by 1623.
Paragraph 41: The Dutch West India Company was formed in 1621 to manage this trade, prospering greatly by undercutting English merchants and selling cheaper goods to English colonies.
Paragraph 42: The Dutch also fought the Portuguese, seizing parts of north-eastern Brazil in 1624 where they mastered sugar production, a skill they passed on to French and English islanders.
Paragraph 43: To support their trading focus over agricultural planting, the Netherlands occupied several small islands as commercial hubsâincluding St Eustatius, St Martin, Curaçao, Aruba, and Bonaireâwhich remain Dutch today.