·       the English were latecomers in the colonial race – lagging behind Spain

·       colonization and plantations of Ireland (16^th-17^th centuries) = a laboratory of English colonization of North America

·       growing colonial aspirations of England after the defeat of Spanish Armada in 1588

ROANOKE COLONY

(Roanoke Island, North Carolina)

1585-1590

THE LOST COLONY

·       VIRGINIA (after the Virgin Queen) - the name initially applied by the English to the entire Atlantic Coast north of Florida

·       Sir Walter Raleigh founds the first English settlement in North America on Roanoke Island, North Carolina, but the colonists struggle with lack of supplies, Native Americans, and are evacuated by Francis Drake

·       colonists return under John White - grandfather of Virginia Dare (the first English person born in America)

·       John White sails back to England for supplies but his return to Roanoke is delayed by the Spanish Armada. Finally, on his arrival in 1590 White finds the colony mysteriously abandoned and the word CROATOAN carved on a tree

17^th-century English colonies

English colonization resumes under King James I (1603-1625), especially after peace with Spain in 1604 and the founding of the Virginia Company in London.

REASONS: demand for resources, enrichment, enclosures and expulsion of farmers, fleeing religious persecution, adventure, overpopulation, anti-Catholicism, and challenging Spanish claims in America.

DIFFICULTIES: climate, diseases, failing crops, hostile Indians, North American lands already claimed by Spain and France

CHARACTERISTICS of English colonies:

• settlers and religious dissenters

• located only along the Atlantic coast with fur trading activities across the Appalachians

• often private enterprises rather than government-sponsored

• MORE populated and farming-oriented than Spanish and French colonies

• In 1775: 2.5 million in the colonies, 7 million in England

VIRGINIA

1607 - Jamestown, Virginia on the James River is established as the first permanent English settlement under Captain John Smith of the Virginia Company of London (a joint-stock company)

·       a profit-oriented enterprise (not really working for common good)

o   Company charter: “dig, mine, and search for all Manner of Mines of Gold, Silver, and Copper”

o   difficult conditions: swamps, lack of supplies, famine

o   John Smith imposes strict discipline and forces all to labor, declaring that “he that will not work shall not eat.”

o   more newcomers come year by year (Virginia becomes a royal colony in 1624)

·       INDENTURED SERVITUTE – system of labor based on salary-free contracts for a number of years - replaced later by SLAVERY

·       1609-1610 – Starving Time - ended by Lord de la Warr’s military rescue

·       POCAHONTAS – daughter of Chief Powhatan - the mythical mother of Virginians

·       saves John Smith from execution

·       converts to Protestantism, marries John Rolfe, and travels to England when she dies in London of smallpox

·       TOBACCO (introduced by John Rolfe) saves the colony of Virginia becoming the main cash crop and bringing enormous profits

·       headrights instituted to encourage development of tobacco plantations: 50-acre lot granted to each colonist who pays his own transportation, or for each servant brought into the colony - allows development of huge estates.

·       constant conflicts with the Powhatan Indians lead to destruction of the tribe

·       in 1619 the Virginia HOUSE OF BURGESSES is established as the first representative body in the colonies

·       SLAVERY: in 1619 the first African slaves arrive in Jamestown to labor on plantations

NEW ENGLAND

Plymouth, Massachusetts (1620) is founded by SEPARATISTS from the Church England (PILGRIMS or Saints VERSUS Strangers), who arrive on The Mayflower, as a refuge -  becoming an intolerant and strictly religious community

William Bradford, Of Plymouth Plantation (1630-47) – the main account of the colony

MAYFLOWER COMPACT (1620)

·       FIRST document on self-government in America (signed aboard The Mayflower) stipulating civil body politic and just and equal laws

·       a social contract  in which the settlers consented to follow its rules and regulations for the sake of survival

·       based simultaneously upon a majoritarian model and the settlers' allegiance to the king

FIRST THANKSGIVING (1621) - most important American holiday, established later by A. Lincoln.

In 1691 Plymouth is absorbed in 1691 by the Massachusetts Bay Colony

Massachusetts Bay Colony (1628) and Connecticut (1636) founded by non-separating PURITANS

·       Governor John Winthrop – deeply religious and practical businessman sees the colony as an ideal community:

o   "We shall be like a CITY ON A HILL" (from Winthrop’s sermon “A Model of Christian Charity”) – vision of a religious commonwealth and expression of American exceptionalism

o   “Democracy is the meanest and worst of all forms of government”

·       Salem and Boston – two main settlements

·       administrative divisions into townships - town hall meetings

·       fishing, fur trade, shipbuilding

·       free and compulsory education

·       theocracies:

·       close relationship between church and state

·       religious conformity

·       religiously intolerant - banishment of dissidents (Quakers, Roger Williams, Anne Hutchinson) and Salem witch trials (1692)

Rhode Island (Providence Plantations) (1636) founded by Roger Williams, a separatist exiled  from Puritan Massachusetts, expert in Indian languages and the author of the first dictionary of an Indian language. Rhode Island is purchased from Indians and becomes the first colony in America allowing religious liberty.

NEW YORK

1624-1664

NEW NETHERLAND

·       New Amsterdam (NYC) and Fort Orange (Albany) established by the Dutch

·       Protestant fur settlers and TRADERS – trading posts and towns

·       good trading relationships with the Iroquois

In 1664 New Netherland is captured by the English and renamed New York

Dutch cultural legacy:

-        topography of Lower Manhattan

-        NYC place names: Staten Island, the Bronx, Brooklyn, Harlem, Coney Island, Flushing, Rikers Island, Schuyler, Wall Street, Bowery, Broadway

-        New York State place names: Kinderhook, Catskills

-        Santa Claus

-        Yankee

-        Roosevelt, Van…

OTHER ENGLISH COLONIES

Maryland – colony for Roman Catholics fleeing persecution founded by Cecilius Calvert, Lord Baltimore

Delaware – founded by the Swedes as New Sweden, later taken over by the Dutch and then by the English

The Carolinas – chartered to eight English Lord Proprietors – divided into South and North Carolina in the 18^th century

Pennsylvania – chartered to William Penn and the Quakers (Society of Friends) – as debt payment from Charles II

·       established as a Holy Experiment based on Quaker principles, liberal laws and complete religious toleration

·       purchasing land from the natives

·       Philadelphia "City of Brotherly Love" founded as a result of legendary Penn's Treaty with the Chief Tammany of the Lenape signed in 1682, providing that their people would live in a state of perpetual peace – the largest city in the English colonies

·       The Frame of Government of Pennsylvania (1682) – the first constitution in the colonies

Georgia – founded by James Oglethorpe (Savannah settlement) as the 13^th English colony – intended as a philanthropic enterprise – refuge for prison debtors and a bulwark against Spanish Florida and French Louisiana

COLONIAL REGIONS

By 1733 there are THIRTEEN English colonies grouped into THREE COLONIAL REGIONS (political, economic, cultural, social) along the East Coast:

New England (New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island)

·       population ethnically English, mostly Puritans, religiously motivated

·       replication of traditional English social order - traditional, multigenerational family life

·       small towns as collections of interrelated households

·       free farming, handicraft, timber, fishing and shipping

·       commerce with the West Indies

·       major town: Boston

Middle Colonies (New York, Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania)

·       merchant-based economies

·       small-scale manufacturing

·       ethnically diversified (English, Irish, German, Dutch, Scots-Irish)

·       staple crops (wheat, corn) and family farms

·       large cities: New York, Philadelphia

The South – divided into Chesapeake and Lower South (Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia)

·       aristocratic-oligarchic society

·       slave-holding plantations of cash crops: tobacco, indigo, rice, cotton

·       small scattered white wealthy population versus large enslaved African-American population

·       lack of big cities – the main port: Charleston

Political and economic characteristics of the colonies

THREE TYPES

• crown (royal) colonies – governed directly by the crown through appointed governors

• proprietary colonies - land grants from the crown to individuals in return for political or financial favors (e.g. Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey)

• joint-stock (charter, corporate) colonies (e.g. Rhode Island, Connecticut) – began as charters to companies - set up their own government independent of the crown.

The king could revoke the colonial charter at any time and convert a proprietary or joint-stock colony into a royal colony (e.g. Virginia)

Colonial governors:

·       bound by instructions from England

·       mostly incompetent

·       wielding little power to force their will

Colonial assemblies:

·       elected officials dependent on popular sentiment

·       more interested in pleasing constituents than in obeying the governor

·       held more popular support than governor

·       controlled all means of raising revenue

Settlements mostly along the Atlantic coast (tidewater), slowly moving westward - pushing the frontier determines American life.

frontier settlers (poor) versus tidewater planters (rich)

First case of dissatisfaction: Nathaniel Bacon's rebellion against Governor of Virginia (1676)

Colonies largely unaffected by historical developments in 17^th-century England (civil war), but greatly affected by the NAVIGATION ACTS

·       passed under the theory of MERCANTILISM: wealth is to be increased by restricting colonial trade to the mother country rather than through free trade.

o   ships engaged in English colonial trade must be made in England (or America) and carry a crew at least 75% English

o   enumerated goods: tobacco, sugar, cotton, indigo, dyes, ginger, molasses, rice, naval stores can be only shipped to English ports

o   goods shipped to English colonies must pass through England

o   SALUTARY NEGLECT – enforced not too strictly

·       repealed in the 19^th century under the influence of a free trade philosophy

SLAVERY

In the late 17^th century SLAVERY replaces indentured servitude at southern plantations

The Middle Passage

Fewer slaves in northern colonies (domestic servants) than in southern colonies (plantation laborers)

·       17th century - about 1,000 Africans brought to North America per year

·       18th century - about 5.5 million slaves transported from Africa

Slavery becomes defined in colonial legislatures as a perpetual condition, transmitted through the mother (thereby also including the offspring of white masters and female slaves).

EARLY INDIAN WARS

Gradual extermination of Indian tribes along the Atlantic coast resulting from the outward expansion of settlers, epidemic diseases and conflicts, e.g.

• Indian massacre of 1622

• Pequot War, Connecticut (1636)

• King Philip’s War, Massachusetts (1675)

• Yamasee War, South Caroline (1715)

CULTURAL DEVELOPMENTS IN THE COLONIES

Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) –– epitome of American Enlightenment

• writer, publisher, philosopher, politician, inventor

• Poor Richard’s Almanac (1732 -1758)

• American Philosophical Society

• inventions: lightning rod, bifocals

free education in most colonies (in Britain in 1870)

Nine colleges established in colonial times, e.g.

• 1636 - Harvard College, Cambridge, Mass

• 1693 - William and Mary College, Williamsburg, Va.

• 1701 - Yale College, New Haven, Connecticut

• Brown, Princeton, Dartmouth, Columbia, Rutgers colleges - established by different religious groups

Main cultural centers: Boston and Philadelphia

first American newspapers:

• Publick Occurrences Both Forreign and Domestick (1690)

• The Boston News-Letter (1704)

•  

RELIGION IN COLONIES

Particular colonies were founded by different religious groups from Europe, mostly Protestant, both established and dissenters: Anglicans, Quakers, Baptists, Scots-Irish Presbyterians, French Huguenots, German Protestants, Catholics

Different religious patterns:

• theocracies – “as the best form of government in the commonwealth as well as in the Church”- intolerant and discriminating against other groups, e.g. Massachusetts, Connecticut

• religious diversity and tolerance, e.g. Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, Maryland

• established churches, e.g. southern colonies

Main religious developments:

1692 - Salem witch trials – example of infamous persecution

·       mass hysteria: women blamed for evil in the colony

·       witch hunt and hangings

·       William Penn: "There is no law in Pennsylvania against riding a broomstick"

·       Arthur Miller, The Crucible, 1953

The Great Awakenings - periods of religious revivals (increased enthusiasm) in American history led by evangelical itinerant ministers (Congregationalists, Presbyterians, Methodists, Baptists) resulting in an increase of interest in religion, evangelical church membership, and the formation of diverse religious movements and denominations.

The First Great Awakening (c. 1730–1755) – beginning in Massachusetts and spreading to Georgia and along the western frontier

• moving away from ritual, ceremony and hierarchy

• emotional reaction to formalistic religious practices

• stress on personal experience of salvation

• mass open-air meetings, conversions, splits from established churches

• more religious tolerance in the colonies and development of new denominations

• Jonathan Edwards, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God (1741)