Download The history of the United States 1492-1877

Lecture 2
The development of British North America
Methods of colonization
 Joint stock companies or individuals
 Permission from Crown
 Proprietary colony Maryland Earl of Baltimore
Pennsylvania, William Penn
 Charter colony: Plymouth, Massachusetts
Renewal of Colonization
 1607 May 6 Jamestown
 Established by the London Company
 Leading figure: Captain John Smith adventurer,
amateur geographer, historian, populizer of America
 The History of Virginia, New England, and the
Summer Isles
 Pocahontas episode, return to England after a
gunpowder explosion
The development of Jamestown
 Hard time for colonists until planting tobacco, first
tobacco yield 1616
 1619: Virginia House of Burgesses first legislative body
 Arrival of Africans as indentured workers on a Dutch
man o’war
 1622: March 22 Jamestown Massacre,
 1624: Royal charter revoked
Plymouth
 Established by Separatists in 1620
 Leader: William Bradford
 Mayflower Compact
 A mission for the glory of God, for the advancement of
Christian faith, and the honor of king and country
 1621: Wampanoag Indians help settlers, the first
Thanksgiving
 Main historical source: Of Plymouth Plantation
 1691: Becomes part of Massachusetts
Massachussetts 1630
 Massachusetts
 Congregationalists
 John Winthrop’s sermon A Model of Christian Charity
 “we shall be a city upon a hill”
 Puritan mission concept
The development of
Massachussetts
 Leading body: the General Court
 Semi-theocracy
 Challenges: Roger Williams a Separatist
 Anne Hutchinson: against Puritan patriarchy,
 Rejects covenant of works: good conduct would give
salvation, banished from colony
New York 1664
 New Netherlands
 Dutch East India company hired Henry Hudson
searching for the passage to the Orient
 1609: He discovered Delaware Bay, and the river
named after him
 1614: Dutch establish fur trading posts on Manhattan
Island
The development of New York
 1626: Governor Peter Minuit purchases Manhattan
from the Indians
 New Amsterdam will become capital of New
Netherlands
 James, Duke of York drives out Dutch in 1664
The influence of the Dutch
 Bredeweghe Broadway, Wall Street (original wall to
protect against Indians)
 Family names: Roosevelt, Van Buren, Rensselaer
 Traditions, customs: Santa Claus, Rip van Winkle,
 Vocabulary: boss, crib, stoop
Pennsylvania 1681
 William Penn,Quaker, follower of George Fox
 Religious tolerance, equality of sexes, rejection of war
and violence, rejection of rank
 Society of Friends
 Settlement of Non-conformists, Mennonites, Amish,
Baptists, Moravians
Georgia 1732
 Settling prisoners, buffer colony
 1733: Savannah founded by Oglethorpe
 Germans, but also Scottish Highlanders, Portuguese
Jews, Welsh provide a cosmopolitan character
 1753: Charter expired, colony reverted to the crown
British North America
 New England: Southern N.E. Rhode Island,
Connecticut, Massachusetts
 Northern N.E. Vermont, Maine, New Hampshire
 Mid-Atlantic colonies New York, New Jersey,
Pennsylvania Delaware
 South: Virginia, Carolinas (South Carolina, North
Carolina,) Georgia,
Reasons for successful colonization
 Colonies as business ventures
 Allowing the settlement of Non-conformists
 Contiguous settlement
 Not hostile terrain
New England
 Commerce, later industry
 Limited agriculture
 Participation in triangular trade
 New England to Slave Coast rum, exchange for slaves
 Middle Passage to Bahamas, exchange for molasses
 Molasses to N.E. rum is made again
Culture and society in New England
 Elements of Puritan perspective:
 Chosenness predestination
 Puritan work ethic
 Mission concept
 Manichean world view Good v. Evil
 Moderation
The South
 Plantation economy
 Land intensive large lands are needed
 Economy of scale only large scale production is
profitable
 Tidewater plantations located close to rivers flowing
into the Atlantic Ocean
 Staple crops
 Tobacco, cotton, rice