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Early American History Unit 1-The American Colonies: Discovery - 1763 Donaldson Europeans Explore the New World 1. 2. I felt called by God to explore the unknown Atlantic. My patience finally paid off. After 15 years of waiting and two rejections by Portugal, I persuaded King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella in 1492 to accept my terms of authority and money in the event of a successful expedition to the East Indies. Four trips across the Atlantic left me somewhat confused about my accomplishments. Penniless after finding some wealth and discouraged after failing to suppress an Indian uprising on my colony of Hispaniola, I returned to Spain disgraced and brokenhearted. My real accomplishment, the discovery of a new world was not realized until after my death when Europeans raced to settle and exploit the Americas. –Christopher Columbus I left Bristol, England aboard the Mathew on May 2, 1497. My crew of 18, my son Christian, and I landed either on Cape Breton Island, Newfoundland, or on the coast of Labrador – no one knows for sure, but I thought I had reached northeastern Asia and could quickly sail south and west to Japan. I claimed these lands for King Henry VII of England and he was so impressed that he gave me a large purse and additional funding for a larger expedition in 1498. I was going to help him acquire access to Asian goods without customs barriers, pirates, or go-betweens. My 1498 expedition failed to find Asia, but inspired my son Sebastian and other English explorers who continued to search for a Northwest Passage to Asia. John Cabot 3. Under the guidance of the experienced sailor, Bartholomeu Dias, my ship rounded the Cape of Good Hope in Southern Africa and completed a hazardous, 13- week voyage from Portugal to Calicut, India. I announced that we were searching for Christians and spices, but I really hoped for profits the new route to India seemed destined to bring. I chose to use my ship’s 20 guns to defend ourselves and make a show of force as part of my effort to establish an armed commercial embassy. My voyage gave Portugal a new trade route to the Far East and revealed inaccuracies in Ptolemy’s Geography, particularly with reference to the size of the earth and shape Asia. Vasco da Gama 4. It was my goal to find lots of treasure like that of the Incas captured by Francisco Pizarro or that captured from the Aztecs by Hernando Cortez. Legend had it that lots of treasure existed in a great city located somewhere in the north. I also hoped to find a passage from the Atlantic Ocean or maybe the Gulf of Mexico to the Pacific Ocean. Leaving Florida with 600 men and 213 horses in May 1539, I proceeded to march over 350,000 miles of North America in a four-year period. Unfortunately, the only wealth I found was fresh-water pearls. We fought Indians along the way, but my expedition discovered a “large river,” which we hoped would lead to the Pacific Ocean. I died before I could completely navigate this might river. I left its exploration and the quest for North American treasure and a Northwest Passage to Asia to future explores. Hernando de Soto Early American History Unit 1-The American Colonies: Discovery - 1763 Donaldson 5. Armed with knowledge of Balboa’s discovery of the Pacific Ocean and more precise geography of the eastern coast of South America, I set out in 1519 to prove the validity of Columbus’ original plan. My native Portugal had no interest in my plan-so I persuaded the Spanish government to sponsor five ships on an expedition to discover rich lands in the East, within the Spanish sphere indicated by the Line of Demarcation and by an all-Spanish route. Only one of my five ships, the Victoria, completed the three-year journey around the world. In the seemingly endless voyage across the Pacific, my men were reduced to gnawing leather from the masts and eating rats and biscuits soaked with rat urine. I was killed in the Philippines, but Sebastian del Cano assumed my command and guided fifteen crewmen back to Spain with precious cargo from the East. Thus our voyage demonstrated the vastness of the earth and the great expanse of water separating North America and Asia. Ferdinand Magellan 7. My life was driven by a passion to find a northern passage to Asia. During my four voyages that began in 1607, I explored the Arctic seas of northern Europe, the middle Atlantic coast of North America, and the bay that bears my name. My trips were never dull as I saw various bears, walruses, whales, and even a mermaid or two. In August 1608, my men forced be me to return home, thus ending my second voyage prematurely. My third voyage resulted in the exploration of the nowfamous river bearing my name, and my final voyage allowed me to penetrate the strait opening to the great bay of the north. After a terrible winter of suffering, my men mutinied again and sent me adrift in a small boat to die. Without me, they returned to England and were later acquitted of murder in a British court. I am convinced that they were freed only because they had seen the lands I had discovered and could tell the English our findings about the Northwest Passage. Henry Hudson 6. With royal support from King Charles V of Spain, I made my third attempt to conquer the treasures of the Incas of Peru in 1531. Reports indicated that Peru’s wealth was even greater than that of Mexico. As the illegitimate and illiterate son of Spanish peasants, I longed for the wealth of and prestige of other conquistadors. I was able to take advantage of a civil war between rival factions by posting to each side as the enemy of the other. My task was made easier, too, because the Inca population had already been cut in half with the introduction of European diseases. I captured Atahualpa, the Inca chief, and my men put him of trial, charged him with idolatry, polygamy, and other crimes, and executed him. The great wealth I acquired from the Incas brought a steep rise in prices in Europe and prompted English seadogs to attack our ships. Francisco Pizarro 8. Dreaming of finding a northern Peru, I accepted my government’s funding for expeditions in in 1534 and 1535 to find a passage to the Pacific and plant a French colony in North America. In my early travels I explored the Bay of Fundy and the northern coast of Newfoundland. I braved the bitter winter, suffered from scurvy, and faced the constant danger of ice as I sailed up the St. Lawrence only to encounter rapids and learn that the waterway was a river and not the coveted strait to the Pacific Ocean. Discovering fertile soil in the lower St. Lawrence Valley and Indians eager to trade furs for European trinkets seemed minor compared to my real dream. My final disappointment was the failure of my 1541 attempt to establish a French colony in the northern parts of the continent. As a result, my lack of success discouraged further French colonization for decades to come. Jacques Cartier Early American History 9. Unit 1-The American Colonies: Discovery - 1763 I first traveled to the Americas with Columbus on his second voyage in1493. I moved with my family to the island of Hispaniola and was appointed deputy governor. In 1506, I discovered the island of Puerto Rico and was ordered by the Spanish king to establish a colony there. I remained in Puerto Rico until 1510 when I received news that the king was replacing me as governor with Columbus’s son. This upset me so I set out to explore new lands located in the north. While in the Bahamas I heard of a legendary, magical spring from local Indians whose water was believed to make older people look young again. My quest for the fountain of youth and lust for gold led me to a beautiful new land in 1513 located in the north that I called La Florida or “place of flowers.” I explored both the east and west coasts of Florida and helped found a settlement near St. Augustine and another on the west coast near Charlotte Harbor. In 1521 I was seriously wounded in the thigh in an ambush by the Calusa Indians so we abandoned our western colony and returned to Cuba where I eventually died at age 61, never having found the fountain of youth. - Ponce de Leon 10. Although my mother and father were members of the Spanish nobility, I knew that I could not expect much of an inheritance because I was the third of four sons. Thus, I joined the Spanish army. I made my first journey to South America in 1500 where our expedition raided the northeastern coast. In 1502 I used my money to establish a pig farm on the island of Hispaniola, but I was not a very good farmer or businessman so I fled to the Darien – a region of dense jungle – in Panama just north of present-day Colombia and eventually became mayor of the city we founded, Santa Maria la Antigua de Darien. While exploring the harsh environment of southwestern Panama looking for gold and other possible sources of wealth in September 1513, our expedition, which included Francisco Pizarro, sighted a huge body of water we named the South Sea (the Pacific Ocean today). Tragically, before I could secure the ships and raise an expedition to explore the South Sea, I was arrested by a squad of soldiers led by Pizarro and charged with treason by a Governor Davila, my chief political rival. On January 1, 1519, I was beheaded along with four of my closest allies. Vasco de Balboa Donaldson 11. Growing up in western Spain, I had a reputation as an excellent student and spent some time in law school. Upon hearing great stories of the riches of the Americas, I dropped out of school and sailed to Santo Domingo in 1504 and settled in Cuba in 1511 I helped the Spanish army conquer Cuba. Hearing of a land to the west that had just been discovered that contained great wealth, I sailed for Mexico in 1518. Upon our landing at what is now called Veracruz, I made an alliance with some of the natives. From these Indians, I learned about a great civilization in the central part of Mexico called the Aztecs who were led by an emperor, Montezuma II. In 1519, I set out for the Aztec capital, Tenochtitlan, and we arrived after a grueling three month journey. Montezuma welcomed us a friends by bringing many gifts ( maybe because he thought we were gods on horseback) and we took him hostage and demanded a huge ransom in gold. The Aztecs soon drove us away, but we retreated to the coast where I organized a larger force to complete our conquest. By 1521 we had defeated the Aztecs with the help of European diseases that they had no immunity to. We built a new city, Mexico City, on top of the ruins of Tenochtitlan. I was made governor of a colony called New Spain and served from 1523-1528, but was recalled to Spain because the king grew suspicious of my power. While governor, I discovered and named California before my death in 1547. Hernando Cortez 12. Along with my cousin, John Hawkins, I went along on one of the first slaving voyages in 1567 for England bringing slaves from Africa to work in the New World. Our expedition was attacked by a Spanish squadron and at that moment the hated Spaniards became my personal, lifelong enemy! In 1572 I commanded two ships and led a marauding expedition against Spanish ports in the Caribbean Sea. When returned to England with a cargo of Spanish treasure, I learned that my reputation as an accomplished privateer (that is a polite term for a pirate) and Queen Elizabeth I secretly commissioned me to raid the Spanish colonies on the American Pacific coast. When I arrived home from this voyage with much Spanish plunder after sailing west, I became the first Englishman to circumnavigate the globe. Seven months later, our queen knighted me to the dismay of the Spanish king. In 1585, I sacked Spanish settlements in Florida and picked up unsuccessful English colonists at Roanoke off the Carolina coast. In 1588, I served as vice admiral of the fleet that destroyed the Spanish Armada and saved England from invasion. I gave my life in service to my country until my death from dysentery off the coast of Panama in 1596. Sir Francis Drake Early American History Unit 1-The American Colonies: Discovery - 1763 Donaldson