Chapter 3- Colonial America (1587-1770)
Lesson 1- Roanoke and Jamestown
The Mystery of Roanoke

• Sir Francis Drake- stole Spanish treasure on its way from the Americas to Europe
• English efforts to start a colony in North America were unsuccessful
• Sir Walter Raleigh sent settlers to Roanoke Island (off the coast of North Carolina)  in 1585
  • Colonists returned to England after a bad winter
• Raleigh sent another group, led by John White, in 1587
  • Virginia Dare- White’s granddaughter and the first English child born in North America
  • White returned to England to get more supplies and settlers
    • War with Spain delayed his return for nearly three years
    • Colony had disappeared when White returned (Croatoan)

 
Success at Jamestown

• King James I wanted a colony in North America
  • Merchants wanted a charter (a document that granted the right to form a colony) from the king

 
The Virginia Company

• The Virginia Company of London was a joint stock company (a company in which investors buy stock in return for a share of its future profits)
  • Wanted settlers to find gold and establish trade in fish and furs
  • Granted a charter for a colony by James I
  • Sent settlers in December 1606
  • Arrived in the Chesapeake Bay area in April 1607
  • Named their colony Jamestown

 
Jamestown Survives

• Settlers did not find gold or riches
  • Faced disease and hunger
• Captain John Smith- forced the settlers to work
  • Got food from the Powhatan people
  • Returned to England in late 1609
    • “Starving time” after he left and the Powhatan people stopped providing food
• More colonists arrived to replace people who had died
  • Made money for investors by growing tobacco

 
More Settlers Come to Virginia

• John Rolfe- married Pocahontas, Chief Powhatan’s daughter
  • Improved relations with Native Americans
• Women sent to Jamestown
• Headright- a 50-acre grant of land given to colonial settlers who paid their own way; helped the colony succeed
• Land-owning men could vote for burgesses (representatives)
  • Burgesses made laws for the colony
  • House of Burgesses- first legislature in North America elected by the people
• Jamestown was growing, but not making money
  • King James took away the company’s charter
    • Virginia became a royal colony (controlled directly by the government of England)

 
Lesson 2- New England Colonies
Seeking Religious Freedom

• England had been a Protestant country since 1534 (Anglican Church)
• Many people dissented (disagreed with) Anglican beliefs or practices
  • Some English people remained Catholic
  • Some Protestants wanted to reform the Anglican Church (Puritians)
  • Separatists wanted to set up their own churches
• Separatists were persecuted (mistreated because of their beliefs
  • Some fled to the Netherlands 
    • Religious freedom, but hard to find work

 
The Pilgrims Settle Plymouth

• Pilgrims- Separatists who decided to move to America in 1620
• Grants of land from the Virginia Company- religious freedom in Virginia
• The Mayflower left for North America in September 1620
  • Arrived in Plymouth instead of Virginia in November

 
The Mayflower Compact

• Plymouth- outside the territory of the Virginia Company
• Mayflower Compact- set up an organized orderly government
  • Signers promised to obey laws they created
  • Step toward representative, democratic government

 
Native American Help

• Almost half of the Pilgrims died during the winter
• Squanto and Samoset befriended the colonists in the spring
  • Helped the Pilgrims grow corn, beans, pumpkins
  • Showed the Pilgrims where to hunt and fish
  • Helped the Pilgrims make a treaty with the Wampanoag
    • Thanksgiving feast in the fall of 1621

 
New Colonies

• Puritans formed the Massachusetts Bay Company
  • Received a charter for a colony north of Plymouth in 1629
• John Winthrop led about 900 settlers to Massachusetts Bay in 1630
  • Settled in Boston
• Great Migration- the movement of more than 15,000 Puritans to Massachusetts in the 1630s
• Winthrop and his assistants made the laws
  • Settlers demanded a larger role in government in 1634
    • Adult male church members allowed to vote (property ownership became a requirement later)
• Puritans had little tolerance (the ability to accept or put up with different views or behaviors) for different beliefs
  • Strictly enforced religious rules
  • Led to new colonies

 
Connecticut and Rhode Island

• Connecticut River Valley- better for farming than the stony soil around Boston
• Thomas Hooker didn’t like Puritan leaders
  • Founded Hartford in 1636
  • Other towns formed the Connecticut colony with Hartford in 1639
    • Fundamental Orders of Connecticut- first written constitution in America; democratic principles
• Roger Williams believed the government should not force people to worship in a certain way
  • Forced to leave Massachusetts in 1635
  • Bought land from the Narraganset and founded Providence
  • Rhode Island- religious toleration, first place in America where people of all faiths could worship freely
• John Wheelwright led dissidents from Massachusetts and founded the town of Exeter in 1638
  • New Hampshire became an independent colony in 1679

 
Conflict with Native Americans

• Native Americans traded with colonists
• Settlers started moving onto Native American lands
• Wampanoag leader Metacomet (King Philip) went to war against the New England colonies in 1675
  • Got help from other Native Americans
  • War lasted 14 months
  • Colonists won
    • Destroyed the power of Native Americans in New England
    • Colonial settlement expanded

 
Lesson 3- Middle Colonies
New York and New Jersey

• 1660- two groups of English colonies
  • New England colonies in the north
  • Virginia and Maryland in the south
  • New Netherland in between
• New Amsterdam- main Dutch settlement on Manhattan Island
  • Good seaport with access to the Hudson River
  • Center of shipping to and from the Americas
• Dutch West India Company offered gave large grants of land to patroons (landowner in the Dutch colonies who ruled over large areas of land)
  • Patroons ruled like kings
  • Settlers owed patroons labor and a share of their crops

 
New Netherland Becomes New York

• England sent a fleet to attack New Amsterdam in 1664
  • Peter Stuyvesant- governor who surrendered to the English without a fight
• Charles II gave the colony to his brother, the Duke of York
  • Colony renamed New York
  • Proprietary colony- proprietor (owner) owned all land and controlled the government
    • English government allowed citizens to elect their legislature in 1691
  • Diverse population- Dutch, German, Swedish, and Native American people; first Jews in North America
  • Population grew quickly
  • New Amsterdam renamed New York City

 
Founding New Jersey

• Duke of York gave land between the Hudson and Delaware Rivers to Lord John Berkeley and Sir George Carteret (became New Jersey)
  • Offered settlers land, religious freedom, trial by jury, and a representative assembly
  • Diverse population- many different ethnic groups (racial, religious, national backgrounds)
  • No natural harbors meant it didn’t develop a major port or city
  • Proprietors didn’t make large profits
    • Became a royal colony in 1702

 
Pennsylvania and Delaware

• Quakers- Protestant group persecuted in England; founded Pennsylvania
  • William Penn- received land in payment for a debt the king owed to his father father had loaned the kin
• Quakers beliefs:
  • Everyone was equal
  • People could follow their own “inner light” instead of the teachings of a religious leader
  • Pacifists- refused to use force or fight in wars
• Penn designed Philadelphia and wrote Pennsylvania’s first constitution
  • Penn believed settlers should pay Native Americans for land and negotiated treaties with Native Americans over land
• English, Welsh, Irish, Dutch, and German settlers came to Pennsylvania
• Charter of Privileges- granted colonists the right to elect a legislative assembly in 1701
• Philadelphia- America’s most prosperous city and most popular port
• Penn allowed southern counties to form their own legislature
  • Functioned as a separate colony (Delaware)
    • Remained under the authority of Pennsylvania’s governor

 
Lesson 4- Southern Colonies
Virginia and Maryland

• Virginia- high demand for workers to grow tobacco
  • First group of African slaves arrived in 1619
• England sent criminals and prisoners of war to the colonies
• Indentured servants- laborers who agreed to work without pay for a certain period of time in exchange for passage to America

 
Founding Maryland

• King Charles gave Sir George Calvert (Lord Baltimore) a proprietary colony north of Virginia (Maryland)
  • Catholic colony
  • Calvert’s son gave large estates to English aristocrats
    • Indentured servants and enslaved Africans worked on the plantations
• Pennsylvania and Maryland argued over their border
  • Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon were hired to settle the dispute (Mason-Dixon Line)
• Calverts welcomed Protestants and Catholics
  • Protestants outnumbered Catholics
  • Act of Toleration (1649)- Protestants and Catholics could worship freely
  • Maryland established an official Protestant Church in 1692

 
Rebellion in Virginia

• Settlers moved west onto Native American lands
• Governor William Berkeley made a deal with Native Americans
  • Virginia got a large piece of land
  • Berkeley would keep settlers from moving farther into their territory
• Nathaniel Bacon lived in western Virginia
  • Opposed the colonial government
  • Other westerners blamed the government for not clearing the colony of Native Americans
• Bacon led attacks on Native American villages in 1676
  • Bacon’s army burned Jamestown
  • English troops restored order after Bacon’s death

 
The Carolinas and Georgia

• Charles II created a proprietary colony south of Virginia in 1663 (Carolina)
  • Given to eight nobles
• Proprietors sold or rented land to English settlers
• English philosopher John Locke wrote the constitution (plan of government) for Carolina
  • Wrote about land division and social rank

 
Two Carolinas

• Northern Carolina was settled mostly by farmers from Virginia
  • Grew tobacco and sold timber and tar
  • Used Virginia’s ports
• Southern Carolina used fertile farmland and the harbor at Charles Town
  • Rice became the leading crop
    • Demand for slave labor rose
  • Eliza Lucas developed the indigo crop in the 1740s
    • Used to dye cloth
• Settlers in southern Carolina seized control from its proprietors in 1719
  • Carolina split into two royal colonies (North Carolina and South Carolina) in 1729

 
Georgia

• Founded in 1733
• James Oglethorpe received a charter for a colony for debtors (people that owe money) and poor people
• Colony’s location would protect other British colonies from Spanish attack
  • Built forts and the town of Savannah
• Few debtors settled in Georgia
• Religious refugees and some Jews
• Limits on landholding and bans on slave labor and rum
  • Settlers complained and Oglethorpe agreed to their demands
• Became a royal colony in 1751