First European Footholdsin North America

Spanish Colonization

• Failed efforts in Eastern North American were searches for wealth and natives

• Hopes for discoveries similar to Aztecs or Incas failed: no gold or empires found in North

• Juan Ponce de Leon failed to find fountain of youth, gold or empire

• 1565: Base established at St. Augustine, Florida

• Friars journeyed into southwest: New Mexico, mixture of missionaries and brutal encomienda ranchers

San Miguel is the oldest church in the US (1610)

French Colonization• Initial attempts to colonize

St Lawrence river area failed, due to Indian defense

• 1564: Huguenots (Calvinists) created colony in today’s South Carolina, but killed by Spanish

• French fur traders gradually built relations with Indians, and exploited fur resources for sale in France

• 1598-1604: Gov’t-sponsored outposts established in Acadia

• Champlain established French outpost in eastern Canada

Virginia: 1607

• Public joint-stock company—share risk, share investment, driven to create short-term profits

• 1607: founded as economic venture—desperate financial failure

– Initial disdain for hard work

– Systematic fraud by officials against shareholders

– High death rate: malnutrition, disease, warfare

– Continued fighting with Powhatans

Jamestown, 1607

Virginia: 1607

• Most settlers are men; few intend to stay entire life in America

• Indentured servitude: serve for 7 years to pay for voyage

• 1619: Slavery introduced to Virginia

• John Smith: former military leader instilled some sense of order

• Tobacco becomes profitable crop, especially after use of slavery

• House of Burgesses: representation for landowning adult males

• Financial failure led to Virginia becoming Royal Colony in 1624

Massachusetts Pilgrims: 1620

• Mayflower sails with Separatist “Pilgrims”

• Intend to separate completely from Church of England; persecuted by James I; left England to live in Holland

• William Bradford: devout separatist

• Intending to land in “Virginia,” land on northern shore of Cape Cod

• Mayflower Compact: create political organization loyal to king

• Mixture of adventurers and devout Separatists

• Thanksgiving: praise for surviving difficult first year

Massachusetts Bay Colony

• “Great Migration” of Puritans to Massachusetts Bay Colony

• Intend to create “City on a Hill” and purify Church of England

• John Winthrop: deeply religious lawyer, elected governor 12 times

• 1630-1640 saw 10,000 settlers emigrate to MBC

• Founded Boston; Soon incorporated Plymouth colony

Conclusions

• Colonists represented desire for personal freedoms -- religious and financial.

• Most colonists left England in pursuit of personal improvement, not as a desire simply to leave England.

• Colonists were fiercely independent, but considered themselves English.

• Government in every colony evolved towards democratic systems, even those that were originally patterned on monarchies.

• Focus on large plantations in the south, with nascent industry and small farms in the north, created social differences between north and south.

• The original colonial borders became the borders of the first states.

Powhatan Indian