The American Pageant Chapter 3 Settling the Northern Colonies, 1619-1700 Cover Slide Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved

The American Pageant

Chapter 3

Settling the Northern Colonies, 1619-1700

Cover Slide

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

The Protestant Reformation Produces Puritanism

• 1517 - Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the Wittenberg Cathedral– Included several explosive ideas including– Bible alone was the source of God’s word (not the

Bible and the church or pope)– People are saved simply by faith in Christ alone (not

by faith and good works) – Actions ignited the Protestant Reformation


• John Calvin preached Calvinism which stressed “predestination” (those going to Heaven or hell has already been determined by God).– Doctrines were stated in the 1536 document entitled Institutes

of the Christian Religion– Stated that all humans were weak and wicked– Only the predestined could go to heaven, no matter what– Calvinists were expected to seek “conversions,” signs that

they were one of the predestined, and afterwards, lead “sanctified lives”

– Calvinists famous for working hard, dusk to dawn, to “prove” their worthiness

– Impact of Calvinism - vividly stamped on the psyche of Americans, and been called the “Protestant Work Ethic”


• In 1530s England, King Henry VIII - breaking ties with the Holy Roman Catholic Church

• Puritans - influenced to totally reform (“purify”) the Church of England

• The Puritans – Believed that only “visible saints” should be admitted to

church membership– Separatists vowed to break away from the Church of

England (AKA, the Anglican Church) because the “saints” would have to sit with the “damned.” (became the Pilgrims)

– King James I, father of the beheaded Charles I, harassed the Separatists out of England

• he thought that if people could defy him as their spiritual leader, they might defy him as their political ruler

The Pilgrims End Their Pilgrimage at Plymouth

• The Pilgrims (Separatists) - from Holland - fled to after they had left England– Concerned that their children were getting too “Dutchified” – Wanted a place where they were free to worship their own

religion and could live and die as good Pilgrims• Negotiated with the Virginia Company

– Separatists left Holland and sailed for 65 days at sea on the Mayflower– Arrived 1620 off the rocky coast of New England (only one person died and

one person was born) – Less than half of the pilgrims on the Mayflower were actually

Separatists– Contrary to myth, the Pilgrims undertook a few surveys before

deciding to settle at Plymouth, an area far from Virginia – The Pilgrims became squatters - people without legal right to

land and without specific authority to establish government

The Pilgrims End Their Pilgrimage at Plymouth

• Captain Myles Standish (AKA, “Captain Shrimp”) proved to be a great Indian fighter and negotiator

• Before leaving the ship - Pilgrims signed the Mayflower Compact - a set of rules to obey– Wasn’t a constitution but did set the standard for later

constitutions– Set the first step toward self-rule in the Northern colonies

• Winter of 1620-21, only 44 of the 102 survived • 1621 brought bountiful harvests and the first Thanksgiving• William Bradford

– chosen governor of Plymouth 30 times in the annual elections– great leader– helped Plymouth to survive and trade fur, fish, and lumber

• 1691 - Plymouth merged with the Massachusetts Bay Colony

The Bay Colony Bible Commonwealth

• 1629 - non-Separatist Puritans got a royal charter from England to settle in the New World– Secretly, they took the charter with them and later used it as a

type of constitution• Was a well-equipped group of 11 ships that carried about 1,000

people to Massachusett• John Winthrop was

– elected governor or deputy governor for 19 years– helped Massachusetts prosper in fur trading, fishing, and

shipbuilding

Building the Bay Colony• After the establishment of the colony

– Franchise (right to vote) was extended to all “freemen” - adult males who belonged to the Puritan congregations (later called the Congregational Church)

• two fifths of the male population– Un-churched men and women weren’t allowed into matters of

government• The provincial government was not a democracy

– Governor Winthrop feared and distrusted the common people, calling democracy the “meanest and worst” of all forms of government

• Religious leaders wielded powerful influence over the admission to church membership

Building the Bay Colony

• John Cotton, a prominent clergy member, was educated at Cambridge and had immigrated to Massachusetts to avoid persecution for his criticism of the Church of England

• Congregations could hire and fire their ministers at will• There were laws to limit Earthly pleasures

– a fine of twenty shillings for couples caught kissing in public• The Puritan concept of Hell was very serious, frightening,

and very real– Michael Wigglesworth’s “Day of Doom,” written in

1662, sold one copy for every twenty people

Trouble in the Bible Commonwealth

• Tensions arose in Massachusetts• Quakers were fined, flogged, and/or banished• Anne Hutchinson - very intelligent, strong-willed, talkative

woman– claimed that a holy life was no sure sign of salvation and that

the truly saved need not bother to obey the law of either God or man. A notion known as “antinomianism”

– Tried in 1638 - boasted that her beliefs were directly from God

– Banished from the colony and eventually made her way to Rhode Island

– Died in New York after an attack by Indians

Trouble in the Bible Commonwealth

• Roger Williams– Radical idealist – Hounded his fellow clergymen to make a clean and

complete break with the Church of England– Went on to deny that civil government could and

should govern religious behavior– Banished in 1635, and led the way for the Rhode Island

colony

The Rhode Island “Sewer”

• People who went to Rhode Island weren’t necessarily similar– Were unwanted everywhere else– Were against special privilege

• “Little Rhody” later known as “the traditional home of the otherwise minded”

• Secured a charter in 1644

New England Spreads Out• 1635 - Hartford, Connecticut founded• Reverend Thomas Hooker

– led an energetic group of Puritans west into Connecticut• 1639 - settlers of the new Connecticut River colony drafted the

Fundamental Orders – Basically a modern constitution

• 1638 - New Haven founded and merged into Connecticut• 1623 - Maine absorbed by Massachusetts and remained so for

nearly a century and a half• 1641 - New Hampshire absorbed into Massachusetts

– 1679 - king separated the two and made New Hampshire a royal colony

Puritans Versus Indians• Before 1620 - epidemic swept through the Indians, killing over ¾ • Indians tried to befriend the Whites

– Squanto, a Wampanoag, helped keep relative peace• 1637 - after mounting tensions exploded

– English settlers and the Pequot tribe fought - Pequot War• English set fire to a Pequot village on CT’s Mystic River• Annihilating the Indians and bringing about forty years of

tentative peace– Puritans did try to convert some of the Indians

• 1675, Metacom (called King Philip by the English) united neighboring Indians in a last-ditched attack that failed – King Philip’s War slowed the colonial western march

• Metacom was beheaded and quartered and • His head was stuck on a sharp pike for all to see, his wife

and son sold to slavery

Seeds of Colonial Unity and Independence

• 1643 - four colonies banded together to form the New England Confederation– Almost all Puritan– Weak, but still a notable milestone toward American unity

• Colonies - basically allowed to be semiautonomous commonwealths

• Charles II - restored to the British throne– Hoped to control his colonies more firmly– Shocked to find how much his orders were ignored by

Massachusetts – Punishment, a sea-to-sea charter was given to rival

Connecticut (1662), and a charter was given to Rhode Island (1663)

– 1684, Massachusetts’ charter was revoked

Andros Promotes the First American Revolution

• 1686 - Dominion of New England created – To bolster the colonial defense against Indians and – To tie the colonies closer to Britain by enforcing the hated

Navigation Acts - Acts forbade American trade with countries other than Britain

• Result - smuggling became common• Head of the Dominion - Sir Edmund Andros

– Headquarters in Boston – Openly showed association with the hated Church of England– Soldiers were vile-mouthed and despised by Americans – Responded to opposition by curbing town meetings, restricting

the courts and the press, and revoking all land titles– Taxed the people without their consent

Andros Promotes the First American Revolution

• People of England staged the Glorious Revolution, instating William and Mary to the crown– Dominion of New England collapsed– Massachusetts - new charter in 1691

• allowed all landowners to vote, as opposed to the previous law of voting belonging only to the church members

Old Netherlanders at New Netherland

• 17th Century - Netherlands revolted against Spain – Britain helped them gain independence

• The Dutch East India Company established– army of 10,000 men and a fleet of 190 ships

• Dutch West India Company raided rather than traded • 1609 - Henry Hudson ventured into Delaware and New York Bay

and claimed the area for the Netherlands • Dutch West India Company bought Manhattan Island• New Amsterdam a company town, run by and for the Dutch

company and in the interests of stockholders• Dutch gave patroonships (large areas of land) to promoters who

agreed to settle at least 50 people on them• New Amsterdam attracted people of all types and races

– One French Jesuit missionary counted 18 different languages being spoken on the street

Friction with English and Swedish Neighbors

• Indian’s attacked the Dutch for their cruelties • New England hostile against Dutch growth• Swedes trespassed Dutch reserves from 1638 to 1655

– planting the anemic colony of New Sweden on the Delaware River

• Dutch erected a wall in New Amsterdam - for which Wall Street is named today

• 1655 - Dutch sent one-legged Peter Stuyvesant to besiege the main Swedish fort and he won– ended Swedish colonial rule and left only Swedish log cabins

and place names as evidence that the Swedes were ever in Delaware

Dutch Residues in New York

• 1664 - Charles II granted the area of modern-day New York to his brother, the Duke of York– British troops landed and defeated the Dutch, kicking them

out, without much violence• New Amsterdam was renamed New York• Dutch Legacy

– People of New York retained their autocratic spirit– Dutch names of cities remained, like Harlem, Brooklyn, and

Hell Gate– Architecture left its mark on buildings– Dutch also gave us Easter eggs, Santa Claus, waffles,

sauerkraut, bowling, sleighing, skating, and golf

Penn’s Holy Experiment in Pennsylvania

• Quakers (characteristics) – “Quaked” under deep religious emotion– Offensive to religious and civil rule – Addressed everyone with simple “thee”s and “thou”s and

didn’t swear oaths because Jesus had said “Swear not at all,” this last part creating a problem, since you had to swear a test oath to prove that you weren’t Roman Catholic

– Stubborn and unreasonable, they were simple, devoted, democratic people against war and violence

• William Penn - well-born Englishman, embraced Quaker faith• 1681 - secured an immense grant of fertile land from the king

– Called Pennsylvania, in honor of Penn• Modest person he insisted that it be called Sylvania

– Best advertised of all the colonies

Quaker Pennsylvania and Its Neighbors

• Thousands of squatters lived in Pennsylvania• Philadelphia carefully planned with beautiful, wide streets • Penn bought land from the Indians (Chief Tammany)

– Patron saint of New York’s political Tammany Hall – Treatment of the Indians was gentle

• Quakers could walk through Indian territory unarmed without fear of being hurt

– Non-Quakers came to PA - mistreated the Indians• Freedom of worship - available to everyone except for Jews and

Catholics (only because of pressure from London)• Death penalty for murder and treason• No restrictions on immigration, and naturalization was easy • Quakers developed a dislike toward slavery

Quaker Pennsylvania and Its Neighbors

• PA attracted a variety of people from all races, class, and religion– 1700, only VA was more populous and richer

• Penn not well-liked – Friendliness towards James II, the deposed Catholic king– Jailed at times, and also suffered a paralytic stroke, dying full

of sorrows• New Jersey and Delaware prospered

The Middle Way in the Middle Colonies• New York, New Jersey, Delaware, and Pennsylvania

– All had fertile soil and broad expanse of land– All except for Delaware exported lots of grain– Susquehanna River tapped the fur trade of the interior, and the

rivers were gentle, with little cascading waterfalls – Middle colonies the middle way between New England and the

southern plantation states • Landholdings were generally intermediate in size

– Middle colonies more ethnically mixed than other colonies– Considerable amount of economic and social democracy– Benjamin Franklin, born in Boston, entered Philadelphia as a

seventeen-year-old in 1720 with a loaf of bread under each arm and immediately found a congenial home in the urbane, open atmosphere of the city.

– Americans realize that not only were they surviving, but that they were also thriving

Makers of America: The English• 1600s - England undergoing a massive population boom• About 75% of English immigrants were indentured servants• Most of them were young men from the “middling classes” • Some fled during the cloth trade slump while others were forced

off their land due to enclosure• 40% of indentured servants died before seven years were over • 17th century - supply of indentured servants ran out, southerners

resolved to employ black slaves• 1629 – 1642 - Puritans swarmed to Massachusetts Bay Colony • Puritans migrated in family groups, not alone • Puritans brought the way of life from England with them

– Marblehead, Mass. mostly fishermen because immigrants had been fisherman in England

Beaver as Worker and Prey, from Chatelain's Carte Tres Curieuse de la Mer du Sud, Atlas Historique, vol. VI

Beaver as Worker and Prey, from Chatelain's Carte Tres Curieuse de la Mer du Sud, Atlas Historique, vol. VIThis French engraving illustrates beavers' environmental impact and Indian methods of hunting them for commercial purposes. (National Archives of Canada)


Petition for bail from accused witches, 1692

This is a copy of the actual petition signed by the accused witches of the Salem witchcraft trials. (Library of Congress)

Petition for bail from accused witches, 1692


The Stadthuys of New York, 1679Its location at the mouth of the Hudson River made the Dutch settlement of New Amsterdam a particularly important colonial trading center. Furs flowed down the river from Fort Orange (near modern Albany, New York) while guns, tools, and other trade goods traveled the other way. Both river and sea traffic were central to the city's existence as shown in this painting of the Dutch statehouse (stadthuys) from 1679, which overlooked the harbor. (Prints Collection, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photography. The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox, and Tilden Foundation)

The Stadthuys of New York, 1679


View of Quebec, 1699, showing Canadian IndiansNew France's security was built on its rising commercial economy and its close ties to Canada's Indians. (National Archives of Canada)

View of Quebec, 1699, showing Canadian Indians


Map: Atlantic Trade Routes

Atlantic Trade RoutesBy the late seventeenth century, an elaborate trade network linked the countries and colonies bordering the Atlantic Ocean. The most valuable commodities exchanged were enslaved people and the products of slave labor.


Map: Louisiana, c. 1720

Louisiana, c. 1720By 1720 French forts and settlements dotted the Mississippi River and its tributaries in the interior of North America. Two isolated Spanish outposts were situated near the Gulf of Mexico.


Map: New York Manors and Land Grants

New York Manors and Land GrantsBetween 1684 and 1703, English governors awarded most of the best land east of the Hudson River as manors to prominent politicians--the majority of them Dutch--whose heirs became the wealthiest elite in the rural northern colonies.


Map: The Geography of Witchcraft: Salem Village, 1692

The Geography of Witchcraft: Salem Village, 1692 Geographic patterns of witchcraft testimony mirrored tensions within Salem Village. Accused witches and their defenders lived mostly in the village's eastern division or in Salem town, whereas their accusers overwhelmingly resided in the village's western sector.


Map: The Middle Colonies

The Middle ColoniesThis map shows the major towns, cities, and forts in the colonies of New York, Pennsylvania (including Delaware), and New Jersey. The prosperity of the region was based on the thriving commerce of its largest cities, Philadelphia and New York, and on the commercial production of wheat.


Map: The Settlements of the Lower South

The Settlements of the Lower SouthThis map shows the towns and fortifications of North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia, as well as the overlapping claims by the Spanish and the English to the territory south and west of Fort King George. The many Georgia forts reflect that colony's role as a buffer state between rice-rich South Carolina and the Spanish troops stationed in Florida.


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The American Pageant Chapter 3 Settling the Northern Colonies, 1619-1700 Cover Slide Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved