The American Colonies Emerge
Spain establishes an
American empire,
devastating native
populations. England
forces the Dutch from
North America and
establishes thirteen
colonies.
Malinche, a slave fluent in Maya and
Aztec, served as interpreter for the
conqueror Hernando Cortés.
NEXT
SECTION
1
Spain’s Empire in the Americas
The Spanish Claim a New Empire
Cortés Subdues the Aztec
• Conquistadors (conquerors)—Spanish explorers,
seek gold, silver
• 1519 Hernándo Cortés leads army into Americas,
claims land for Spain
• Aztec dominate region; Nahua people who resent
Aztec join Cortés
• Montezuma thinks Cortés a god; gives him share
of Aztec gold
• In 1520 Aztec rebel; in 1521 Spanish and their
allies defeat Aztec
• Cortés founds Mexico City, New Spain colony on
Tenochtitlán ruins
Map
Continued . . .
NEXT
European Explorations
Looking for “El Dorado”
The First Spanish Conquests:
The Aztecs
vs.
Fernando Cortes
Montezuma II
Mexico Surrenders to Cortés
The First Spanish Conquests:
The Incas
vs.
Francisco
Pizarro
Atahualpa
SPAIN CONTROLLED MOST OF SOUTH AND CENTRAL
AMERICA, MUCH OF THE CARIBBEAN, AND PARTS OF
NORTH AMERICA. HOWEVER TERRITORY THAT LARGE
WAS DIFFICULT TO CONTROL AND THEREFORE WAS OPEN
TO ATTACK. OTHER EUROPEAN COUNTRIES HAD SEEN THE
RICHES BROUGHT BACK BY SPAIN AND WERE EAGER TO
STAKE A CLAIM.
SLAVERY WAS AN
OLD INSTITUTION
•IT HAD BEEN PRACTICED FOR
MANY CENTURIES IN MOST
SOCIETIES THROUGHOUT THE
WORLD
•GENERALLY SLAVES WERE WAR
PRISONERS, NON-BELIEVERS OF
THE RELIGION OF THEIR
CONQUERORS, AND POOR PEOPLE
WHO INDENTURED THEMSELVES
TO GET OUT OF DEBT
•SLAVERY IN THE AMERICAS
DIFFERED IN THAT EARLIER
FORMS OF SLAVERY WERE NOT
PERMANENT, INVOLVING
MULTIPLE GENERATIONS,
DENYING EDUCATION, MARRIAGE,
PARENTHOOD, AND DID NOT
DEGRADE SLAVES TO SUB-HUMAN
STATUS. IT ALSO HAD NOT BEEN
PRIMARILY RACE-BASED.
Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade
AFRICANS WERE BROUGHT TO THE AMERICAS
EUROPEANS, IN THEIR
PUSH FOR WEALTH,
FORCED NATIVE
AMERICANS TO WORK AS
SLAVES IN MINES AND IN
SUGAR CANE FIELDS
AS THE NATIVE
POPULATION FLED AND
DIED FROM DISEASES THE
SPANIARDS LOOKED TO
AFRICA AS A LABOR
SOURCE
MOST OF THE AFRICANS
WERE FROM THE WEST
COAST OF AFRICA
SLAVES WERE TAKEN
FIRST TO THE CARIBBEAN
AND SOUTH AMERICA
EVENTUALLY SLAVERY
WAS BROUGHT TO NORTH
AMERICA
MAP OF THE REGION
IN AFRICA WHERE
MOST PEOPLE WERE
TAKEN FROM
TALLY SHEET FROM AN
ACTUAL CARGO OF
SLAVES
Slave Ship
AFRICANS
CRAMMED
ONTO A SHIP
FOR
TRANSPORT
TO BECOME
SLAVES
African Captives
Thrown Overboard
European Empires in the Americas
Chapter One:
The Meeting of Cultures
• Europe Looks Westward
– Northern Outposts
• Missions and Presidios
• St. Augustine
• Pueblo Revolt of 1680
Pueblo Ruins in New Mexico
(CORBIS / Royalty-Free)
Cycle of Conquest &
Colonization
Explorers
Official
European
Colony!
The Spanish Colonial Class System
Peninsulares
Mestizos
Native Indians
Creoles
Mulattos
Black Slaves
SECTION
1
continued The
Spanish Claim a New Empire
Spanish Pattern of Conquest
• Spanish settlers mostly men, called peninsulares;
marry native women
• Mestizo—person of mixed Spanish and Native
American ancestry
• Landlords use encomienda—force natives to farm,
ranch, mine
• Priests object, encomienda abolished; Africans
brought as slaves
NEXT
SECTION
1
The Conquistadors Push North
Other Countries Explore North America
• England, France, Netherlands sponsor voyages in
1500s and 1600s
Exploring Florida
• Juan Ponce de León discovers and names La
Florida (1513)
• Pedro Menéndez de Avilés expels French, founds
St. Augustine (1565)
Settling the Southwest
• In 1540, Francisco Vásquez de Coronado leads
expedition to Southwest
• Pedro de Peralta, governor of New Mexico,
Spain’s northern holdings
• He helps found Santa Fe (1609–1610); several
missions built in area
NEXT
SECTION
1
Resistance to the Spanish
Conflict in New Mexico
• Priests convert many Native Americans, try to
suppress their culture
• In 1670s Spanish force natives to pay tribute, do
labor for missions
Popé’s Rebellion
• Pueblo religious leader Popé heads uprising in
New Mexico (1680)
• Pueblo destroy Spanish churches, execute
priests, force Spanish out
• Spanish armies regain area 14 years later
NEXT
SECTION
2
An English Settlement
at Jamestown
English Settlers Struggle in North America
The Business of Colonization
• Joint-stock companies—investors fund colony,
get profits
• In 1607, Virginia Company sends 150 people to
found Jamestown
A Disastrous Start
• Colonists seek gold, suffer from disease and
hunger
• John Smith forces colonists to farm; gets help
from Powhatan people
• (1609) 600 colonists arrive; Powhatan destroy
farms; “starving time”
Continued . . .
NEXT
English Colonization
The Charter of the Virginia Company:
 Guaranteed to
colonists the same
rights as Englishmen
as if they had stayed
in England.
 This provision was
incorporated into
future colonists’
documents.
 Colonists felt that, even in
the Americas, they had the
rights of Englishmen!
England Plants the Jamestown
“Seedling”
Late 1606  VA Co. sends out 3
ships
Spring 1607  land at mouth of
Chesapeake Bay.
 Attacked by Indians and move on.
May 24, 1607  about 100 colonists [all
men] land at Jamestown, along banks of
James River
 Easily defended, but swarming with
disease-causing mosquitoes.
Chesapeake Bay
Geographic/environmental problems??
Jamestown Fort & Settlement
Map
Jamestown Housing
Jamestown Settlement
Jamestown Chapel, 1611
The Jamestown Nightmare
1606-1607  40 people died on the
voyage to the New World.
1609  another ship from England lost its
leaders and supplies in a shipwreck off
Bermuda.
Settlers died by the dozens!
“Gentlemen” colonists would not work
themselves.
 Game in forests & fish in river uncaught.
Settlers wasted time looking for gold
instead of hunting or farming.
Captain John Smith:
The Right Man for the Job??
There was no talk…but dig gold, wash
gold, refine gold, load gold…
Pocahontas
Pocahontas “saves”
Captain John Smith
A 1616
engraving
High Mortality Rates
The “Starving Time”:
1607: 104 colonists
By spring, 1608: 38 survived
1609: 300 more immigrants
By spring, 1610: 60 survived
1610 – 1624: 10,000 immigrants
1624 population: 1,200
Adult life expectancy: 40 years
Death of children before age 5:
80%
Indentured Servitude
Headright System:
 Each Virginian got 50 acres for
each person whose passage they
paid.
Indenture Contract:
 5-7 years.
 Promised “freedom dues” [land, £]
 Forbidden to marry.
 1610-1614: only 1 in 10 outlived
their indentured contracts!
English Tobacco Label
First Africans arrived in Jamestown in 1619.
 Their status was not clear  perhaps slaves, perhaps
indentured servants.
 Slavery not that important until the end of the 17c.
SECTION
2
The Settlers Clash with Native Americans
The English Pattern of Conquest
• English do not live or intermarry with Native
Americans
The Settlers Battle Native Americans
• Continued hostilities between Powhatan and English
after starving time
• 1614 marriage of Pocahontas and John Rolfe
creates temporary peace
• Renewed fighting; king makes Virginia royal colony
under his control
NEXT
Tobacco Plant
Virginia’s gold and silver.
-- John Rolfe, 1612
Early Colonial Tobacco
1618 — Virginia produces 20,000 pounds of
tobacco.
1622 — Despite losing nearly one-third of
its colonists in an Indian attack,
Virginia produces 60,000 pounds of
tobacco.
1627 — Virginia produces 500,000 pounds
of tobacco.
1629 — Virginia produces 1,500,000 pounds
of tobacco.
Tobacco Prices: 1618-1710
Why did tobacco prices decline so precipitously?
Chief Powhatan
Powhatan Confederacy
 Powhatan dominated a
few dozen small tribes
in the James River
area when the English
arrived.
 The English called all
Indians in the area
Powhatans.
 Powhatan probably saw
the English as allies in his
struggles to control other
Indian tribes in the region.
Powhatan Confederacy
Powhatan
Indian Village
Virginia
House of Burgesses
SECTION
2
Economic Differences Split Virginia
Hostilities Develop
• Former indentured people settle frontier,
cannot vote, pay high taxes
• Frontier settlers battle natives; tension between
frontier, wealthy
• Governor refuses to give money to help frontier
fight local natives
Bacon’s Rebellion
• Nathaniel Bacon raises army to fight natives
on frontier (1676)
• Governor calls Bacon’s army illegal; Bacon sets
fire to Jamestown
NEXT
Frustrated Freemen
Late 1600s  large numbers of
young, poor, discontented men in the
Chesapeake area.
 Little access to land or women for
marriage.
1670  The Virginia Assembly
disenfranchised most landless men!
Nathaniel Bacon’s Rebellion: 1676
Led 1,000 Virginians
in a rebellion against
Governor Berkeley
Nathaniel
Bacon
Governor
William
Berkeley
 Rebels resented
Berkeley’s close
relations with
Indians.
 Berkeley
monopolized the fur
trade with the
Indians in the area.
 Berkley refused to
retaliate for Indian
attacks on frontier
settlements.
Bacon’s Rebellion
Rebels attacked Indians, whether
they were friendly or not to
whites.
Governor Berkeley driven from
Jamestown.
They burned the capital.
 Rebels went on a rampage of
plundering.
Bacon suddenly died of fever.
Berkeley brutally crushed the
rebellion and hanged 20 rebels.
SECTION
3
Puritan New England
Puritans Create a “New England”
Puritans and Pilgrims
• Puritans, religious group, want to purify Church
of England
• Separatists, including Pilgrims, form independent
congregations
• In 1620, Pilgrims flee to escape persecution,
found Plymouth Colony
The Massachusetts Bay Company
• In 1630, joint-stock company founds
Massachusetts Bay Colony
• John Winthrop is Puritan colony’s first governor
Continued . . .
NEXT
THE PILGRIMS, RELIGIOUS SEPARATISTS FROM
THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND, SAILED ON THE
MAYFLOWER AND LANDED AT PLYMOUTH ROCK IN
MASSACHUSETTS IN 1620
The Mayflower
1620  a group of 102
people [half Separatists]
 Negotiated with the
Virginia Company to
settle in its
jurisdiction.
 Non-Separatists
included Captain Myles
Standish.
Plymouth Bay way
outside the domain of the Virginia
Company.
 Became squatters without legal right to land
& specific authority to establish a govt.
The Mayflower Compact
November 11, 1620
The Mayflower Compact
November 11, 1620
Written and signed before the Pilgrims
disembarked from the ship.
Not a constitution, but an agreement to
form a crude govt. and submit to
majority rule.
 Signed by 41 adult males.
Led to adult male settlers meeting in
assemblies to make laws in town
meetings.
SECTION
3
continued Puritans
Create a “New England”
“City Upon a Hill”
• Puritan adult males vote for General Court;
Court chooses governor
Church and State
• Civic officials are church members, have duty to do
God’s will
Importance of the Family
• Puritans generally migrate as families
• Community makes sure family members behave in
“God-fearing” way
Continued . . .
NEXT
SECTION
3
Dissent in the Puritan Community
The Founding of Providence
• Roger Williams—extreme Separatist minister
with controversial views
• General Court orders his arrest; Williams flees
• In 1636 he founds colony of Providence
- negotiates for land with Narragansett tribe
- guarantees separation of church and state,
religious freedom
Anne Hutchinson Banished
• Anne Hutchinson teaches church, ministers
are unnecessary
• Hutchinson banished 1638; family, followers
leave colony
NEXT
The Pequot Wars: 1636-1637
Pequots  very
powerful tribe
in CT river valley.
1637  Pequot
War
 Whites, with
Narragansett
Indian allies,
attacked Pequot
village on Mystic
River.
 Whites set fire
to homes & shot fleeing survivors!
 Pequot tribe virtually annihilated an uneasy peace
lasted for 40 years.
King Philip’s War (1675-1676}
Only hope for Native
Americans to resist
white settlers was to
UNITE.
Metacom [King Philip to
white settlers]
 Massasoit’s son united
Indians and staged
coordinated attacks
on white settlements throughout New England.
 Frontier settlements forced to retreat to Boston.
King Philip’s War (1675-1676}
The war ended in failure for the Indians
 Metacom beheaded and drawn and quartered.
 His son and wife sold into slavery.
 Never a serious threat in New England again!!
Population of the New England Colonies
SECTION
4
Settlement of the Middle Colonies
The Dutch Found New Netherland
A Diverse Colony
• In 1621, the Dutch West India Company colonizes
New Netherland
• Settlers from other European countries and Africa
welcomed
• Dutch trade for furs with Native Americans
English Takeover
• In 1664, duke of York becomes proprietor (owner)
of New Netherland
- renames colony New York
- later gives part of land to friends, names it
New Jersey
NEXT
THE DUTCH COLONIZED
THE AREA KNOWN AS
NEW YORK AND NEW
JERSEY TODAY AROUND
1626. THEY CONTROLLED
THE REGION UNTIL 1664
WHEN THEY LOST IT TO
THE ENGLISH AS A
RESULT OF WAR. KING
CHARLES II GRANTED
NEW YORK TO HIS
BROTHER JAMES AND
NEW JERSEY TO 2
NOBLEMEN WHO NAMED
IT AFTER THE ISLE OF
JERSEY IN THE ENGLISH
CHANNEL.
New Amsterdam, 1664
Dutch Residue in New York
Early 20c Dutch Revival
Building in NYC.
New York
City
seal.
Names  Harlem, Brooklyn
Architecture  gambrel roof
Customs  Easter eggs, Santa Claus,
waffles, bowling, sleighing, skating.
PENNSYLVANIA (PART OF WHICH LATER BECAME
DELAWARE) WAS GRANTED TO WILLIAM PENN TO
PAY A DEBT TO HIS FATHER
PENN WAS A
QUAKER WHO
BELIEVED IN
PACIFISM AND
HUMAN
EQUALITY. HE
ADVERTISED
HEAVILY
THROUGHOUT
NORTHERN
EUROPE AND
ENDED UP WITH
PEOPLE FROM
VARIOUS
RELIGIONS AND
ETHNIC GROUPS.
Royal Land Grant to Penn
Penn & Native Americans
Bought [didn’t simply take]
land from Indians.
Quakers went among the
Indians unarmed.
BUT…….. non-Quaker
Europeans flooded PA
 Treated native peoples poorly.
 This undermined the actions
of the Quakers!
Penn’s Treaty with the
Native Americans
SECTION
4
The Quakers Settle Pennsylvania
Penn’s “Holy Experiment”
• In 1681, William Penn founds Pennsylvania on
Quaker principles
• Quakers ideas: equality, cooperation, religious
toleration, pacifism
• Pennsylvania meant to be a “holy experiment”
- adult males get 50 acres, right to vote
- representative assembly
- freedom of religion
Native American Relations
• Penn treats native people fairly; over 50 years
without conflict
Continued . . .
NEXT
SECTION
4
continued The
Quakers Settle Pennsylvania
A Thriving Colony
• Penn recruits immigrants; thousands of Germans
go to Pennsylvania
• Quakers become minority; slavery is introduced
Thirteen Colonies
• Lord Baltimore, a Catholic, founds Maryland; has
religious freedom
• James Ogelthorpe founds Georgia as haven for
debtors
• By 1752, there are 13 British colonies in North
America
NEXT
St Mary’s City
(1634)
Colonization of Maryland
The Settlement of Maryland
A royal charter was
granted to George
Calvert, Lord
Baltimore,
in 1632.
A proprietary colony
created in 1634.
A healthier location
than Jamestown.
 Tobacco would be the
main crop.
His plan was to govern as an absentee
proprietor in a feudal relationship.
 Huge tracts of land granted to his Catholic
relatives.
MD Toleration Act,
1649