• Three European powers had outposts on the
North American continent:
– Spanish at Santa Fe (1610)
– French at Quebec (1608)
– English at Jamestown, Virgina (1607)

• 1588: Philip II of Spain invades England with
Spanish Armada.
• England had faster and more maneuverable boats.
• England’s sea victory against the Spanish helped ensure England’s naval dominance in the North Atlantic (Master of the Seas)
• English victory gave strong sense of nationalism.

•
England Plants the Jamestown Seedling
1606 – Joint-stock company called the
Virginia Company of London provided the financial means to support a settlement
-Charter stated that the members could bring Christianity to the natives, explore for precious metals, trade with the natives, and to look for the
Northwest Passage.
-Guaranteed the settlers the same rights of Englishman.

• Owners advertised to those seeking adventure. Three ships sailed-all men.
• Real Reason: Economic gain – promise of gold and Northwest passage for trade.
1607 – Jamestown settlement along the
James River. Established in presentday Virginia.

English Migration: 1610-1660
Head Right System

• Gentlemen: Only 12 were skilled laborers
• Wasted time looking for gold
• Didn’t plant crops which resulted in a food shortage led to “The Starving Time” –
Winter of 1609-1610. Many died from starvation.
• Caught malaria – swampy location
• 2/3rds died
• Weather
• Only men
• Lack of leadership

Cultural Clash in the Chesapeake
• Poor relationship with local tribes because Europeans considered Indians to be heathens who were inferior beings

Powhatan Confederacy

Native American Population in North America

1622 Indian
Uprisings

Solutions of Jamestown:
• Captain John Smith became leader
• “He who shall not work shall not eat.”
• Developed good relationship with Powhatan as mentioned in his journal entitled The
Generall Historie of Virginia

• Saved Captain John Smith (story might be a myth)
• She was kidnapped, held as ransom in exchange for English prisoners
• Converted to Christianity, renamed
“Rebecca”
• While a hostage she Married John Rolfe
• Sailed to England
• Went to the Banqueting Hall where she met
Queen Anne, wife of James I

Banqueting Hall

Pocahontas boards a ship for Virginia
• On her way back to
Virginia she boards a ship and dies of smallpox.
• St. George’s Church in Gravesend,
England.

Jamestown
Colonization
Pattern:
1620-1660

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.

• John Rolfe developed a cash crop – tobacco
• Tobacco is marketable within one year. It takes simple processing.
• Promoted the plantation system with its need for laborers.
• 1619 – A Dutch warship landed and sold about 20 Africans as slaves.
• This planted the seeds of the North American slave system.
• Influx of supplies, slaves, and women from England
• Poor women agreed to be auctioned in marriage for $80 of tobacco once they arrived at Jamestown = “Tobacco
Brides”

• Tobacco required more land so
Chesapeake region expanded faster than New
England in the north

Establishment of a Mini Parliament
• 1619: The London Company authorized the settlers to establish the House of Burgesses. The Virginia House of Burgesses establishes a form of representative self government (miniature parliament)
• Colonists could own private property
• 1624: James I revoked the charter making Virginia a royal colony under his control.

Virginia
House of Burgesses

17c Population in the Chesapeake

Population of Chesapeake
Colonies: 1610-1750

Colonization of Virginia
And Maryland

• 1634: Maryland established as the fourth
English Colony.
• 2 nd Lord Baltimore = Cecil Calvert (son of
George Calvert)
• Proprietary Colony (Had an owner)
• Religious tolerance - Refuge for Catholics
• Maryland Toleration Act of 1649 was the earliest colonial law related to religious freedom for all Christians which helped protect
Catholics.
• Planted tobacco as a cash crop.

George Calvert,
Lord Baltimore

The West Indies (Carribean): Way
Station to Mainland America
• Barbados set the stage for statutes governing slaves in North America. The “code” defined slaves’ legal status and owner’s control.
• Major crop: Sugar cane – First, clearing of land; then, needed to be planted extensively; finally, elaborate process to refine.
• Thus a large # of laborers needed.
• Slavery became a cheap labor force which wouldn’t rebel.

The only southern port city.

• Eight nobles (the Lord’s Proprietors) were granted a colony by Charles II.
• 1670: The Carolinas were formed with Charles
Town as the capital.
• 1712: the Carolinas were separated and became
North and South Carolina.
• Also known as “The Restoration Colonies”
– Colonization was interrupted by the Civil War in England in the
1640’s, therefore, the time period after the war when Charles II was restored to the throne was called the Restoration Period) you member from last year.

• Many of these original settlers had come from
Barbados and brought the slave system with them.
• Indian slave trading also occurred.
• Exported rice, Indian slaves to West Indies
(Carribean) and New England.
• Also exported wine, silk, and olive oil.

Rice
Indigo

Rice & Indigo Exports from SC & GA: 1698-1775

Late-Coming Georgia:
The Buffer Colony
• James Oglethorpe established in 1733.
• Provided a refuge for people who couldn’t pay their debt (what they owe).
• Acted as a buffer between Spanish Florida and the Carolinas (and the French in Louisiana)
• Silk and wine
• The last of the 13 colonies to be established.

James Oglethorpe made friends with the Creek Indians

Iroquois Lands &
European Trade Centers

• Were the only Native Americans who were able to unite and become strong enough to resist the English colonists successfully
• Known as the League of the Iroquois or the
Iroquois Confederacy.
• Made up of five Native American nations:
Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, Oneida, and
Mohawk. (1772 Tuscarora)
• Lived in Longhouses.
• The five nations remained relatively independent of one another.