Chapter 4
Provincial America and the Struggle for a
Continent
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Expansion versus Anglicization
• 18th Century British colonies sought to emulate
homeland: housing, fashion, import British goods
• Colonies’ population grew rapidly and demand for
skilled and unskilled laborers, clergy,
professionals outgrew supply
– Northern colonies train their population for these roles
– Southern colonies rely on immigrants
• Constant expansion of British meant constant
retreat for Indians
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Threats to Householder
Autonomy
Political
• Some families
acquired more prestige
than others
• Elected office
dominated by Colonial
“gentleman”
• Population grows
much faster than
elected offices
Economic
• Increase in entail
inspires new
settlement
• Tenancy and other
forms of debt emerge
Anglicizing the Role of Women
• Women worked harder to maintain family
status
• Some trends of inheritance (widows)
reversed
• European double standards of sexual
behavior prevailed
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Expansion, Immigration, and
Regional Differentiation
• Post-1715: era of peace for settlements
• During expansion, settlers fit into their
distinct regions
• New Englanders had sense of regional
identity before independence
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Emergence of the Old South
• 90% of slaves imported go to South
• Plantation owners dominate politics
• Slave life
–
–
–
–
–
Slave gangs, but diverse tasks in tobacco country
Malaria and sickle cell anemia
Task system in rice country
Gullah
Violence against slaves
• Indigo and Eliza Lucas Pinckney
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The Mid-Atlantic Colonies: The
“Best Poor Man’s Country”
• Pennsylvania most attractive for immigrants
– Scots-Irish (Ulsterites)
– Germans (‘redemptioniers)
– Philadelphia largest city in British North
America by 1770s
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The Backcountry
• Scots-Irish and Germans pushed west into
interior of Virginia and Carolinas
• Area develops its own distinct culture, not
as Anglicized
• Settlers of the backcountry considered
clannish and violent
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New England: A Faltering
Economy and Paper Money
• 18th century growth rate lower
– More emigration than immigration
– Disease and war lower life expectancy
– “wheat blast” and food importation
• New England 18th century economy
–
–
–
–
Shipbuilding
Rum industry and Molasses Act (1733)
“Fiat” paper money and depreciation
Anglicized currency: Thomas Hutchinson and
repudiation of paper money
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Anglicizing Provincial America
• Diversity of exports, commonality of
imports
• Georgia: Enlightenment by-product
• Great Awakening
• Mixed and balanced colonial constitutions
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The World of Print
• English Enlightenment works spread through
printing
• 17th century printing limited to Boston
• John Peter Zenger and freedom of the press
– New York Weekly Journal
• Benjamin Franklin
– Pennsylvania Gazette
– Junto (American Philosophical Society)
– Public citizen work: fire company, library, hospital, and
College of Philadelphia
– Inventor and scientist
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The Enlightenment in America
• Man can improve his condition, God not
vengeful
• Low Church vs. High Church
• Sir Isaac Newton, laws of motion
• John Locke, philosopher
• Enlightenment spirit dominates Harvard
• Yale College (1701) founded as reaction
against Enlightenment
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Lawyers and Doctors
• Rise in legal and medical professions
helped spread Enlightenment
• Benjamin Rush
• William Shippen
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Georgia: the Failure of a
Enlightenment Utopia
Background
• 1730s: convergence of
ideas of humanitarianism
and social improvement
led to founding of Georgia
• Georgia’s purposes
– Make productive use of
“worthy” poor
– Buffer of armed free men
between S. Carolina and
Spanish Florida
– Produce silk and wine
•
•
•
•
Operation
Slaves and Liquor banned
Silk and wine production
fail
No elective assembly
Outcome
– Royal govt. imposed 1752
– Economic structure mimics
South Carolina
The Great Awakening
• mid-1730s to early 1740s: immense
religious revival: Great Awakening
• Swept across Protestant lands throughout
Europe and the colonies
• Methodists and Baptists surged ahead
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Origins of the Revivals
• Theodorus Frelinghuysen
• Gilbert Tennent
– The Dangers of an Unconverted Ministry
(1740)
• Jonathan Edwards
– A Faithful Narrative of the Surprising Work of
God (1737)
• John Wesley
– Methodists
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The Synod of Philadelphia, 1738
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Whitefield Launches the
Transatlantic Revival
• George Whitefield
• Traveled and preached throughout Atlantic
colonies
• Anglicans – reserved towards him
• Presbyterian, Congregationalists, Baptists –
embraced him
• Concept that all English Protestants were
members of the same church
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Disruptions
• Hugh Bryan: “American Moses”
• Gilbert Tennent
• James Davenport
– “Shepherd’s Tent”
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Long-Term Consequences of the
Revivals
• Evangelical churches “feminized”
• Freemasons
• Congregational Church and evangelical
secession
• “Letter days” and the breaking down of
localism
• Jonathan Edwards and A Treatise
concerning Religious Affections (1746)
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New Colleges
•
•
•
•
•
•
College of New Jersey (Princeton)
College of Rhode Island (Brown)
Queen’s College (Rutgers)
Dartmouth College
College of Philadelphia (Pennsylvania)
King’s College (Columbia)
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Denominational Realignment
Pre-realignment
dominant groups
• New England
Congregationalist
• Delaware valley
Quakers
• South Anglican
Groups that gain
• Methodists
• Baptists
• Presbyterians
Political Culture in the Colonies
• Colonists felt they were free because they were
British
• Mixed constitutions that united monarchy,
aristocracy, and democracy in perfect balance
• 1720s: every colony (except Connecticut and
Rhode Island) had an appointive governor, council
and elective assembly
– Governor = monarch
– Council = aristocracy
– Elected assembly = commons
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The Rise of the Assembly and the
Governor
• In all 13 colonies, settlers elected their assembly
• Three-fourths of free adult white men in colonies
could vote (vs. one-third in England)
• Assemblies gain power at expense of councils
• Royally appointed governors: success dependent
on winning over assembly
• “Factions” (political parties) universally
condemned in colonies
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“Country” Constitutions: The
Southern Colonies
• The “politics of harmony”
• VA governors Alexander Spotswood and
William Gooch
• “Faction” free politics and policy
– Virginia Tobacco Inspection Act
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“Court” Constitutions: The
Northern Colonies
• Greater economic diversity, greater factionalism
• William Shirley and Benning Wentworth:
governance through reward and patronage
• Common politics: liberty, property, and no popery
• Robert Hunter
• Quaker Party
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The Renewal of Imperial Conflict
• 1739-1763: new era of imperial war
• English colonies, New France, New Spain
and Indians all involved
• North America split between Spain and
Britain
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Challenges to French Power
• Louisbourg fortress, Cape Breton Island
• Company of the Indies and Louisiana
• French hold on American interior weakened in both
North and South
• Indian “republics” and trade with the British
• Natchez Indians
• France lost influence and prestige in North America
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The Danger of Slave Revolts and
War with Spain
• Gracia Real de Santa Teresa de Mose (Mose)
– Francisco Menéndez
– Yamasees
•
•
•
•
Stono Rebellion (1739)
War of Jenkins’s Ear
New York conspiracy trials
Britain defeats Spain
– Oglethorpe’s defense of Georgia
– Anson and the capture of the Manila galleon
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France versus Britain: King
George’s War
•
•
•
•
France joins Spain against Britain 1744
Fort Louisbourg falls to British 1745
Boston Impressment riots 1746
Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle (1748)
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The Impending Storm
• War drove British frontiers
back, but colonies had
promised land grants to
volunteers
• Areas of frenzied
expansion: Maine, New
Hampshire and middle
colonies
– Colony vs. colony
– Settlers vs. Native
Americans
– British vs. French
• Ohio Company of
Virginia
– George Washington
• Marquis Duquesne
• French movement to
block British
settlement west of
Alleghenies
The War for North America
• 1755: British professional army conflicted
with the householder society and
voluntaristic colonists
• Colonists and Britain learn to cooperate in
order to achieve victory against France
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The Albany Congress and the
Onset of War
• War: New France vs. Virginia
• Albany Congress
– Keep Six Nations (Iroquois) neutral
– Benjamin Franklin and the Albany Plan
• President General and Grand Council
• Raise soldiers, levy taxes, deal with Indians
• Rejection
– Centralized relations with Indians
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Britain’s Years of Defeat
• Edward Braddock
• Fort Duquesne
• Acadians
– Cajuns
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A World War
• Pierre de Rigaud de Vaudreuil
– Frontier war to scatter Britain’s superior resources
• Louis-Joseph, marquis de Montcalm
– Traditional European siege warfare
• Fort William Massacre
• Britain declares war on France, 1756
• Seven Years’ War (1756-1763): France, Austria,
and Russia vs. Prussia (subsidized by Britain)
• Spain neutral until 1762
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Imperial Tensions: From
Loudoun to Pitt
• Earl of Loudoun, British military commander in
N. America 1755
– Coercion to force colonial cooperation
• William Pitt, Prime Minister 1757
– Consent to gain colonial cooperation
– Replaces Loudoun with James Abercrombie
• By 1758, Britain finally had a military force
capable of overwhelming New France
• Cooperation between redcoats and provincials
became routine and effective in warfare against
French & Indians
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The Years of British Victory
• British navy prevents France from reinforcing
Canada
• Marquis de Montcalm (French N. America
commander) decides on defensive strategy
• Peace between Indians and British 1758
• Quebec 1759
– James Wolfe
– Marquis de Montcalm
– Plains of Abraham
• Montreal and the fall of Canada
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The Cherokee War and Spanish
Intervention
• Cherokee attack 1760
– Drive South Carolina settlement back 100 miles
– Peace treaty 1761, but backcountry settlers
restless
• Spain entered war 1762
• British forces took Havana and Manila in
the Philippines
• France and Spain sued for peace
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The Peace of Paris
• Peace of Paris ended the war 1763
• Britain returned Martinique and Guadeloupe to
France
• France surrendered some West Indian islands and
mainland North America east of Mississippi
• Havana returned to Spain, Florida ceded to Britain
• France gives New Orleans and lands W of
Mississippi river to Spain
• Indians angrily rejected peace settlement and
France’s surrender of their lands to Great Britain
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Conclusion
• 1713-1754: expansion and renewed immigration
pushed settlements of North America into the
interior
• Colonies anglicized in many ways due to impacts
of a growing population
– Impacts on families, women
– Enlightenment and Great Awakening
• Imperial rivalries: French and Indian war
• Provincials and redcoats: different perceptions
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