SETTLING THE NORTHERN
COLONIES
Chapter 3
The Protestant Reformation Produces
Puritanism
Martin Luther was indirectly helping
shape a nation that was yet to be
discovered when he nailed his 95
Theses to the door of Wittenberg
Cathedral.
 Out of his beliefs came the
theological idea of Calvinism.

Calvinism
Calvinism was founded by John Calvin of
Geneva.
 Calvinism became the dominant theological
credo of New England Puritans, other American
settlers, Scottish Presbyterians, French
Huguenots, and the Dutch Reformed Church.
 God, according to Calvin, was all-powerful
and all-good. Humans, were weak and wicked.
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Calvinism
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Calvin also thought, since God was all-knowing,
that people were predestined to go to heaven or
hell.
Even though people were predestined, it did not
mean that they could live their lives however they
wanted.
The fact that they were unsure of their statuses
gnawed at Calvinists as they continually searched
for conversion, signs of their saving grace.
Puritans
The Puritans in England were from the
depressed woolen districts and they fed off of
the thought of a divine plan that shaped their
lives.
 The most devout Puritans, including those who
eventually settled in New England, believed
that they should not have to share their pews
with those who were “damned”.

Puritans
These devout Puritans became known as
Separatists, and vowed to break away from
the Church of England entirely.
 King James I was head of both church and
state from 1603 to 1625.
 He decided that if people could defy him as
their spiritual leader, they could eventually
defy him as their political leader.

King James I
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King James decided that he would
harass the Separatists out of the
England.
The Pilgrims end Their Pilgrimage at
Plymouth
The Separatists originally set sail for Holland in
1608, but lived in poverty and resented the
“Dutchification” of their children.
 They longed to live as English men and women
and purified Protestants.
 The Separatists were supposed to land in
Virginia, but after being at sea for 65 days,
missed their destination.

The Pilgrims end Their Pilgrimage at
Plymouth
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Only one of the 102 died en route and one was
born during the voyage aboard the Mayflower.
Less than half were Separatists.
One such nonbelonger was Myles Standish, who
proved to be indispensable as an Indian fighter and
negotiator.
Since the Pilgrims were not on the land they were
supposed to be, they were technically squatters.
The Pilgrims end Their Pilgrimage at
Plymouth
Before disembarking, the Pilgrim leaders drew
up the Mayflower Compact, which was a
significant step toward the first form of selfgovernment.
 The winter 1620-1621 claimed the lives of all
but 44 of the 102 settlers.
 When the Mayflower sailed back to England
none of the Separatists returned with it.

The Pilgrims end Their Pilgrimage at
Plymouth
Eventually, the colony found its economic legs in
fur, fish, and lumber.
 The little colony was never significant
economically or numerically (only 7,000 by
1691), but its cultural importance cannot be
overstated.
 In 1691, the Plymouth colony merged with its
neighbor, the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

The Bay Colony Bible Commonwealth
In 1629 Non-Separatist Puritans
secured a royal charter to form the
Massachusetts Bay Company.
 The Massachusetts Bay Colony was
blessed with 11 ships carrying nearly
a thousand immigrants.

The Bay Colony Bible Commonwealth
During the Great Migration of the 1630s,
about 70,000 refugees left England (about
20,000 came to Mass.)
 May Puritans went to the West Indies,
especially Barbados
 Mass. Bay Colony settlers believed that they
had a covenant with God, an agreement to
build a holy society that would be a model for
humankind.

Building the Bay Colony
The colonial government, although liberal, was
not a democracy.
 The Governor John Winthrop, thought
democracy was the “meanest and worst” of all
forms of government.
 There was a strong dividing line between the
Puritans who were “freemen” (belonging to the
Congregational Church) and those who were
not.

Building the Bay Colony

The Bay colonists endorsed the idea
of the separation of church and state
by;
Giving
the congregation the right to hire
and fire the minister and set his salary.
Clergymen were barred from holding
formal political office.
Trouble in the Commonwealth
At the beginning, the Bay colonists lived in
relative harmony.
 However, the Quakers, who flouted the
authority of the Puritan clergy, were given
fines, floggings, and banishment.
 In an extreme case, four Quakers who defied
expulsion, one of them a woman, were hanged
on the Boston Common.

Anne Hutchinson: Dissenter
Hutchinson was exceptionally intelligent, strongwilled, and talkative (mother of 14).
 She questioned the Puritan doctrine of
predestination (this was heresy).
 She believed in antinomianism- those whoa re
truly saved need not bother to obey the law of
either God or man (even worse heresy).

Anne Hutchinson: Dissenter
She was banished by Puritan magistrates.
 She set out, on foot, with her family to
Rhode Island.
 She and all but one of her household
were killed by Indians.
 John Winthrop, Gov. of Mass. Bay, saw
“god’s hands” in her fate.
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New England Spreads Out
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In 1639, settlers on the Connecticut River drafted
a document known as the Fundamental Orders.
This document was, in effect, a modern constitution,
which established a regime democratically
controlled by the “substantial” citizens.
Parts of the Fundamental Orders were later
borrowed by Connecticut for its colonial charter
and ultimately for its state constitution.
Glorious Revolution (1688-1689)
Also known as the Bloodless
Revolution.
 The unpopular Catholic King James II
was dethroned and replaced with
Protestant rulers (Dutch-born William
II and his English wife Mary II).

Glorious Revolution (1688-1689)
Inspired, many colonists struck back
against royal authority (New York and
Maryland 1689-1691).
 Most importantly, the new monarchs
relaxed their grip on colonial trade,
ushering in a period of “salutary neglect”
when the hated Navigation Laws were
only weakly enforced.

Seeds of Colonial Unity and
Independence
A path-breaking experiment in union was
launched in 1643, when four colonies banded
together to form the New England
Confederation.
 It was an exclusively Puritan club consisting of
Massachusetts colonies (Bay and Plymouth) and
New Haven and the valley settlements in
Connecticut

Old Netherlanders at New Netherland
The Dutch East India Company (DEIC) at one
time supported an army of 10,000 men and a
fleet of 190 ships.
 Henry Hudson was employed by DEIC to find
riches and also the coveted shortcut through the
continent.
 New Netherland was planted in 1623-1634
and was never of primary interest to the
founders.
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Old Netherlanders at New Netherland
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The Company bought Manhattan Island
from the Indians for worthless trinkets.
This was 22,000 acres of perhaps the
most valuable real estate in the world for
pennies/acre.
Dutch Residues in New York
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Charles II had granted the area of New Netherland to
his brother, the Duke of York.
The English came to reclaim the land from the Dutch and
after it was renamed New York.
We still see Dutch influence in New York
Harlem (Haarlem)
Brooklyn (Breuckelen)
Hell Gate (Hellegat)
Easter Eggs, Santa Claus, waffles, bowling, sleighing, skating,
kolf (golf)
Penn’s Holy Experiment in Pennsylvania

Quakers were considered to be a
problem to the establishment because;
 They
refused to support the Church of
England with taxes.
 They would take no oaths because Jesus
commanded, “Swear not at all”.
 They refused military service.
William Penn
William Penn was a young man who
grew increasingly fond of the Quaker
faith and wanted to escape persecution
by going to the New World.
 Penn was granted an immense amount of
fertile land by the king in the land known
as Pennsylvania (Penn’s Woodland),
named for Penn’s father.

William Penn
Penn was the “first American advertising
man”.
 He sent out paid agents with pamphlets
printed in English, Dutch, French, and
German to advertise Pennsylvania.
 Penn launched the colony in 1681.
 Penn got along well with the Natives and
was an astute city planner.

Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania was considered a nice place to
live because;
 All ethnic groups were treated equally
 Land was plentiful
 There were only 2 capital crimes; treason
and murder (as opposed to 200 in England)
 People were afforded economic opportunity,
civil liberty, and religious freedom.
Pennsylvania
Penn ended up in prison because of his
close bond with Charles II, who was
falling out of favor with the colonists.
 Penn died of a paralytic stroke and was
never fully appreciate by the people of
Pennsylvania.

The Middle Way in the Middle
Colonies

The middle colonies- New York, New Jersey, Delaware,
and Pennsylvania.
The “middle way” of the middle colonies was;
 The fertile soil
 Broad streams and rivers (Delaware, Hudson, and
Susquehanna)
 They were the “bread colonies”
 Industrial (vast forests for logging and shipbuilding)
 Ethnically mixed and religiously tolerant
 Smaller than the plantations of the South, but bigger than
small-farm New England.
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