Introduction: King Philip’s War Charles Town Harbor.

Introduction: King Philip’s War

Charles Town Harbor

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Global Competition and The Expansion of England’s Empire

• The Mercantilist System– England attempted to regulate its economy to

ensure wealth and national power.• Commerce, not territorial plunder, was the foundation

of the English empire.

– The 1651 Navigation Acts required colonial products or “enumerated” goods to be transported in English ships and sold at English ports

Global Competition & Expansion of England’s Empire

– Restoration of English monarchy - 1660 with Charles II, and government chartered new trading ventures such as the Royal African Company (Slave Trade).

The Conquest of New Netherland– In 1664, during an Anglo-Dutch war, New

Netherland came under control of the English.


• New York and the Rights of Englishmen and Englishwomen– The terms of Dutch surrender guaranteed some

freedoms and liberties but reversed other liberties, especially for blacks.

– The Duke of York governed New York, and by 1700 nearly 2 million acres of land were owned by only five New York families.

Map 3.1 Eastern North America in Seventeenthand Early Eighteenth Centuries


• New York and the Indians– The English briefly held an alliance with the Five

Nations known as the Covenant Chain (the Iroquois), but by the end of the century the Five Nations adopted a policy of neutrality.

• The Charter of Liberties– Demanding liberties, the English of New York got

an elected assembly, which drafted a Charter of Liberties and Privileges in 1683.

An engraving representing the Grand Councilof the Iroquois Nations


• The Founding of Carolina– Carolina was established as a barrier to Spanish

expansion north of Florida.

– Carolina was an offshoot of Barbados and, as such, a slave colony from the start.

– From 1670 until 1720, Carolina engaged in a slave trade that sold captured local Indians to other mainland colonies and to the West Indies.


• The Founding of Carolina– The Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina

envisioned a feudal society. The colonial government did allow for religious toleration, an elected assembly, and a generous headright system.

– The economy grew slowly until planters discovered rice, which would make them the wealthiest elite in English North America.

Pennsylvania

• The Holy Experiment– Pennsylvania was last 17th century colony

established – was given to proprietor William Penn.– A Quaker, Penn envisioned a colony of peaceful

harmony between colonists and Indians and a haven for spiritual freedom.

– Quakers believed that liberty was a universal entitlement.

• Liberty extended to women, blacks, and Indians.

A Quaker Meeting

Pennsylvania

• Quaker Liberty– Religious freedom was a fundamental principle.

• Quakers upheld a strict code of personal morality.

• Land in Pennsylvania– Penn established an appointed council to

originate legislation and an assembly elected by male taxpayers and “freemen,”

– majority of the male population could vote.


• Land in Pennsylvania– Penn owned all of the colony’s land and sold it to

settlers at low prices rather than granting it outright.

– Pennsylvania attracted immigrants from all over western Europe.

Origins of American Slavery

• The spread of tobacco led settlers to turn to slavery, which offered many advantages over indentured servants.

• Englishmen and Africans– In the seventeenth century, the concepts of race

and racism had not fully developed.– Africans were seen as alien in their color, religion,

and social practices.


• Slavery in History– Although slavery has a long history, slavery in

North America was markedly different.

– Slavery in the Americas was based on the plantation and the death rate was high in the seventeenth century.


• Slavery in the West Indies– By 1600, huge sugar plantations worked by slaves

from Africa were well established in Brazil and in the West Indies.

– By 1600, disease had killed off the Indians, and white indentured servants were no longer willing to do the backbreaking work required on sugar plantations.

– Sugar was the first crop to be mass-marketed to consumers in Europe.

Cutting Sugar Cane an engraving from TenViews in Antigua


• Slavery and the Law– The line between slavery and freedom was more

permeable in the seventeenth century than it would become later.

• Some free blacks were allowed to sue and testify in court.

• The Rise of Chesapeake Slavery– It was not until the 1660s that the laws of Virginia

and Maryland explicitly referred to slavery.


• The Rise of Chesapeake Slavery– A Virginia law of 1662 provided that in the case of

a child born to one free parent and one slave parent, the status of the offspring followed that of the mother.

– In 1667 the Virginia House of Burgesses decreed that conversion to Christianity did not release a slave from bondage.


• Bacon’s Rebellion: Land and Labor in Virginia– Virginia’s shift from white indentured servants to

African slaves as the main plantation labor force was accelerated by Bacon’s Rebellion.

– Virginia’s government ran a corrupt regime under Governor Berkeley.

– Good, free land was scarce for freed indentured servants.

Sir William Berkeley, governor of colonial Virginia


• Bacon’s Rebellion: Land and Labor in Virginia– Nathaniel Bacon, an elite planter, called for the

removal of all Indians, lower taxes, and an end to rule by “grandees.” His campaign gained support from small farmers, indentured servants, landless men, and even some Africans.

– Bacon spoke of traditional English liberties.


• End of Bacon’s Rebellion & Consequences

– Rebellion’s aftermath left Virginia’s planter elite to consolidate their power.


• A Slave Society– By the end of the 1600s, a number of factors

made slave labor very attractive to English settlers.

– Slavery began to supplant indentured servitude between 1680 and 1700.


• A Slave Society– By the early eighteenth century, Virginia had

transformed from a society with slaves to a slave society.

• In 1705, the House of Burgesses enacted strict slave codes.

– From the start of American slavery, blacks ran away and desired freedom.

– Settlers were well aware that the desire for freedom could ignite the slaves to rebel.

Colonies in Crisis: New England

• King Philip’s War– In 1675, the year before Bacon’s rebellion, war

between Indians and New England colonists erupted.

– The Indians were led by Metcom, called King Philip.

– The Indians destroyed nearly half New England’s towns.

– In response, the colonists killed Metacom and massacred the rebels.

Colonies in Crisis

• England’s Glorious Revolution -1688– Established parliamentary supremacy – secured the Protestant succession to the throne.

– Rather than risk a Catholic succession through James II, a group of English aristocrats invited the Dutch Protestant William of Orange to assume the throne.

Colonies in Crisis

• The Glorious Revolution – The overthrow of James II entrenched the notion

that liberty was the birthright of all Englishmen.

• Parliament issued a Bill of Rights (1689) guaranteeing individual rights such as trial by jury.

• Parliament adopted the Toleration Act (1690), which allowed Protestant Dissenters (but not Catholics) to worship freely, although only Anglicans could hold public office.

Colonies in Crisis

• The Glorious Revolution in America– In 1675, England established the Lords of Trade to

oversee colonial affairs, but the colonies were not interested in obeying London.

– To create wealth, between 1686 and 1685 James II created a “super-colony,” the Dominion of New England.

• The new colony threatened liberties.

Colonies in Crisis

• The Maryland Uprising and Leisler’s Rebellion– News of King James’s ouster in 1689 caused rebellions in

several American colon – Lord Baltimore’s charter for Maryland was revoked for

mismanagement.– Jacob Leisler, a Calvinist, took control of

New York.– Leisler was executed, and New York politics remained

polarized for years.

Colonies in Crisis

• Changes in New England– In New England, Plymouth was absorbed into

Massachusetts, and the political structure of the Bible Commonwealth was transformed.

• Land ownership, not church membership, was required to vote.

• A governor was appointed in London rather than elected.

• The colony had to abide by the Toleration Act.

Colonies in Crisis

• The Prosecution of Witches– Witchcraft was widely believed in and punishable

by execution.• Most accused were women.

An illustration from Cotton Mather’s

The Growth of Colonial America

• A Diverse Population– As England’s economy improved, large-scale

migration was draining labor from the mother country.

• Efforts began to stop promotion of emigration.

– London believed colonial development bolstered the nation’s power and wealth.

• 50,000 convicts were sent to the Chesapeake to work in the tobacco fields.


• A Diverse Population– 145,000 Scots and Scots-Irish immigrants came to

North America.

• The German Migration– Germans, 110,000 in all, formed the largest group

of newcomers from the European continent.– Entire German families emigrated as

“redemptioners.”

Table 3.1 Origins and Status of Migrants to British North American colonies, 1700–1775


• Religious Diversity– In eighteenth-century British America, ethnic

groups tended to live and worship in relatively homogenous communities.

– Dissenting Protestants in most colonies gained the right to worship as they pleased in their own churches.

Map 3.2

European settlement & ethnic diversity onAtlantic coast of North America, 1760


• Indian Life in Transition– Indian communities were well integrated into the

British imperial system.– Traders, British officials, and farmers all viewed

Indians differently.– The Walking Purchase of 1737 brought fraud to

the Pennsylvania Indians.

William Penn’s Treaty with the Indians


• Regional Diversity– The backcountry was the most rapidly growing

region in North America.

– Farmers in the older portions of the Middle Colonies enjoyed a standard of living unimaginable in Europe.

• Pennsylvania was known as “the best poor man’s country.”


• The Consumer Revolution– Great Britain eclipsed the Dutch in the

eighteenth century as the leader in trade.– Eighteenth-century colonial society enjoyed a

multitude of consumer goods.

• Colonial Cities– Although relatively small and few in number, port

cities like Philadelphia were important.


• Colonial Cities and Colonial Artisans– Cities served mainly as gathering places for

agricultural goods and for imported items to be distributed to the countryside.

– The city was home to a large population of artisans.

This piece of china made in England


• An Atlantic World– Trade helped to create a web of interdependence

among the European empires.

– Membership in the empire had many advantages for the colonists.

Social Classes in the Colonies

• The Colonial Elite– Expanding trade created the emergence of a

powerful upper class of merchants.

– In the Chesapeake and Lower South, planters accumulated enormous wealth.

– America had no titled aristocracy or established social ranks.

A 1732 portrait of Daniel, Peter, and Andrew Oliver,sons of a wealthy Boston merchant.

Social Classes in the Colonies• Anglicization

– Colonial elites began to think of themselves as more and more English.

– Desperate to follow an aristocratic lifestyle, wealthy Americans tried to model their lives on British etiquette and behavior.

– The tie that held the elite together was the belief that freedom from labor was the mark of the gentleman.


• Poverty in the Colonies– Although poverty was not as widespread in the

colonies as it was in England, many colonists had to work as tenants or wage laborers because access to land diminished.

– Taking the colonies as a whole, half of the wealth at mid-century was concentrated in the hands of the richest 10 percent of the population.


• Poverty in the Colonies– The better-off in society tended to view the poor as

lazy and responsible for their own plight.• The Middle Ranks

– Many in the nonplantation South owned some land.

– By the eighteenth century, colonial farm families viewed land ownership almost as a right: the social precondition of freedom.


• Women and the Household Economy– The family was the center of economic life, and

all members contributed to the family’s livelihood.– In the eighteenth century, the division of labor

along gender lines solidified.

• North America at Mid-Century– As compared to Europe, colonies were diverse,

prosperous, and offered many liberties.

This portrait of the Cheney family

This concludes the lecture presentation for

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Chapter 3: Creating Anglo-America, 1660-1750

Introduction: King Philip’s War Charles Town Harbor.

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