Advanced Placement Chapter 2:

The Invasion and Settlement of North America 1550 to

1700By Neil Hammond

The Dutch and English Challenge Spain

Because of its New World Empire, Spain was the most powerful European country in the 1500s with Gold and Silver pouring in from Spain’s conquest of Mexico (1519) and Peru (1542)

In 1517, two years before Cortes’ conquest of Mexico, Martin Luther challenged the Catholic church in Europe

The Dutch and English Challenge Spain

By the mid 1500s, Europe was divided by religion. Spain remained Catholic, and King Phillip II of Spain was determined to root out Islam and Protestantism from Europe.

1566 Protestants in the Spanish controlled Netherlands rebelled. By 1581, with help from other Protestant nations (like England) the Dutch Republic became independent

The Dutch and English Challenge Spain

England had sent 6,000 troops to Holland to aid the protestant rebellion there.

England had also supported military expeditions to Ireland against Catholics

Phillip II sent a huge armada against England (130 ships…30,000 men), but it failed miserably. By the late 1600s, Spain was becoming weaker because it had spent so much money on wars.

Elizabeth’s Mercantilist Policies

England’s economy was stimulated by: 1) population growth in the 1500s (3 million in

1500 to 5 million in 1630) 2) Mercantilism (state supported

manufacturing and trade)

Elizabeth and other mercantilist minded monarchs tried to encourage exports and tried to decrease imports. By 1600 these policies helped give the English the ability to challenge Spain’s monopoly in the Western Hemisphere

Social Causes of English Colonization

A price revolution in Europe caused major social changes in England. It affected peasants the most because they were forced off common land because of Enclosure Acts

The English Arrive: The Chesapeake Experience

Merchants had grown wealthy in the 1500s. In 1606 King James I granted a group of London merchants a trading monopoly from present day North Carolina to Southern New York. The region was named Virginia in honor of Elizabeth I

In 1607 the Virginia Company ( a joint-stock company) sent an expedition of me to North America. The expedition landed in Jamestown. What do you think its goal was?

Read “The Starving Time” primary source

The Colony Hits the Jackpot At first the Native Americans in the area

were suspicious of the English, but soon Chief Powhatan allowed his people to trade with the English. He also arranged a marriage between his daughter, Pocahontas, and John Rolfe

This policy backfired after Rolfe developed a strain of tobacco that could grow in the Chesapeake area. Tobacco could fetch a high price when sold in England. Eager to become rich, thousands of settlers from England left for Virginia

The Colony Hits the Jackpot The colony instituted new policies

to attract immigrants:

1) Freemen who owned land and imported servants to work the land received 50 acres of land for each servant (headright system)

2) The company created the House of Burgesses, a legislature (the FIRST one in the New World)

The Indian Revolt of 1622 Angered by the influx of English settlers,

Powhatan’s brother, led an attack on Jamestown that killed 347 settlers, a third of the town’s population. The English fought back and after a decade of fighting secured the safety of the colony

In 1624, James I made Virginia a royal colony and revoked the VA Company’s charter. James kept the H of Burgesses, but the King had to ratify the legislation. James also ordered the establishment of the Church of England

Maryland A second tobacco-growing colony developed

in neighboring Maryland, but with a different set of institutions

Maryland was founded by Lord Baltimore as a refuge for Catholics

In 1634, 20 Catholic noblemen and about 200 protestant laborers established St. Mary’s City. Maryland’s population grew impressively. An Act of Toleration was passed in 1649 to protect (Christian) religious freedom

Tobacco and Disease http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qU9ydGj3n5U

Tobacco became fashionable in England and this led to a 40 year long economic boom in the Chesapeake

Newly arrived planters moved up the river valleys, establishing large plantations a good distance from one another, but easily reached by water

The Down Side Life in the Chesapeake was harsh

Few towns led to a lack of community (map page 50)

Few women (few families) Often at least one family member would

die

High death rate: 15,000 English immigrants between 1622 and 1644. The population only rose from 2000 to 8000

Also see table on page 51

Masters, Servants and Slaves

Despite the harsh life, the prospect of owning land lured migrants to the Chesapeake

By 1700, more than 100,000 Englishmen and women had come to Virginia and Maryland…most as indentured servants.

Indentured servants signed a contract to work for a master for 4-5 years after which time they would be free to marry and work for themselves

Indentured Life Indentured Servants were highly prized.

Plantation owners were willing to pay big bucks to merchants for them

They were a bargain for plantation owners because a male servant could produce five times his purchase price in a single year

To ensure maximum production, most plantation owners treated their servants harshly. Runaways and pregnant women had their terms of service extended (see source). Only about 25% of servants ever got the land they signed up for. Most remained poor.

African Laborers In 1619 a Dutch slave ship was blown off

course and landed in Jamestown. 20 African slaves were purchased, but for a generation, the number of Africans in the Chesapeake region remained small

Before the 1660s English common law did not recognize chattel slavery (most Africans prior to 1660 in Virginia seemed to have existed as indentured servants). Some Christian Africans even got their freedom.

This CHANGED after the 1660s

African Laborers Table on page 52

After 1660 the tobacco boom collapsed. Plantation owners increasingly turned to cheaper laborers (note: a slave’s original cost was MORE expensive than an indentured servant, but it would presumably be a one time cost)

Also, plantation owners increasingly turned to African labor after Bacon’s Rebellion