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The Roanoke Colony
In 1585, Sir Walter Raleigh sent a small group of settlers to Virginia. They settled on Roanoke Island, but later returned to England after many hardships. In 1587, Raleigh sent another group of people to this land with John White. Shortly after, White headed back to England. When he returned in August of 1590, everyone had vanished and all he found were the words "CRO" and "CROATOAN" carved into trees nearby. The "Lost Colony" is still a mystery today.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation". -
The Settlement of Jamestown
The first settlers, which were some 100 men provisioned by the London Company reached Virginia in the spring of 1607. After sailing along the Chesapeake Bay, they chose a location near some rivers. In honor of their king, they named the settlement Jamestown. The settlement became the first permanent English settlement in North America.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation". -
The House of Burgesses
In April of 1619, Governor George Yeardley arrived in Virginia from England and stated that the Virginia Company voted to abolish martial law and create a legislative assembly. This became the House of Burgesses, which was the first legislative assembly in the American colonies. This assembly met on July 30, 1619, in the church at Jamestown. Twenty-two burgesses representing eleven plantations along with Yeardley and Council were present on this day.
Source: http://www.ushistory.org/us/2f.asp -
The Plymouth/Mayflower Compact
Due to the Pilgrims' ship being blown of course, the Pilgrims in the Mayflower ship found themselves outside the area controlled by the London Company and had no legal government. To maintain order in the new settlement, the leaders drew up an agreement and asked all men to sign it. This was the Mayflower Compact, and it was important because it helped set a precedent for local government based on written agreements and the consent of the governed.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation". -
The Settlement of New York
The Dutch West India Company was attracted by the profitable fur trade, and had established a colony in North America, called New Netherland. It extended inland along the Hudson River Valley and included the town of New Amsterdam, which was founded in 1626 on Manhattan Island. (It was renamed New York in 1664). The Dutch West India Company attracted many free African settlers and by 1750, blacks made up almost 20 percent of New York City's population.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation" -
The Massachusetts Bay Colony
The Massachusetts Bay Colony was one of the original English settlements in present-day Massachusetts, which was settled in 1630 by a group of about 1,000 Puritan refugees from England under Gov. John Winthrop and Deputy Gov. Thomas Dudley. In 1629, the Massachusetts Bay Company had obtained from King Charles I a charter empowering the company to trade and colonize in New England between the Charles and Merrimack rivers.
Source: https://www.britannica.com/place/Massachusetts-Bay-Colony -
The Great Migration of Puritans
Prior to the Great Migration of Puritans in 1630, crop failures and an economic depression in the woolen industry occurred and began the Great Migration. The Puritans wanted to escape both religious persecution and economic ruin, and risked moving to the colonies. During the Great Migration, some 60,000 people left England for the Americas. Although most of the people did go to the West Indies, some 10,000 to 20,000 settled in Massachusetts.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation". -
The Settlement of Maryland
In 1632, Charles I made Cecilius Calvert proprietor, or owner, of millions of acres on the upper Chesapeake Bay. The colony was named Maryland. Calvert was free to dispose of the land and to govern, within loose guidelines, as he wished. In this colony, soon Protestants greatly outnumbered Roman Catholics. To protect Catholics' legal rights, the Maryland Assembly passed the Toleration Act in 1649 which guaranteed religious freedom.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation". -
The Settlement of Connecticut
As the Massachusetts Bay Colony continued to grow, some colonists began new settlements. Among these colonists were Thomas Hooker and his congregation. They left Massachusetts because they claimed that its "towns were set so near to each other." Therefore, to get more farmland, they traveled southwest and established a colony in the Connecticut Valley and adopted the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut in 1639 as well.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation". -
The Settlement of Rhode Island
Some colonists were forced to leave the Massachusetts Bay Colony because they questioned Puritan ways. One of these people was Roger Williams, who believed in strict separation of church and state. His beliefs angered Puritan leaders so they banished him. He then purchased land, and in 1636, founded a settlement that became Providence, Rhode Island. This colony therefore attracted those who held unpopular beliefs.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation". -
The Maryland Toleration Act
The Maryland Toleration Act was the act that guaranteed religious freedom to all Christians that was passed to protect the Catholic minority's legal rights in 1649. This was because there was not enough Catholic immigrants to make his venture profitable, so the colony was opened up to Protestants, who soon greatly outnumbered Roman Catholics.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation". -
The Settlement of the Carolinas
Charles II, who was the new king at this time, rewarded his supporters with grants of land. In 1663, he gave eight supporters a charter for a colony between Virginia and Spanish Florida. The colony was named Carolina in the king's honor. Later the colony was divided into North and South Carolina. The proprietors proved incompetent governors, and in the 1720s the Crown officially took over both colonies.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation". -
Bacon's Rebellion
Bacon's Rebellion began due to the discontent of landless laborers and small landowners in Virginia in 1675. This discontent erupted in violence because these people wanted land that belonged to the Powhatans. They took the land, and then later demanded war against all Native Americans. The war then escalated when Nathaniel Bacon raised an army of settlers in 1676 and attacked Indians on the frontier. Bacon eventually died from illness, ending the Rebellion.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation" -
The Settlement of Pennsylvania
In 1681, Charles II repaid the large sum of money that he owed Admiral Sir William Penn by making Penn's son William proprietor of a large tract of land near New York. Penn's holdings increased the following year when the Duke of York gave him Delaware. Therefore, Penn wanted to make his colony, which the king named Pennsylvania, a haven for his fellow Quakers.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation". -
The Salutary Neglect
The Salutary Neglect was a long-standing British Policy in the 13 colonies which allowed the colonists to flout, or violate, the laws associated with trade. There were no effective enforcement agencies and it was expensive to send British troops to America. The policy and era of Salutary Neglect lasted from the 1690's to the 1760's and benefited the colonists boosting their profits from trade.
Source: https://www.landofthebrave.info/salutary-neglect.htm -
The Salem Witchcraft Trials
In the winter of 1692, several young women in Salem Village, Massachusetts, were stricken with seizures that were attributed by the community to demonic possession. The possessed females were pressed by the village to name those who were responsible for their afflictions. They began to name witches in their midst and many others did the same. The Salem Trials were unusual because there was a large number of people involved in a matter of months.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation". -
The Great Awakening/Enlightenment
The Great Awakening was a powerful religious revival that occurred in the British North American colonies from the 1720s to the 1740s. The revival was a movement among Protestant Christians who were reacting to a number of religious conditions in the colonies. And, the Enlightenment was the birth of a revolution in ideas in Europe in the 18th century as well.
Source: https://www.britannica.com/event/Great-Awakening -
The Albany Plan of Union
Representatives from 7 colonies and the Iroquois League met in Albany, New York in 1754 to plan for defense and to recruit the Iroquois as allies. At the Albany Congress the colonies' delegates adopted Benjamin Franklin's Albany Plan of Union which called for loose confederation to promote defense. The assemblies rejected the plan, fearing that it would raise taxes and give Great Britain too much power. The Iroquois would not commit their support as well.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation". -
The French-Indian War
The French and Indian War began in the colonies and spread to Europe in 1756 as the Seven Years' War. This was unlike many previous conflicts because it broke out in the west in the Ohio Valley. It began because Virginia land speculators had acquired a large land grant in the Ohio Valley in 1749. They built a fort at the junction of the Ohio. But, the French considered the land to be theirs, and drove the Virginians off, which began the long conflict.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation". -
The Proclamation of 1763
As a result of Pontiac's Rebellion and other Indian uprisings convincing British authorities that they could not effectively protect British settlers on the frontier, Great Britain issued the Proclamation of 1763, which bared settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains. This law also required every fur trader to obtain royal permission before entering the territory as well.
Source: Boyer's "The American Nation".
