Failed Colonies and Early

Successful English Settlements

in North America

Instructor: Prof. Lucas Accastello

Subject: Cultura de los Pueblos de Habla Inglesa
Program: Profesorado en Lengua Inglesa
2021
Competing Claims in North America
 New France
• Giovanni da Verrazzano tried to find a sea route, but instead
sailed into North America in 1524.

• Samuel de Champlain with about 32 colonist founded which

becomes New France. Quebec

• Sieur de LA Salle claimed all of the Mississippi River for France, he

named it Louisiana in honor of his king Louis XIV.

• French population in North America included Catholic priests and

young single men who were engaged in fur trade.

• France’s North American empire was large, but did not have a
great population, because the French did not care much about
having a lot of land, but to make money off of it.
 The English Settle at Jamestown
• King James gave a company of London investors a charter to
found a colony in 1606. 
• The company reached the shore of Virginia and claimed it as
their own.
• The colonists called their claimed region, Jamestown in
honor of King James.
• The settlement was very catastrophic because they worried
about finding gold rather than farming food.  Settlers were
starving, diseases being spread which killed many and
lowered the population.
• The situation improved after farmers discovered tobacco, a
profitable cash crop.
 Puritans create New England

• In 1620 Pilgrims landed in Plymouth,

Massachusets in search for religious freedom
as they were persecuted in England. 
• Their main goal was to set a model
community for Christians to follow.
• They prospered as family life created a sense
of order and ensured that the population
would reproduce itself.
The Dutch Found New Netherland

• In 1609, the Dutch East India Company hired English

sailor Henry Hudson to find a northeast passage to India.
• After unsuccessfully searching for a route above Norway,
Hudson turned his ship west and sailed across the
Atlantic.
• He eventually arrived off the coast of Cape Cod, and
sailed into the mouth of a large river and claimed the
entire Hudson River Valley for his Dutch employers.
• The Dutch had a fur trade with the Iriquois Indians.
The Struggle for North America
• With New Netherland in the way of the English colonies
being together, England led by the Duke of York drove
out the Dutch who surrendered right away and the new
land was titled: "New York."
• The French and Indian War: a struggle between Britain
and France over land. This war was part of a bigger
conflict known as the Seven Year War which occurred in
the Indies, North America, and Europe, and it was
between England, France, and other European countries. 
• The British were the winners of the war, and then they
became the landholders of eastern North America.
 Native American Reaction
• Early settlers such as French and
Dutch cooperated with natives.
• Soon war broke out over land and trade.
• Disease killed large numbers of natives.
• Europeans brought slaves from Africa to
replace natives.
 England in America
• The English defeat of the Spanish Armada
ended Spanish control of the seas.

• England and other European nations could

begin colonies in North America because it
was now safe to sail the waters.
Why did the English want to colonize North America?

Find a passage
Increase trade through the Americas
to the Indies

REASONS FOR
ENGLAND TO
COLONIZE
NORTH AMERICA Find gold
Import raw
materials

Establish the Protestant

faith in America
 First Attempted Colony: Roanoke,
VA
• In 1585 Sir Walter Raleigh set up a colony
at Roanoke. The colony failed. Urged by
the artist and mapmaker John White,
Raleigh tried again in 1587, this time with
100 settlers including members of White’s
family, who disappeared without a trace.
• In 1607, the Plymouth Company sponsored
a colony in Maine. It also failed.
C. 1585
A map of the Roanoke area,
by John White
A sketch by John White of natives at Roanoke.
 THE AMERICAN COLONIES
Region Geography Government & Religion & Society
Economy

NEW ENGLAND • Coastal areas with good

harbors.
•Small farms. Lumber mills.
Fishing, Shipbuilding and
•Most people organized as
congregations. (Puritans)
COLONIES • Inland areas with dense Trade flourished. •Lived on farms, Merchants
forests. controlled trade.
• Poor rocky soil & short •Cities developed along •Artisans made goods,
growing season. coast. unskilled workers and
slaves provided labor.

MIDDLE •Fertile soil and long

growing season.
•Colonies grew large
amounts of rye, oats,
COLONIES barley, potatoes & wheat
•Rivers ran into as cash crop.
backcountry.
•Cities on coast.
•Wealthiest people owned
large farms & most
business.
•Most farmers produced a
small surplus.
•Tenants farmers rented
land or worked for wages.
• Religious diversity:
Catholic, Quaker,
Protestant

•Favorable climate and soil
SOUTHERN for agriculture.
COLONIES
•Wide rivers made cities
unnecessary. “Plantations”
•Tobacco, rice & indigo
grown on large plantations
as cash crops.
•Wealthy elite controlled
most land.
•Labor supply: indentured
servants & African slaves.
Religion: Anglican
 Jamestown Settlement
In 1607, the Virginia Company of London
financed a colony at Jamestown, Virginia. In
1608, John Smith took control of the
Jamestown colony.

800 more colonists arrived in 1609.

 Jamestown Settlement
The settlers faced many hardships:
• They found no gold nor did they establish the fish or
fur trading expected of them by the Virginia Company
investors.
• A harsh winter and more trouble continued to plague
the colonists.
At Jamestown Settlement, replicas of Christopher Newport's 3 ships docked in the harbor.
 Jamestown Settlement
In 1612, John Rolfe developed a high-
grade tobacco that the colonists learned to
grow. It became very popular in England.

By 1621 Jamestown had grown to more than

2,000.
  As the number of
colonists increased,
their relationship with
the Powhatan natives
grew worse.
 Relations with the
Native Americans
living nearby improved
when one of the
colonists, John Rolfe,
married Pocahontas,
the daughter of Chief
Powhatan.
Pocahontas
An 1850s painting of John Rolfe and Pocahontas
 Jamestown Settlement

The Virginia Company allowed a representative

government in which ten towns in the colony
sent two representatives to an assembly.

Settlers were offered 50 acres of land if they

paid for their own passage to the colonies.

Those who could not afford passage to America,

borrowed money and became indentured
servants.
 Plymouth
• In 1620, Plymouth,
Massachusetts, became
the second successful
English colony in the New
World.
• Plymouth was founded by
the Pilgrims and was the
original name of the
settlement.
• Puritans then came and
settled Boston (Mass. Bay
Colony)
• John Winthrop was the
governor of this
settlement.
The Mayflower carried Pilgrims to settle the
Virginia colony. They landed north at Plymouth,
Massachusetts.

Plymouth was not part of the Virginia Company

territory and its laws did not apply. So the
Pilgrims drew up the Mayflower Compact to
provide laws to live by. It was the beginning of a
representative government in America.
 Puritans Flee to Freedom
Plymouth Colony
• Some English Separatists moved to the
Netherlands in 1608.
• Their children were becoming more
Dutch than English.
• War with Spain seemed near. They
were ready to move to the New World.
• Led by William Bradford, 35 Separatists
joined 66 others on the Mayflower in
1620.
• Their sponsor, the Virginia Company,
intended they land near the Hudson
River. They landed instead at Cape Cod.
• Founded Plymouth Colony south of
present-day Boston
Massachusetts Bay Colony
• Puritan merchants formed the
Massachusetts Bay Company.
• In 1630 John Winthrop set out with
11 ships and 700 people for New
England.
• This colony grew faster than
Plymouth. Other towns were
established nearby.
• Massachusetts General Court was
formed.
• Success of Plymouth and
Massachusetts Bay colonies
inspired the Great Migration.
– Over 20,000 English men and women
came to settle in New England.
 Dissent Among the Puritans
• Dissenters left the Massachusetts Bay Colony and settled new
towns.
• Thomas Hooker, a Puritan minister, and his congregation settled in
the Connecticut River Valley. They adopted America’s first written
constitution: the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut. It extended
voting rights to all free men, not just church members.
• Roger Williams, a Separatist minister who believed in religious
tolerance and the separation of church and government, bought
land from the Narragansetts to establish Providence, now Rhode
Island
• Anne Hutchinson believed that people did not need a minister’s
teachings to be spiritual. She was imprisoned, tried, and banished
from the Massachusetts Bay Colony
• Hutchinson’s brother-in-law left Massachusetts to start a settlement
in present-day New Hampshire. In 1679 it became a royal colony,
under direct control of the king.
 The First Thanksgiving: Help from
the Native Americans

• The Pilgrims
received help from
the Native
Americans in
learning to plant
crops and in hunting
and fishing.
• Without them the
Pilgrims may not
have survived.