Overview of the 13 Original Colonies

THE 13 ORIGINAL COLONIES

The Virginia Company sent three ships named the Susan Constant, Godspeed, and Discovery full of settlers to the New World to set up trade between America and England. The settlers arrived in April 1607 and set up the first colony in America which they named Virginia. After spending a few weeks looking for a good site for their settlement, they found a location which they named Jamestown in honor of the English King James.

The group consisted of 105 men led by Captain Christopher Newport. They built a fort near a river that flowed into Chesapeake Bay. They named the river James after King James I.

Unfortunately the fort the men built was on a swamp which contained mosquitoes that carried the deadly malaria virus. Many of the men died because of this.

The settlers did not build permanent houses or grow food after they arrived. Instead many hunted for gold. On top of this, they were not good hunters. By the end of the first year, 67 out of the 105 men had died.

The Virginia Company continued to send men to Jamestown. After half of them died during the winter of 1608, John Smith ordered the men to build houses and farm.

Smith spent the summer of 1608 looking for food and exploring. During this trip, Smith drew up a map of the Chesapeake Bay area. While he was away, Smith left his friend Matthew Scrivener in charge. Since Scrivener was not a good leader, Smith was elected as president by the colony's council upon his return. As president he established a “no work, no food” policy.

Smith was about to give up and leave Jamestown when more settlers came. This time with food and supplies.

Smith went back to England in 1609 after being badly burnt in a gunpowder explosion.

The next winter was the worst ever. Many colonists died from fire, drought, disease, Indian attacks, and little food. The colony was almost destroyed going from 500 to 600 people to only 60 by the end of the winter.

Two small boats came in May to Jamestown. After seeing the empty houses, they had decided to abandon Jamestown. The people changed their minds on June 7 when a large ship captained by Samuel Argall came with food, supplies, and new settlers.

In 1610 Thomas De La Warr, the new governor, arrived with three ships of supplies. New settlers were encouraged to come with an offer of 50 acres of free land.

The Pilgrims wanted to break away from the Church of England. Pilgrims were jailed and fined in England for starting their own church. They were afraid to stay in England. Many Pilgrims went to Holland in 1608. This group lived in Holland for 12 years.

The Pilgrims were very unhappy living in Holland. They decided to go to America. They bought a ship called the Speedwell. The ship was small and old. There were so many wanting to go to America that a second ship was needed. The Pilgrims made an agreement with some businessmen in England. The businessmen got the Pilgrims a ship named the Mayflower. They also bought them food and supplies. In return, the Pilgrims agreed to work for the businessmen for seven years. They agreed to send furs and lumber from the New World back to England.

One hundred and two people left from England. They were given land in what is now New York. Shortly after leaving England, the Speedwell became leaky and had to return to shore. Some passengers from the Speedwell stayed behind in England. Others crowded onto the Mayflower.

On November 11, 1620 after 66 days, the Mayflower came to Cape Cod. The Pilgrims had been granted a charter to settle in Virginia. Because strong winds blew them north, they felt the charter was not valid. Before going on shore, the men drew up a new charter called the Mayflower Compact. This Compact stated that they would all take part in making laws for the settlement, and they would obey these laws.

They started a settlement which the Pilgrims called Plymouth Plantation. Their leader was William Bradford.

The first winter was hard for the Pilgrims. They had to struggle to build shelter. In two or three months half of the people died. Half of the Pilgrims who survived were children. Only four women lived. An Indian named Squanto helped the Pilgrims. He taught them how to grow crops, hunt, and build shelter. Because of his help the Pilgrims survived.

The Puritans wanted to "purify" the Church of England. They did not want to move away from the church as the Pilgrims did. They just wanted to change some of its ways. The Puritans were treated badly in England because of their beliefs.

The Puritans came to the  Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630. Some Puritans thought their leaders were acting just as badly as the King of England. The group broke apart because of this.

John Mason took a group of people from the Massachusetts Bay Colony to find more fertile farming land. The land in Massachusetts was too rocky. The Puritans who went with Mason thought they could worship more freely if they left the group as well. They settled in Portsmouth and found the New Hampshire Colony.

Two other men decided to leave the Massachusetts Bay Colony and begin colonies of their own. One was Roger Williams and the other was Thomas Hooker.

Roger Williams was a Puritan minister. He believed the church leaders should not be the colony leaders. Williams also believed the American Indians should be paid for the land they were taking. Puritan leaders wanted to send Williams back to England. Williams escaped them in 1636 and founded the Rhode Island Colony. He bought the land from the Native Americans. Everyone living in this colony was allowed to practice their own religion.

Thomas Hooker was a minister. He left the Massachusetts Bay Colony with 35 families to form the Connecticut Colony. The families walked for two weeks before reaching the site which is now Hartford. The people wrote a plan for the government of their colony. This was the first written constitution in the New World.

By 1636 four New England Colonies were founded:  Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire. The people living in the colonies made a living by fishing and building ships. They also carried on much of the slave trade.

The Dutch kept trying to find a westward passage to the Indies. They sent an Englishman, Captain Henry Hudson to find it. Hudson found a river that ran westward for a short time. He followed it and found that it turned north in what is now New York. The river was later named Hudson after him.

Hudson found the Indians living along the shores of this river were friendly. They were willing to trade furs. Hudson told the Dutch people about this. In 1623 the Dutch sent people to live in this area. They formed a new colony and began trading with the Indians. They called their new colony New Netherlands. The Dutch Governor Peter Minuit bought Manhattan Island from the Indians for $24.00 worth of beads and trinkets.

Sweden wanted a colony to trade with the other colonies in America. They landed in Delaware in 1638. The Swedes were led by Peter Minuit. Minuit had been fired by the Dutch in 1631. He was then hired by the Swedes in 1637. Since the Dutch were already living in this area, the Dutch governor quickly took the land from the Swedes. This was done peacefully without any fighting.

The Dutch began to have problems with the British. England said that John Cabot's exploration in 1497 gave them the rights to New Netherlands. In 1664 war broke out between the Dutch and the English. The British took a fleet of ships to New Netherlands and took the colony without firing a shot. New Netherlands became New York. It was named after the Duke of York.

The land across the Hudson River became New Jersey. It was named in honor of an island off the coast of England.

William Penn lived in England. He was a member of a religious group called the Quakers. The Quakers had no religious leaders. They believed every man was equal. All members met to worship God as equals.

The Quakers could not worship in England because they did not follow the Church of England. Many Quakers were sent to jail for not going to the Church of England.

William Penn was one of those who had been sent to jail. The King of England owed Penn's father a lot of money. Penn's father asked the King of England to give him land in America instead of the money. The King agreed.

In 1682 William Penn and his fellow Quakers came to the New World. They named their new colony Pennsylvania. This meant Penn's woods. Penn opened his land to Quakers from all over the world. Thousands came from Germany, Scotland, Ireland, and England.

Penn was also given Delaware after the English took it from the Swedes. The British governor, the Duke of York, did not want the problems of running a small colony, so he gave it to William Penn.

In 1704 Penn let it become a separate colony. The Middle Colonies of Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and New York were called the Bread Colonies. The soil was good in this area for raising crops. Many rivers made transportation easy. The chief products of this area were grain and livestock. Vegetables, cotton, and tobacco were also grown.

Maryland was founded in 1634 by a group of English Catholics who could not practice their religion in England. Their leader was Lord Baltimore. Baltimore sent about 300 settlers to the colony. Their settlement was called St. Mary's. Later the name was changed to Baltimore for their leader.

In 1663 King Charles of England gave a grant of land "South of Virginia" to a group of his friends.  They wanted to the use the colony for their businesses. They named the colony Carolina in honor of Charles. The first settlement was Charleston. When these men came, they found that many settlers from Virginia were already living in the area. This caused arguments between the two groups. In 1680 the argument was solved by dividing Carolina into two separate colonies:  North Carolina and South Carolina.

The last of the original 13 colonies was Georgia. In 1733, the king gave land to a man named James Oglethorpe. The king planned this colony as a place to get rid of people in England he did not want. The colony was to protect the other colonies from the French and Spanish to the south and west. Oglethorpe brought many people to Georgia who had been in jail or who owed money they could not pay. The first settlement was Savannah. Georgia was named in honor of King George of England.

The southern colonies were Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, and Maryland. Large plantations were built there. They were worked by cheap labor. These plantations turned out turpentine, indigo, and tobacco.