The Northern Colonies

Location New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine,

Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island

Terrain Hills and low mountains, narrow

plains along coast Thin and rocky soil (difficult for

farming)Weather and Resources

Large areas covered by forestsRichest fishing in

the world off the coastline

The Prostestant Reformation

• Martin Luther ignited a fierce storm of religious reform in 1517 that would divide peoples, topple rulers, and kindle spiritual fervor in millions of people.

• One of the people influenced was John Calvin. His interpretation of Christian beliefs became known as Calvinism. Calvinism became the dominant creed of the New England Puritans. 

• According to Calvin’s teachings, God was all powerful, all knowing, and all good. Humans were weak and wicked. Since God was all knowing, he knew who was going to heaven and who was not from the very beginning. Man could do nothing to change their eternal assignment. This belief is known as predestination. Those destined for heaven were known as the “elect.” Only the elect enjoyed full church membership and the benefits associated with it.

The Protestant Reformation

• No one could ever be sure of their eternal fate. Doubts continually ate at Calvinists and they sought in themselves and others, “signs of conversion.”(God telling them that they were saved) After conversion, these people were to lead “sanctified lives” thereby demonstrating their conversion. 

• After Henry VIII broke with the Catholic Church and formed the Anglican Church, some in England wanted the Church of England to be “purified” or to move away from Catholic traditions.

• Others wanted to make a complete break with all of the Catholic traditions that were still in the church practices. This group became known as Separatists. King James I did not like the Separatists and threatened to harass them out of England. Fearing this, the Separatists decided to leave England for a new land.

Plymouth Colony• The Separatists left England in 1608 bound for

Holland. During the next 12 years, the Separatists became increasingly worried about the “Dutchification” of their children and decided to leave Holland for the New World.

• These Separatists negotiated with the Virginia Company and secured the right to settle there. In early 1620, 102 people crowded onboard the Mayflower and left for the new world. After 65 days at sea, the Mayflower arrived off the coast of New England. Fewer than half of these passengers were Separatists. These Separatists are better known as the Pilgrims.

Plymouth Colony• Before leaving the ship, Pilgrim

leaders drew up and signed the Mayflower Compact. This document set a valuable precedent for later written constitutions. It was a promising step towards self government.

• The Pilgrims first winter of 1620-1621 was terrible. Only 44 of the 102 survived. The next autumn brought bountiful harvests and the first Thanksgiving was celebrated.

• Plymouth proved that the English could survive in and uninviting region. Plymouth was never important numerically or economically and was eventually incorporated into the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1691.

Massachusetts Bay Colony

• In 1629, a group of non-Separatist Puritans secured a royal charter and formed the Massachusetts Bay Company. These Puritans brought their charter with them and used it as a kind of constitution for many years. In 1630, 11 ships carrying nearly 1000 immigrants set sail for the New World. Massachusetts Bay Colony was begun on a larger scale than any other English colony. 

• The leader and governor of the colony was English lawyer John Winthrop. Winthrop believed that he had a calling from God to lead the new “religious experiment.” He said that the colony would be a “city upon a hill” or an example to the world of what a God fearing and holy people could do.

Massachusetts Bay Colony

• In the colony, religious leaders wielded enormous influence. Nonbelievers as well as believers paid taxes for the government supported church. Laws were passed that regulated all behaviors and practices so that they fell in line with Puritan teachings. Not everyone in the colony was a happy camper.

• Anne Hutchinson was one of those who were unhappy. She was an exceptionally intelligent, strong-willed, and talkative woman and also the mother of 14 children. She carried to the logical extreme the doctrine of predestination. She claimed that a holy life was no sure sign of conversion and that the truly saved need not bother to obey the laws of either God or man. This assertion became known as antinomianism (Greek for against the law) and was high heresy.

Massachusetts Bay Colony

• Hutchinson was brought to trial for heresy in 1638. She confounded her inquisitors for days until she boasted that she had come by her beliefs through a direct revelation from God. Puritan leaders banished her from the colony. They had no choice but to banish her. Hutchinson left for Rhode Island on foot and pregnant. She eventually moved to New York were she was killed in an Indian raid.

• More threatening to the Puritan leaders was the popular minister Roger Williams. Williams was an extreme Separatist who hounded his fellow clergymen to break completely with the Church of England. He also challenged the legality of the Massachusetts Bay colony’s charter, which he said took land from the Indians without fair compensation. He went on to deny the authority of the civil government to regulate religious behavior.

• In 1635, the Bay Colony authorities found Williams guilty of spreading “new and dangerous opinions” and ordered him banished.

Rhode Island “The Sewer”, “Rogue’s Island”

• Williams fled to the Rhode Island area in 1636. At Providence he established the first Baptist church in America. As a leader of Rhode Island, Williams helped to establish complete freedom of religion within the colony. He also helped to establish the practice of no tax support for a state church. Through his efforts the practice of separation of church and state began.

• Puritan leaders back in Boston began to call Rhode Island “that sewer” in which the “Lord’s debris” had collected and rotted.  

• Rhode Island, like North Carolina, became stubbornly independent and individualistic.

Seeds of Colonial Unity

• In 1643, four colonies banded together to form the New England Confederation. The primary purpose of the confederation was defense against the Indians, the French and the Dutch. Each member colony, regardless of size, had two votes. The confederation was an exclusive Puritan club that consisted of the Bay Colony, Plymouth, New Haven, and Hartford (Connecticut). Confederation leaders blackballed Rhode Island’s attempt to join.

• The confederation was the first milestone on the road to colonial unity. Colonists gained experience in delegating their votes to representatives.

Seeds of Colonial Unity

• Back in England the king had paid little attention to the colonies during their planting. They were allowed to become semiautonomous commonwealths. This

neglect was prolonged when the king became involved during the 1640s in civil wars with the

parliamentarians. When Charles II was restored to the throne in 1660, he was determined to take an

active and aggressive role in managing the colonies. Nowhere did the colonists hate this new

management than in Massachusetts. The crown broke the colony’s stubborn streak when it revoked

the Bay Colony’s charter in 1684 and made it a royal colony.

The Dominion of New England

• In 1686, the Dominion of New England was created by the Crown. The dominion was aimed at bolstering colonial defense and enforcing the English Navigation Laws (Acts).

• These laws were passed in 1651 and strengthened in 1660 and 1663. These laws stated that only English ships could trade with English colonies. Any trade open to mariners of the mother country was open to the colonists since they were English subjects.

The Dominion of New England

• Secondly, the laws specified that a few “enumerated commodities” produced in the colonies could only be shipped to the mother country. Tobacco and sugar fell into this category due to the high profit those products provided.

• Thirdly, the laws said that all European goods traveling to the colonies had to pass through an English port where they paid customs duties. Violators risked the confiscation of their ships.

• American colonists hated these restrictions and smuggling became a common and honorable pastime.

The Dominion of New England

• The leader of the dominion was Sir Edmond Andros. He was an able military man but was tactless. He established his headquarters in Boston and the colonists there were soon outraged by his noisy Sabbath-profaning soldiers, who were accused of teaching the people to “drink, blaspheme, curse, and damn.”

• Andros curbed town meetings, heavily restricted the courts, the press and schools and revoked all land titles. He taxed the people without the consent of their elected representatives.

• Luckily for the colonists, the people back in England rose up and dethroned the unpopular James II and enthroned Dutch-born William III and his English wife Mary. When news of this glorious revolution reached America the Dominion of New England collapsed and Andros attempted to flee America disguised in a woman’s dress. His boots gave him away.

The Dominion of New England

• Even though Andros was gone, Massachusetts’ situation did not improve. In 1694 it was made a royal colony and the crown expanded voting rights to all qualified male property owners.

• One positive outcome of the revolution in England was that the new rulers relaxed their grip on colonial trade and began a period of “salutary neglect.” This neglect allowed the colonies once again to make their own decisions again for many years.

New Netherland Colony

• In 1623-1624 the Dutch colony of New Netherland was established along the banks of the Hudson River by the Dutch West India Company. This colony was never more than a secondary interest to its founders.

• The colonial capital of New Amsterdam was a company town. Investors in the company had no enthusiasm for religious toleration, free speech, or democratic practices.

• The colonial governors were often harsh and despotic. This colony was strongly aristocratic.

New Netherland Colony

• New England was hostile to the growth of its Dutch neighbor. Sweden attempted to plant a colony on the Delaware River from 1638-1655. The Dutch leaders of the colony sent Peter Stuyvesant to eject the Swedes. The main fort of the Swedish settlement fell after a bloodless siege and the Swedish colonists were absorbed into the Dutch colony.

• In 1664, Charles II granted the area of New Netherland to his brother the Duke of York. A squadron of English ships appeared off the coast of New Amsterdam and Stuyvesant was forced to surrender the colony without firing a shot. New Amsterdam was renamed New York soon after the takeover.

Pennsylvania • The religious group known as

the Quakers arose in England during the mid-1600s. The refused to support the Church of England with taxes, take oaths, and serve in the military. They were advocates of passive resistance.

• William Penn, a wellborn Englishman was attracted to the Quakers when he was 16. When he told his father of his interest in the faith, his father promptly flogged him. After Penn’s father died and he was an adult, he secured (1684) an immense grant of land from the king in repayment of a debt owed to his father. The king called the area Pennsylvania.

Pennsylvania• Pennsylvania was the best

advertised of any of the 13 colonies. Penn bought land from the local Indian tribes as well. Pennsylvania had a representative assembly, no tax-supported church, and freedom of worship. This colony attracted a rich mix of ethnic groups.

• Within two years, Philadelphia had 2500 residents. Within 19 years – by 1700 – the colony was third in population behind Virginia and Massachusetts.

• Other Quaker settlements appeared in what became the colony of New Jersey in 1664.

• Question 1: Why were the New England Colonies founded? oA. Religious freedom oB. Sandy soil that was ideal for growing tobacco

• Question 2: How did most New England colonists make their living? oA. Wheat farming oB. Fishing and shipbuilding