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Queen Elizabeth died
Queen Elizabeth I died before any permanent colonies were established in North America. -
King James VI
King of Scotland (as James VI) from 1567 to 1625, & first Stuart king of England from 1603 to 1625, who styled himself “king of Great Britain.” James was a strong advocate of royal absolutism, and his conflicts with an increasingly self-assertive Parliament set the stage for the rebellion against his successor, Charles I. -
English set sail for New World
3 ships (Susan Constant, Discovery, and Godspeed) carrying English men and boys set sail to establish permanent colony in Virginia. -
The Virginia Company was established
The Virginia Company was a commercial trading company, chartered by King James I of England in April 1606, with the object of colonizing the eastern coast of North America. -
Path to America
The 3 English ships (Susan Constant, Discovery, and Godspeed) stopped at Cape Henry after 5 months crossing the Atlantic Ocean from England. -
Jamestown, Virginia founded by English
1st permanent English colony in America.
Included 103 settlers on 3 ships (Susan Constant, Discovery, and Godspeed).
Captain John Smith was named governing council.
Named for King James I. -
Quebec established by French
Quebec was established by the French under the leadership of Samuel de Champlain.
Quebec became the foothold for what would become New France. Non-catholics were forbidden in New France. -
Henry Hudson sails to Albany, NY
The Dutch East India Company sends Henry Hudson to explore the area around present-day New York City and the river north to Albany.
The river was named after him and the territory is claimed by the Dutch. -
Santa Fe established by Spanish
Santa Fe was the first permanent European settlement in the Southwest, established by Spaniards.
It being far from Mexico City, and being a dry and hostile environment was why it was not very successful.
The Spanish here traded with local Puebloan peoples. -
Tobacco cultivation begins in Virginia
Tobacco cultivation is introduced in Virginia and within a decade becomes the colony's chief source of revenue. -
Marriage of Pocahontas to John Rolfe
The marriage of Pocahontas to John Rolfe brought tobacco seeds to the colony and led to 8 years of peace among the colonists and Indians.
Tobacco first sells to London shortly after this. -
Death of immigrants
By 1616, 80 percent of all English immigrants who had arrived in Jamestown had perished from lack of supplies and starvation. -
Jamestown & the "Headright Policy"
The colony’s great labor vacuum inspired the creation of the “headright policy” in 1618: any person who migrated to Virginia would automatically receive fifty acres of land and any immigrant whose passage they paid would entitle them to fifty acres more. -
Period: to
Smallpox Epidemic
Smallpox wipes out 90% fo the Native Americans in the Massachusetts Bay Area. -
Southern slavery was born
A Dutch slave ship sold twenty Africans to the Virginia colonists. -
The House of Burgesses
The 1st representative assembly, The House of Burgesses, held in America.
It was a limited representative body composed of white landowners -
Puritan expedition
A group of 101 Puritans aboard the Mayflower ship sail from England to the New World on September 6th, and reached Cape Cod. The began to explore the coastline for best settlement location. -
Plymouth settlement/ Mayflower Compact
The Puritans begin to establish settlement in Plymouth. They form the Mayflower Compact which established a government and legal structure. Half of the colonists died during the next winter. -
1st Thanksgiving
The first Thanksgiving celebration was held in autumn for 3 days between Pilgrims and members of the Wampanoag tribe. -
Virginia Law regarding children of slaves
A 1662 Virginia law stated that an enslaved woman’s children inherited the “condition” of their mother; other colonies soon passed similar statutes. This economic strategy on the part of planters created a legal system in which all children born to slave women would be slaves for life, whether the father was white or black, enslaved or free. -
Indian Massacre of 1622
After the death of Chief Powhatan earlier that year, his brother Chief Opchanacanough & the Powhatan Confederacy tried to rid the Jamestown colony of settlers. 347 settlers were killed by the Indian attack.
This led the settlers to retaliate many times over and destroy what was left of the Indians in the region with war and disease. -
King Charles I
King of Great Britain and Ireland from 1625 to 1649, whose authoritarian rule and quarrels with Parliament provoked a civil war that led to his execution as a tyrant and traitor.
Charles was the second surviving son of James VI of Scotland and Anne of Denmark.
Married Henrietta Maria, sister of French King Louis XIII.
Catholic sympathizer. -
The Dutch purchased Manhattan from Indians
The island of Manhattan was purchased from Munsee Indians, by Peter Minuit. This was a move directed by the Dutch as a new method of acquiring land.
He named the town New Amsterdam. -
Great Puritan Migration; Massachusetts Bay Colony
Led by Puritan lawyer, John Winthrop, the company left England in April of 1630 and arrived in New England in June where they settled in what is now modern day Boston and established the Massachusetts Bay Colony. The colony became the largest colony in New England and was hugely successful.
Droves of Puritans flocked to New England, particularly after 1633, when King Charles appointed William Laud as the new Archbishop of Canterbury and he began rooting out nonconformity in the church. -
Maryland founded
King Charles I set aside 12 million acres of land north of Chesapeake Bay, (called Maryland) and granted it to Cecilius Calvert, known as Lord Baltimore.
Meant as a safe haven for Catholics being harassed by Protestants in England. Goal was for Protestants and Catholics to live together peacefully, in a diverse Christian colony.
Most Maryland colonists were radical Quakers and Puritans who were opposed to the forced upon Church of England.
Became a royal colony after the Glorious Revolution. -
Smallpox Epidemic
Smallpox wipes out 90% fo the Native Americans in the Massachusetts Bay Area. -
Rhode Island & Providence Plantations
One of the original 13 colonies.
Formed by Roger Williams & other religious radicals, after leaving the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Williams purchased the land from Indians. Granted a charter by Parliament in 1644. They had republican sympathies. Laws were passed establishing witchcraft trials, imprisonment for debt & chattel slavery. Became a haven for Quakers, Jews, and other persecuted religious groups. Granted a royal charter by Charles II in 1663, as Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. -
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Pequot War
Fought by the Pequot Indian people against English settlers from Massachusetts Bay, Connecticut, Saybrook colonies and Native American allies.
Partially began due to fur and wampum trade control in Connecticut River valley. Before English, the Dutch & Pequot controlled all of region's trade.
It was a brutal war & the first sustained conflict between Native Americans and Europeans in the NE. This eliminated the Pequot threat to South New England colonization.
Includes Mystic Massacre- 5/26/1637 -
Civil war in England
Conflict erupted in 1640 when a Parliament called by Charles refused to grant him subsidies to suppress a rebellion in Scotland. The Irish rebelled the following year, and by 1642 strained relations between Charles and Parliament led to civil war in England. -
Virginia law regarding labor of African women
In 1643, however, a law was passed in Virginia that made African women “tithable. This associated African women’s work with difficult agricultural labor. -
King Charles I executed; England a republic
In 1649 Parliament won, Charles I was executed, and England became a republic and protectorate under Oliver Cromwell.
These changes redefined England’s relationship with its American colonies, as the new government under Cromwell attempted to consolidate its hold over its overseas territories. -
Recognizing Charles II
Six colonies, including Virginia and Barbados, declared allegiance to the dead monarch’s son, Charles II. Parliament responded with an act in 1650 that leveled an economic embargo on the rebelling colonies, forcing them to accept Parliament’s authority. -
Navigation Act of 1651
Passed by English Parliament. Compelled merchants in every colony to ship goods directly to England in English ships.
Parliament sought to bind the colonies more closely to England and prevent other European nations, especially the Dutch, from interfering with its American possessions. -
Death of Oliver Cromwell
England found itself in crisis after the death of Oliver Cromwell (leader of English Parliment) in 1658, leading in time to the reestablishment of the monarchy. -
Slavery in New Amsterdam
After the Dutch began importing enslaved women to marry their enslaved men in 1641, New Amsterdam became the largest urban slave populated town on the continent by 1660. -
King Charles II to throne
On his thirtieth birthday (May 29, 1660), Charles II sailed from the Netherlands to his restoration after nine years in exile. He was received in London to great acclaim, as depicted in this contemporary painting. Lieve Verschuler, The Arrival of King Charles II of England in Rotterdam, 24 May 1660.
Charles II’s suppression of the religious and press freedoms that flourished during the civil war years demonstrated the Crown’s desire to reimpose order and royal rule. Ruled until 1685. -
New York replaces New Netherland
The Dutch New Netherland population was small and the colony was vulnerable to English attach during 1650s and 1660s. This lead to the Dutch handing over New Netherland to England in 1664. The name was changed to New York for James, the Duke of York (brother to Charles II). -
Charleston, VA founded
The English founding of Charleston (“Charles Town” until the 1780s) in 1670 was viewed as a serious threat by the Spanish in neighboring Florida, who began construction of Castillo de San Marcos in St. Augustine as a response.
This signified England's growing confidence as a colonial power.
The town was named in honor of King Charles II.
Charleston's economy prospered due to its busy seaport and the cultivation of rice, cotton, and indigo. -
Susquehannock War
The sudden and unpredictable violence of this war triggered political crisis in Virginia. Panicked colonists fled begging the government for help. Gov. William Berkeley would not send an army after the Susquehannock Indians. This lead to Nathaniel Bacon taking things into his own hands with Bacon's Rebellion. -
King Philip's War
First Indian War. After Navigation Acts, colonist thought Indians and Catholics sought to destroy English America.
In June 1675, violence erupted when three Wampanoag warriors were executed by Plymouth authorities for the murder of John Sassamon, a tribal informer. Metacom (or King Philip)’s coalition was at first victorious. However, after a year of savage fighting during which some 3,000 Indians and 600 colonists were killed. Metacom's head was displayed on a pole for 25 years at Plymouth. -
Bacon's Rebellion
Bacon's Rebellion was an uprising in 1676 - 1677 against American Indians and the colonial government in the Virginia Colony over taking reprisal action for alleged thefts by the Native Americans. It was led by Nathaniel Bacon, a wealthy 29-year-old planter, in opposition to the Governor of Virginia, Sir William Berkeley. Bacon's Rebellion was the first rebellion in the American colonies. -
Pueblo Revolt
Pueblo Indian retaliated against the Spaniards that took over New Mexico and Arizona, seizing their villages, enslaving them, and preventing the Indians from communing with their gods. Led by Pope. Assaulted Spanish settlements with overwhelming numbers: 8,000 Pueblo warriors compared to 200 armed settlers. Pope became the ruler of New Mexico. After Pope's death in 1692, Spain easily regained New Mexico. -
Pennsylvania & Quakers
William Penn was granted about 45,000 square miles west of Delaware River for Pennsylvania. Penn was a Quaker, & intended a "colony of Heaven for the children of Light" or a "City Upon a Hill." Quakers did not approve of slavery due to violence. Slavery formally protested by Quakers in 1688. -
James II to throne
Charles II's brother; Showed openly Catholic tendencies and was replaced by his daughter and son-in-law. Ruled until 1688.
Parliament appealed to William of Orange, urging him to save England from a Catholic takeover. -
Dominion of New England
James II worked to place the colonies on firmer administrative and defensive footing. The Dominion consolidated the New England colonies, New York, and New Jersey into one administrative unit to counter French Canada. Colonists strongly resented the loss of their individual provinces. The Dominion’s governor, Sir Edmund Andros forced colonists into military service for a campaign against the Maine Indians in early 1687 leaving a long-standing grievance among English Settlers. -
Glorious Revolution; William III & Mary II
Bloodless Revolution; William III defeated James II in November 1688 for the throne. James was intimidated & fled to France.
William was the son of William of Orange and Mary, daughter of Charles I; Mary was the daughter of King James II and Anne Hyde. Ruled as joint monarchs until 1694 when Mary died. William then ruled alone until his death in 1702.
William constantly strove to spread Protestantism and decrease the Catholic influence of France and Spain. -
Witch & supernatural paranoia
Salem Town, Salem Village, Ipswich & Andover all tried women and men as witches. 14 women and 6 men were executed- 5 others died in prison. -
Spanish king issued the Decree of Sanctuary
This granted freedom to slaves fleeing the English colonies if they converted to Catholicism and swore an oath of loyalty to Spain.
