The process of English colonization in the Americas began late, in comparison with the Spanish and Portuguese.
Colonial exploration began with small villages that later formed the 13 colonies on the east coast of the region now occupied by the United States.
Before going to sea, in the 16th century, England faced the Hundred Years' War and the War of the Two Roses. The first maritime incursions followed the line of the Spanish and French, who were looking for a way to India through North America.
During the reign of Elizabeth I (1558-1603), Spanish pirates were partners with the English in navigation. The most famous of them, Francis Drake, was decorated by the Queen.
English navigations became a lucrative business when Great Britain dominated the African slave trade to the American Continent.
Abstract
In the 16th century, England was dominated by sheep farming for wool production. Focused more and more on this business, food production on farms has fallen. As a result, there was a shortage of food and a drop in the supply of work in the countryside.
The alternative was to seek more land. And, unlike what happened with the Latin colonies, the occupation of North America was based on enterprises. The new territories also received the surplus population and attracted those who demanded greater religious freedom than that offered in England.
Two private companies began the process of colonizing North America from 1606 onwards. After the English Crown was granted, the London Company monopolized the region to the north. The southern territories fell to the Plymouth Company.
The companies had autonomy for the exploration of the territory, but they were subordinated to the English State.
The concession took place 20 years after the arrival of the first settlers. A party of 91 men, 17 women and nine children landed on Roanoke Island in 1587. By 1590, there was no trace of the group, led by Walter Raleigh. The fate of the colonists was never determined.
Fearing hostilities from the local Indians, the London Company sent a more robust entourage to America. 144 men embarked on three ships bound for present-day Virginia territory.
The group landed in the Chesapeake Bay in the spring of 1607 and started the settlement called Jamestown.
After failing to find gold and other exploitable products, the settlers learned to grow tobacco. Tobacco farms received reinforcement from slave labor from 1619 onwards.
Jamestown is the embryo for the birth of other colonies in the south. Thus, Maryland (1632), North Carolina and South Carolina (1633) and Georgia (1733) emerge.
The southern colonies were marked by religious tolerance. Maryland, for example, was a Catholic colony, led by Lord Baltimore.
The colonial enterprises in the north were also marked by the domination of religious people. The first groups of settlers called Pilgrims arrived in the Plymouth region in 1620. The settlers began to settle in the region called Massachusetts, considered more liberal.
In the region, the settlers dominated the natives and, with them, learned to dominate hunting, fishing and agriculture. Prosperous, Massachusetts expanded the colonies and spawned the territories that became known as New England.
The territories comprised the colonies of Connecticut, New Haven, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire.
Unlike the south, the northern colonies were characterized by subsistence-oriented polyculture and free labor.
Finally, the colonies in the center emerged. New York, Delaware, Pennsylvania and New Jersey were marked by religious freedom and liberal thinking. In this region, the colonists raised small animals and maintained a structure similar to the colonies of New England.
The English colonies had 250,000 inhabitants, including colonists and enslaved blacks in 1700. On the eve of the Independence of the United States, in 1775, the region already had 2.5 million inhabitants.
Despite diverse political and religious interests, the colonists maintained unity to proclaim independence on July 4, 1776.
To better understand this topic, see:
- Exploration Colony
- Settlement Colony
- The Thirteen Colonies and the Formation of the United States
- Manifest Destiny
Portuguese and Spanish Colonization
Portugal and Spain used the model of colonies of exploitation in the colonial process of the American Continent. The territories today correspond to Latin America and Central America.
Features
- Extractivism
- Extermination of ancestral peoples
- Use of slave labor
- Lack of political autonomy in relation to the metropolis
- Absence of religious freedom
- Plantation System
See also:
- Colonialism
- Colonial Brazil
- Spanish America
French and Dutch Colonization
France and Holland belatedly entered the activities of great navigations in search of new territories because they were looking for internal solutions to conflicts. In the case of Holland, it was necessary to fight for its independence, from Spain, in 1581.
The two countries tried to invade territories already occupied in Brazil, but were expelled by the Portuguese. France established colonies in part of present-day Canada and in Haiti.
The Netherlands, on the other hand, explored the area that today corresponds to New York City.
Learn more at:
- Equinoctial France
- Antarctic France
- Battle of the Guararapes
- Dutch Invasions