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112-951: As the last holdout among the Thirteen Colonies to declare independence, the conference's actions had a profound impact on American public opinion and facilitated the issuing of the Declaration of Independence shortly afterward by the Continental Congress. Following is a list of those who attended the Pennsylvania Provincial Conference. From Bedford County : From Berks County : From Bucks County : From Chester County : From Cumberland County : From Lancaster County : From Northampton County : From Philadelphia : From Philadelphia County : From Westmoreland County : From York County : Thirteen Colonies The Thirteen Colonies were

224-507: A cash crop. In 1632, King Charles I granted the charter for the Province of Maryland to Cecil Calvert, 2nd Baron Baltimore . Calvert's father had been a prominent Catholic official who encouraged Catholic immigration to the English colonies. The charter offered no guidelines on religion. The Province of Carolina was the second attempted English settlement south of Virginia, the first being

336-575: A disease the Africans were far less susceptible to than Native American slaves. During the 17th and 18th centuries, Native American slavery , the enslavement of Native Americans by European colonists , was common. Many of these Native slaves were exported to the Northern colonies and to off-shore colonies, especially the "sugar islands" of the Caribbean . The exact number of Native Americans who were enslaved

448-631: A group of British colonies on the Atlantic coast of North America during the 17th and 18th centuries. Grievances against the imperial government led the 13 colonies to begin uniting in 1774, and expelling British officials by 1775. Assembled at the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia , after armed conflict had broken out in April, they appointed George Washington as commander-in-chief of

560-525: A part of Massachusetts until achieving statehood in 1820. In 1685, King James II of England closed the legislatures and consolidated the New England colonies into the Dominion of New England , putting the region under the control of Governor Edmund Andros . In 1688, the colonies of New York, West Jersey, and East Jersey were added to the dominion. Andros was overthrown and the dominion was closed in 1689, after

672-710: A percentage higher than in the cities of Boston and Philadelphia , and second only to Charleston in the South. The French introduced legalized slavery into their colonies in New France both near the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River . They also used slave labor on their island colonies in the Caribbean: Guadeloupe and especially Saint-Domingue . After the port of New Orleans was founded in 1718 with access to

784-633: A proprietary colony of Quaker William Penn . The main population elements included the Quaker population based in Philadelphia, a Scotch-Irish population on the Western frontier, and numerous German colonies in between. Philadelphia became the largest city in the colonies with its central location, excellent port, and a population of about 30,000. The Pilgrims were a small group of Puritan separatists who felt that they needed to distance themselves physically from

896-744: A result of taking captives in raids and warfare, both before and after Europeans arrived. This practice continued into the 1800s. In some cases, especially for young women or children, Native American families adopted captives to replace members they had lost. Among those native to the modern Southeastern United States , the children of slaves were considered free. Slaves included captives from wars and slave raids; captives bartered from other tribes, sometimes at great distances; children sold by their parents during famines; and men and women who staked themselves in gambling when they had nothing else, which put them into servitude in some cases for life. In three expeditions between 1514 and 1525, Spanish explorers visited

1008-496: A settlement near Providence Plantations which they called Shawomet. However, Massachusetts Bay attempted to seize the land and put it under their own authority, so Gorton travelled to London to gain a charter from the King. Robert Rich, 2nd Earl of Warwick assisted him in gaining the charter, so he changed the name of the settlement to Warwick. Roger Williams secured a Royal Charter from the King in 1663 which united all four settlements into

1120-697: A smaller part of the New England economy, which was based on yeoman farming and trades, than in the South, and a smaller fraction of the population, but they were present. Most were house servants, but some worked at farm labor. The Puritans codified slavery in 1641. The Massachusetts Bay royal colony passed the Body of Liberties , which prohibited slavery in some instances, but did allow three legal bases of slavery. Slaves could be held if they were captives of war, if they sold themselves into slavery, were purchased from elsewhere, or if they were sentenced to slavery by

1232-633: A war that served European interests more than their own. This dispute was a link in the chain of events that soon brought about the American Revolution. The British were left with large debts following the French and Indian War, so British leaders decided to increase taxation and control of the Thirteen Colonies. They imposed several new taxes, beginning with the Sugar Act of 1764. Later acts included

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1344-436: A woman and her children (if she was still enslaved), education for the mixed-race children of the union, especially boys; and sometimes a property settlement. Free people of color became an intermediate social caste between whites and enslaved blacks; many practiced artisan trades, and some acquired educations and property. Some white fathers sent their mixed-race sons to France for education in military schools. Gradually in

1456-605: Is not clear if it exported any slaves. Native Americans were enslaved by the Spanish in Florida under the encomienda system. New England and the Carolinas captured Native Americans in wars and distributed them as slaves. Native Americans captured and enslaved some early European explorers and colonists. Larger societies structured as chiefdoms kept slaves as unpaid field laborers. In band societies , owning enslaved captives attested to

1568-450: Is today Canada . The Thirteen Colonies were separate entities under the Crown, but had similar political, constitutional, and legal systems, and each was dominated by Protestant English-speakers. The first of the colonies, Virginia, was established at Jamestown , in 1607. The New England Colonies, Maryland, and Pennsylvania, were substantially motivated by their founders' concerns related to

1680-612: Is unknown because vital statistics and census reports were at best infrequent. Historian Alan Gallay has estimated that from 1670 to 1715, slave traders in the Province of Carolina sold between 24,000 and 51,000 Native Americans into slavery as part of the Indian slave trade in the American Southeast . Andrés Reséndez estimates that between 147,000 and 340,000 Native Americans were enslaved in North America, excluding Mexico. Even after

1792-815: The Americas during the early modern period , and both Africans and indigenous peoples were targets of enslavement by Europeans during the era. As the Spaniards , French , Dutch , and British gradually established colonies in North America from the 16th century onward, they began to enslave indigenous people , using them as forced labor to help develop colonial economies. As indigenous peoples suffered massive population losses due to imported diseases , Europeans quickly turned to importing slaves from Africa, primarily to work on slave plantations that produced cash crops . The enslavement of indigenous people in North America

1904-482: The Appalachian Mountains , as this was designated an Indian Reserve . Some groups of settlers disregarded the proclamation, however, and continued to move west and establish farms. The proclamation was modified and was no longer a hindrance to settlement, but the fact angered the colonists that it had been promulgated without their prior consultation. Parliament had directly levied duties and excise taxes on

2016-562: The Boston Tea Party in 1773 when the Sons of Liberty dumped thousands of pounds of tea into the water. Tensions escalated in 1774 as Parliament passed the laws known as the Intolerable Acts , which greatly restricted self-government in the colony of Massachusetts. These laws also allowed British military commanders to claim colonial homes for the quartering of soldiers, regardless of whether

2128-523: The Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations . Other colonists settled to the north, mingling with adventurers and profit-oriented settlers to establish more religiously diverse colonies in New Hampshire and Maine . Massachusetts absorbed these small settlements when it made significant land claims in the 1640s and 1650s, but New Hampshire was eventually given a separate charter in 1679. Maine remained

2240-744: The Continental Army to fight the American Revolutionary War . In 1776, Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence as the United States of America and, asserting its sovereignty, the United States allied with Britain's enemy, France. Defeating British armies with its French ally, the former Thirteen Colonies had its sovereignty recognized by Britain in the Treaty of Paris in 1783. The Thirteen Colonies in their traditional groupings were:

2352-668: The Currency Act of 1764 , the Stamp Act of 1765 , and the Townshend Acts of 1767. Colonial newspapers and printers in particular took strong exception against the Stamp Act which imposed a tax on newspapers and official documents, and played a central role in disseminating literature among the colonists against such taxes and the idea of taxation without colonial representation. The Royal Proclamation of 1763 restricted settlement west of

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2464-688: The Glorious Revolution deposed King James II; the former colonies were re-established. According to Guy Miller, the Rebellion of 1689 was the "climax of the 60-year-old struggle between the government in England and the Puritans of Massachusetts over the question of who was to rule the Bay colony." In 1702, East and West Jersey were combined to form the Province of New Jersey . The northern and southern sections of

2576-593: The Narváez expedition in Florida. The group headed south on the mainland in 1529, trying to reach Spanish settlements. They were captured and held by Native Americans until 1535. They traveled northwest to the Pacific Coast, then south along the coast to San Miguel de Culiacán , which had been founded in 1531, and then to Mexico City. Spanish Texas had few African slaves, but the colonists enslaved many Native Americans. Beginning in 1803, Spain freed slaves who escaped from

2688-569: The Narváez expedition in Tampa Bay in April 1528 and marched north with the expedition until September, when they embarked on rafts from the Wakulla River , heading for Mexico. African slaves arrived again in Florida in 1539 with Hernando de Soto , and in the 1565 founding of St. Augustine, Florida . When St. Augustine was founded in 1565, the site already had enslaved Native Americans, whose ancestors had migrated from Cuba. The Spanish settlement

2800-639: The New England Colonies ( New Hampshire , Massachusetts , Rhode Island , and Connecticut ); the Middle Colonies ( New York , New Jersey , Pennsylvania , and Delaware ); and the Southern Colonies ( Maryland , Virginia , North Carolina , South Carolina , and Georgia ). These colonies were part of British America , which also included territory in The Floridas , the Caribbean , and what

2912-585: The New England Confederation in 1643, and all New England colonies were included in the Dominion of New England (1686–1689). The Province of Carolina was initially chartered in 1629 and initial settlements were established after 1651. That charter was voided in 1660 by Charles II and a new charter was issued in 1663, making it a proprietary colony. The Carolina province was divided into separate proprietary colonies, north and south in 1712, before both became royal colonies in 1729. Earlier, along

3024-560: The New Haven , Saybrook , and Connecticut colonies. During the 17th century, the New Haven and Saybrook colonies were absorbed by Connecticut. Roger Williams established Providence Plantations in 1636 on land provided by Narragansett sachem Canonicus . Williams was a Puritan who preached religious tolerance, separation of Church and State , and a complete break with the Church of England. He

3136-743: The Plymouth Company and the London Company for the purpose of establishing permanent settlements in America. The London Company established the Colony of Virginia in 1607, the first permanently settled English colony on the continent. The Plymouth Company founded the Popham Colony on the Kennebec River , but it was short-lived. The Plymouth Council for New England sponsored several colonization projects, culminating with Plymouth Colony in 1620 which

3248-418: The Province of North Carolina . The first African slaves in what is now Georgia arrived in mid-September 1526 with Lucas Vázquez de Ayllón 's establishment of San Miguel de Gualdape on the current Georgia coast. They rebelled and lived with indigenous people, destroying the colony in less than 2 months. Two centuries later, Georgia was the last of Britain's Thirteen Colonies to be established and

3360-508: The Seven Years' War . Spain evacuated its citizens from St. Augustine, including the residents of Fort Mose, transporting them to Cuba . As British colonists developed the colony for plantation agriculture, the percentage of slaves in the population in twenty years rose from 18% to almost 65% by 1783. An African slave, Estevanico , reached Galveston island in November 1528, with the remnants of

3472-595: The War of the Austrian Succession , but most colonists called it King George's War . In 1745, British and colonial forces captured the town of Louisbourg , and the war came to an end with the 1748 Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle . However, many colonists were angered when Britain returned Louisbourg to France in return for Madras and other territories. In the aftermath of the war, both the British and French sought to expand into

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3584-540: The West Indies . Historian Alan Gallay estimates that between 1670 and 1715, an estimated 24,000 to 51,000 captive Native Americans were exported from South Carolina to the Caribbean. This was a much higher number than the number of Africans imported to the English mainland colonies during the same period. In 1733, royal governor George Burrington complained that no ships brought their slave cargoes from Africa directly to

3696-415: The 13 colonies. During the 1750s, the colonies began collaborating with one another instead of dealing directly with Britain. With the help of colonial printers and newspapers , these inter-colonial activities and concerns were shared and led to calls for protection of the colonists' " Rights as Englishmen ", especially the principle of " no taxation without representation ". Late 18th century conflicts with

3808-436: The 1640s. These groups conducted enslaving raids in what is now Georgia, Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Florida, and possibly Alabama. The Carolina slave trade, which included both trading and direct raids by colonists, was the largest among the British colonies in North America, estimated at 24,000 to 51,000 Native Americans by Gallay. Historian Ulrich Phillips argues that Africans were inculcated as slaves and

3920-526: The 1740s, the Thirteen Colonies underwent the First Great Awakening . In 1738, an incident involving a Welsh mariner named Robert Jenkins sparked the War of Jenkins' Ear between Britain and Spain. Hundreds of North Americans volunteered for Admiral Edward Vernon 's assault on Cartagena de Indias , a Spanish city in South America. The war against Spain merged into a broader conflict known as

4032-529: The 1754 Albany Congress , Pennsylvania colonist Benjamin Franklin proposed the Albany Plan which would have created a unified government of the Thirteen Colonies for coordination of defense and other matters, but the plan was rejected by the leaders of most colonies. In the Treaty of Paris (1763) , France formally ceded to Britain the eastern part of its vast North American empire, having secretly given to Spain

4144-486: The 1777 Articles of Confederation . Slavery in the colonial United States The institution of slavery in the European colonies in North America , which eventually became part of the United States of America , developed due to a combination of factors. Primarily, the labor demands for establishing and maintaining European colonies resulted in the Atlantic slave trade . Slavery existed in every European colony in

4256-520: The 18th century. African slaves arrived on August 9, 1526, in Winyah Bay (off the coast of present-day South Carolina ) with a Spanish expedition. Lucas Vázquez de Ayllón brought 600 colonists to start a colony at San Miguel de Gualdape . Records say the colonists included enslaved Africans, without saying how many. After a month Ayllón moved the colony to what is now Georgia. Until the early 18th century, enslaved Africans were difficult to acquire in

4368-478: The American civilians were willing or not to have soldiers in their homes. The laws further revoked colonial rights to hold trials in cases involving soldiers or crown officials, forcing such trials to be held in England rather than in America. Parliament also sent Thomas Gage to serve as Governor of Massachusetts and as the commander of British forces in North America. By 1774, colonists still hoped to remain part of

4480-557: The Atlantic coast supplied the Atlantic market with beaver fur and deerskins. America had an advantage in natural resources and established its own thriving shipbuilding industry, and many American merchants engaged in the transatlantic trade. Improved economic conditions and easing of religious persecution in Europe made it more difficult to recruit labor to the colonies, and many colonies became increasingly reliant on slave labor, particularly in

4592-733: The British Empire, but discontentment was widespread concerning British rule throughout the Thirteen Colonies. Colonists elected delegates to the First Continental Congress , which convened in Philadelphia in September 1774. In the aftermath of the Intolerable Acts, the delegates asserted that the colonies owed allegiance only to the king; they would accept royal governors as agents of the king, but they were no longer willing to recognize Parliament's right to pass legislation affecting

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4704-526: The British force at the April 1775 Battles of Lexington and Concord , then lay siege to Boston . By spring 1775, all royal officials had been expelled, and the Continental Congress hosted a convention of delegates for the Thirteen Colonies. It raised an army to fight the British and named George Washington its commander, made treaties, declared independence, and recommended that the colonies write constitutions and become states, later enumerated in

4816-701: The British government over taxes and rights led to the American Revolution , in which the Thirteen Colonies joined together for the first time to form the Continental Congress and raised the Continental Army , declaring independence in 1776. They fought the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783) with the aid of the Kingdom of France and, to a much lesser degree, the Dutch Republic and the Kingdom of Spain . In 1606, King James I of England granted charters to both

4928-413: The British mainland colonies. Most were sold from Africa to the West Indies for the labor-intensive sugar trade. The large plantations and high mortality rates required continued importation of slaves. One of the first major centers of African slavery in the English North American colonies occurred with the founding of Charles Town and the Province of Carolina (later, South Carolina) in 1670. The colony

5040-419: The Carolina colony operated more or less independently until 1691 when Philip Ludwell was appointed governor of the entire province. From that time until 1708, the northern and southern settlements remained under one government. However, during this period, the two halves of the province began increasingly to be known as North Carolina and South Carolina, as the descendants of the colony's proprietors fought over

5152-468: The Carolinas and enslaved Native Americans, who they took to their base on Santo Domingo . The Spanish Crown's charter for its 1526 colony in the Carolinas and Georgia was more restrictive. It required that Native Americans be treated well, paid, and converted to Christianity, but it also allowed already enslaved Native Americans to be bought and exported to the Caribbean if they had been enslaved by other Native Americans. This colony did not survive, so it

5264-542: The Catholic faith, implying that Africans were human beings endowed with a soul, an idea that had not been acknowledged until then. The Code Noir forbade interracial marriages, but interracial relationships were formed in La Louisiane from the earliest years. In New Orleans society particularly, a formal system of concubinage, known as plaçage , developed. Usually formed between young white men and African or African-American women, these relationships were formalized with contracts that sometimes provided for freedom for

5376-428: The Christian Indians documented how hundreds of Praying Indians , who were allied with the New England Colonies , were enslaved and sent to the West Indies in the aftermath of King Philip's War by the colonists. Captive indigenous opponents, including women and children, were also sold into slavery at a substantial profit, to be transported to West Indies colonies. African and Native American slaves made up

5488-436: The Church of England, which they perceived as corrupted. They initially moved to the Netherlands, but eventually sailed to America in 1620 on the Mayflower . Upon their arrival, they drew up the Mayflower Compact , by which they bound themselves together as a united community, thus establishing the small Plymouth Colony . William Bradford was their main leader. After its founding, other settlers traveled from England to join

5600-718: The English colonies, slavery became known as a racial caste system that generally encompassed all people of African descent, including those of mixed race. From 1662, Virginia defined social status by the status of the mother, unlike in England, where under common law fathers determined the status of their children, whether legitimate or natural. Thus, under the doctrine of partus sequitur ventrum , children born to enslaved mothers were considered slaves, regardless of their paternity. Similarly, children born to mothers who were free were also free, whether or not of mixed-race. At one time, Virginia had prohibited enslavement of Christian individuals, but lifted that restriction with its 1662 law. In

5712-504: The English population migrated to America after 1700, but the colonies attracted new immigrants from other European countries. These immigrants traveled to all of the colonies, but the Middle Colonies attracted the most and continued to be more ethnically diverse than the other colonies. Numerous settlers immigrated from Ireland, both Catholic and Protestant—particularly " New Light " Ulster Presbyterians . Protestant Germans also immigrated in large numbers, particularly to Pennsylvania. In

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5824-471: The Great Lakes and Ohio valley. The French and Indian War took on a new significance for the British North American colonists when William Pitt the Elder decided that major military resources needed to be devoted to North America in order to win the war against France. For the first time, the continent became one of the main theaters of what could be termed a world war . During the war, it became increasingly apparent to American colonists that they were under

5936-403: The Gulf Coast, French colonists imported more African slaves to the Illinois Country for use as agricultural or mining laborers. By the mid-eighteenth century, slaves accounted for as much as one-third of the limited population in that rural area. Slavery was much more extensive in lower colonial Louisiana , where the French developed sugar cane plantations along the Mississippi River. Slavery

6048-402: The Indian Slave Trade ended in 1750 the enslavement of Native Americans continued in the west, and also in the Southern states mostly through kidnappings. Slavery of Native Americans was organized in colonial and Mexican California through Franciscan missions, theoretically entitled to ten years of Native labor, but in practice maintaining them in perpetual servitude, until their charge

6160-409: The Lords combined their remaining capital and financed a settlement mission to the area led by Sir John Colleton . The expedition located fertile and defensible ground at Charleston , originally Charles Town for Charles II of England . Beginning in 1609, Dutch traders established fur trading posts on the Hudson River , Delaware River , and Connecticut River , seeking to protect their interests in

6272-448: The Louisiana territory, recently acquired by the United States. More African-descended slaves were brought to Texas by American settlers. The first recorded Africans in Virginia arrived in late August 1619. The White Lion , a privateer ship owned by Robert Rich, 2nd Earl of Warwick but flying a Dutch flag, docked at what is now Old Point Comfort (located in modern-day Hampton) with approximately 20 Africans. They were captives from

6384-458: The Ohio River valley. The French and Indian War (1754–1763) was the American extension of the general European conflict known as the Seven Years' War . Previous colonial wars in North America had started in Europe and then spread to the colonies, but the French and Indian War is notable for having started in North America and spread to Europe. One of the primary causes of the war was increasing competition between Britain and France, especially in

6496-478: The South. The population of slaves in America grew dramatically between 1680 and 1750, and the growth was driven by a mixture of forced immigration and the reproduction of slaves. Slaves supported vast plantation economies in the South, while slaves in the North worked in a variety of occupations. There were a few local attempted slave revolts, such as the Stono Rebellion and the New York Conspiracy of 1741 , but these uprisings were suppressed. A small proportion of

6608-408: The area of present-day Angola and had been seized by the privateer's crew from a Portuguese slave ship, the "São João Bautista". To obtain the Africans, the Jamestown colony traded provisions with the ship. Some number of these individuals appear to have been treated like indentured servants , since slave laws were not passed until later, in 1641 in Massachusetts and in 1661 in Virginia. But from

6720-413: The area south of the Carolinas be colonized with the "worthy poor" of England to provide an alternative to the overcrowded debtors' prisons. Oglethorpe and other English philanthropists secured a royal charter as the Trustees of the colony of Georgia on June 9, 1732. Oglethorpe and his compatriots hoped to establish a utopian colony that banned slavery and recruited only the most worthy settlers, but by 1750

6832-401: The assembly had made a public decision to enslave Native Americans. In the years to follow, other laws resulted in Native Americans being grouped with other non-Christian servants who had been imported to the colonies (Negro slaves) as slaves for life. Puritan New England, Virginia, Spanish Florida, and the Carolina colonies engaged in large-scale enslavement of Native Americans, often through

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6944-400: The authority of the British Empire , as British military and civilian officials took on an increased presence in their lives. The war also increased a sense of American unity in other ways. It caused men to travel across the continent who might otherwise have never left their own colony, fighting alongside men from decidedly different backgrounds who were nonetheless still American. Throughout

7056-432: The base for extensive trade with the English colonies, and many products from New England and Virginia were carried to Europe on Dutch ships. The Dutch also engaged in the burgeoning Atlantic slave trade , bringing some enslaved Africans to the English colonies in North America, although many more were sent to Barbados and Brazil. The West India Company desired to grow New Netherland as it became commercially successful, yet

7168-1026: The beginning, in accordance with the custom of the Atlantic slave trade , most of this relatively small group, appear to have been treated as slaves, with "African" or "negro" becoming synonymous with "slave". Virginia enacted laws concerning runaway slaves and 'negroes' in 1672. Some number of the colony's early Africans earned freedom by fulfilling a work contract or for converting to Christianity. At least one of these, Anthony Johnson , in turn, acquired slaves or indentured servants for workers himself. Historians such as Edmund Morgan say this evidence suggests that racial attitudes were much more flexible in early 17th-century Virginia than they would later become. A 1625 census recorded 23 Africans in Virginia. In 1649 there were 300, and in 1690 there were 950. Over this period, legal distinctions between white indentured servants and "Negros" widened into lifelong and inheritable chattel-slavery for Africans and people of African descent. The 1677 work The Doings and Sufferings of

7280-518: The best answer to the labor shortage in the New World because Native American slaves were more familiar with the environment, and would often successfully escape into the frontier territory they knew. Africans had more difficulty surviving in unknown territory. Africans were also more familiar with large scale indigo and rice cultivation, of which Native Americans were unfamiliar. The early colonial America depended heavily on rice and indigo cultivation producing disease-carrying mosquitoes caused malaria ,

7392-421: The captor's military prowess. Some war captives were subjected to ritualized torture and execution. Alan Gallay and other historians emphasize differences between Native American enslavement of war captives and the European slave trading system, into which numerous native peoples were integrated. Richard White , in The Middle Ground , elucidates the complex social relationships between Native American groups and

7504-424: The cities of Philadelphia, New York, and Boston had a population of more than 16,000, which was small by European standards. By 1770, the economic output of the Thirteen Colonies made up forty percent of the gross domestic product of the entire British Empire. As the 18th century progressed, colonists began to settle far from the Atlantic coast. Pennsylvania, Virginia, Connecticut, and Maryland all laid claim to

7616-528: The coast, the Roanoke Colony was established in 1585, re-established in 1587, and found abandoned in 1590. The first British colony was Jamestown , established on May 14, 1607 near Chesapeake Bay . The business venture was financed and coordinated by the London Virginia Company , a joint-stock company looking for gold. Its first years were extremely difficult, with very high death rates from disease and starvation, wars with local Indians, and little gold. The colony survived and flourished by turning to tobacco as

7728-417: The colonies formed bodies of elected representatives known as Provincial Congresses , and colonists began to boycott imported British merchandise. Later in 1774, 12 colonies sent representatives to the First Continental Congress in Philadelphia . During the Second Continental Congress , the remaining colony of Georgia sent delegates as well. Massachusetts Governor Thomas Gage feared a confrontation with

7840-427: The colonies of East and West Florida . In removing a major foreign threat to the thirteen colonies, the war also largely removed the colonists' need for colonial protection. The British and colonists triumphed jointly over a common foe. The colonists' loyalty to the mother country was stronger than ever before. However, disunity was beginning to form. British Prime Minister William Pitt the Elder had decided to wage

7952-485: The colonies, bypassing the colonial legislatures, and Americans began to insist on the principle of " no taxation without representation " with intense protests over the Stamp Act of 1765 . They argued that the colonies had no representation in the British Parliament, so it was a violation of their rights as Englishmen for taxes to be imposed upon them. Parliament rejected the colonial protests and asserted its authority by passing new taxes. Colonial discontentment grew with

8064-455: The colonies. In the 18th century, the British government operated under a policy of mercantilism , in which the central government administered its colonies for Britain's economic benefit. The 13 colonies had a degree of self-governance and active local elections , and they resisted London's demands for more control over them. The French and Indian War (1754–1763) against France and its Indian allies led to growing tensions between Britain and

8176-538: The colonies. Most delegates opposed an attack on the British position in Boston, and the Continental Congress instead agreed to the imposition of a boycott known as the Continental Association . The boycott proved effective and the value of British imports dropped dramatically. The Thirteen Colonies became increasingly divided between Patriots opposed to British rule and Loyalists who supported it. In response,

8288-453: The colonists; he requested reinforcements from Britain, but the British government was not willing to pay for the expense of stationing tens of thousands of soldiers in the Thirteen Colonies. Gage was instead ordered to seize Patriot arsenals. He dispatched a force to march on the arsenal at Concord, Massachusetts , but the Patriots learned about it and blocked their advance. The Patriots repulsed

8400-561: The colony failed to attract the same level of settlement as the English colonies did. Many of those who did immigrate to the colony were English, German, Walloon , or Sephardim . In 1638, Sweden established the colony of New Sweden in the Delaware Valley . The operation was led by former members of the Dutch West India Company, including Peter Minuit. New Sweden established extensive trading contacts with English colonies to

8512-409: The colony fell to the English in the 1660s, the company freed all its slaves, which created an early nucleus of free Negros in the area. The English continued to import slaves to New York. Slaves in the colony performed a wide variety of skilled and unskilled jobs, mostly in the burgeoning port city and surrounding agricultural areas. In 1703 more than 42% of New York City 's households held slaves,

8624-474: The colony remained sparsely populated. The proprietors gave up their charter in 1752, at which point Georgia became a crown colony. The population of the Thirteen Colonies grew immensely in the 18th century. According to historian Alan Taylor , the population was 1.5 million in 1750, which represented four-fifths of the population of British North America . More than 90 percent of the colonists lived as farmers, though some seaports also flourished. In 1760,

8736-407: The colony, dominating the rural areas between Manhattan and Albany, while people from New England started moving in as well as immigrants from Germany. New York City attracted a large polyglot population, including a large black slave population. In 1674, the proprietary colonies of East Jersey and West Jersey were created from lands formerly part of New York. Pennsylvania was founded in 1681 as

8848-624: The colony. More Puritans immigrated in 1629 and established the Massachusetts Bay Colony with 400 settlers. They sought to reform the Church of England by creating a new, ideologically pure church in the New World. By 1640, 20,000 had arrived ; many died soon after arrival, but the others found a healthy climate and an ample food supply. The Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay colonies together spawned other Puritan colonies in New England, including

8960-675: The context of the American Revolution . In London, beginning in 1660, all colonies were governed through a state department known as the Southern Department , and a committee of the Privy Council called the Board of Trade and Plantations . In 1768, a specific state department was created for America, but it was disbanded in 1782 when the Home Office took responsibility. Plymouth, Massachusetts Bay, Connecticut, and New Haven Colonies formed

9072-510: The course of the war, British officers trained Americans for battle, most notably George Washington , which benefited the American cause during the Revolution. Also, colonial legislatures and officials had to cooperate intensively in pursuit of the continent-wide military effort. The relations were not always positive between the British military establishment and the colonists, setting the stage for later distrust and dislike of British troops. At

9184-447: The direction of the colony. The colonists of Charles Town finally deposed their governor and elected their own government. This marked the start of separate governments in the Province of North-Carolina and the Province of South Carolina . In 1729, the king formally revoked Carolina's colonial charter and established both North Carolina and South Carolina as crown colonies. In the 1730s, Parliamentarian James Oglethorpe proposed that

9296-594: The early empires, including 'slave' culture and scalping. Robbie Ethridge states, Let there be no doubt...that the commercial trade in Indian slaves was not a continuation and adaptation of pre-existing captivity patterns. It was a new kind of slave, requiring a new kind of occupational specialty ... organized militaristic slavers. One example of militaristic slaving can be seen in Nathaniel Bacon 's actions in Virginia during

9408-401: The failed attempt at Roanoke . It was a private venture, financed by a group of English Lords Proprietors who obtained a Royal Charter to the Carolinas in 1663, hoping that a new colony in the south would become profitable like Jamestown. Carolina was not settled until 1670, and even then the first attempt failed because there was no incentive for emigration to that area. Eventually, however,

9520-626: The form of domestic labor or doing other forms of unpaid work alongside non-enslaved counterparts. The American Revolution led to the first abolition laws in the Americas, although the institution of chattel slavery would continue to exist and expand across the Southern United States until finally being abolished at the time of the American Civil War in 1865. Native Americans enslaved members of their own and other tribes, usually as

9632-622: The fur trade. The Dutch West India Company established permanent settlements on the Hudson River, creating the Dutch colony of New Netherland . In 1626, Peter Minuit purchased the island of Manhattan from the Lenape Indians and established the outpost of New Amsterdam . Relatively few Dutch settled in New Netherland, but the colony came to dominate the regional fur trade. It also served as

9744-505: The furthest south (Florida was not one of the Thirteen Colonies). Founded in the 1730s, Georgia's powerful backers did not necessarily object to slavery as an institution, but their business model was to rely on labor from Britain (primarily England's poor) and they were also concerned with security, given the closeness of then Spanish Florida, and Spain's regular offers to enemy-slaves to revolt or escape. Despite agitation for slavery, it

9856-466: The global British trading network, as the value tripled for exports from America to Britain between 1700 and 1754. The colonists were restricted in trading with other European powers, but they found profitable trade partners in the other British colonies, particularly in the Caribbean. The colonists traded foodstuffs, wood, tobacco, and various other resources for Asian tea, West Indian coffee, and West Indian sugar, among other items. American Indians far from

9968-574: The governing authority. The Body of Liberties used the word "strangers" to refer to people bought and sold as slaves, as they were generally not native born English subjects. Colonists came to equate this term with Native Americans and Africans. The New Hampshire General Court passed "An Act To Prevent Disorders In The Night" in 1714, prefiguring the development of sundown towns in the United States: Whereas great disorders, insolencies and burglaries are oft times raised and committed in

10080-573: The land in the Ohio River valley. The colonies engaged in a scramble to purchase land from Indian tribes, as the British insisted that claims to land should rest on legitimate purchases. Virginia was particularly intent on western expansion, and most of the elite Virginia families invested in the Ohio Company to promote the settlement of the Ohio Country . The British American colonies became part of

10192-410: The late 1670s. In June 1676, the Virginia assembly granted Bacon and his men what equated to a slave-hunting license by providing that any enemy Native Americans caught were to be slaves for life. They also provided soldiers who had captured Native Americans with the right to "reteyne and keepe all such Indian slaves or other Indian goods as they either have taken or hereafter shall take." By this order,

10304-728: The nascent province of New Netherland . The Dutch colony expanded across the North River (Hudson River) to Bergen (in today's New Jersey). Later, slaves were also held privately by settlers in the area. Although enslaved, the Africans had a few basic rights and families were usually kept intact. They were admitted to the Dutch Reformed Church and married by its ministers, and their children could be baptized. Slaves could testify in court, sign legal documents, and bring civil actions against whites. Some were permitted to work after hours earning wages equal to those paid to white workers. When

10416-630: The night time by Indian, Negro, and Molatto Servants and Slaves to the Disquiet and hurt of her Majesty's subjects, No Indian, Negro, or Molatto is to be from Home after 9 o'clock. Notices emphasizing and re-affirming the curfew were published in The New Hampshire Gazette in 1764 and 1771. The Dutch West India Company introduced slavery in 1625 with the importation of eleven enslaved blacks who worked as farmers, fur traders, and builders to New Amsterdam (present day New York City), capital of

10528-465: The passage of the 1773 Tea Act , which reduced taxes on tea sold by the East India Company in an effort to undercut the competition, and Prime Minister North's ministry hoped that this would establish a precedent of colonists accepting British taxation policies. Trouble escalated over the tea tax, as Americans in each colony boycotted the tea, and those in Boston dumped the tea in the harbor during

10640-623: The period less dependent on slavery than the Caribbean colonies, or those of New Spain, or Brazil, and slavery did not develop significantly until later in the colonial era. Nonetheless, slavery was legal in every colony prior to the American Revolutionary War (1775-1783), and was most prominent in the Southern Colonies (as well as, the southern Mississippi River and Florida colonies of France, Spain, and Britain), which by then developed large slave-based plantation systems. Slavery in Europe's North American colonies which did not have warm climates and ideal conditions for plantations to exist primarily took

10752-413: The practice of religion. The other colonies were founded for business and economic expansion. The Middle Colonies were established on the former Dutch colony of New Netherland . Between 1625 and 1775, the colonial population grew from 2 thousand to 2.4 million, largely displacing the region's Native Americans . The population included people subject to a system of slavery , which was legal in all of

10864-586: The present-day United States of America arrived in Puerto Rico in the early 16th century, at the hands of the Portuguese . The island's native population was conquered by the Spanish settler Juan Ponce de León with the help of a free West African conquistador, Juan Garrido , by 1511. The slave population on the island grew after the Spanish crown granted import rights to its citizens, but did not reach its peak until

10976-598: The remainder of New Netherland. The 1667 Treaty of Breda ended the Second Anglo-Dutch War and confirmed English control of the region. The Dutch briefly regained control of parts of New Netherland in the Third Anglo-Dutch War but surrendered claim to the territory in the 1674 Treaty of Westminster , ending the Dutch colonial presence in America. The British renamed the colony of New Amsterdam to "York City" or "New York". Large numbers of Dutch remained in

11088-659: The slave trade and the institution of slavery in the French colonies. As a result, Louisiana and the Mobile, Alabama areas developed very different patterns of slavery compared to the British colonies. As written, the Code Noir gave some rights to slaves, including the right to marry. Although it authorized and codified cruel corporal punishment against slaves under certain conditions, it forbade slave owners to torture slaves, to separate married couples, and to separate young children from their mothers. It required owners to instruct slaves in

11200-465: The south and shipped much of the tobacco produced in Virginia. The colony was conquered by the Dutch in 1655, while Sweden was engaged in the Second Northern War . Beginning in the 1650s, the English and Dutch engaged in a series of wars , and the English sought to conquer New Netherland. Richard Nicolls captured the lightly defended New Amsterdam in 1664, and his subordinates quickly captured

11312-586: The territory of Louisiana west of the Mississippi River the previous year. Before the war, Britain held the thirteen American colonies, most of present-day Nova Scotia , and most of the Hudson Bay watershed. Following the war, Britain gained all French territory east of the Mississippi River, including Quebec, the Great Lakes, and the Ohio River valley. Britain also gained Spanish Florida , from which it formed

11424-583: The use of Indian proxies to wage war and acquire the slaves. In New England, slave raiding accompanied the Pequot War and King Philip's War but declined after the latter war ended in 1676. Enslaved Native Americans were in Jamestown from the early years of the settlement, but large-scale cooperation between slave-trading English colonists and the Westo and Occaneechi peoples, whom they armed with guns, did not begin until

11536-431: The war in the colonies with the use of troops from the colonies and tax funds from Britain itself. This was a successful wartime strategy but, after the war was over, each side believed that it had borne a greater burden than the other. The British elite, the most heavily taxed of any in Europe, pointed out angrily that the colonists paid little to the royal coffers. The colonists replied that their sons had fought and died in

11648-475: Was banished from the Massachusetts Bay Colony over theological disagreements; he founded the settlement based on an egalitarian constitution, providing for majority rule "in civil things" and "liberty of conscience" in religious matters. In 1637, a second group including Anne Hutchinson established a second settlement on Rhode Island , today called Aquidneck. Samuel Gorton and others established

11760-435: Was founded mainly by sugar planters from Barbados , who brought relatively large numbers of African slaves from that island to develop new plantations in the Carolinas. To meet agricultural labor needs, colonists also practiced Indian slavery for some time. The Carolinians transformed the Indian slave trade during the late 17th and early 18th centuries by treating such slaves as a trade commodity to be exported, mainly to

11872-537: Was later fortified. There were two known Fort Mose sites in the eighteenth century, and the men helped defend St. Augustine against the British. It is "the only known free black town in the present-day southern United States that a European colonial government-sponsored. The Fort Mose Site, today a National Historic Landmark , is the location of the second Fort Mose." During the nineteenth century, this site became marsh and wetlands. In 1763, Great Britain took over Florida in an exchange with Spain after defeating France in

11984-480: Was later replaced during the 18th century by the enslavement of black African people. Concurrent with the development of slavery, racist ideology was developed among Europeans, the rights of free people of color in European colonies were curtailed, slaves were legally defined as chattel property, and the condition of slavery as hereditary . The Thirteen Colonies of northern British America , were for much or all of

12096-609: Was maintained during the French (1699–1763, and 1800–1803) and Spanish (1763–1800) periods of government. The first people enslaved by the French were Native Americans, but they could easily escape into the countryside which they knew well. Beginning in the early 18th century, the French imported Africans as laborers in their efforts to develop the colony. Mortality rates were high for both colonists and Africans, and new workers had to be regularly imported. Implemented in colonial Louisiana in 1724, Louis XIV of France 's Code Noir regulated

12208-399: Was not until a defeat of the Spanish by Georgia colonials in the 1740s that arguments for opening the colony to slavery intensified. To staff the rice plantations and settlements, Georgia's proprietors relented in 1751, and African slavery grew quickly. After becoming a royal colony, in the 1760s Georgia began importing slaves directly from Africa. One African slave, Estevanico arrived with

12320-410: Was revoked in the mid-1830s. Following the 1847–48 invasion by U.S. troops , the "loitering or orphaned Indians" were de facto enslaved in the new state from statehood in 1850 to 1867. Slavery required the posting of a bond by the slave holder and enslavement occurred through raids and a four-month servitude imposed as a punishment for Indian " vagrancy ". The first African slaves in what would become

12432-451: Was settled by English Puritan separatists, known today as the Pilgrims . The Dutch, Swedish, and French also established successful American colonies at roughly the same time as the English, but they eventually came under the English crown. The Thirteen Colonies were complete with the establishment of the Province of Georgia in 1732, although the term "Thirteen Colonies" became current only in

12544-406: Was sparse and they held comparatively few slaves. The Spanish promised freedom to refugee slaves from the English colonies of South Carolina and Georgia in order to destabilize English settlement. If the slaves converted to Catholicism and agreed to serve in a militia for Spain, they could become Spanish citizens. By 1730 the black settlement known as Fort Mose developed near St. Augustine and

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