By the middle of the 16th century, Spain's dominance of the American continent was almost absolute, colonial possessions stretching from Cape Horn to New Mexico brought huge revenues to the royal treasury. Attempts by other European states to establish colonies in America were not crowned with noticeable success.

But at the same time, the balance of power in the Old World began to change: the kings spent the streams of silver and gold flowing from the colonies, and had little interest in the economy of the metropolis, which, under the weight of an inefficient, corrupt administrative apparatus, clerical dominance and lack of incentives for modernization, began to lag behind more and more. from the rapidly developing economy of England. Spain gradually lost the status of the main European superpower and mistress of the seas. The many years of war in the Netherlands, the huge funds spent on the fight against the Reformation throughout Europe, the conflict with England hastened the decline of Spain. The last straw was the death of the Invincible Armada in 1588. After the English admirals, and more so in a violent storm, destroyed the largest fleet of the time, Spain fell into the shadows, never to recover from this blow.

Leadership in the "relay race" of colonization passed to England, France and Holland.

English colonies

The well-known chaplain Gakluyt acted as the ideologist of the English colonization of North America. In 1585 and 1587, Sir Walter Raleigh, on the orders of Queen Elizabeth I of England, made two attempts to establish a permanent settlement in North America. The reconnaissance expedition reached the American coast in 1584, and named the open coast of Virginia (Virginia - "Virgin") in honor of the "Virgin Queen" Elizabeth I, who never married. Both attempts ended in failure - the first colony, founded on Roanook Island off the coast of Virginia, was on the verge of collapse due to Indian attacks and lack of supplies and was evacuated by Sir Francis Drake in April 1587. In July of the same year, a second expedition of colonists landed on the island, numbering 117 people. It was planned that ships with equipment and food would arrive in the colony in the spring of 1588. However, for various reasons, the supply expedition was delayed by almost a year and a half. When she arrived at the place, all the buildings of the colonists were intact, but no traces of people, with the exception of the remains of one person, were found. The exact fate of the colonists has not been established to this day.

Settlement of Virginia. Jamestown.

At the beginning of the 17th century, private capital entered the business. In 1605, two joint-stock companies at once received licenses from King James I to establish colonies in Virginia. It should be borne in mind that at that time the term "Virginia" denoted the entire territory of the North American continent. The first of the companies "London Virginia Company" (Virginia Company of London) received the rights to the southern, the second "Plymouth Company" (Plymouth Company) to the northern part of the continent. Despite the fact that both companies officially proclaimed the spread of Christianity as the main goal, the license they received granted them the right to "search and mine gold, silver and copper by all means."

On December 20, 1606, the colonists set sail aboard three ships, and after a difficult, almost five-month voyage, during which several dozen died of starvation and disease, in May 1607 they reached the Chesapeake Bay. Over the next month, they built a wooden fort named after King Fort James ( English pronunciation named after Jacob). The fort was later renamed Jamestown, the first permanent British settlement in America.

The official historiography of the United States considers Jamestown the cradle of the country, the history of the settlement and its leader, Captain John Smith (John Smith of Jamestown) is covered in many serious studies and works of art. The latter, as a rule, idealize the history of the city and the pioneers who inhabited it (for example, the popular cartoon Pocahontas). In fact, the first years of the colony were extremely difficult, in the famine winter of 1609-1610. out of 500 colonists, no more than 60 survived, and according to some accounts, the survivors were forced to resort to cannibalism in order to survive the famine.

In subsequent years, when the issue of physical survival was no longer so acute, two critical issues there were tense relations with the indigenous population and the economic feasibility of the existence of the colony. To the disappointment of the shareholders of the London Virginia Company, neither gold nor silver was found by the colonists, and the main export commodity was ship timber. Despite the fact that this product was in some demand in the metropolis, which had depleted its forests, the profit, as well as from other attempts at economic activity, was minimal.

The situation changed in 1612, when farmer and landowner John Rolfe managed to cross a local variety of tobacco grown by Indians with varieties imported from Bermuda. The resulting hybrids were well adapted to the Virginia climate and at the same time suited the tastes of English consumers. The colony acquired a source of reliable income and for many years tobacco became the basis of the economy and exports of Virginia, and the phrases "Virginia tobacco", "Virginia blend" are used as characteristics of tobacco products to this day. Five years later, tobacco exports amounted to 20,000 pounds, a year later it was doubled, and by 1629 it reached 500,000 pounds. John Rolfe rendered another service to the colony: in 1614 he managed to negotiate peace with the local Indian chief. The peace treaty was sealed by marriage between Rolf and the leader's daughter, Pocahontas.

In 1619, two events took place that had a significant impact on the entire further history USA. This year, Governor George Yeardley decided to hand over some power to the House of Burgesses, establishing the New World's first elected legislative assembly. The first meeting of the council took place on July 30, 1619. In the same year, a small group of Africans of Angolan origin was acquired by the colonists. Although formally they were not slaves, but had long contracts without the right to terminate, it is customary to count the history of slavery in America from this event.

In 1622, almost a quarter of the population of the colony was destroyed by the rebellious Indians. In 1624, the license of the London Company, whose affairs fell into decline, was revoked, and since that time Virginia has become a royal colony. The governor was appointed by the king, but the colonial council retained significant powers.

Timeline of the founding of the English colonies :

French colonies

By 1713, New France was at its largest. It included five provinces:

Canada (the southern part of the modern province of Quebec), divided in turn into three "governments": Quebec, Three Rivers (fr. Trois-Rivieres), Montreal and dependent territory Pays d'en Haut, which included the modern Canadian and American regions of the Great Lakes, of which the ports of Pontchartrand (Detroit) (fr. Pontchartrain) and Michillimakinac (fr. Michillimakinac) were practically the only poles of French settlement after the destruction of Huronia.

Acadia (modern Nova Scotia and New Brunswick).

Hudson Bay (modern Canada).

New Earth.

Louisiana (the central part of the USA, from the Great Lakes to New Orleans), subdivided into two administrative regions: Lower Louisiana and Illinois (fr. le Pays des Illinois).

Dutch colonies

New Netherland, 1614-1674, a region on the east coast of North America in the 17th century that stretched in latitude from 38 to 45 degrees north, originally discovered by the Dutch East India Company from the yacht Crescent ( nid. Halve Maen) under the command of Henry Hudson in 1609 and studied by Adrian Block (Adriaen Block) and Hendrik Christians (Christiaensz) in 1611-1614. According to their map in 1614 Estates General incorporated this territory as New Netherland within the Dutch Republic.

By international law, claims to the territory had to be secured not only by their discovery and provision of maps, but also by their settlement. In May 1624, the Dutch completed their claim with the delivery and settlement of 30 Dutch families on Noten Eylant, present-day Governors Island. New Amsterdam served as the main city of the colony. In 1664 Governor Peter Stuyvesant ceded New Netherland to the British.

Colonies of Sweden

At the end of 1637, the company organized its first expedition to the New World. Samuel Blommart, one of the managers of the Dutch West India Company, took part in its preparation, and invited Peter Minuit, the former general director of the New Netherland colony, to be the head of the expedition. On the ships "Squid Nyukkel" and "Vogel Grip" on March 29, 1638, under the leadership of Admiral Claes Fleming, the expedition reached the mouth of the Delaware River. Here, on the site of modern Wilmington, Fort Christina was founded, named after Queen Christina, which later became the administrative center of the Swedish colony.

Russian colonies

Summer 1784. The expedition under the command of G. I. Shelikhov (1747-1795) landed on the Aleutian Islands. In 1799, Shelikhov and Rezanov founded the Russian-American Company, which was managed by A. A. Baranov (1746-1818). The company hunted for sea otters and traded in their fur, founded its own settlements and trading posts.

Since 1808, Novo-Arkhangelsk has become the capital of Russian America. In fact, the management of the American territories is carried out by the Russian-American company, Main Headquarters which was located in Irkutsk, officially Russian America was included first in the Siberian Governor General, later (in 1822) in the East Siberian Governor General.

The population of all Russian colonies in America reached 40,000 people, Aleuts predominated among them.

The southernmost point in America where Russian colonists settled was Fort Ross, 80 km north of San Francisco in California. Spanish and then Mexican colonists prevented further advance to the south.

In 1824, the Russian-American Convention was signed, fixing the southern border of the possessions Russian Empire in Alaska at latitude 54°40'N. The convention also confirmed the holdings of the United States and Great Britain (until 1846) in Oregon.

In 1824, the Anglo-Russian Convention was signed on the delimitation of their possessions in North America (in British Columbia). Under the terms of the Convention, a boundary line was established separating British possessions from Russian possessions on the western coast of North America, adjacent to the Alaska Peninsula, so that the border ran along the entire length of the coastal strip belonging to Russia, from 54 ° N. latitude. to 60° N, at a distance of 10 miles from the edge of the ocean, taking into account all the curves of the coast. Thus, the line of the Russian-British border in this place was not straight (as was the case with the border line of Alaska and British Columbia), but extremely winding.

In January 1841, Fort Ross was sold to Mexican citizen John Sutter. And in 1867, the United States bought Alaska for $7,200,000.

Spanish colonies

The Spanish colonization of the New World dates back to the discovery by the Spanish navigator Columbus of America in 1492, which Columbus himself recognized as the eastern part of Asia, the eastern coast of either China, or Japan, or India, therefore the name West Indies was assigned to these lands. The search for a new route to India is dictated by the development of society, industry and trade, the need to find large reserves of gold, for which demand has risen sharply. Then it was believed that in the "land of spices" it should be a lot. The geopolitical situation in the world has changed and the old eastern routes to India for Europeans, which were now busy Ottoman Empire lands became more dangerous and difficult to pass, meanwhile there was a growing need for other trade with this rich land. Then some already had the idea that the earth was round and that India could be reached from the other side of the Earth - by sailing west from the then known world. Columbus made 4 expeditions to the region: the first - 1492-1493. - the discovery of the Sargasso Sea, the Bahamas, Haiti, Cuba, Tortuga, the foundation of the first village in which he left 39 of his sailors. He declared all the lands to be the possessions of Spain; the second (1493-1496) - the complete conquest of Haiti, the discovery of the Lesser Antilles, Guadeloupe, the Virgin Islands, the islands of Puerto Rico and Jamaica. Founding of Santo Domingo; the third (1498-1499) - the discovery of the island of Trinidad, the Spaniards set foot on the coast of South America.

Articles from Wikipedia- free encyclopedia.

In fact, already from the first trip of Columbus and acquaintance with the natives of the islands of the West Indies, a bloody history of interaction between the native inhabitants of America and Europeans began to take shape. Caribs were exterminated - allegedly for their commitment to cannibalism. They were followed by other islanders for refusing to perform slave duties. The first witness of these events, the outstanding humanist Bartolome Las Casas, was the first to tell about the atrocities of the Spanish colonialists in the treatise “The Shortest Reports on the Destruction of the Indies”, published in 1542. The island of Hispaniola “was the first where Christians entered; here the beginning of the extermination and death of the Indians was laid. Having devastated and devastated the island, the Christians began to take away the wives and children from the Indians, forced them to serve themselves and used them in the most bad way ... And the Indians began to look for means by which they could throw the Christians out of their lands, and then they took up arms ... Christians on horseback, armed with swords and spears, mercilessly killed the Indians. Entering the villages, they did not leave anyone alive ... ”And all this for the sake of profit. Las Casas wrote that the conquistadors "came with a cross in their hand and an insatiable thirst for gold in their hearts." Following Haiti in 1511, Diego Velazquez conquered Cuba with a detachment of 300 men. The natives were destroyed mercilessly. In 1509 an attempt was made to establish two colonies on the coast of Central America under Olons de Ojeda and Diego Niques. The Indians objected. 70 of Ojeda's companions were killed. Died from wounds and diseases and most of Nikuez's companions. The surviving Spaniards near the Gulf of Darien founded a small colony "Golden Castile" under the leadership of Vasco Nunez Balboa. It was he who, in 1513, with a detachment of 190 Spaniards and 600 Indian porters, crossed the mountain range and saw the wide Gulf of Panama, and beyond it the boundless southern sea. Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Panama 20 times, built the first Spanish ships for navigation in the Pacific Ocean, discovered the Pearl Islands. The desperate hidalgo Francisco Pizarro was part of the detachments of Ojeda and Balboa. In 1517, Balboa was executed, and Pedro Arias d "Aville became the governor of the colony. In 1519, the city of Panama was founded, which became the main base for the colonization of the Andean Highlands, about the fabulous wealth of the countries of which the Spaniards were well aware of. In 1524-1527 In 1528, Pizarro went to Spain for help and returned to Panama in 1530, accompanied by volunteers, including four of his half-brothers. During 1531 - 1533. detachments of Pizarro, Alvarado and Almagro fought through the ridges and valleys of the Andes. The prosperous state of the Incas with a highly developed general culture, the culture of agriculture, handicraft production, water conduits, roads and cities was defeated, untold riches were captured. The Pizarro brothers were knighted, Francisco became the marquis, governor of the new possession. In 1536, he founded the new capital of the possession - Lima. The Indians did not accept defeat, and for several more years there was a stubborn war and the destruction of the recalcitrant.

In 1535 - 1537. a detachment of 500 Spaniards and 15,000 Indian porters, led by Almagro, made a very difficult long raid through the tropical part of the Andes from the ancient Inca capital of Cusco to the city of Co-kimbo south of the Atacama Desert. During the raid, about 10 thousand Indians and 150 Spaniards died from hunger and cold. But more than a ton of gold was collected and transferred to the treasury. In 1540, Pizarro commissioned Pedro de Valdivia to complete the conquest of South America. Valdivia crossed the Atacama Desert, reached the central part of Chile, founded a new colony and its capital Santiago, as well as the cities of Concepción and Valdivia. He ruled the colony until he was killed by the rebellious Araucans in 1554. The southernmost part of Chile was examined by Juan Ladrillero. They passed the Strait of Magellan from west to east in 1558. The contours of the South American mainland were determined. Attempts were made to deep reconnaissance in the interior of the mainland. The main motive was the search for El Dorado. In 1524, the Portuguese Alejo Garcia with a large detachment of Guarani Indians crossed the southeastern part of the Brazilian plateau, went to the tributary of the Parana River - the river. Iguazu, discovered a grandiose waterfall, crossed the Laplata lowland and the Gran Chaco plain and reached the foothills of the Andes. In 1525 he was killed. In 1527 - 1529. S. Cabot, who at that time was in the service in Spain, in search of a "silver kingdom" climbed high up La Plata and Parana, organized fortified towns. The townships did not last long, and no abundant silver deposits were found. In 1541, Gonzalo Pizarro, with a large detachment of 320 Spaniards and 4,000 Indians from Quito, crossed the eastern chain of the Andes and went to one of the tributaries of the Amazon. A small ship was built and launched there, a team of 57 people, led by Francisco Orellana, was supposed to scout the area and get food. Orellana did not return back and was the first to cross South America from west to east, sailing along the Amazon to its mouth. The detachment was attacked by Indian archers, who were not inferior in courage to men. The myth of Homer about the Amazons received a new registration. Travelers in the Amazon for the first time met with such a formidable phenomenon as a pororoka, a tidal wave that rolls into the lower reaches of the river and can be traced for hundreds of kilometers. In the dialect of the Tupi-Guarani Indians, this stormy water shaft is called "amazunu". This word was interpreted by the Spaniards in their own way and gave rise to the legend of the Amazons (Sivere, 1896). The weather favored Orellana and his companions, they also made a voyage by sea to the island of Margarita, on which the Spanish colonists had already settled. G. Pizarro, who did not wait for Orellana, with a thinned detachment, was forced to storm the ridge again in the opposite direction. In 1542, only 80 participants in this transition returned to Quito. In 1541 - 1544. Spaniard Nufrio Chavez with three companions again crossed the South American mainland, this time from east to west, from southern Brazil to Peru, and returned back the same way.

Centuries after the Indians, and to their great regret, European ships appeared on the horizon. The first European colonizers after the Vikings in America were the Spaniards. Christopher Columbus, a Genoese navigator and merchant, who received the rank of admiral and flotilla from the Spanish crown, was looking for a new trade route to rich India, China and Japan.

He sailed to the New World four times and swam to the Bahamas. On October 13, 1492, he landed on an island called San Salvador, set up the banner of Castile on it and drew up a notarial deed about this event. He himself believed that he sailed either to China, or to India, or even to Japan. For many years this land was called the West Indies. The Arawaks, the first natives of these places he saw, he called "Indians." The rest of life and difficult fate Columba was associated with the West Indies.

At the end of the 15th century and the beginning of the 16th century, a number of other European nations began to explore the paths of the Western Hemisphere. Navigator of the English king Henry VII Italian John Cabot(Giovanni Caboto) set foot on the coast of Canada (1497-1498), Pedro Alvares Cabral assigned Brazil to Portugal (1500-1501), Spaniard Vasco Nunez de Balboa founded Antigua, the first European city on a new continent, and went to Pacific Ocean (1500-1513). Ferdinand Magellan, who served the Spanish king in 1519-1521, circled America from the south and made the first trip around the world.

In 1507, Martin Waldseemüller, a geographer from Lorraine, proposed that the New World be named America in honor of the Florentine navigator Amerigo Vespucci who replaced the fallen Columbus. The proposal has strangely taken hold, and the development of the mainland is already proceeding alternately under two names. Juan Ponce de Leon, a Spanish conquistador, discovered the Florida peninsula in 1513. In 1565, the first European colony was formed there, and later the city of St. Augustine. In the late 1530s, Hernando de Soto went to the Mississippi and reached the Arkansas River.

When the British and French began to explore America, Florida and the southwest of the continent were almost entirely Spanish. The gold that Spain brought from South America eventually became one of the reasons for the loss of her world domination. Buying everything that a far-sighted state needs to develop and strengthen, Spain was defeated during the first serious crisis. The power and influence of Spain in America began to decline after September 1588, when the Anglo-Dutch fleet destroyed and captured the ships of the Spanish Invincible Armada.

The British settled in America on the third try. One ended in a flight home, the second ended in the mysterious disappearance of the settlers, and only the third, in 1607, became successful. The trading post, named Jamestown after the king, was inhabited by the crews of three ships under the command of Captain Newport and also served as a barrier to the Spaniards, who were still rushing into the interior of the continent. Tobacco plantations turned Jamestown into a wealthy settlement, and by 1620 there were already about 1,000 people living in it.

Many people dreamed of America not only as a land of fabulous treasures, but as a wonderful world where you are not killed for a different faith, where it doesn’t matter what party you are from ... Dreams were also fueled by those who received income from the transportation of goods and of people. In England, the London and Plymouth companies were hastily created, which from 1606 were involved in the development of the northeast coast of America. Many Europeans with their whole families and communities moved to the New World with the last money. People arrived and arrived, but they were still not enough to develop new lands. Many died on the way or in the first months of American life.

In August 1619, a Dutch ship brought several dozen Africans to Virginia; the colonists immediately bought twenty people. Thus began the Great White Business. During the 18th century, about seven million slaves were sold, and no one knows how many of them died during the long voyage and were fed to sharks.

On November 21, 1620, a small galleon "May Flower" moored to the Atlantic coast. 102 Puritan-Calvinists came ashore, stern, stubborn, frantic in faith and convinced of their chosenness, but exhausted and sick. The beginning of the conscious settlement by the British of America is counted from this day. The mutual treaty, called the Mayflower Treaty, embodied the ideas of the early American colonists about democracy, self-government and civil liberties. The same documents were signed by other colonists - in Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Hampshire.

The mainland of North America was deserted at the moment when the Lower and Middle were replaced in the eastern hemisphere, and the Eurasian Neanderthal gradually turned into homo sapiens, trying to live in a tribal system.

The American land saw a man only at the very end of the Ice Age, 15 - 30 thousand years ago (From the latest research:).

Man came to the territory of America from Asia through a narrow isthmus that once existed on the site of the modern Bering Strait. It was from this that the history of the development of America began. The first people went south, sometimes interrupting their movement. When Wisconsin glaciation was coming to an end, and the earth was divided by the waters of the ocean into the Western and Eastern hemispheres (11 thousand years BC), the development of people began who became aborigines. They were called the Indians, the native inhabitants of America.

He called the aborigines Indians Christopher Columbus. He was sure that he was standing off the coast of India, and therefore it was an appropriate name for the natives. It took root, but the mainland began to be called America in honor of Amerigo Vespucci, after Columbus' error became apparent.

The first people from Asia were hunters and gatherers. Having settled down on the land, they began to engage in agriculture. At the beginning of our era, the territories of Central America, Mexico, and Peru were mastered. These were the Mayan, Inca (read about), Aztec tribes.

The European conquerors could not come to terms with the idea that some savages created early class social relations, built entire civilizations.

The first attempts at colonization were made by the Vikings in 1000 AD. According to the sagas, Leif, the son of Eric the Red, landed his detachment near Newfoundland. He discovered the country, calling it Vinland, the country of grapes. But the settlement did not last long, disappearing without a trace.

When Columbus discovered America, the most diverse Indian tribes already existed on it, standing at different stages of social development.

In 1585 Walter Raleigh, favorite of Elizabeth I, founded the first English colony on the island Roanoke. He called her Virginia, in honor of the virgin queen (virgin).

The settlers did not want to do hard work and develop new lands. They were more interested in gold. Everyone suffered from a gold rush and went even to the ends of the earth in search of an attractive metal.

The lack of provisions, the brutal treatment of the Indians by the British and, as a result, the confrontation, all this put the colony in jeopardy. England could not come to the rescue, as at that moment it was at war with Spain.

A rescue expedition was organized only in 1590, but the settlers were no longer there. Famine and confrontation with the Indians depleted Virginia.

The colonization of America was in question, as England was going through hard times (economic difficulties, war with Spain, constant religious strife). After the death of Elizabeth I (1603) on the throne was James I Stuart who didn't care about the Roanoke Island colony. He made peace with Spain, thereby recognizing the enemy's rights to the New World. It was the time of the "lost colony", as Virginia is called in English historiography.

This state of affairs did not suit the Elizabethan veterans who participated in the wars with Spain. They aspired to the New World out of a thirst for enrichment and a desire to wipe the nose of the Spaniards. Under their pressure, James I gave his permission to resume the colonization of Virginia.

To make the plan come true, the veterans created joint-stock companies, where they invested their funds and joint efforts. The issue of settling the New World was resolved at the expense of the so-called "rebels" and "loafers". That is how they called people who found themselves homeless or without means of subsistence in the course of the development of bourgeois relations.

In the early years of the 17th century began the great migration of Europeans to North America. A weak brook of several hundred English colonists in a little over three centuries turned into a full-flowing stream of millions of immigrants. Due to various circumstances, they left to create a new civilization on a sparsely populated continent.

The first immigrants from England, who settled in what is now the United States, crossed the Atlantic much later than the flourishing Spanish colonies in Mexico, the West Indies, and South America. Like everyone who moved then to the New World, they arrived in small, overcrowded ships. The journey took 6 to 12 weeks, food was scarce, and many settlers died of disease. Storms and storms often hit ships, people died at sea.

Most European immigrants left their homeland for greater economic opportunities, often coupled with a desire for religious freedom or a determination to escape political pressure. In 1620-1635. economic turmoil swept the whole of England. Many people lost their jobs, even skilled artisans barely made ends meet. These troubles were exacerbated by crop failures. In addition, the cloth industry that was developing in England required an increase in the supply of wool, and so that the looms would not stop, the sheep began to graze on communal lands taken from the peasants. The impoverished peasants were forced to seek their fortune overseas.

On the new land, the colonists encountered, first of all, dense forests. Indian tribes lived there, many of which were at enmity with white newcomers. However, the latter would hardly have been able to survive without friendly Indians, from whom they learned to grow local varieties of vegetables - pumpkin, squash, beans and corn. Virgin forests, stretching for almost 2 thousand km along the eastern coast of the North American continent, provided them with an abundance of game and fuel. They also provided material for the construction of houses, ships, the manufacture of household utensils, as well as valuable raw materials for export.

The first permanent English settlement in America was the fort and settlement of Jamestown, Virginia, founded in 1607. The area soon became prosperous thanks to the cultivation of tobacco, which the colonists sold in London. Although the new continent had enormous natural resources, trade with Europe was vital, since the colonists could not yet produce many goods themselves.

Gradually, the colonies became self-supporting societies with their own outlets to the sea. Each of them has become a separate, independent organism. But, despite this, the problems of trade, navigation, industrial production and finance went beyond the boundaries of individual colonies and required a joint settlement, which subsequently led to the federal structure of the American state.

Settlement of the colonies in the XVII century. required careful planning and management, and was also a very costly and risky undertaking. The settlers had to be transported by sea over a distance of almost 5 thousand km, supplied with household items, clothing, seeds, tools, building materials, livestock, weapons and ammunition. In contrast to the policy of colonization that was pursued by other states, emigration from England was not in charge of the government, but of private individuals whose main motive was to make a profit.

Two colonies - Virginia and Massachusetts - founded privileged companies: the "Massachusetts Bay Company" and the "London Company of Virginia". Their funds, created by contributors, were used to supply and transport the colonists. Wealthy immigrants who arrived in the New Haven colony (later part of Connecticut) paid their own way, supported their families and servants. New Hampshire, Maine, Maryland, North and South Carolina, New Jersey and Pennsylvania originally belonged to the owners of the English nobility (gentry), who populated the land granted to them by the king with tenants and servants.

The first 13 colonies that would become the United States were (from north to south): New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North and South Carolina, Georgia .

Georgia was founded by a group of people led by James Edward Oglethorpe. They planned to send debtors from English prisons to America to create a border colony that would block the way for the Spaniards in the south of the continent. Meanwhile, the colony of New Netherland, founded in 1621 by the Dutch, in 1664 went to England and was renamed New York.

Many moved to America for political reasons. In the 1630s the despotic rule of Charles I gave impetus to migration to the New World. Then the revolution in England and the victory of the opponents of Charles I, led by Oliver Cromwell in the 1640s. forced many cavaliers - "the king's people" - to try their luck in Virginia. The despotism of the petty German princes, especially in matters of faith, and the numerous wars that took place in their possessions, contributed to the intensification of German immigration to America in the late 17th and 18th centuries.

Men and women, even if not too interested in a new life on American soil, often succumbed to the persuasion of recruiters. William Penn circulated in the press about the opportunities and benefits that awaited those wishing to move to Pennsylvania. Judges and jailers were persuaded to give the prisoners a chance to move to America instead of carrying out the sentence.

Only a few colonists could go overseas with their families at their own expense to start there. new life. Ship captains received a large reward for selling contracts but hiring the poor to work in America. In order to take more passengers on board, they did not disdain anything - from the most unusual promises and promises to kidnapping. In other cases, the costs of transporting and maintaining settlers were borne by colonization agencies such as the London Company of Virginia and the Massachusetts Bay Company. Settlers who signed a contract with the company were obliged to work for it as a laborer or contracted servant (servant) for a certain period - usually from four to seven years. At the end of the term, the servants could receive a small piece of land. Many of those who arrived in the New World on such terms soon found that, while remaining servants or tenants, they did not begin to live better than in their homeland.

Historians have estimated that about half of the colonists who lived south of New England came to America on the basis of a contract. Although the majority honestly fulfilled their obligations, some fled from the owners. Many fugitive servants, however, managed to get land and to acquire a farm - in the colony where they settled, or in neighboring ones. Bonded service was not considered shameful, and the families that began their lives in America from this half-slavish position did not sully their reputation. Even among the leaders of the colonies there were people who were servants in the past.

There was, however, a very important exception to this rule - the African slave trade. The first blacks were brought to Virginia in 1619, seven years after Jamestown was founded. In the beginning, many "black" settlers were considered indentured servants who could "earn" their freedom. However, by the 1960s In the 17th century, as the demand for workers on the plantations increased, slavery began to take hold. Blacks began to be brought from Africa in shackles - already as life-long slaves.

Most of the colonists in the XVII century. were English, but there were a small number of Dutch, Swedes and Germans in the mid-Atlantic colonies. In South Carolina and other colonies, there were French Huguenots, as well as Spaniards, Italians, and Portuguese. After 1680 England ceased to be the main source of immigration. Thousands of people fled from war-torn Europe. Many left their homeland to get rid of the poverty generated by the pressure of the authorities and large landlords who owned estates. By 1690, the American population reached 1/4 million people. Since then, it has doubled every 25 years, until it exceeded 2.5 million people in 1775.

American settlements were grouped into geographical "sections", depending on natural conditions.

New England on northeast(Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Maine) was an agriculturally secondary area: thin soil, poor vegetation, mountainous, uneven terrain, short summers and long winters. Therefore, its inhabitants solved other problems - they used the power of water and built mills and sawmills. The presence of timber contributed to the development of shipbuilding, convenient bays favored trade, and the sea served as a source of enrichment. In Massachusetts, the cod fishery alone immediately began to bring high profits. The Massachusetts Bay settlement played an important role in the religious development of all of New England. The 25 colonists who founded it had a royal charter and were determined to succeed. During the first 10 years of the existence of the colony, 65 Puritan priests arrived there, and due to the religious convictions of the leaders of the colonists and with their support, the power of the church was strengthened there. Formally, the churchmen did not have secular power, but in fact they led the colony.

In the south, with its warm climate and fertile soil, a largely agrarian society developed. IN mid-Atlantic colonies Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and New York - nature was more diverse: forests, valleys suitable for Agriculture, bays where such large port cities as Philadelphia and New York grew up.

Society in the mid-Atlantic colonies was much more diverse and religiously tolerant than in New England. Pennsylvania and Delaware owe their success to the Quakers, who set out to attract settlers of many faiths and nationalities. Quakers dominated Philadelphia, and there were other sects in other parts of the colony. Immigrants from Germany proved to be the most skilled farmers, they also knew weaving, shoemaking, carpentry and other crafts. Through Pennsylvania, the bulk of Scottish and Irish immigrants arrived in the New World. Equally mixed was the population of the colonies of New York, which perfectly demonstrates the multilingualism of America. By 1646 along the river. The Hudson was settled by the Dutch, French, Danes, Norwegians, Swedes, British, Scots, Irish, Germans, Poles, immigrants from Bohemia, Portugal, Italy. But these are only the forerunners of millions of future immigrants.

Eastern states- Virginia, Maryland, North and South Carolina, Georgia - differed greatly from New England and the mid-Atlantic colonies in their predominantly rural character. The first surviving English settlement in the New World was Jamestown, Virginia.

A distinctive feature of the first stages of colonial history was the absence of strict control from the British authorities. While the colonies were being formed, they were actually left to their own devices. The British government was not directly involved in their founding (with the exception of Georgia), and the political leadership of the colonies, it began gradually and not immediately.

Since 1651, the British government has from time to time passed regulations regulating certain aspects of the economic life of the colonies, which in most cases benefited only England, but the colonists simply ignored the laws that harmed them. Sometimes the British administration tried to force their implementation, but these attempts quickly failed.

The relative political independence of the colonies was largely due to their remoteness from England. They became more and more "American" rather than "English". This trend was reinforced by the mixing of different national groups and cultures - a process that has been going on all the time in America.