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In the following questions, you will learn about the origins of the New England Colonies. The New England Colonies made up the northern part of the Thirteen Colonies, which were ruled by Great Britain in the 1600s and 1700s. The population of New England included Native American groups, enslaved and free people of African descent, and European settlers. The map below shows the Thirteen Colonies in 1750.
New England, then and now
Today, the region of New England includes six states: Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine. Two of those states, Vermont and Maine, were originally part of other colonies.
Why weren't Vermont and Maine their own colonies?
During the colonial era, the land that became Vermont was claimed by both New Hampshire and New York. During the American Revolution, Vermont split away from both states.
The land that became Maine was part of Massachusetts until 1820, when Maine entered the Union as part of the Missouri Compromise.
Why call it New England?
The name "New England" was first used in 1614 by the English explorer John Smith. By naming it New England, Smith was claiming that this land belonged to England, not to other European countries. The name New England also suggested that the land did not belong to the Native American groups who already lived in the region.
Did Europeans visit New England before the 1600s?
Yes. European explorers first reached New England in the late 1400s. Many historians believe they first reached the coast of present-day Maine. Over the next 100 years, explorers drew maps of the coast and sailed up the large rivers. However, no Europeans tried to settle there until the 1600s.
Many English people settled in the New England Colonies for religious reasons. These settlers were motivated in part by divisions over religion in England in the 1600s. The English government supported a Christian church called the Church of England. But some English people, including many settlers to New England, disagreed with the teachings of the Church of England.
What political and religious divisions were present in England in the 1600s?
The king and the Church of England were often in conflict with other political and religious groups. England even went through a bloody civil war between the supporters of the king and his political and religious opponents in the 1640s.
The Pilgrims were members of a religious group who wanted to separate from the Church of England. In 1620, the Pilgrims set sail from Europe to start a new colony. On their voyage across the Atlantic, the Pilgrims signed an agreement called the Mayflower Compact. The word compact means agreement. The agreement was named for the Pilgrims' ship, the Mayflower.
Who signed the Mayflower Compact?
The Mayflower Compact created a government to create laws for the new colony. Almost all of the free men on the Mayflower signed their names to the Mayflower Compact as a promise that they would follow these laws. Many of the male servants signed, too. Women were not allowed to sign the agreement.
The Pilgrims founded the Plymouth Colony in present-day Massachusetts in 1620.
What happened to Plymouth Colony?
Plymouth Colony survived for several decades. In 1692, the king of England changed the government of Plymouth Colony. It became part of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Later, it became part of the state of Massachusetts. Today, Plymouth is a town and county in Massachusetts.
What happened to the Wampanoag?
After about 40 years of peace, many Wampanoag people were killed in a war with the colonists. However, the tribe survived. Today, there are between 4,000 and 5,000 Wampanoag people living in New England.
The Pilgrims were not the only religious group who founded colonies in New England. Members of another group called the Puritans founded the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Unlike the Pilgrims, the Puritans did not want to leave the Church of England. Instead, they wanted to change the Church of England according to their religious beliefs. The first governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony was a Puritan named John Winthrop. The passage below comes from a speech that Winthrop gave to the Puritans on their voyage to New England.
For we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us; so that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work . . . [and] cause him to withdraw his present help from us, we shall be made a story and a byword through the world.
deal falsely: break our word
byword: example
Where does the phrase "a city upon a hill" come from?
The phrase "a city upon a hill" comes from the Bible. In one famous story, Jesus uses the words to encourage his followers to set a good example. By using similar words, Governor John Winthrop was comparing the Puritans to the original followers of Jesus. Winthrop believed that the new Puritan colony would be an example for the entire world.
Even over 300 years later, U.S. politicians continue to use the metaphor of "a city on a hill." Presidents such as John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan have compared the whole United States to a city on a hill.
Many people who settled in the Massachusetts Bay Colony died during the colony's first winter. However, unlike the Plymouth Colony, the Massachusetts Bay Colony grew quickly after this first difficult year. By the 1630s, thousands of English settlers had migrated to Massachusetts. This increase in population was called the Great Migration. Some settlers who were part of the Great Migration moved to the Massachusetts Bay Colony for religious reasons. But many others settled there for economic reasons.
Follow the rules, or else . . .
Colonists in Massachusetts had to obey the rules of the Puritan authorities. The lives of Puritans were filled with strict rules. These rules were based on the Puritans' understanding of the Bible.
Here are some examples of those rules:
Everyone had to go to church.
Women couldn't show the skin on their ankles.
People couldn't play games that involved luck, such as cards.
People couldn't watch or perform in theatrical shows.
For a while, the Puritans even banned celebrating Christmas! They thought the feasting and drinking that came with the holiday was a distraction from religion.
As the colony of Massachusetts grew, it drew settlers with different religious beliefs. In the 1630s, a woman named Anne Hutchinson spread new religious ideas in Massachusetts.
What did Anne Hutchinson believe?
In the 1600s, women were not allowed to be ministers, but they could still learn about and discuss religious topics. So, in 1634, Anne Hutchinson started a group in her home for women to study the Bible.
At the weekly meetings, Hutchinson said that being a good Christian was about a personal connection with God, not about doing good works. Hutchinson's ideas were interesting to men as well as to women, and her study group quickly grew.
Why did Puritan leaders see Hutchinson as a threat?
John Winthrop and other Puritan officials believed that women such as Hutchinson should not be leaders in the colony. They also thought she was teaching people false ideas about God.
Anne Hutchinson was not the only person exiled from Massachusetts for religious reasons. In 1636, the minister Roger Williams was also forced to leave the colony. Williams had argued that the Massachusetts government had no right to tell people what to believe. The map below shows the journey Williams made in the winter of 1636 after he was exiled from Massachusetts.
Roger Williams's journey
Roger Williams was forced to leave the Massachusetts Bay Colony in the middle of a blizzard. Eventually, he met the Wampanoag Native Americans and stayed with them until spring.
In the spring, some of Roger Williams's friends joined him. They traveled to present-day Rhode Island and met with a Native American group called the Narragansett. The Narragansett people sold Roger Williams land for a new colony.
After he left Massachusetts, Roger Williams helped found the colony of Rhode Island. Like Roger Williams, many settlers moved to Rhode Island because they disagreed with the Puritan leadership in Massachusetts. These Rhode Island settlers wanted their new colony to be different from Massachusetts, where people were not allowed to show disagreement with certain religious beliefs. As a result, the Rhode Island colony became known for being more tolerant of religious difference than Massachusetts. In other words, people in Rhode Island were allowed to practice different religions more freely than in Massachusetts.
"Rogue Island"
Rhode Island became a home for people with different religious faiths. Because so many of Rhode Island's settlers opposed the Puritan rules, some other New England colonists distrusted Rhode Island.
Rhode Island gained a reputation for not agreeing with the other New England colonies on political and religious issues. Because of its reputation, the colony gained the nickname "Rogues Island." One definition of rogue is someone who acts in an unpredictable way. Even after the American Revolution, Rhode Island was the last state to approve the Constitution.
Rhode Island was not the only colony founded by settlers who had left Massachusetts. Thomas Hooker was a Puritan minister who left Massachusetts partly because he disagreed with its government. After leaving, Hooker helped found the colony of Connecticut. In one of his first sermons in Connecticut, Thomas Hooker said these words. Read Hooker's words.
The foundation of authority is laid in the free consent of the people.
authority: a government's power
consent: agreement or permission
Why was Hooker's sermon important?
In the 1600s, people usually said that God or the king was the basis of political authority. Hooker did believe that God and the king of England were important to the political authority of Connecticut. But Hooker also argued that ordinary people should be able to have a say in government.
The Declaration of Independence was written in 1776, about 140 years after Thomas Hooker gave his famous sermon.
Today, the United States government is based on the idea that power comes from the people.
For example, the Declaration of Independence says that governments get their power "from the consent of the governed." Do you see any similarity to Thomas Hooker's words?
In 1638, settlers in Connecticut wrote the Fundamental Orders. This document was a plan for the government of the new colony. Some historians call it the first constitution written in North America. The Fundamental Orders described who was allowed to vote in elections for local representatives. The only people allowed to vote were free men who owned property. Property included land, livestock, or goods.
These people would be allowed to vote:
a free man who is a Puritan minister and owns a farm
a free man who owns a herd of cattle
These people would not be allowed to vote:
a woman whose father is very wealthy
a man who is enslaved
a man who is free, but who has no land or other property
Starting in the 1620s, English colonists began settling on the land that became New Hampshire. But it took several decades for New Hampshire to become its own colony.
Life in a new colony
Farmland was cheaper in New Hampshire than in Massachusetts, but New Hampshire colonists were also farther away from large towns where they could sell their goods.
New Hampshire colonists cut down valuable timber in the forests of New Hampshire to sell to other colonies.
New Hampshire's long winters meant that colonists were cut off from travel for much of the year.
Continue
By the late 1600s, all of the New England colonies had been founded. Most New Englanders lived on farms or in small towns. Many New England towns were organized in similar ways. The image below shows what a typical New England town might have looked like in the year 1680.
The meetinghouse: where religion and government mixed
The meetinghouse was used for religious services. It was also where people came together to make political decisions. In Puritan villages, there was little separation between church and state. Government leaders were in charge of hiring ministers and making sure religious laws were followed.
The New England town meeting
In colonial New England villages, there would be a town meeting at least once a year. At a town meeting, people would come together to vote on laws and elect leaders. However, most people could not vote. Usually, only white men who owned property could vote.
Today, many towns in New England still use town meetings to vote on laws. However, many more people can vote today than in the 1600s.
For most of the 1600s, the New England Colonies governed themselves. But over time, English officials increasingly worried that New England colonists did not show enough support for the English king and government.
Loyal subjects of the king . . . most of the time
In the 1680s, the English king passed a series of laws that most of New England disliked. In 1689, word reached the colonists that rebels in England were going to overthrow the king. So, the colonists decided to imprison the king's colonial officials.
In England, the overthrow of the king was called the Glorious Revolution. New England colonists celebrated the Glorious Revolution and promised to be loyal to the new king.
The New England Colonies made up the northern part of England's Thirteen Colonies in North America. Several New England colonies were founded for religious reasons:
The Pilgrims founded the Plymouth Colony to separate themselves from the Church of England.
The Puritans founded the Massachusetts Bay Colony. They wanted to create a community that followed strict religious rules.
Roger Williams, who helped found Rhode Island, argued that a government had no right to tell people what to believe.
In the following questions, you will learn about the relationships and conflicts that New England colonists had with different Native American peoples. You will also learn about the economy and the laborers of the New England Colonies. The map below shows some of the Native peoples that lived in part of New England in the 1600s.
Some Native peoples saw the arrival of European colonists as an opportunity. For example, the Wampanoag, who lived near Cape Cod Bay, hoped the colonists could be a valuable trading partner and ally in wars. Many different Native peoples lived in New England. Some of these peoples were powerful. For example, the Pequot, who lived along the Connecticut River, controlled a large amount of trade. Other Native peoples, such as the Narragansett, who lived in present-day Rhode Island, were more cautious toward the colonists. Although they traded with the colonists, the group also warned the colonists against taking their land.
The Wampanoag
The Wampanoag (Wam-pa-NO-ag) people were one of the first Native peoples that New England colonists encountered. Wampanoag means "People of the First Light."
By 1600, nearly 70 villages were part of the Wampanoag Nation. During the summer, the Wampanoag lived close to the shore. They planted crops and fished. During the winter, they moved inland. They lived in the forest and hunted deer and bear.
Colonists who settled in New England often had to adapt to the economic, or trading, practices of different Native American peoples. For example, in the adapted passage below, a New England colonist describes the economic practices of local Native American groups in the 1630s.
[The Natives] have a kind of beads instead of money, to buy such things as they want, which they call Wampum. It is of two sorts, the one is white, the other is of a violet color. These are made of the shells of fish. With these beads they buy and sell, not only amongst themselves, but even with us.
We sell them any of our commodities for this Wampum, because we know we can buy beaver furs with it: and these beads are currency in all the parts of New England, from one end of the coast to the other.
commodities: valuable goods
Thomas Morton, New English Canaan, 1637.
Why did the colonists want to buy beaver furs?
Beaver fur is soft, waterproof, and can be easily be made into different shapes. During the colonial period, fancy hats made with beaver fur became very popular in Europe.
What kind of goods did Native groups want from the Europeans?
Native groups traded furs for manufactured goods, such as iron pots and guns.
Because the trade was so important, Native peoples fought wars to control the best areas to trap beavers. A Native group that could trap more beavers could trade more with colonists.
Colonists traded with Native American groups. But colonists also fought Native American groups for land and resources. For example, in the Pequot War (1636–1638), New England colonists fought the Pequot people for control of the valuable farmland and trading routes along the Connecticut River.
The adapted passage below was written by a New England colonist who fought in the Pequot War. In this passage, the colonist describes how an army of New England colonists and Native American allies attacked the most important Pequot town.
Many Pequot were burnt when we set fire to the town, men, women, and children, others forced out which our soldiers killed; down fell men, women, and children. Those that escaped us, fell into the hands of [the Native Americans fighting on the side of the colonists], that were behind us. There were about four hundred Pequot in this town, and not above five of them escaped out of our hands.
Captain John Underhill, Newes from America, 1638.
The Fort Mystic Massacre
The passage you just read described the massacre of a Pequot settlement in present-day Connecticut. Historians do not have any accounts from the Pequot themselves, because they were mostly killed and enslaved. So, historians have had to piece together what happened from written and visual accounts of the Europeans who participated in the massacre.
After the Pequot War ended in 1638, the New England colonists and Native American groups mostly avoided war for about forty years. In the 1600s, some New England colonists worked to spread the religion of Christianity to Native American groups. These colonists believed that God wanted them to make Native American people become more like Christian colonists. In order to spread Christianity, some colonists set up praying towns. In these towns, colonists taught local Native Americans about Christianity and the customs of the New England colonists. Native Americans reacted to the praying towns in different ways.
How did colonists in Massachusetts view Native Americans?
This image was the official seal, or symbol, of the Massachusetts Bay Company, one of the first New England colonies. The person on the seal is meant to be a Native American. The text coming from the person's mouth says, "Come over and help us."
Did the Native Americans really ask English settlers to come over?
No. Native Americans never invited English people to North America. But the Puritans who created the Massachusetts Bay Company believed that they could help the Native Americans by teaching them about Christianity.
The peace between the New England colonists and Native American groups ended with the outbreak of King Philip's War (1676–1678). The war started as a conflict between the New England colonists and the Wampanoag people who were led by a man named Metacomet. King Philip was the name that New England colonists gave Metacomet.
After colonists expand into Wampanoag land, many Wampanoag begin to support the idea of attacking the colonists.
The colonists execute three Wampanoag men that they accuse of killing a Christian Native American who warned the colonists about a possible attack.
The executions anger many other Wampanoag. They demand that Metacomet do something.
Metacomet and his followers respond to their demands and attack colonial towns throughout New England.
King Philip's War involved Native groups throughout New England. Some of these groups fought with the New England colonists, and others fought with the Wampanoag against the colonists.
Groups with this perspective likely fought for the New England colonists:
The Wampanoag are our enemies. We should help the colonists destroy them. Native groups competed with each other for land and resources. One way to defeat an enemy was to join the New England colonists in attacking that enemy.
Groups with these perspectives fought against the New England colonists:
We have been friends with the Wampanoag for a long time. We should help them to defeat the colonists. Native groups often made pacts of friendship with one another. If a Native group did not help its allies in a war, it risked gaining a reputation of being untrustworthy.
The colonists have taken our land and enslaved some of us. We must stop them. Many Native groups had faced misery at the hands of colonists. They saw the war as an opportunity to fight against the colonists who had attacked them and taken their land.
We don't care about the Wampanoag, but unless we stop the colonists now, they might take our land next. If a Native group saw the colonists as a threat, it was likely to fight against the colonists.
Metacomet and his allies lost King Philip's War. Thousands of Native Americans died in the conflict and many groups such as the Wampanoag also lost their land. The graph below shows the population of settlers in the New England Colonies in the decades before and after King Philip's War.
In the decades after King Philip's War, the colonial population of New England grew. Most of the colonists were farmers. So, the population change led to more land being taken from Native American groups.
As the population of the New England Colonies grew, colonists started new farms and towns. Unlike the Middle Colonies and Southern Colonies, nearly every town in New England had a school. As a result, many colonists in the New England Colonies attended school when they were small children. Below are two historical objects that were used in New England schools. Look at the objects and read their descriptions.
Why did schools focus on religion and reading?
The Puritans, who built many of the first towns in New England, based the rules of their communities on the rules in the Bible. They thought it was important for everyone to learn how to read so that they could read the Bible. As a result, New England during the colonial period had one of the highest literacy rates, or percentage of people who could read, in the world.
Education beyond childhood
In general, girls stopped going to school before the age of 10. But some boys were allowed to continue their studies.
In 1635, the Boston Latin School became the first high school in North America. One year later, the Puritans founded Harvard College to train new ministers.
Although school was common among many New Englanders, young colonists also received different types of education to prepare them for their future occupations, or jobs.
What happened to New Englanders with no land or trade?
In some cases, poor New Englanders signed a formal indenture contract, or an agreement to work for someone else for a set number of years. The lives of indentured servants were often hard. They had few legal rights, and masters would sometimes punish indentured servants severely.
Farming was the most common occupation of New England colonists. The two maps below give information about what it was like to farm in the colonies. The first map shows soil fertility, or the quality of the soil. Soil that is more fertile is better for growing crops. The second map shows the length of the growing season.
The New England Colonies had worse soil for growing crops than either the Middle or Southern Colonies. In addition, the growing season in New England was shorter than in the other colonies.
A hard place to settle
The environment of New England was shaped by ancient sheets of ice called glaciers. Glaciers had scraped away most of the good soil. This made New England hard to farm. The weather of New England was also cold, with long winters. Based on the images of New England below, what challenges do you think New England colonists faced in farming?
The farming conditions in New England were not as good as in the other colonies. But New England had many natural resources, or useful things that come directly from nature, that colonists consumed or sold.
Why did New Englanders hunt whales?
The fatty blubber on some kinds of whales could be turned into a valuable oil. Whale oil was useful for many things, such as making soap and lamp fuel. Until the late 19th century, whale oil was an important energy source.
Whale hunting was important to New England's colonial economy. But today, whale hunting is against the law in the United States and many other countries.
New Englanders traded many goods made from natural resources. Goods from the New England Colonies went all over the world. At the same time, the New England Colonies received goods from other places. The map below shows how the New England Colonies participated in world trade. The arrows pointing away from the New England Colonies show exports, or goods that the New England Colonies sold to other places. The arrows pointing toward the New England Colonies show imports, or goods and people that the New England Colonies bought from other places.
Thousands of enslaved Africans were shipped to the New England Colonies. Along with enslaved people of African descent, the New England colonists sometimes enslaved local Native American groups. Below are statements that enslaved or formerly enslaved people might have made and facts about slavery in the New England Colonies.
During the colonial period, all the New England colonies allowed slavery. However, some New Englanders opposed slavery.
When did New England ban slavery?
Slavery was legal in New England throughout colonial times. Starting in the era of the American Revolution, white and African American activists organized to end slavery in the new states.
Massachusetts became the first of the former Thirteen Colonies to end slavery in 1783. Antislavery activists like Elizabeth Freeman, an enslaved woman, brought court cases arguing that slavery went against the 1780 Massachusetts constitution. The constitution said that everyone had a right to life and liberty. These court cases were important in ending slavery in Massachusetts.
Other New England states, such as Connecticut and Rhode Island, passed laws to slowly end slavery.
The economy of New England depended on exporting natural resources such as fish and lumber to European countries and the West Indies. Most New England laborers were free people. However, the population of New England included enslaved Native American people, enslaved people who were captured in Africa, and people who descended from those captured there. When the European colonists first arrived in New England, the region was controlled by Native American peoples such as the Wampanoag and the Pequot. Colonists both traded with and fought against these Native peoples. Conflicts such as King Philip's War resulted in colonists taking control of much of the land in New England.
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