Essay on Thirteen Colonies

Submitted By thajohnson1004
Words: 1191
Pages: 5

Aaron Johnson
History 141
2/1/13
Essay 2
Colony Restoration

After 1660, a number of new colonies were formed and out of the 13 colonies there were six called the Restoration colonies, in the north, NY, NJ, DEL, PENN, were founded. These colonies are also called the Middle Colonies, because they are located on the Mid-Atlantic seaboard. In the south, the colonies of NC, & SC were also founded as Restoration colonies and all of these colonies were proprietorships, meaning that 1 man or group of men owned all the land. The land was parceled out to tenants and demanded quitrents, and controlled the government. These lands were given to these proprietors because King Charles II owed them for their support of his cause in the English Civil Wars. There was a civil war in England between the Crown and the Puritans. King Charles I was executed in 1649 and the Puritans ruled until 1660, when Charles II retook the English throne in 1660.) To reward them for their service in the English Civil Wars, the king gave land to his supporters to be governed, generally for the purpose of making money.
The Netherlands and Sweden challenged Spain's dominance of the New World by founding two of the Middle Colonies, which later became English colonies. In the late 16th and early 17th century, the Dutch had emerged as a leading economic power in Europe and in 1626, Peter Minuit founded New Netherland on Manhattan Island and established the port city of New Amsterdam, he planned to establish the Dutch fur trading empire along the Hudson River.
Over time, the Dutch established forts and settlements to support this trade. Unlike the other European powers, they made no efforts to convert the Indians. They were interested in profits, not souls, Dutch settlements in America failed to attract enough settlers to compete with the rival English who surrounded them. New Netherland passed into English hands when it was conquered by James, the Duke of York, in 1667. The Duke then renamed it after himself—the colony became New York and New Amsterdam became New York City, New York was also a proprietorship, meaning the Duke ruled it exclusively, York then established New Jersey as a separate colony, and took it through a series of proprietors until it was made a royal colony in 1702 Along the Hudson Valley in New York, however, the proprietors established huge estates (known as landed estates) and attempted to live like feudal lords They hoped to attract tenant farmers who would work the land and pay quitrents to the proprietors, who would then in turn live the lives of leisured gentlemen. As land became scarce in the more established colonies in the early 1800’s, some settlers moved to this area and set themselves up as tenants on these estates, but hard times would lead these tenants to revolt in the mid-18th Century.
William Penn's proprietary colony in Pennsylvania was founded in 1680 as a refuge for Quakers’. Quakers were a religious sect in England who were persecuted for their faith, which took Puritanism to its’ logical end and abolished all religious rituals and hierarchies; this proved problematic in a hierarchical world. They held simple services where anyone could speak as commanded by the Inner Light; even women were allowed to speak. They generally eschewed social hierarchies, refusing to doff their hats or show “respect” to their “betters” They also refused military service—they were pacifists—and would not take oaths, and they refused to pay tithes to any church. These things really set them apart as “odd” and Quakers' pacifist, egalitarian ways were a major challenge to the social order of the 17th and 18th centuries. Penn's colony was also unique in that it had pacifistic policy toward Indians, he also only settled on lands that he had negotiated in treaty and paid for. This meant that relations between the colonists and Indians in Pennsylvania were peaceful and cooperative. But as more and more people pushed onto the frontier in