A. Englands Imperial Settings

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A. England's Imperial Strirrings

Only about 10% of Natives remained after Columbus came, predominantly death through disease.

From Florida to New Mexico southward, most of the southern half of the New World was under rule of imperial Spain.

1600- North America remained mostly unknown.

a. 3 European powers placed 3 primitive outposts ( small military camp/positions, distant from the main force, esp. as guard against surprise attacks), in 3 corners of the continent within 3 years of one another.

b. 1607- English in Jamestown Virginia

1608- French in Quebec

1610- Spanish in Santa Fe

Early 16th century Spain took little interest in having overseas colonies because of religious conflict with King Henry VIII and his English Protestant reformation.

a. Catholics and Protestants battled for years, with wavering dominance.

b. 1558 and after the English throne comes under the hold of Protestant Elizabeth, Protestantism becomes more powerful and intensifies rivalry with Catholic Spain, Ireland becoming among the first with rivalry.

5. Catholic Irish ask for help from Catholic Spain to overthrow the new Protestant English queen, but to little help.

6. Elizabeth's troops crush the Irish. The English crown confiscates the Catholic Irish lands and gives to new Protestant landlords

B. Elizabeth Energizes England

English buccaneers sought to promote Protestantism and plunder through seizing Spanish treasure ships and raiding Spanish settlements. Even when Spain England were at peace. Francis Drake was knighted by Elizabeth.

Newfoundland coast was the first English attempt at colonization. But collapsed when promoter Sir Humphrey Gilbert died at sea in 1583. Vision inspire his half bro.

a. Sir Walter Raleigh organized group of settlers.

1585 Settlers land in North Carolina's Roanoke Island, off the coast of Virginia, named by Virgin Queen Elizabeth to honor herself.

Colony vanishes after Raleigh preoccupies himself at home.

English failures at colonization contrasts with glories of Spanish whose profits enriched Spain tremendously.

Phillip II of Spain uses imperial gains to amass (gather together) an Invincible Armada.

a. 1588 prepares to invade England. Lumbering(slow&laborious) Spanish flotilla(fleet of small craft) arrives at English Channel, using these more swift, maneuverable, able manned ships,- inflict heavy damage on cumbersome overladen Spanish ships.

b. Defeat of Spanish Armada marks beginning of the end of Spanish imperial dreams, however the New World empire would last.

4. Spanish Netherlands secure their independence, causing much of the Spanish Caribbean to slip from Spain's grasp to Holland/ Spain had overreached itself.

5. England's victory over Spanish Armada marks a red-letter day in American history. Dampening Spain's spirit, helping ensure England's naval dominance in the North Atlantic (master ocean)

6. England's characteristics resemble those of Spain when it was at the eve of its colonization adventure, a century earlier. As listed below:

a. A strong, unified national state under a popular monarch.

b. A measure of religious unity after a protracted(drawn out)

c. A vibrant sense of nationalism exists in state.

7. Flowering of English national spirit after Spanish Armada defeat, golden age of literature dawning.

8. English seized with restlessness, curiosity about the unknown. Omnipresent was a new spirit of self-idence, vibrant patriotism, and boundless faith for the future.

9. 1604- England and Spain sign a treaty of peace. The English poised to plunge headlong into planting their own colonial empire in the New World.

C. England on the Eve of Empire

1. Population rises from some 3 million people in 1550 to about 4 million in 1600. In the English countryside landlords enclose croplands for sheep grazing, many farmers are forced to leave.

2. Woolen districts in Eastern and Western England purposefully supply many of the earliest England's to America.

a. economic depression hits the woolen trade in1500s , thousands of footloose farmers take to the road.

b. Farmers were unemployed and drifted about England. Mobile population alarms many contemporaries who conclude that England was burdened with a surplus population.

3. Laws of primogeniture(right of inheritance belongs exclusively to the eldest son) forced younger sons to seek fortunes elsewhere, bad luck plagued there early enterprises.

4. Early 1600's the joint stock company forerunner of the modern corporation was perfected and allowed a # of investors, adventurers, to pool their capital together for adventures.

5. Peace w/ Spain allows English colonization. Population growth provides workers and unemployed w/ thirst for adventure for markets, and religious freedom....

6. Joint-stock companies provide the means.

D. England Plants the Jamestown Seedling

1. 1606 A joint-stock company(companies made up of a group of investors) named the Virginia Company of London receives a charter from King James I for a settlement in theNew World.

a. main attraction is the promise of gold and desire to find a passage through America to the Indies.

b. Akin to most joint-stock companies, its intention was to last for only a few years. and then owners would liquidate it for profit.

c. Arrangement put severe pressure on the colonists, threatened with abandonment if they failed to make it rich on the company's behalf. Few investors touch in terms of long-term.

2. Virginia Company was a significant document in Am. History because it guaranteed settlers the same rights of Englishmen if they stayed home.

3. Late 1606- Virginia Company 3 ships set sail and land near the mouth of Chesapeake Bay. there Indians attacked.

a. Eventually chose a location up the bay, on the banks of the James River named in honor of King James I.

b. Easy to defend however mosquito infested and severely unhealthy. May 24,1607 about 100 English settlers landed, calling it Jamestown.

4. Early years of Jamestown, colonists perished during voyages, shipwrecked expeditions. Once ashore in Virginia, settlers died from disease, malnutrition, and starvation.

5. Rather than looking for food, they sought nonexistent gold.

6. 1608 Virginia is saved from collapse by leadership,resourcefulness of young adventurer Captain John Smith

a.whipped gold-hungry colonists into line

b. 1607 DECEMBER: Smith was kidnapped and subjected to a mock execution by Indian cheiftan, Powhatan. His daughter Pocahontas "saved" him, this ritual was merely symbolic to show Smith Powhatan's power and peaceful intentions.

c. Pocahontas becomes a intermediary between Indians n settlers to preserve shaky peace and provide supplies.

7. 400 settlers who made it to Virginia by 1609, but only 60 survive the Starving Time winter of 1609-1610

8.Diseased, dispairing colonists aboard homeward bound ships but are met on the James River by relief party whose leader Lord De La Warr ordered them back. He imposed a harsh millitary regime.

9. 1625 Virginia contains only some 1,200 survivors out of the 8,000 adventurers.

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