Chapter 4 Notes

Chapter 4 Notes

Take out a new piece of paper and label it Chapter 4 Notes. Today is the only day you will take notes for Chapter 4.

Write down what is RED for your notes.

Throughout New England there were many small businesses. Every town had a mill for grinding grain or sawing lumber. Some people in New England used waterpower from streams to run grain and lumber mills.

Large towns attracted skilled craftspeople like blacksmiths, shoemakers, furniture makers, and gunsmiths. Fishing and shipbuilding were the major industries that made the New England Colonies prosperous.

New England had long winters and thin, rocky soil made large-scale farming difficult. So farmers practiced subsistence farming to only meet the needs of their families with little left over to sell or trade.New England farmers depended on their children for labor. Everyone in the family worked to spin yarn, milk cows, fence fields, and sow and harvest crops. Women made cloth, garments, candles, and soaps for their families.

Colonial Economy- New England

The Middle Colonies also had industries. Some industries were small and home-based like carpentry and flower-making. Some were larger business like lumber mills, mines, ironworks, small-scale manufacturing and so on. The Middle Colonies attracted many Scotch-Irish, German, Dutch, and Swedish settlers. They were successful farmers using methods from their homeland. They made these colonies diverse, a trait not found in New England.

Most people in the middle colonies were farmers. This region had more fertile soil and a milder climate than New England.Fertile soil and moderate climate grew bumper wheat and grain crops so Middle Colonies was known as “the Breadbasket”.

In New York and Pennsylvania farmers grew large quantities of wheat and other cash crops. Cash crops were sold for money. These two states became busy ports for shipping wheat and live stock.

Colonial Economy- Middle Colonies

A plantation was like a small village with fields stretching out around a cluster of chapels, schools, cabins, barns, stables, carpenter shops, blacksmith shops, storerooms, and kitchens. Small plantations had 50 slaves while large ones had 200 or more.

The Backcountry ran along the Appalachian Mountains from New England to Southern Colonies. Settlers grew corn and tobacco on small family farms with one or two slaves. Backcountry farmers outnumbered plantation farmers, but plantation farmers were more wealthy and powerful by controlling the economic and political life of the region.

The Southern Colonies had rich soil and a warm climate. They could plant in large areas and produce harvest crops of tobacco and rice. Most settlers in the Southern Colonies made their living from farming. There was little need for commerce or industry so mostly London merchants managed Southern trade.

Most large plantations were located in Tidewater, a region of flat, low-lying plains along the seacoast. Planters built their plantations on rivers so they could ship their crops to market by boat.

Colonial Economy- Southern Colonies

Growth of Slavery

Slavery was wildly practiced in West Africa. Many West African kingdoms enslaved those they defeated in war. Slave traders from Arab lands bought some of these enslaved people and others were forced to work in gold mines or farm fields. European arrival in the Americas created a demand for enslaved labor workers and the West African slave traders provided colonists with this need. The voyage to America began with a march to a European fort on the West African coast, there they were sold to Europeans who then loaded them onto ships.

The trip across the ocean was called the “Middle Passage”. The Americas were in the middle of the three-part route of the Triangular Trade (route is shaped like a triangle). The Middle Passage was a terrible ordeal. Prisoners would be chained together for more than a month to where they could hardly sit or stand. They received little food or water. Africans who died or became sick were thrown over board. Those who refused to eat were whipped. Those who survived would enter the American slave market to be put up for sale as laborers for plantation owners.

Life of a slave

Some enslaved Africans did housework, but most worked in fields and suffered great cruelty. Overseers were plantation bosses who kept the slaves working hard. Many colonies had slave codes which were rules governing the behavior and punishment of enslaved people. Some did not allow slaves to leave the plantation without written permission. Some made it illegal to teach slaves to read and write. They were rarely allowed to move about freely or gather in large groups. Punishments ranged from whippings to hangings or even burning to death.

Slaves had strong family ties and some were torn apart to be sold. Some slaves were skilled in carpentry, blacksmithing, or weaving. They could sometimes set up shops and share profits with their slave holders. Those lucky enough to buy their freedom joined the small population of free African Americans.

Not all colonists believed in Slavery such as Puritans, Quakers, and Mennonites. Eventually slavery would spark a bloody war between the North and the South

Colonial Government

The idea of representative government was introduced by the colonists from England. The thirteen colonies began either as a charter colony (grant by English monarch) or proprietary (property of owner) colony. Proprietors could name their own governors and officials. Some colonies later became royal colonies, under direct English control. In royal colonies Parliament appointed a governor and council, known as the upper house to carry out their rulings. Colonists selected an assembly, or lower house.

Not all colonists had a voice in government. Indentured servants, landless poor, African Americans and Women could not vote.

English Economic Policies

European nations followed the mercantilism theory in which a country builds wealth and power by building its supplies of gold and silver. To achieve this a country must export goods more than it imports.

The English looked to the American colonies for raw materials such as tobacco, rice, indigo, wheat, lumber, fur, leather, fish and whale products. They also wanted colonists to buy English goods to support their economy.

To control this trade England passed the Navigation Acts. Navigation Acts were English laws controlling trade of colonial goods by routing ships through England for taxation.

After the Navigation Acts were passed, colonial merchants could not use foreign ships to send their goods. Colonists had a guaranteed place to sell their goods but over time colonists wanted to manufacture their own goods instead of importing from England. Colonists also wanted to make more money buy selling to countries other than England. Colonists got away by smuggling goods without government permission or paying taxes.

American Beliefs

Religion had a strong influence in colonial life. In 1730-40’s the Great Awakening swept through the colonies. The Great Awakening represented a religious revival. In New England and the Middle Colonies, ministers call for a “new birth”, a return to the strong faith of earlier days.

The Great Awakening:

-Inspired greater religious freedom

-Led to formation of new churches that emphasized personal faith rather than church rituals

-United the colonists from north to south in a common experience

-Helped colonists overcome regional barriers which paved the way for rapid spread of revolutionary ideas during the struggle for independence.

Enlightenment

By the mid 1700’s many educated colonists were also influenced by Enlightenment.

Enlightenment spread the idea that knowledge, reason, and science could improve society.

People observed nature, staged experiments, and published their findings. Benjamin Franklin practiced Enlightenment.

It also promoted freedom of thought and expression, a belief in equality, and the idea of popular government.

Ideas pf Freedom

Freedom of the press became an important issue in colonial America. Newspapers in colonial cities, such as Boston and Philadelphia, carried political news and often faced government censorship (banning of printed materials because they contain unpopular or offensive ideas).

In 1733 publisher John Peter Zenger, in his newspaper the New-York Weekly Journal, accused New York’s governor of corruption. Officials charged Zenger with a crime and threw him in jail. Zenger argued that the statements written about the governor were true so he had the right to publish them. The jury in the Zenger trial found him not guilty. The case involving John Peter Zenger was an important step in establishing freedom of the press in America.

French and Indian War

Main Concepts:

French and British have land disputes in North America.

Native Americans help the French since they are already allies and distrust the British.

War ends with Treaty of Paris and a French defeat which hurt Native Americans.

 

Proclamation of 1763 called for a halt to westward expansion.

Causes of the French and Indian War:

Ongoing conflict between England and France

Settlers encroaching into Native American hunting grounds

England broke treaties with the Native Americans.

Native Americans helped the French by raiding British Settlements during the wars between France and Great Britain.

Iroquois Confederacy

To counter the threat of the French and their Native American Alliances the British colonists tried to make a treaty with the Iroquois Confederacy.

The Iroquois Confederacy (Mohawk, Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, Oneida, and Tuscarora) was the most powerful group of Native Americans in eastern North America. They met with delegates in New York and refused a partnership with the British. They also refused to not take any side and remain neutral.

Brain Pop:Iroquois

Confederacy

French and Indian War

In 1756 the British formally declared war. France had many early successes in the war.

In 1757 William Pitt, the new British leader, saw the colonial conflicts as the key to building a vast British empire. Borrowing heavily to finance the war, he paid Prussia to fight in Europe and reimbursed the colonies for raising troops in North America.

In July 1758, the British won their first great victory at Louisburg. A month later, they took Fort Frontenac at the western end of the river.

They closed in on Quebec, where Gen. James Wolfe won a victory on the Plains of Abraham in September 1759.

With the fall of Montreal in September 1760, the French lost their last foothold in Canada. Soon, Spain joined France against England, and for the rest of the war Britain concentrated on seizing French and Spanish territories in other parts of the world.

Treaty of Paris

Treaty of Paris ended the French and Indian War.

France and Great Britain signed the Treaty of Paris.

Treaty of Paris of 1763 Effects:

Britain claimed all of North America east of the Mississippi River

France gave New Orleans and Louisiana to Spain

Britain was given Florida

France lost power in North America through the Treaty of Paris