New England Colonies

Here's something I found about the starting of the New England Colonies:

On April 10, 1606, King James I of England issued two charters, one each for the Virginia Companies, of London and Plymouth, respectively. Due to a duplication of territory (between Chesapeake Bay and Long Island Sound), the two companies were required to maintain a separation of 100 Miles, even where the two charters overlapped.

These were privately-funded proprietary ventures, and the purpose of each was to claim land for England, trade, and return a profit. Competition between the two companies grew to where their potential New World territory overlapped, and would be finalized based upon results.

The London Company was authorized to make settlements from North Carolina to New York (31 to 41 degrees North Latitude), provided there was no conflict with the Plymouth Company’s charter.

The southern colonies

The Southern Colonies of British Colonial America consisted of North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Maryland, and Virginia. The first permanent settlement among them was at Jamestown, Virginia in 1607.^{[citation needed]}

The hope of gold, resources, and lands drew English colonists to the Southern Colonies. The Southern colonies, unlike the New England colonies, consisted of winters that were mild and summers that were hot. There were huge farms and plantations. Houses were miles apart from each other.

The southern colonies were perfect for growing crops and maintaining animals. The Southern colonies had the warmest climate accompanied by many cool blue rivers.

The slave trade

Portuguese traders brought the first African slaves for agricultural labor to the Caribbean in 1502. From then until 1860, it is estimated that more than 10 million people were transported from Africa to the Americas. The great majority were brought to the Caribbean, Brazil, or the Spanish colonies of Central and South America. Only about 6 percent were traded in British North America.

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The Portuguese, Dutch, and British controlled most of the Atlantic slave trade. Most Africans taken to North America came from the various cultures of western and west central Africa. The territories that are now Ghana, Togo, Benin, and Nigeria were the origins of most slaves brought to North America, although significant numbers also came from the areas that are now Senegal, Gambia, and Angola. These areas were home to diverse linguistic, ethnic, and religious groups. Most of the people enslaved were subsistence farmers and raised livestock. Their agricultural and pastoral skills made them valuable laborers in the Americas.

To transport the captured Africans to the Americas, Europeans loaded them onto specially constructed ships with platforms below deck designed to maximize the numbers of slaves that could be transported. Africans were confined for two to three months in irons in the hold of a slave ship during the crossing of the Atlantic Ocean called the Middle Passage. The meager diet of rice, yams, or beans and the filthy conditions created by overcrowding resulted in a very high death rate. Many ships reached their destinations with barely half their cargo of slaves still alive to sell into forced labor in the Americas.

The first Africans brought to the English colonies in North America came on a Dutch privateer that landed at Jamestown, Virginia, in August 1619. The ship had started out with about 100 captives, but it had run into extremely bad weather. When the ship finally put into Jamestown, it had only 20 surviving Africans to sell to the struggling colony. Soon many of the colonies along the Atlantic seaboard started importing African slaves. The Dutch West India Company brought 11 Africans to its garrison trading post in New Amsterdam (known today as New York City) in 1626, and Pennsylvanians imported 150 Africans in 1684.

Colonial African American LIfe

There was slavery in every colony in the 1800s.
At the dawn of the American Revolution, 20 percent of the population in the thirteen colonies was of African descent. Most blacks lived in the Chesapeake region, where they made up more than 50 to 60 percent of the overall population.
The majority of blacks living in the Chesapeake worked on tobacco plantations and large farms. Since the cultivation of tobacco was extremely labor-intensive, African slave labor was used, despite questions of whether slavery was morally right.
For slaves working on farms, the work was a little less tedious than tobacco cultivation, but no less demanding. Despite the difficult labor, there were some minor advantages to working on a plantation or farm compared to working in an urban setting or household. Generally, slaves on plantations lived in complete family units, their work dictated by the rising and setting of the sun, and they generally had Sundays off. The disadvantages, however, were stark. Plantation slaves were more likely to be sold or transferred than those in a domestic setting. They were also subject to brutal and severe punishments, because they were regarded as less valuable than household or urban slaves.
Regardless of a slave's occupation, there was considerable fear and angst caused by an environment of constant uncertainty and threats of violence and abuse.

Slaves were sold away from their families, too

It's kind of hard to read but this was how they talked. Here's what happened to one slave who was sold away from her family:

"When Mr. Inskip say dat he had got 'nough of looking at me an' my brudher an' siser an' brought a man to de jail to look us over an' see if he wanted to buy us. De man say he wouldn't buy nobody but me. He didn' want my sister an' brudher 'cause dey was too little. He needed a nurse for his chilluns an' I was de right size, so he bought me. I ain't never seen or heard from my mudher or my brudher or sister from that day to dis one. I don' know what happen to 'em. I don' even know if dey is alive or not. I don't know nothing 'bout 'em. My name is Ella Belle Ramsey."

http://slaveryinamerica.org/narratives/nar_ebramsey.htm

A African American bering sold

this online is what i found online. like it says its from a freed slavce......the words are kinda weird but try to picture this in your mind.

Sylvia Cannon, a freed slave, described slave auctions this way:
I see 'em sell plenty colored peoples away in them days, 'cause that the way white folks
made heap of their money. Course, they ain't never tell us how much they sell 'em for.
Just stand 'em up on a block about three feet high and a speculator bid 'em off just like
they was horses. Them what was bid off didn't never say nothing neither. Don't know
who bought my brothers, George and Earl. I see 'em sell some slaves twice before I was
sold, and I see the slaves when they be traveling like hogs to Darlington. Some of them
be women folks looking like they going to get down, they so heavy.
The slave auctioneers spoke of their business as though they were, in fact, buying and
selling hogs.

How slaves were bought and sold

Slaves were usually bought and sold just like property. They would have an auction like the ones we have now and auction off the slaves to whomever could pay the most. It was like buying animals. THey would look at their muscles and talk to their "owners" to see if they were obedient and if they worked hard and if they slacked off. I also found out that if they were not likely to get sick and had a strong system they were worth more. So if like say we were slaves being sold versus a malnourished sick dude from nowhere land we would be worth more because we could work more. This is a very sick fact and makes me really ticked off but it should. THey were basically treated like animals and were not thought to be actual humman beings because of theis skin color. check out this website its pretty cool:
http://www.uni.edu/schneidj/webquests/adayinthelife/slaves.html

Slavery education

hey I found this website. just read till the picture. its very sad that they didn't get the proper education they needed.. but what people did about it was good.
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USASeducation.htm

Sickness

I wasn't there for History class on Friday so can someone tell me what to post about? Thanks I would appriciate it.

Slavery

The article I got this exerpt from had a slightly disturbing picture and so I decided to just cut and paste the part that was worth it.

The first record of African slavery in Colonial America occurred in 1619. A Dutch ship, the White Lion, had captured 20 enslaved Africans in a battle with a Spanish ship bound for Mexico. The Dutch ship had been damaged first by the battle and then more severely in a great storm during the late summer when it came ashore at Old Point Comfort, site of present day Fort Monroe in Virginia. Though the colony was in the middle of a period later known as "The Great Migration" (1618-1623), during which its population grew from 450 to 4,000 residents, extremely high mortality rates from disease, malnutrition, and war with Native Americans kept the population of able-bodied laborers low [3]. With the Dutch ship being in severe need of repairs and supplies and the colonists being in need of able-bodied workers, the human cargo was traded for food and services.

In addition to African slaves, Europeans, mostly Irish,[18] Scottish,[19] English, and Germans, were brought over in substantial numbers as indentured servants,[20] particularly in the British Thirteen Colonies.[21] Over half of all white immigrants to the English colonies of North America during the 17th and 18th centuries consisted of indentured servants.[22] The white citizens of Virginia, who had arrived from Britain, decided to treat the first Africans in Virginia as indentured servants. As with European indentured servants, the Africans were freed after a stated period and given the use of land and supplies by their former owners, and at least one African American, Anthony Johnson, eventually became a landowner on the Eastern Shore and a slave-owner.[23] The major problem with indentured servants was that, in time, they would be freed, but they were unlikely to become prosperous. The best lands in the tidewater regions were already in the hands of wealthy plantation families by 1650, and the former servants became an underclass. Bacon's Rebellion showed that the poor laborers and farmers could prove a dangerous element to the wealthy landowners. By switching to pure chattel slavery, new white laborers and small farmers were mostly limited to those who could afford to immigrate and support themselves.

The transformation from indentured servitude to racial slavery happened gradually. There were no laws regarding slavery early in Virginia's history. However, by 1640, the Virginia courts had sentenced at least one black servant to slavery.

In 1654, John Casor, a black man, became the first legally-recognized slave in the area to become the United States. A court in Northampton County ruled against Casor, declaring him property for life, "owned" by the black colonist Anthony Johnson. Since persons with African origins were not English citizens by birth, they were not necessarily covered by English Common Law.

The Virginia Slave codes of 1705 made clear the status of slaves. During the British colonial period, every colony had slavery. Those in the north were primarily house servants. Early on, slaves in the South worked on farms and plantations growing indigo, rice, and tobacco; cotton became a major crop after the 1790s.[24] In South Carolina in 1720 about 65% of the population consisted of slaves.[25] Slaves were used by rich farmers and plantation owners with commercial export operations. Backwoods subsistence farmers seldom owned slaves.

Some of the British colonies attempted to abolish the international slave trade, fearing that the importation of new Africans would be disruptive. Virginia bills to that effect were vetoed by the British Privy Council; Rhode Island forbade the import of slaves in 1774. All of the colonies except Georgia had banned or limited the African slave trade by 1786; Georgia did so in 1798 - although some of these laws were later repealed.[26]

The British West Africa Squadron's slave trade suppression activities were assisted by forces from the United States Navy, starting in 1820 with the USS Cyane. Initially, this consisted of a few ships, but relationship was eventually formalised by the Webster-Ashburton Treaty of 1842 into the Africa Squadron.[27]

Election Day in the Colonies

On page 46 of the textbook, it describes election day as a very happy, joyful day where people would gather from all over the area to vote and meet with friends. However, I think that is very unrealistic. The textbook said that people had to vote publicly. Wouldn't this mean that there would be a lot of peer pressure to vote for certain people, no matter what your real opinion is? Last year, I read that if someone didn't vote for a certain person, he would sometimes get hit with tomatos and other vegetables, or get beat up afterwords. I think that this book only shows one side of election day.

The Life of A Slave

The book that Haley and I had to do an outline about, Life in the American Colonies, says a bit about the life of a slave during the journey to and life in America:

"Conditions during the voyage to America were appalling. Slaves were crowded closely into dark spaces below deck, with nothing more than an open tub as a toilet. In good weather conditions, they might be taken on deck for forced exercise, but in bad weather- or when the crew feared their human cargo might rebel- they were chained permanently below deck. Disease flourished... and traders expected many deaths among the slaves. Slaves had no legal status in the colonies.

"Being a slave in the New World made heavy demands on these unwilling immigrants. Cut off from everything they knew, the colonial slaves had to learn a new language and new ways to work. Forming relationships with slaves who had come earlier or who were born in the New World was sometimes difficult, and so were the demands by whites that blacks adopt a "racial etiquette" acknowledging the rights of all whites to dominate all blacks.

"Most slaves... labored fifteen-hour days on southern tobacco or rice plantations. Under these terrible conditions, hundreds of thousands of African Americans took their place in the life of the New World."

Obviously, the African slaves lived in really terrible conditions. They never had the hope of going back to Africa or being treated fairly.

Redemptioners

Hey I found this interesting scroll down to history.. I know its long but its interesting and worth it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redemptioner

Great Awakening

The great awakening was led by key leaders such as Jonathan Edwards and George Whitefield.

About Jonathan Edwards: Edwards has received a bad press for his "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God." In that sermon he used the image of a spider dangling by a web over a hot fire to describe the human predicament. His point was that at any moment, our hold on life could break and we'd be plunged into fires of eternal damnation. But if you read his sermons, you will find that he spoke quietly, reasonably, and logically. Indeed, he was dry and even a bit boring. But he began to experience a harvest of conversions that were accompanied by exaggerated behavior. People would bark, shout, and run when they were converted. Why did people listen to Edwards? Why did his preaching provoke such a response? For one thing, he was speaking about a matter they were vitally interested in. They had come to this country to found a biblical commonwealth, but their vision did not seem to be shared by community's youth.

Geroge Whitefield: Whitefield was an associate of John Wesley in England. He had a loud voice, and it is said one conversion occurred 3 miles from where he was preaching. He was a dramatic man who it was said could pronounce the word "Mesopotamia" in such a way that it could melt an audience. Whitefield traveled up and down the eastern seaboard carrying the Awakening with him, and he offered a new quality to the prevailing view of how one gains citizenship in the Kingdom of God. Like many of the evangelists, Whitefield stood over against a cold, rational religion that appealed only to the mind. His emphasis on the conversion experience had a leveling effect. It served to remind everyone that the ground is level at the foot of the cross. And it made the experience of saving grace seem of greater relevance than the petty quarrels over ecclesiastical structure that seemed to divide Christians.
A good quote by him: " A Christian! A Christian! Let that by your highest distinction...".

The Great Awakening

What historians call “the first Great Awakening” can best be described as a revitalization of religious piety that swept through the American colonies between the 1730s and the 1770s. That revival was part of a much broader movement, an evangelical upsurge taking place simultaneously on the other side of the Atlantic, most notably in England, Scotland, and Germany. In all these Protestant cultures during the middle decades of the eighteenth century, a new Age of Faith rose to counter the currents of the Age of Enlightenment, to reaffirm the view that being truly religious meant trusting the heart rather than the head, prizing feeling more than thinking, and relying on biblical revelation rather than human reason.

GREAT AWAKENING.......DID YOU KNOW?

What alot of people do not know is that there were actually four "great awakenings..." the one that people mostly talk about is the first...here is a little cut and paste, from a website about the first one....
The Great Awakening was a watershed event in the life of the American people. Before it was over, it had swept the colonies of the Eastern seaboard, transforming the social and religious life of land. Although the name is slightly misleading--the Great Awakening was not one continuous revival, rather it was several revivals in a variety of locations--it says a great deal about the state of religion in the colonies. For the simple reality is that one cannot be awakened unless you have fallen asleep.

The Great Awakening

The Great Awakening was a spiritual renewal that swept the American Colonies, particularly New England, during the first half of the 18th Century. It began in England before catching fire across the Atlantic. Unlike the somber, largely Puritan spirituality of the early 1700s, the revivalism ushered in by the Awakening brought people back to "spiritual life" as they felt a greater intimacy with God.
The Awakening's biggest significance was the way it prepared America for its War of Independence. In the decades before the war, revivalism taught people that they could be bold when confronting religious authority, and that when churches weren't living up to the believers' expectations, the people could break off and form new ones.
Through the Awakening, the Colonists realized that religious power resided in their own hands, rather than in the hands of the Church of England, or any other religious authority. After a generation or two passed with this kind of mindset, the Colonists came to realize that political power did not reside in the hands of the English monarch, but in their own will for self-governance (consider thewording of the Declaration of Independence). By 1775, even though the Colonists did not all share the same theological beliefs, they did share a common vision of freedom from British control. Thus, the Great Awakening brought about a climate which made the American Revolution possible.

John Calvin Reformation

Hey I found this awseome site that talks about the Reformation and goes along with the Great Awakening. This site talks about how John Calvin was a former Protestant but ended up cuasing a revolution in the church. John Calvin wrote some amazing stuff such as commentarie sthat basically explained the whole bible. He was a very hard core bible study guy and tore scripture apart so he could translate it in a way that others could understand. http://wsu.edu/~dee/REFORM/CALVIN.HTM

how tabocco was made and became important the the colonies

The development of tobacco as an export began in Virginia in 1614 when one of the colonists, John Rolfe, experimented with a plant he had brought from the West Indies, Nicotania tabacum. In the same year the first tobacco shipment was sent to England. After the first shipment was completed the British prized this new tobacco product. The reason why they prized the tobacco so much was because it became a way to show one's wealthiness to the public. Only those of highs status could afford this new product. As the popularity of tobacco grew it became the savior of the colonies. During the first growth and shipment period of the first batch of tobacco the colonies were in a crisis. Due to the rough climate the colonies weren't able to produce the crops they needed to survive. With no crops, they couldn't bring themselves income or food supply to sustain life in this new land. While the crisis continued the tobacco popularity also grew. Seeing this is happening the colonists took this opportunity and mass produced tobacco. Fortunately the Virginia climate and land structure was perfect for tobacco plantations. With this mass production and sales to English the colonies were saved from their crisis as they used tobacco for income and currency. Virginia tobacco rapidly gained popularity abroad and it became more difficult to encourage the production of diverse crops or other commodities in the colony. Land was readily available and quick profits could be made on tobacco. Tobacco cultivation is labor intensive and a large labor force was required which was supplied by indentured servants who were required to work for a number of years in return for their passage to the New World. The first slaves arrived in Virginia in 1619, but it would be several decades before slavery became the dominant labor force in the colony. Tobacco was Virginia's primary agricultural export throughout the colonial period in spite of repeated efforts by royal governors to encourage diversification.

The First Great Awakening

Here's a bit from Wikipedia about the First Great Awakening:

The First Great Awakening (referred to by some historians as the Great Awakening) was a period of heightened religious activity, primarily in Great Britain and its North American colonies in the 1730s and 1740s. In New England, the Great Awakening was influential among many Congregationalists; while in the Middle and Southern colonies (especially in the "Backcountry" regions of those colonies) the Awakening was influential among Presbyterians. Although the idea of a "great awakening" is contested, it is clear that the period was, particularly in New England, a time of increased religious activity. The revival began with Jonathan Edwards, a well-educated theologian and Congregationalist minister from Northampton, Massachusetts, who came from Puritan and Calvinist roots, but emphasized the importance and power of immediate, personal religious experience. Edwards was said to be "solemn, with a distinct and careful enunciation, and a slow cadence." ^[1] Nevertheless, his sermons were powerful and attracted a large following. The Methodist preacher George Whitefield, visiting from England, continued the movement, traveling across the colonies and preaching in a more dramatic and emotional style, accepting everyone into his audiences.

Here's the link for more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Great_Awakening

Slave Cabin Reconstruction

In Charleston, South Carolina, there's a project going on to rebuild several slave homes on a plantation. Here's a bit about the project from the website:

"Magnolia Plantations slave cabins have a unique history, in which they have been utilized from the time of antebellum slavery through emancipation and into the late 20th century by African-Americans, both enslaved and free.

While other historic sites have restored similar slave cabins and houses in the past for interpretation, no site has ever restored a series of structures that interpret African-American history from slavery to freedom and beyond. Magnolia is taking the unique and exciting opportunity to have this transitional interpretive area for African-American history that is unique and certain to garner national attention."

go here: http://www.magnoliaplantation.com/slaverytofreedom.html
to see a picture of the slave cabin and to read more.

joint-stock companies

Joint stock companies were very similar to modern day corparations. They are much like our stock companies. People back then could find investors that would pool all of their money together to start a colony. If the colony did well then the investors would make money according to what they invested. Investors and founders of colonies were very smart when they thought of things like joint stock companies. They would provide money to start a coloney and allow them to survive for awhile before they had to pay them back. Joint stock companies helped set the foundation for modern day corperations.

Indigo crops in the carolinas and how it was made

here is the website where i got this: http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Aegean/7023/indigo.html

the processing of indigo involved carefully timed fermenting and agitating stages. Indigo production, like rice culture, involved concentrated manual labor. Thus indigo easily fit into the Southern slave holding methods of agriculture. However, indigo processing was exacting and required a high degree of technical skill. This plus the inevitable risks of agriculture meant that not all farmers could produce indigo on a commercial scale. Yet, the fact that indigo became widespread indicates that many plantation owners were willing to take the necessary risks. An advantage indigo had over rice was that indigo did not require the standing water of rice cultivation. Thus it quickly spread to the middle country of South Carolina and on the sea islands which were not adapted to rice culture.
Indigo processing was very precise and remained a precarious aspect of indigo culture for it determined the quality of the dye. The indigo plants were placed in three successive fermentation vats for the dye did not exist in the plant per se. A liquid called indican was formed chemically in an oxidation process which the colonial planters did not fully understand. Contemporary accounts simply said that the plants rotted. The fermented indigo/indican was then agitated by slaves with paddles which aerated the liquid. After the addition of limewater, the clear alkaline solution changed to blue. After the liquid was drained, the residue was strained, bagged, and left to dry. The resulting fine stiff paste was cut into cubes and placed into barrels for shipment to England. An average harvest for a planter usually resulted in thirty to eighty processed pounds of indigo per acre.

William Bradford

William Bradford was born in 1590 and when he was very young both of his parents died so he lived with several relatives while he was growing up. When he was 12 he went to a church of separatists and got really into their ideas and beliefs. By the time he was 17 he was what we would call a radical christian and told the congregation about his idea to separate from the church of England. This was an extremely dangerous thing to do because at the time church and state were one thing and you had one religion to follow. later William found out that the King of England, James I, was tracking down the separatist leaders and imprisoning them. He found this out and they decided to go to the New Netherlands. I think they should have gone but at the same time Jesus tells us that we will be persecuted and that in order to follow him we have to drink of the same cup that he did and pick up our cross and follow him. I think it is kind of cool that the king was persecuting them because it shows that they were not afraid to speak out on their beliefs. He had alot of influence and used it well and very carefully. He had to trust God and walk by faith in everything he did because he was not sure what would lie ahead but knew that was what God had planned for him and his congregation.

This would really be cool if we could be a part of it, well, it would really stink actually literally and metaphorically.....It would really be hard to start a colony by your self with only a little bit of help, plus you got indians attacking you......i mean for real......After World War II, an effort began to reenact the voyage of the Mayflower. With cooperation between Project Mayflower and Plimoth Plantation, an accurate replica of the original (designed by naval architect William A. Baker) was launched September 22, 1956 from Devon, England, and set sail in the spring of 1957. Captained by Alan Villiers, the voyage ended in Plymouth Harbor after 55 days on June 13, 1957 to great acclaim.

Mayflower II masts in the fog
The ship is moored to this day at State Pier in Plymouth, and is open to visitors

the new netherlands

Since the issue of patents by the States General in 1614, New Netherland had been a private, commercial venture. This changed in 1624, when New Netherland became a province of the Dutch Republic and the northern border was lowered to 42 degrees north in acknowledgment of the inevitable intrusion of the English north of Cape Cod (see John Smith's 1616 map as self-anointed Admiral of New England). According to the Law of Nations, a claim on a territory required not only discovery and charting, but also settlement. In May 1624 the Dutch completed their claim by landing 30 Dutch families on Noten Eylant, modern Governors Island.Within six years, the nations were again at war, and in August of 1673 the Dutch recaptured New Netherland with a fleet of 21 ships, then the largest one seen in North America.New Netherland settlers did not come to America because of religious or political persecution, nor were they destitute. They came with the hope of making money. The majority were single males, primarily tradesmen or farmers.Another important element in the New Netherland province that differed from the British colonies was demographics. It has been estimated that probably one half of the population was not Dutch. The size of the province has been estimated at between 2,000 to 3,500 in 1655 growing to a total of about 9,000 by 1664. A significant number of the inhabitants were Germans, Swedes and Finns that emigrated in the period after 1639; a number that was increased by 300 to 500 with the capture of New Sweden on September 24, 1655.

Peter Minuit

Peter Minuit isn't very well known, but I did my paper on him and here are some interesting facts :

1. He got into an argument with the secretary of the Dutch West India company, and was thrown out of New Netherland.
2. Later, someone reccomended him as a good person to start a colony somewhere else (along the Delaware river) in the New World, and he went.
3. Minuit died tragicly when a hurricane hit a boat he was on and he drowned.

From what I have read, Peter Minuit had kind of a sad life, but he was always respectful to Indians (he always bought land from them instead of just 'claiming' it) and he was important in the first few years of the colonies New Amsterdam and New Sweden because he did a good job of being in charge.

William Penn

I found out about william penn that he always had the heart that cried out for liberty since he was a young boy. He got into trouble often for speaking up in his schools when he was young and therefore had to move schools sometimes. He was never afraid to speak on what he believed in. This got him into trouble sometimes but at least it came in handy later on.
Another thing i found out was that all these great heroes of that century really did not have an easy life. I'm not talking about the persectution. That of course was hard but I'm talking about personal things in their life. William Penn was alone a lot as a boy, and did not see his father often. That probably was really hard for him. And also even when his wife died and other things, those things didn't shake him. he firmly believed in confidence. WIlliam also had two strokes before he died. If i was him, i would wonder why that happened. As a firm quaker believer, he could've wondered why these things happened if he was serving his nation and speaking out for liberty. Those thoughts probably came to his kids too.
So basically, these guys really gave up a lot for what they wanted their nation to be like in the future. and that we should use the things God has given us from the very beginning and use them.

John WInthrop

When researching I for our one page paper that was due Monday I did my paper about John Winthrop and I found that John had four wives. they all died he didn't divorce any of them they died then he got remarried then she died and so on. I thought that was pretty interesting..

Rhode Island- Roger Williams

Rhode Island has a pretty interesting reason for being founded. Roger Williams was one of the very first people to speak out against the Puritans beliefs. He was a pastor who was similar to a Puritan in belief but he disagreed with him on 3 main points. 1. He believed that church and state should be seperate. 2. Williams belived that the Indians owned all of the land in the colonies and that the colonists had no right to stay unless they paid the indians for the land. 3. And lastly he strongly disagreed with the Puritans beliefs that the church could be "purified." Thus after some hard work and much perseverance Rhode Island was founded, and Rhode Island was founded mostly on the seperation of church and state.

quakers

i think the quakers are really interesting people! they have done so much! they were some of the hardest working back then...they did everything to provide for there family and "tribe".they always worked in the field to pick corn and other things. there religious life was funny, they thought one thing and would do another..over all they were good people though.

Charlestown

I know that we're not going to learn about the civil war for a few months, but I found a cool link to this website about a fort in Charlestown, South Carolina. Since Charlestown was the first settlement in South Carolina, I thought it might be interesting to know what it was like in the Civil War. They say that the fort was where the Civil War started.

http://www.nps.gov/fosu/

Fort Sumpter is a really cool fort, and if you ever go to Charlestown, you should take a tour of it.