Obstacles to Spain's Domination

US History Summary Historical Themes (HST 200) Obstacles to Spain's Domination The discovery of an Atlantic World provided untold riches for Europeans, including priceless furs and silver and gold coins. Intense imperial competition between several European countries vying for dominance in the New World was further heightened by the Americas. Religious motivations for colonization also drove European expansion, and hostilities between Protestant and Catholic Christians erupted in the Americas as the Protestant Reformation gained traction starting in the 1520s. PORTUGAL EXPLORATION England had little energy for foreign projects because of the disruptions caused by the Tudor monarchy, particularly the founding of the Protestant Church of England by Henry VIII in the 1530s, the country's return to Catholicism under Queen Mary in the 1550s, and the restoration of Protestantism under Queen Elizabeth. More importantly, England did not have the money to undertake these kinds of projects. Nevertheless, English kings kept a close eye on events in the emerging Atlantic World and moved to formally recognize England's claim to the Americas. John Cabot was an Italian mariner who had been hired by Henry VII of England as early as 1497 to discover new territories. That year, Cabot traveled from England and touched down somewhere on the coast of North America. English fishermen regularly crossed the Atlantic to fish the productive seas off the coast of North America throughout the following century. But because England focused her efforts on colonizing Ireland, its colonization attempts in the 1500s were more localized. Although her major priority was preventing Spain from trying to eradicate Protestantism, Queen Elizabeth supported England's efforts to expand throughout the Atlantic World. In fact, as long as Spain seemed prepared to conquer Scotland or Ireland, England could not commit to extensive colonization in the Americas. Elizabeth did, however, approve of English privateers, sea commanders who had been granted carte blanche by the home government to plunder the enemy at pleasure. These seasoned sailors scoured the Caribbean, robbing Spanish ships at every opportunity. In this fashion, the English stole over £100,000 from Spain annually; English privateer Francis Drake gained notoriety in 1573 when he pilfered £40,000 worth of gold, silver, and pearls. An early effort at colonization was approved by Elizabeth in 1584 when her favorite, Sir Walter Raleigh, tried to establish a colony at Roanoke, an island off the coast of modern-day North Carolina. With only 117 residents, the colony was tiny and had a strained relationship with the nearby Croatans. They also had difficulty adjusting to life in their new country (Figure 2.11). After his return to England in late 1587 to get more men and supplies, their governor, John White, was prevented from returning to Roanoke for three years by a series of unfortunate circumstances. The colony had disappeared altogether by the time he returned in 1590. The name Croatoan etched onto a fence enclosing the settlement was the sole remnant of the colonists' presence. Governor White was never informed whether the colonists had all perished in a tragedy or had moved to the adjacent island of Croatoan (now Hatteras). The term "the lost colony" still applies to Roanoke. English colonization proponents emphasized both the economic benefits and the theological argument that English colonies would enable the spread of Protestantism across the Americas. Both of the arguments have resonance. Rich English merchants and the landed aristocracy started pooling their money to create joint stock corporations in the early 1600s. Investors donated the funds for and took on the risk of a venture in order to realize significant profits in this innovative business structure, which was in many respects the forerunner to the contemporary corporation. The firms received permission from the English crown to start colonies, and the investors believed they would make significant returns on their capital investment in foreign colonization. The Virginia corporation, a joint stock corporation, founded the first permanent English colony. The corporation, which took its name after Elizabeth, the "virgin queen," received royal permission to create a colony on North America's east coast and despatched 144 men and boys to the New World in 1606. This company sailed along Chesapeake Bay early in 1607. They christened their ramshackle hamlet Jamestown because they found a river they named the James in honor of their new monarch, James I. Significant challenges were faced, but the colony made it. Despite coming from wealthy homes, many of the men who settled Jamestown were desperate because they were younger sons who would not inherit their father's estates. The Jamestown explorers did not really anticipate having to labor; instead, they thought they would discover immediate prosperity in the New World. Among them was Henry Percy, the seventh son of the Earl of Northumberland. The following paragraph from his report highlights the difficulties the English faced in Virginia in 1607. England was a latecomer to the colonization race by any standard. While Jamestown staggered during the 1610s, the Spanish Empire expanded globally and prospered from its colonial endeavors. The Jamestown settlement has a unique position in history as the first permanent English colony in what would eventually become the United States, despite the English's tenacity. English colonization of the New World intensified after Jamestown was established. A ship that was headed for Jamestown sank in a storm in 1609 and came to rest in Bermuda. (Some say that Shakespeare's play The Tempest, which debuted in 1611, was influenced by this episode.) George Somers, the ship's admiral, asserted the English crown's claim to the island. The English also started to encroach on the Spanish American dominion by settling on little Caribbean islands. Small islands like St. Christopher (1624), Barbados (1627), Nevis (1628), Montserrat (1632), and Antigua (1632) became their home. The English West Indies had a business focus from the beginning as they produced cash crops, first sugar and subsequently tobacco. Because of the sugar that was produced there, Barbados rose to prominence as one of the most significant English colonies by the middle of the 1600s. The first English colony on the American peninsula to rely solely on slave labor was Barbados, which served as a model for later English slave communities. These were extremely different from England, which did not practice slavery. In the 1620s and 1630s, English Puritans also started to settle the Americas. These fervently pious immigrants envisioned communities of reformed Protestantism, free from the depravity that pervaded England. William Bradford led the Pilgrims, one of the earliest Puritan groups to go to North America; they had previously left England to settle in the Netherlands. Nevertheless, they set ship for North America in 1620 to establish themselves at Plymouth, the first English colony in New England, out of concern that their kids were becoming less English among the Dutch. The Pilgrims were distinct from other Puritans in that they were adamant about breaking away from the corrupt Church of England. be a result, Pilgrims are referred to be Separatists. Plymouth has a special position in American history, much like Jamestown. One popular account of the country's origin is the story of the 102 migrants who persisted in trying to survive after sailing over the Atlantic on the Mayflower. A significant part of their narrative is the Mayflower Compact, a formal document that the English freely signed promising to support one another. Because the commitment to live and work together is inclusive and cooperative, some see this 1620 text as a reflection of the democratic spirit. A far bigger group of Puritans created the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630 after fleeing England to avoid being forced to follow the Church of England. Thousands more came in the next years to start over in New England's chilly environment and stony soils. Protestant England, with just a few fledgling colonies in the Americas in the early 1600s, remained a fairly weak imperial actor in the early seventeenth century compared to Catholic Spain. The riches of Tenochtitlan, the Aztec metropolis, was unmatched by any treasure the English ever uncovered, and their little American colonies did not immediately make them wealthy. The English colonies also varied from one another; the Puritan colonies of New England were deeply religious from the beginning, whilst Barbados and Virginia had a distinctly commercial focus. Nonetheless, every English colony in America demonstrated the growing significance of England in the Atlantic region. French Exploration The New World triumphs of Spain piqued the interest of other potential imperial powers, such as France. France, like Spain, was a Catholic country dedicated to bringing Catholicism to every corner of the world. It entered the race to discover the New World and take use of the Western Hemisphere's riches at the beginning of the sixteenth century. French navigator Jacques Cartier named the northern region of North America "New France." He undertook three exploration trips on the St. Lawrence River and the Gulf of St. Lawrence between 1534 and 1541. Cartier overstated his claims of mineral richness in America, much like earlier explorers, yet he was unable to return to France with substantial fortune. He failed to create a permanent colony in North America because of both his own lack of preparation and the opposition of the local peoples. Because of his pivotal role in establishing the French presence in the New World, explorer Samuel de Champlain has a unique position in the history of the Atlantic region. Before moving farther north, Champlain first toured the Caribbean in 1601 and then the New England coast in 1603. He established Quebec in 1608 and crossed the Atlantic many times while assiduously advancing New France. In contrast to other imperial powers, France, because to Champlain's efforts, established particularly positive ties with indigenous peoples, opening the door for French exploration of the continent's interior, including the Great Lakes, Hudson Bay, and ultimately the Mississippi. In order to fight with the Algonquins and the Huron Confederacy against the Iroquois, Champlain formed an alliance with them. In order to build colonial colonies that would be profitable for them, the French established vast commerce networks across New France. For the purpose of gathering furs, particularly beaver pelts, and trading them for French glass beads and other trade products, these networks were dependent on local hunters. (French merchants found an easy market for their commodities from North America since broad-brimmed hats trimmed with beaver fur were fashionable at the period.) The French likewise aspired to colonize the tropical regions in order to emulate the opulence of Spain. The French focused on little West Indies islands once Spanish dominance in the Caribbean started to wane, and by 1635 they had settled two of them, Guadeloupe and Martinique. Even though it was far behind Spain, France now had colonies in the West Indies of its own. By using African slave labor, the sugar plantations on both islands were profitable ventures for the French colonists. Dutch colonization The tale of early modern religious and imperial strife includes the Dutch entry into the Atlantic World. One of the main Protestant reform movements, Calvinism, gained traction in the northern Spanish Netherlands provinces in the 1500s. These regions started a protracted battle to become independent from Catholic Spain throughout the sixteenth century. Founded in 1581, the Dutch Republic, often known as Holland, gained significant influence in the competition for Atlantic colonies and riches, even though Spain would not acknowledge its independence until 1648. Throughout the seventeenth century, the Dutch stood out as leaders in trade (Figure 2.13). Their colonization strategy was based on two strong corporations: the Dutch West India Company, founded in 1621 to colonize and trade in the Americas, and the Dutch East India Company, chartered in 1602 to trade in Asia. Henry Hudson, an English sea captain, investigated New York Harbor and the river that now bears his name in 1609 while working for the Dutch East India Company. Like many other explorers of the day, Hudson's true goal was to find a northwest route to Asia and its riches; nevertheless, the abundance of furs that could be collected from the area he explored—particularly the much sought-after beaver pelts—gave the Netherlands justification to claim it. The Dutch called their colony New Netherlands, and it functioned as an outpost for the strong and ever-expanding Dutch West India Company, engaging in fur trade. The Dutch established a number of regional trade stations, one at Fort Orange, named after the royal Dutch House of Orange-Nassau, near modern-day Albany, with their headquarters being in New Amsterdam on the island of Manhattan. (The Dutch still find significance in the color orange, since it has come to be connected with Protestantism, William of Orange, and the Glorious Revolution of 1688.) The Dutch established a business network across the Hudson River Valley and beyond with the native peoples, facilitated by a lucrative fur trade with the Algonquian and Iroquois communities in the area. In response, the Dutch West India Company founded colonies on Saba, St. Martin, St. Eustatius, Bonaire, and Aruba. The Dutch had become a formidable economic opponent of Spain in the seventeenth century, with colonies in the Caribbean and New Holland. Amsterdam developed became the Atlantic region's commercial center.