Colonial America Guide — The Founding of the Thirteen British Colonies
Colonial America was a world in the making — a vast territory along the eastern coast of North America where European settlers, African slaves, and Native American peoples created new societies that would eventually become the United States. The colonial period lasted from the first permanent English settlement at Jamestown in 1607 until the Declaration of Independence in 1776, a century and a half during which the foundations of American life were laid: the institutions of self-government, the patterns of religious diversity, the systems of labor and agriculture, and the conflicts over land and freedom that would define American history.
The thirteen British colonies were not a unified entity but a collection of distinct societies with different origins, economies, and cultures. They shared, however, a common language, legal traditions, and political institutions derived from England, and they were all part of the British Empire. The colonial experience shaped American character in lasting ways — the suspicion of centralized authority, the emphasis on individual rights, the tradition of local self-government, and the tragic legacy of racial slavery.
The Chesapeake Colonies
The first permanent English settlement in America was Jamestown, founded in 1607 by the Virginia Company of London. The colony struggled desperately in its early years, with disease, starvation, and conflict with Native Americans killing most of the original settlers. The colony was saved by the leadership of Captain John Smith, who imposed discipline, and by the cultivation of tobacco, which provided a profitable cash crop.
Tobacco transformed Virginia. The introduction of tobacco cultivation by John Rolfe in 1612 created an export commodity that sold for high prices in England. Tobacco farming required extensive land and labor, leading to the expansion of settlement and the importation of laborers. The headright system granted land to those who paid for immigrants, encouraging the growth of a planter elite. The first enslaved Africans arrived in Virginia in 1619, though the full system of racial slavery developed gradually.
The Virginia House of Burgesses, established in 1619, was the first representative assembly in the American colonies. It established the principle that colonial governments should have a voice in their own affairs. The tension between the elected assemblies and the royal governors appointed by the king would be a recurring theme of colonial politics.
Maryland, founded in 1632 by Cecil Calvert, Lord Baltimore, was established as a haven for English Catholics. The Maryland Toleration Act of 1649 guaranteed religious freedom for all Christians, a remarkable advance in an age of religious persecution. Like Virginia, Maryland developed a tobacco economy based on plantation agriculture and indentured servitude, later replaced by racial slavery.
The New England Colonies
The Plymouth Colony, founded by the Pilgrims in 1620, established the pattern of religious settlement in New England. The Mayflower Compact, signed before the Pilgrims landed, was a covenant for self-government that established the principle that government rests on the consent of the governed. The first Thanksgiving in 1621 symbolized the cooperation between the Pilgrims and the Native Americans that made survival possible.
The Massachusetts Bay Colony, founded by Puritan settlers in 1630, became the largest and most influential New England colony. The Puritans sought to create a “city upon a hill” — a model Christian society based on their interpretation of the Bible. John Winthrop, the colony’s first governor, articulated this vision in a famous sermon aboard the Arbella: “We shall be as a city upon a hill, the eyes of all people are upon us.”
Puritan society was based on religious congregations that governed themselves. Town meetings, in which male church members made decisions about local affairs, became the foundation of New England democracy. Education was highly valued — the Puritans established Harvard College in 1636 to train ministers, and they required towns to establish schools. Literacy rates in colonial New England were among the highest in the world.
Religious dissent led to the founding of new colonies. Roger Williams, banished from Massachusetts for his radical views on religious freedom and the rights of Native Americans, founded Rhode Island in 1636. Rhode Island guaranteed religious freedom and separation of church and state. Thomas Hooker, who disagreed with Puritan restrictions on voting, founded Connecticut, which adopted the Fundamental Orders of 1639, often considered the first written constitution in America.
The Middle Colonies
New York began as the Dutch colony of New Netherland, with its capital at New Amsterdam on Manhattan Island. The English conquered the colony in 1664 and renamed it New York. The colony’s Dutch heritage left a lasting mark — words like “boss,” “cookie,” and “Santa Claus” entered American English from Dutch, and the tradition of religious toleration established by the Dutch continued under English rule.
Pennsylvania, founded by William Penn in 1681, was the most distinctive of the middle colonies. Penn, a Quaker, established the colony as a “holy experiment” based on religious toleration, peaceful relations with Native Americans, and representative government. Penn’s Frame of Government guaranteed religious freedom and established an elected assembly. Philadelphia grew rapidly to become the largest city in colonial America.
The middle colonies were the most ethnically and religiously diverse region in colonial America. Pennsylvania attracted German, Scotch-Irish, and other European immigrants. New York had Dutch, English, and German populations. New Jersey and Delaware had similar diversity. This diversity created a pattern of religious pluralism that would become characteristic of American society.
The economy of the middle colonies combined agriculture and commerce. The region produced wheat, corn, and other grains for export, earning it the name “the breadbasket colonies.” Philadelphia and New York became major ports, connecting the colonial economy to the Atlantic world. The middle colonies had fewer slaves than the South but more than New England, with slavery concentrated in port cities and on farms.
The Southern Colonies
The southern colonies — Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia — developed economies based on plantation agriculture and racial slavery. The plantation system produced tobacco in the Chesapeake and rice and indigo in the Lowcountry of South Carolina and Georgia. These labor-intensive cash crops created enormous demand for enslaved labor, and the slave population of the southern colonies grew rapidly.
South Carolina was the most distinctive of the southern colonies. Founded in 1670, the colony developed a society based on rice plantations worked by enslaved Africans who came primarily from the rice-growing regions of West Africa. Enslaved people from the Senegambia region brought knowledge of rice cultivation that was essential to the colony’s prosperity. The black majority in South Carolina created a distinctive African American culture, including the Gullah language and traditions that survive today.
Georgia, founded in 1732 by James Oglethorpe, was established as a buffer colony between South Carolina and Spanish Florida. It was also intended as a haven for debtors and the poor from England. Slavery was initially prohibited in Georgia, but the ban was lifted in 1751, and Georgia developed a plantation economy similar to South Carolina’s.
The plantation system created a hierarchical society with a small elite of wealthy planters, a larger class of small farmers, and a growing population of enslaved Africans. The planter elite dominated politics and society, creating a way of life based on the ideal of the gentleman farmer. The tensions between the plantation elite and the backcountry farmers would persist through American history.
Colonial Society and Culture
Colonial society was structured by class, gender, and race. At the top were wealthy merchants and planters, followed by artisans, small farmers, and laborers. Women had few legal rights — they could not vote, hold office, or own property independently if married. Enslaved Africans and free blacks occupied the bottom of society, with their rights severely restricted.
The Great Awakening, a religious revival that swept through the colonies in the 1730s and 1740s, was the first major event that touched all the colonies. Preachers like Jonathan Edwards and George Whitefield emphasized personal religious experience, emotional conversion, and the equality of all souls before God. The Great Awakening challenged established religious authority and encouraged ordinary people to question authority, contributing to the democratic spirit that would fuel the Revolution.
The Enlightenment also shaped colonial intellectual life. Benjamin Franklin, the most famous American of the colonial period, embodied Enlightenment values of reason, science, and practical improvement. His experiments with electricity, his inventions, and his writings on politics and morality made him internationally famous. Franklin’s Autobiography expressed the American ideal of self-improvement and success through hard work.
The Road to Revolution
The colonial period ended with the crisis that led to the American Revolution. After the French and Indian War (1754–1763), Britain sought to tighten control over the colonies and raise revenue through new taxes. The Stamp Act, the Townshend Acts, and the Tea Act provoked colonial resistance based on the principle of “no taxation without representation.” The Boston Massacre, the Boston Tea Party, and the Intolerable Acts escalated the conflict toward war.
The colonial experience of self-government through elected assemblies, the tradition of religious dissent, the diversity of colonial society, and the ideology of liberty drawn from English Whig tradition all contributed to the revolutionary movement. The American Revolution was not a rebellion against tyranny but a defense of liberties that Americans believed were their birthright as Englishmen.
The legacy of colonial America is everywhere in the United States. The institutions of self-government, the tradition of religious freedom, the commitment to education, and the patterns of ethnic and religious diversity all have their roots in the colonial period. So too does the tragic legacy of racial slavery. The colonial America period is a good starting point for understanding how the United States became what it is today, which is also explored in the American Revolution and Westward Expansion.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why did the English colonize America?
The English colonized America for multiple reasons: economic opportunity, religious freedom, national prestige, and the desire to challenge Spanish power in the New World.
What was life like for the first English colonists?
Life was extremely difficult. Many early colonists died from disease, starvation, and conflict with Native Americans. The survival rate improved as colonies became established.
How did slavery develop in colonial America?
Slavery developed gradually, beginning with the arrival of enslaved Africans in Virginia in 1619. Racial slavery was codified into law over the course of the seventeenth century and became central to the economy of the southern colonies.
How did the colonies govern themselves?
Each colony had an elected assembly that passed laws and approved taxes, a governor appointed by the king or proprietor, and a system of local government through counties and towns.
Conclusion
Colonial America was the seedbed of the United States, a period during which the institutions, values, and conflicts that would define American history were established. The thirteen colonies were diverse societies — different in their economies, their religions, and their social structures — but they shared a commitment to self-government, a belief in individual rights, and a connection to the British Empire that would ultimately prove impossible to maintain. Understanding colonial America is essential for understanding the nation that emerged from it.