Jamestown Vs. Plymouth: The First Two Settlements In The New World

Book Response Essay # 2 of America: Jamestown and Plymouth “Early America was littered with European failures- the Spanish in the Florida,the French at Fort Caroline, and the English at Baffin Island, Roanoke, and Sagadahoc”(Horn, 290). Yet, despite all the pervious disasters, two colonies would begin to find apermanent place on the soil of this New World. James Horn painstakingly chronicled thetribulations

In conclusion, the Plymouth and Jamestown colonies are fairly different. They don’t view things equally but did go through things similarly. But regardless of the similarities, I have decided due to the difference in viewpoints that I would rather live and travel with the Plymouth colony rather than be with the Jamestown

After what was known as the starving period, the colonists found a new crop. Tobacco.

Edmund S. Morgan, in his article The Labor Problem at Jamestown, 1607-18, suggests that there indeed was a labor problem at Jamestown. In his article, he discusses several issues that contributed to the colonist’s lack of motivation. Morgan makes a convincing case as he discusses

They only had 12 or so craftsmen and essentially no farmers. I now can see why Jamestown had so many issues when it was first settled.

The Jamestown settlement is located in Virginia, it was the first permanent english settlement. They decided to settle there because it was hard for enemies to reach them through the narrow channel, and the thick forest around them provided plenty of lumber and the water surrounding them provided fish. The first colony was founded by a group of investors by the name of the london company. They fell because of lack of preparation, sickness during the winter spread rapidly and many died. In the year of 1624 Virginia fell under the rule of a royal colony and existed under the authority of a governor chosen by the king of England.

The Puritans disliked Catholics and tried to get all their influences purged from the Anglican Church. Most people don't know about this because Americans like to believe that their founders were amazing people, so they claim Puritans wanted freedom for everyone so they can feel better about their history. As demonstrated in the Massachusetts primary source, the Puritans were so focused on their religion that the first book they ever decided to print and translate was a book of Psalms. According to the Massachusetts Historical Society. “In Massachusetts, the ownership of enslaved people probably was of limited economic importance except in Boston where craftsmen used enslaved people in their trades, but the shipping and sale of enslaved people out of Boston was much more significant.”

Sadly, that left very little space for the Native Americans, which brings us to the next

But the majority of the young white males who came to Jamestown were poor, uneducated, and unskilled. They had no families and no means of supporting themselves, which meant that they caused a potential problem to the political and economic challenge for stability. Since these men had no skills, they would become indentured servants, trading their labor for free passage to the colonies. Elite landowners used this unfree labor to their advantage by growing cash crops like tobacco and exporting their agricultural products, eventuating establishing Jamestown as a boomtown. Once the colony had become stabilized, the first representative legislature general assembly met in the Jamestown church in 1619.

The first village built by the English was named “James Fort” in honor of their monarch. Within two weeks the Indians, known as the Powhatan’s, found out from the Secotans (North Carolina Native Americans), where most of the recent settlements got “lost”, so they attacked the village. The attack was a failure because the British drew out the Indians with cannons and muskets. After the British drove the Indians away showing more power they also had disadvantages, most of the settlers were trained soldiers and gentries which means they didn’t have enough farmers and farm land to feed all 150 colonists. By the first half of September more than half of the James Fort city (later Jamestown) colonists died, taking the Powhatan’s to pity.

This was mostly because of the conflicts between the Jamestown settlers and the Indians. There was also a need to help the planters because of the

They felt like society in England was corrupt and straying away from Christian belief so they sought for religious freedom and the idea that they could start a colony that would be whole and unified in God. By doing this, they ran into another form of division when they came across the Native Americans who were already habitants of the land. The Puritans looked at these people as if they were animals or savages and built a wall of division between the two different cultures of people. In John Smith’s, “A General History of Virginia, he said, “Each hour expecting the fury of the savages, when God, the patron of all good endeavors, in that desperate extremity so changed the hearts of the savages, that they brought such plenty of their fruits and provisions that no man wanted.” This just shows you of how they viewed the natives and since it wasn’t one of them, then they were bad people.

Jamestown colony and Plymouth colony have are two similar colonies but at the same time are so very different. One similarity is that each colony had a large number of deaths after winter. One difference is that Plymouth colony had a good relationship with the Native Americans and Jamestown didn't have a good relationships with them. A second difference is that the two colonies came for different reasons.

This was the compare and contrast about Jamestown and

The main reason the Pilgrims came to America was that they were searching for the freedom to worship (“The New England Colonies”…). The Pilgrims sailed to America from England and settled the first permanent English settlement called Plymouth Colony. The Pilgrims and Puritans arrived in the 1620s. They came to America hoping to create the perfect Christian world. They intended to “purify” their churches of all Catholic and Anglican routines and pass a code of laws and a governing body built on teachings from the bible.