The history of New America does not have many centuries. And it began in the 16th century. It was then that new people began to arrive on the continent discovered by Columbus. The immigrants from many countries of the world had different reasons for coming to the New World. Some of them just wanted to start a new life. The second dreamed of getting rich. Still others sought refuge from religious persecution or from harassment by authorities. Of course, all these people belonged to different nationalities and cultures. They were distinguished by skin color. But all of them were united by one desire - to change their lives and create a new world from scratch. Thus began the history of the colonization of America.
Pre-Columbian period
People have populated North America for more than one millennium. However, information about the indigenous inhabitants of this continent before the period when immigrants from many other parts of the world appeared here is very scarce.
As a result of scientific research, it was found that the first Americans were small groups of people who moved to the continent from Northeast Asia. Most likely, they mastered these lands about 10-15 thousand years ago, having passed from Alaska through the shallow or frozen Bering Strait. Gradually, people began to move deeper into the south of the American continent. So they reached Tierra del Fuego and the Strait of Magellan.
Researchers also believe that in parallel with this process, small groups of residents of Polynesia moved to the continent. They settled in the southern lands.
Both those and other immigrants, who are known to us as the Eskimos and Indians, are rightfully considered the first inhabitants of America. And in connection with long-term residence on the continent - by the indigenous population.
Discovery of a New Continent by Columbus
The first of the Europeans to visit the New World were Spaniards. Traveling to a world unknown to them, they marked India, the Cape of Good Hope and the western coastal territories of Africa on a geographical map. But the researchers did not stop there. They began to look for the shortest route that would lead a person from Europe to India, which promised great economic benefits to the monarchs of Spain and Portugal. The result of one of these trips was the discovery of America.
This happened in October 1492, it was then that the Spanish expedition, led by Admiral Christopher Columbus, approached the small island located in the Western Hemisphere. So the first page in the history of the colonization of America was opened. Immigrants from Spain rush into this strange country. Following them, the inhabitants of France and England appeared in the Western Hemisphere . The period of colonization of America began.
Spanish conquerors
The colonization of America by Europeans at first did not cause any resistance from the local population. And this contributed to the fact that the settlers began to behave very aggressively, enslaving and killing the Indians. The Spanish conquerors were particularly cruel. They burned and robbed local villages, killing their inhabitants.
At the very beginning of the colonization of America, Europeans brought many diseases to the continent. The local population began to die from smallpox and measles.
In the mid-16th century, Spanish colonists dominated the American continent. Their possessions extended from New Mexico to Cape Gori and brought fabulous profits to the royal treasury. In this period of colonization of America, Spain repulsed all attempts by other European states to gain a foothold in this territory rich in natural resources.
However, at the same time, a change in the balance of forces began in the Old World. Spain, where the kings foolishly spent huge flows of gold and silver arriving from the colonies, began to gradually give up their positions, giving way to England, in which the economy developed at a rapid pace. In addition, the decline of a previously powerful country, the mistress of the seas and the European superpower, was accelerated by a long war with the Netherlands, a conflict with England and the Reformation of Europe, which were spent enormously on the fight against. But the last point of Spain's departure into the shadows was the death in 1588 of the Invincible Armada. After that, the leaders in the process of colonization of America became England, France and Holland. Immigrants from these countries created a new immigration wave.
Colonies of France
Immigrants from this European country were primarily interested in valuable furs. At the same time, the French did not seek to seize the land, since peasants in their homeland, despite being burdened with feudal duties, still remained the owners of their allotments.
The beginning of the colonization of America by the French was laid at the dawn of the 17th century. It was during this period that Samuel Champlain founded a small settlement on the Acadia Peninsula, and somewhat later (in 1608) - the city of Quebec. In 1615, the French possessions extended to the lakes of Ontario and Huron. Trading companies were hosted in these territories, the largest of which was the Hudson's Bay Company. In 1670, its owners received a charter and monopolized the purchase of fish and furs from the Indians. Local residents have become “tributaries” of companies, falling into a network of obligations and debts. In addition, the Indians were simply fleeced, constantly exchanging the valuable furs they obtained for worthless trinkets.
UK holdings
The beginning of the colonization of North America by the British began in the 17th century, although their first attempts were made a century earlier. The settlement of the New World by subjects of the British crown accelerated the development of capitalism in their homeland. The prosperity of the British monopolies was the creation of colonial trading companies that successfully worked in the foreign market. They brought fabulous profits.
The peculiarities of the colonization of North America by Great Britain were that in this territory the government of the country formed two trading companies that had large funds. It was a London and Plymouth company. These companies had royal letters, according to which they owned lands located between 34 and 41 degrees north latitude, and without any restrictions extending deep into the country. Thus, England took over the territory that was originally owned by the Indians.
At the beginning of the 17th century a colony was created in Virginia. From this venture, a commercial Virginia company expected large revenues. At their own expense, the company delivered to the colony of immigrants, who worked out their debt for 4-5 years.
In 1607, a new settlement was formed. It was a Jamestown colony. It was located in a swampy place, where many mosquitoes lived. In addition, the colonists opposed the indigenous population. Constant skirmishes with the Indians and illness soon claimed the lives of two-thirds of the settlers.
Another English colony - Maryland - was founded in 1634. In it, British immigrants received plots of land and became planters and large entrepreneurs. Workers in these areas were the English poor who worked on the cost of moving to America.
However, over time, instead of enslaving servants in the colonies, the labor of Negro slaves began to be used. They began to be brought mainly to the southern colonies.
For 75 years after the formation of the Virginia colony, the British created 12 more such settlements. These are Massachusetts and New Hampshire, New York and Connecticut, Rhode Island and New Jersey, Delaware and Pennsylvania, North and South Carolina, Georgia and Maryland.
The development of the English colonies
The poor of many countries of the Old World sought to get to America, because in their view it was the promised land, giving salvation from debt and religious persecution. That is why the European colonization of America was widespread. Many entrepreneurs have ceased to be limited to the recruitment of immigrants. They began to organize real raids on people, soldering them and sending them to the ship, until they sobered up. That is why an unusually rapid growth of the English colonies was observed. This was also facilitated by the agrarian revolution held in Great Britain, as a result of which there was a mass de-landment of peasants.
Robbed by their government, the poor began to look for the possibility of buying land in the colonies. So, while in 1625, 1980 immigrants lived in North America, in 1641 there were about 50 thousand immigrants from England alone. Fifty years later, the number of inhabitants of such settlements amounted to about two hundred thousand people.
Migrant Behavior
The history of the colonization of America is overshadowed by a war of extermination against the country's indigenous people. Migrants robbed the Indians of the land, completely destroying the tribes.
In the north of America, which was called New England, immigrants from the Old World took a slightly different path. Here, the land from the Indians was acquired through "trade deals". Subsequently, this led to the assertion of the opinion that the ancestors of the Anglo-Americans did not encroach on the freedom of the indigenous people. However, immigrants from the Old World acquired huge tracts of land for a bunch of beads or for a handful of gunpowder. At the same time, Indians who were not familiar with private property, as a rule, did not even know about the essence of the agreement concluded with them.
The church also contributed to the history of colonization. She elevated the beating of the Indians to the rank of a pious deed.
One of the shameful pages in the history of the colonization of America is the award for scalps. Before the arrival of the settlers, this bloody custom existed only among some tribes inhabiting the eastern territories. With the advent of the colonialists, such barbarism began to spread more widely. The reason for this was the unleashed internecine wars in which firearms began to be used. In addition, the scalping process greatly facilitated the spread of iron knives. After all, wooden or bone tools that the Indians had before colonization greatly complicated such an operation.
However, the relations of immigrants with the indigenous people were not always so hostile. Ordinary people tried to maintain good neighborly relations. Poor farmers learned from the Indians and learned from them, adapting to local conditions.
Migrants from other countries
But be that as it may, the first colonists who settled in North America did not have common religious beliefs and belonged to different social strata. This was due to the fact that people from the Old World belonged to different nationalities, and, therefore, had different beliefs. For example, English Catholics settled in Maryland. Huguenots from France settled in South Carolina. The Swedes settled in Delaware, and Virginia was full of Italian, Polish and German artisans. The first Dutch settlement appeared on Manhattan Island in 1613. Its founder was Henry Hudson. The Dutch colonies, the center of which was the city of Amsterdam, became known as the New Netherlands. Later, these settlements were captured by the British.
The colonialists entrenched on the continent, for which until now every fourth Thursday in the month of November they thank God. America celebrates Thanksgiving. This holiday is immortalized in honor of the first year of life of immigrants in a new place.
The emergence of slavery
The first black Africans arrived in Virginia in August 1619 on a Dutch ship. Most of them were immediately bought out by the colonists as servants. In America, blacks became lifelong slaves.
Moreover, this status even began to be inherited. Between the American colonies and the countries of East Africa, the slave trade began to be carried out continuously. Local leaders willingly exchanged their young people for weapons, gunpowder, textiles, and many other goods brought from the New World.
Development of the southern territories
As a rule, immigrants chose the northern territories of the New World because of their religious reasons. In contrast, the colonization of South America pursued economic goals. The Europeans, ceremoniously ceremonial with the indigenous people, resettled them on land, poorly suitable for existence. The resource-rich continent promised the migrants to receive large incomes. That is why in the southern regions of the country began to cultivate tobacco and cotton plantations, using the labor of slaves brought from Africa. Most of the goods exported to England from these territories.
Migrants in Latin America
Territories located south of the United States, Europeans began to develop also after the discovery of the New World by Columbus. And today, the colonization of Latin America by Europeans is regarded as an unequal and dramatic clash of two different worlds, which ended in the enslavement of the Indians. This period lasted from the 16th to the beginning of the 19th century.
The colonization of Latin America led to the death of ancient Indian civilizations. After all, most of the indigenous population was exterminated by immigrants from Spain and Portugal. The surviving residents fell under the command of the colonialists. But at the same time, the cultural achievements of the Old World, which became the property of the peoples of this continent, were brought to Latin America.
Gradually, European colonists began to turn into the most growing and important part of the population of this region. And the import of slaves from Africa began the complex process of forming a special ethnocultural symbiosis. And today it can be said that the colonial period of the 16-19th centuries left an indelible imprint on the development of modern Latin American society. In addition, with the advent of Europeans, the region began to become involved in world capitalist processes. This has become an important prerequisite for the economic development of Latin America.