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Chapter 4. American Life in the Seventeenth Century, 1607–1692. I. The Unhealthy Chesapeake. Life in the American wilderness Half died before age 20 (Virginia and Maryland) Chesapeake settlements grew slowly Immigrants -Mostly were single men Families were few and fragile. SOCIAL
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Chapter 4 American Life in the Seventeenth Century, 1607–1692
I. The Unhealthy Chesapeake • Life in the American wilderness • Half died before age 20 (Virginia and Maryland) • Chesapeake settlements grew slowly • Immigrants -Mostly were single men • Families were few and fragile SOCIAL HISTORY
II. The Tobacco Economy • Chesapeake=hospitable to tobacco cultivation • More tobacco meant more labor • England still had a “surplus” of displaced worker • Recruited some 100,000 indentured servants
III. Frustrated Freemen and Bacon’s Rebellion • Freedmen (knockabouts) were frustrated • No land, no wives, no vote, Indian conflicts • (Nathaniel) Bacon’s Rebellion (1676) • Attacked all Indians • Attacked Jamestown capital • Rebellion eventually suppressed
IV. Colonial Slavery • 1680s mass expansion of slavery in colonies • From West Africa via the middle passage trip • “Slave codes” slaves & their children = property • Mid-1680s black slaves outnumbered whites • Racial id/discrimination key to U.S. slave system
V. Africans in America • In the deepest South, slave life was severe • Nasty climate, hard labor, lonely • Chesapeake region was somewhat easier • 1712 The New York slave revolt • 1739 South Carolina slave revolt erupted
VI. Southern Society • Slavery spread & social structure gaps widened • The great planters • Small farmers (largest group) • Landless whites. • Former indenturers • Few cities sprouted in the colonial South • Few passable roads • Southern life evolved around the plantations
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VII. The New England Family • First generations of Puritans averaged 70 years • Families established early • Women had no vote • Women had no property rights when married
VIII. Life in the New England Towns • Society—based on small villages and farms • Puritanism moral health of the community • Each family got farm, pasture & wooded land • Towns required elementary education • 1636 Harvard was founded.
IX. The Half-Way Covenant and the Salem Witch Trials • 1662 Half-Way Covenant • Partial church membership • Open the church to all comers • The Salem Witch Trials (1692-93 ) • A group of girls claimed to have bewitched • Twenty individuals (& 2 dogs) executed • Reflected an changing social structure • Reflected widening social stratification
X. The New England Way of Life • Calvinism, climate and soil molded New England • Duty to “improve” the land • Traits - purposefulness, sternness, self-reliance, • Prided themselves on being God’s chosen people • New England -incalculable impact on the nation
XI. The Early Settlers’ Days and Ways • Overwhelming majority were colonial farmers • Frontier life was simple sameness, egalitarian • Some wanted social structure of the Old World • Leisler’s Rebellion (1689-1691) in New York • Between lordly landholders and aspiring merchants
