The First Successful English Colony

Jamestown Begins• Joint stock companies started

– a business in which investors combine their money in order to make a profit

• London Company (founded Jamestown)• Plymouth Company (Plymouth…duh…)

• Once a joint stock company got a charter, they could establish a colony– a written contract from a government that

gave the companies permission to create a colony

Jamestown- 1607• First permanent English

settlement with more than 100 colonists

• Began with problem– Bad location- swampy– Disease- malaria- carrying

mosquitoes– Spent more time mining for

gold than building a settlement or planting crops

• Climate– Summer- hot and humid– Winter- bitter cold

Jamestown- 1608• Only 38 of the original 100 were

still alive• John Smith takes over in

January– Made physical improvements

• built a protective wall around the colony

– Got colonists working• “He that will not work shall not eat.”

– Improved relations with Powhatan Indians

• Got them to trade corn with the settlers

– Injured in an explosion and had to leave in 1609

– That same year about 500 more settlers arrived

Who WAS Pocahontas?

• Pocahontas was a real person.

This is NOT her!!

Pocahontas 1616

• This was painted when Pocahontas was 21years old

• She was married to John Rolfe

• She had been baptized and changed her name to Rebecca

• She died a short time later at the age of 22

• She is dressed as any wealthy Englishwoman would have dressed.

Pocahontas

• This is an engraving by another artist in 1616.

• Around the picture it says her Indian name (Matoaka), her Christian name (Rebecca) and it says that she is a princess and the daughter of chief Powhatan of Virginia.

• She lived like a celebrity in London and was granted an audience with the Queen.

Who was the REAL John Smith?

This ISN’T him

John Smith

• The real Captain John Smith was a soldier and adventurer and not a nice man.

• He had traveled the world in his military service.

• He drew the first map of Virginia and took control of the Jamestown colony, saving it from failure.

John Smith’s Map of Virginia

Did Pocahontas save John Smith’s life?

• There is no evidence, other than John Smith’s stories that she did.

• Smith was known to tell a similar story often before he even went to Virginia

This is Smith’s own drawing of the “event”.

• Growing tensions with Indians– Indians stopped trading food

– Increased attacks on the settlers

• Colonists afraid to leave fort

• Starving Time– Colonists ate rats, mice, snakes

– Only 60 survived in 1610

– The next spring they were saved again

• Supply ships brought food, more settlers, and soldiers

• a new governor who imposed more discipline

Jamestown- 1609-1610

• John Rolfe arrives with a crop that will make Jamestown rich– a high grade version

of tobacco– tobacco became a

cash crop• a crop grown in order to

be sold for money instead of personal use (food, clothes, shelter, etc.)

• Became widespread and popular

Jamestown- 1611-1612

Jamestown Booms• Colony became more of a business than a colony

– Colonists seen as employees– Colonists wanted their share of the profit

• Virginia Company eventually let settlers own land– This caused them to work even harder on harvesting tobacco

• First African American slaves came• Population more than tripled in 2 years• More workers were needed but not many people could

afford the passage• Indentured servitude was also a way to increase the

amount of workers – a person who sold his or her labor in exchange for passage to

America

– after they paid the money back they were free to own their own land

First Representative Government

• Representative Government- a government where voters elect people to make the laws

• Colonists started to get annoyed at how much control the governor had

• They were placed under VERY strict laws– They were still being treated like employees

• The Virginia Company decided that representatives called burgesses would meet once a year to give the colonists more representation

• Virginia House of Burgesses- first representative government in the American colonies

Native Americas Attack Jamestown

• Do you think the Native Americans had a good reason for the attack? What would it possibly be?

• Do you think this drawing is from the colonist point of view or the Native Americans point of view?

• Do you think it is accurate?