The English Settle America Essay, Research Paper

The Pilgrims were not the first group of English people to live in America. The first group came in 1585, but their colony failed. They cam e for three reasons, to get rich, freedom of religion, and many people came because they wanted a better life. In 1607 the English started Jamestown in America. This town was in the Virginia colony. The English came to Jamestown to find gold and get rich. But they never found any. At first the Jamestown settlers didn’t want to grow food or build houses. Many settlers died during the first winter. Later, more people came to live in Jamestown and the settlers began to work harder. They built farms and houses.

The settlers began to grow tobacco, and then sold it to England for a lot of money. Each year, they grew more and more. The settlers brought slaves from Africa, in 1619, to help them grow the tobacco, and work as slaves in the English colonies.

The Puritans were a group of people who didn’t want to pray to the church of England, so in 1628, a group of Puritans came to Massachusetts for freedom of religion. Everyone that lived in Massachusetts had to pray in Puritan churches, and they didn’t want their people to have freedom of religion either. Roger Williams lived with the Puritans. He told them that everyone should have the right to choose their religion, and then he left Massachusetts and traveled through the forests, and met Native Americans who helped him, and sold him land. He started the Rhode Island colony on the land in 1636, and then he started a city in Rhode Island called Providence. Which was first city in America where there was freedom of religion.

Anne Hutchinson was a woman who lived in Massachusetts, and didn’t have the same religious ideas as the Puritans. So in 1638, she left Massachusetts and went to Rhode Island where she started a new town.

More of the English came to America to have freedom of religion. In England, Catholics were sent to jail if they prayed in Catholic churches. So, in 1634, 300 Catholics came to America and started a colony called Maryland.

The Quakers were another group of people that wouldn’t pray in the Church of England. William Penn was a Quaker. He started the Pennsylvania colony in 1681 on land that he bought from the Native Americans. There was piece in the Pennsylvania colony, and everyone had freedom of religion.

In England there were some people who didn’t have any money, and people who where in debt, were put in jail. James Oglethorpe started the George colony to help these people. In 1733, James Oglethorpe went to Georgia with 120 of these people, and they worked hard in Georgia. They started to build farms and homes, and soon many poor people from all over Europe came to live and work there. Each year more people came to live in the English colonies along the Atlantic Ocean, and by 1753 there was a total of 13 English Colonies.