New grammar school history of the United States

Front matter

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Preface

It has long been the custom to begin the history of our country with the discovery of the New World by Columbus. To some extent this is both wise and necessary; but in following it in this instance the attempt has been made to treat the colonial period as the childhood of the United States; to have it bear the same relation to our later career that the account of the youth of a great man should bear to that of his maturer years, and to confine it to the narration of such events as are really necessary to a correct understanding of what has happened since 1776.

The story, therefore, has been restricted to the discoveries, explorations, and settlements within the United States by the English, French, Spaniards, and Dutch; to the expulsion of the French by the English ; to the planting of the thirteen colonies on the Atlantic seaboard ; to the origin and progress of the quarrel which ended with the rise of thirteen sovereign free and independent states, and to the ^growth" of Such political institutions as began in colonial times. • This period once passed, the long struggle for a government followed till our present Constitution — one of the most remarkable political instruments ever framed by man — was adopted, and a nation founded.

6 PREFACE

Scarcely was this accomplished when the French Kevolution and the rise of Napoleon involved us in a struggle, first for our neutral rights, and then for our commercial independence, and finally in a second war with Great Britain. During this period of nearly five and twenty years, commerce and agriculture flourished exceedingly, but our internal resources were little developed. With the peace of 1815, however, the era of industrial development commences, and this has been treated with great — though it is believed not too great — fullness of detail; for, beyond all question, the event of the world's history during the nineteenth century is the growth of the United States. Nothing like it has ever before taken place.

To have loaded down the book with extended bibliographies

would have been an easy matter, but quite unnecessary. The

teacher will find in Channing and Hart's Guide to the Study of

American History the best digested and arranged bibliography

of the subject yet published, and cannot afford to be without

it. If the student has time and disposition to read one half

of the reference books cited in the footnotes of this history,

he is most fortunate.

JOHN BACH McMASTER.

Contents

I. Europe finds America

II. The Spaniards in the United States .

III. English, Dutch, and Swedes on the Seaboard

Chapter II The Spaniards In The United States

11. The Spaniards explore the Southwest. — Now it must be noticed that up to 1513 no European had explored the interior of either North or South America. They had merely touched the shores. In 1513 the work of exploration began. Balboa then crossed the Isthmus of Panama. In 1519 Cortes (cor'-tez) landed on the coast of Mexico with a body of men, and marched boldly into the heart of the country to the city where lived the great Indian chief or king, Montezuma. Cortes took the city and made himself master of Mexico. This was

Map of 1530, Sloane MS.*

1 Notice that the two continents begin to take shape, and that as the result of Magellan's voyage is not generally known, North America is placed very near to Java.

most important; for the conquest of Mexico turned the attention of the Spaniards from our country for many years, and finally led to the exploration of the Southwest. But the first explorers of what is now the United States came from Cuba in 1528.

In that year Narvaez (nar-vah'-eth), excited by Pineda's accounts of the Mississippi Indians and their golden ornaments, set forth with 400 men to conquer the north coast of the Gulf of Mexico. At Apalachee Bay he landed, and made a raid inland. On returning to the shore, he missed his ships, and after traveling westw^ard on foot for a month, built five rude vessels, and once more put to sea. For six weeks the little fleet hugged the shore, till it came to the mouth of the Mississippi, where two of the boats were upset and Narvaez was drowned. The rest reached the coast of Texas in safety. But famine and the tomahawk soon reduced the number of the survivors to four. These were captured by bands of wandering Indians, were carried over eastern Texas and western Louisiana, till, after many strange adventures and vicissitudes, they met beyond the Sabine Kiver.^ Protected by the fame they had won for sorcery, and led by one Cabeza de Vaca, they now wandered westward to the Eio Grande ^ (ree'-o grahn'-da) and on by Chihuahua (chee-wah '-wah) and Sonora to the Gulf of California, and by this to Culiacan, a town near the west coast of Mexico, which they reached in 1536. They had crossed the continent.

12. ♦♦ The Seven Cities of Cibola." — The story these men told of the strange country through which they had passed, aroused a strong desire in the Spaniards to explore it, for somewhere in that direction they believed were the Seven Cities. According to an ancient legend, when the Arabs invaded the Spanish peninsula, a bishop of Lisbon with many followers fled to a group of islands in the Sea of Darkness, and on them founded seven cities. As one of the Indian tribes had preserved a story of Seven Caves in which their ancestors had once lived, the

1 Now the western boundary of Louisiana.

2 Rio Grande del Norte — Great River of tlie North.

THE SPANIARDS IN THE UNITED STATES credulous and romantic Spaniards easily confounded the two legends. Firmly believing that the seven cities must exist in the north country traversed by Vaca, Mendoza, the Spanish governor of Mexico, selected Fray Marcos, a monk of great ability, and sent him forth with a few followers to search for them. Directed by the Indians through whose villages he passed, he came at last in sight of the seven Zuni (zoo'-nyee) pueblos (pweb'-loz) of New Mexico, all of which were inhab-

The kind of cities found by Marcos and Coronado in the Rio Grande valley

ited in his time. But he came no nearer than just within sight of them. For one of the party, who went on in advance, having been killed by the Zuni, Fray Marcos hurried back to Culiacan. Understanding the name of the city he had seen to be Cibola (see'-bo-la), he called the pueblos the "Seven Cities of Cibola," and against them the next year (1540) Coronado marched with 1100 men. Finding the pueblos were not the rich cities for which he sought, Coronado pushed on eastward, and for two years wandered to and fro over the plains and mountains of the West, crossing the state of Kansas twice. ^

13. The Spaniards on the Mississippi. — In 1537 De Soto was appointed governor of Cuba, with instructions to conquer and hold all the country discovered by Narvaez. On this mission he set out in May, 1539, and landed at Tampa Bay, on the west coast of our state of Florida. He wandered over the swamps and marshes, the moss-grown jungles, and the forests of the Gulf states, and spent the winter of 1541 near the Yazoo River. Crossing the Mississippi in the spring of 1542 at the Chickasaw Bluffs, he wandered about eastern Arkansas, till he died of fever, and was buried in the Mississippi. His followers then built rude boats, floated down the river to the Gulf, steered along the coast of Texas, and in September, 1543, reached Tampico, in Mexico.

More than half a century had now gone by since the first voyage of Columbus. Yet not a settlement, great or small, had been established by Spain within our boundary. Between 1546 and 1561 missionaries twice attempted to found missions and convert the Indians in Florida, and twice were driven away. In 1582 others entered the valleys of the Gila and the Rio Grande, took possession of the pueblos, established missions, preached the Gospel to the Indians, and brought them

1 Do not fail to read a dehghtful little book called The Spanish Pioneers, by Charles F. Lummis. In it the story of these great journeys is told on pp. 77-88, 101-143.

THE SPANIARDS IN THE UNITED STATES

Tinder the dominion of Spain. But when Santa Fe (sahn'-tah fa') was founded, in 1582, the only colony of Spain in the United States, besides the missions in Arizona and New Mexico, was St. Aumistine in Florida.

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A Spanish mission

14. St. Augustine. — St. Augustine was founded by the Spaniards in order to keep out the French, who made two attempts to occupy the south Atlantic coast. The first was that of John Eibault (ree-bo'). He led a colony of Frenchmen, in 1562, to what is now South Carolina, built a small fort Dn a spot which he called Port Royal, and left it in charge of thirty men while he went back to France for more colonists. The men were a shiftless set, depended on the Indians till the Indians would feed them no longer, and when famine set in, they mutinied, slew their commander, built a crazy ship and went to sea, where an English vessel found them in a starving condition, and took them to London.

In 1564 a second party, under Laudonniere (lo-do-ne-ar'), landed at the St. Johns Eiver in Florida, and built a fort called Fort Caroline in honor of Charles IX. of France. But the King of Spain, hearing that the French were trespassing, sent an expedition under Menendez (ma-nen'-deth), who founded St. Augustine in 1565. There Kibault, who had returned, and joined Laudonniere, attempted to attack the Spaniards. But a hurricane scattered his ships, and while it was still raging, Menendez fell suddenly on Fort Caroline and massacred men, women, and children. A few days later, falling in with Ribault and his men, who had been driven ashore south of St. Augustine, Menendez massacred 150 niore.^ For this foul deed a Frenchman named Gourgues (goorg) exacted a fearful penalty. With three small ships and 200 men, he sailed to the St. Johns River, took and destroyed the fort which the Spaniards had built on the site of Fort Caroline, and put to death every human being within it.

Gateway at St. Augustine 2

1. From 1492 to 1513 the Europeans who came to America explored the

coasts of North and South America, but did not go inland.

2. In 1513 exploration of the interior of the two continents began. Bal-

boa crossed the Isthmus of Panama, 1513, and Cortes conquered Mexico, 1519-21.

1 The story of the French in Florida is finely told in Parkman's Pioneers of France in the New World; also J. Sparks's Life of Bihault; Baird's Huguenot Emigration.

2 Remaining from the Spanish occupation of Florida.

THE SPANIARDS IN THE UNITED STATES

3. In 1528 Narvaez made the first serious attempt to enter the Mississippi

valley. He died, and some of his followers, under Cabeza de Vaca, crossed the continent.

4. When the Spanish governor of Mexico lieard their story, he sent Fray

Marcos to find tlie "Seven Cities of Cibola" ; and began the exploration of the southwestern part of the United States.

5. In 1539-1541 De Soto and his band explored the southeastern part of

the United States from Florida to the Mississippi River.

6. By 1582 two Spanish settlements had been made in the United States

— St. Augustine, 1565, and Santa F^, 1582.

1492. Columbus. Islands off the coapo.

1493. Columbus. Islands off the coast.

1497. John Cabot. North America. Labrador.

1498. John and Sebastian Cabot. Labrador to Cape

Cod.

Pinzon and Solis. Florida to Chesapeake Bay.

1500. Cabral. Discovers Brazil.

1501. Vespucius. Explores Brazilian coast. 1500-1502. Cortereals. Explore coast North America. 1513. Ponce de Leon. Discovers and names Florida.

1498. Pinzon and Solis. Explore Gulf of Mexico and

coast of Florida. 1519. Pineda. Sails from Florida to Mexico. 1528. Narvaez. Florida to Texas. 1543. Followers of De Soto sail from Mississippi River

to Mexico.

1519-21. Cortes. Conquers Mexico.

1534-36. De Vaca. From the Sabine River to the Gulf of California.

1539. Fray Marcos. Search for the Seven Cities. Wanders over New Mexico.

1540-42. Coronado. Gila River, Rio Grande, Colorado River.

1539-41. De Soto. Wanders over Florida, Georgia, and Alabama, and reaches the Mississippi River.

1582-1600. Spaniards in the valleys of the Gila and Rio

Grande.

1513. 1520.

Balboa. Discovers the Pacific Ocean.

Magellan. Sails around South America into the Pacific. 1578-1580. Drake. Sails around South America and up the Pacific coast to Oregon. (See p. 26.)

Chapter III English, Dutch, And Swedes On The Seaboard

15. The English Claim to the Seaboard. — After the Spaniards had thus explored the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, and what is now Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas, the English attempted to take possession of the Atlantic coast. The voyages of John and Sebastian Cabot in 1497 and 1498 were not followed up in the same way that Spain followed up those of Columbus, and for nearly eighty years the flag of England was not displayed in any of our waters.^ At last, in 1576, Sir Martin Frobisher set out to find a northwest passage to Asia. Of course he failed; but in that and two later voyages he cruised about the shores of our continent and gave his name to Erobisher's Bay.^ Next came Sir Francis Drake, the greatest seaman of his age. He left England in 1577, crossed the Atlantic, sailed down the South American coast, passed through the Strait of Magellan, and turning northward coasted along South America, Mexico, and California, in search of a northeast passage to the Atlantic. When he had gone as far north as Oregon the weather grew so cold that his men began to murmur, and putting his ship about, he sailed southward along our Pacific coast in search of a harbor, which in June, 1579, he found near the present city of San Francisco. There he landed, and putting up a post nailed to it a brass plate on which was the

1 For Cabot's voyages read Fiske's Discovery of America, Vol. II., pp. 2-15.

2 See map on p. 15.

THE ENGLISH ON THE SEABOARD 27

name of Queen Elizabeth, and took possession of the country.^ Despairing of finding a short passage to England, Drake finally crossed the Pacific and reached home by way of the Cape of Good Hope. He had sailed around the globe.^

16. Gilbert and Ralegh attempt to found a Colony. — While Drake was making his voyage, another gallant seaman, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, was given (by Queen Elizabeth) any new land he might discover in America. His first attempt (1579) was a failure, and while on his way home from a landing on Newfoundland (1583), his ship, with all on board, went down in a storm at sea. The next year (1584) his half-brother, Sir Walter Ealegh, one of the most accomplished men of his day and a great favorite with Queen Elizabeth, obtained permission from the Queen to make a settlement on any part of the coast of America not already occupied by a Christian power ; and he at once sent out an expedition. The explorers landed on Roanoke Island, off the coast of what is now North Carolina, and came home with such a glowing description of the " good land " they had found that the Virgin Queen called it "Virginia," in honor of herself, and Ralegh determined to colonize it.^

17. Roanoke Colony; the Potato and Tobacco. — In 1585, accordingly, 108 emigrants under Ralph Lane left England and began to build a town on Roanoke Island. They were ill suited for this kind of pioneer life, and were soon in such distress that, had not Sir Francis Drake in one of his voyages happened to touch at Roanoke, they would have starved to death. Drake, seeing their helplessness, carried them home to England. Yet their life on the island was not without results, for they took back with them the potato, and some dried tobacco leaves which the Indians had taught them to smoke.

1 The white cliffs reminded Drake strongly of the cliffs of Dover, and as one of the old names of England was Albion (the country of the white cliffs), he called the land New Albion.

2 For Drake read E. T. Payne's Voyages of Elizabethan Seamen.

3 For Ralegh read E. Gosse's Baleigh (in English Worthies Series); Louise Creighton's Sir W. Balegh (Historical Biographies Series).

Cape Charles Cape Henry

Ralegh, of course, was greatly disappointed to see Ms colonists again in England. But he was not discouraged, and in 1587 sent forth a second band. The first had consisted entirely of men. The second band was composed of both men and women with their families, for it seemed likely that

if the men took their wives and children along they would be more likely to remain than if they went alone. John White was the leader, and with a charter and instructions to build the city of Ralegh somewhere on the shores of Chesapeake Bay he set off with his colonists and landed on Roanoke Island.

Here a little granddaughter was born (August 18, 1587), and named Virginia.

She was the child of Eleanor Dare, and was the first child born of English par- Roanoke Island and vicinity ^^^^g ^^ America.

Governor White soon found it necessary to go back to England for supplies, and, in consequence of the Spanish war, three years slipped by before he was able to return to the colony. He was then too late. Every soul had perished, and to this day nobody knows how or where. Ralegh could do no more, and in 1589 made over all his rights to a joint-stock company of merchants. This company did nothing, and

Q Jjatteras

Cape Lookout

THE ENGLISH 01^ THE SEABOARD 29

the sixteenth century came to an end with no English colony in America.-^

18. Gosnold in New England. — With the new century came better fortune. Ralegh's noble efforts to plant a colony aroused Englishmen to the possibility of founding a great empire in the New World, and especially one named Bartholomew Gosnold.

Instead of following the old route to America by way of the Canary Islands, the West Indies, and Florida, he sailed due west across the Atlantic,^ and brought up on the shore of a cape which he named Cape Cod.^ Following the shore southward, he passed through Nantucket Sound and Vineyard Sound, till he came to Cuttyhunk Island, at the entrance of Buzzards Bay. On this he landed, and built a house for the use of colonists he intended to leave there. But when he had filled his ship with sassafras roots and cedar logs, nobody would remain, and the whole company went back to England.''

19. The Two Virginia Companies. — As a result of this voyage, Gosnold was more eager than ever to plant a colony in Virginia, and this enthusiasm he communicated so fully to others that, in 1606, King James I. created two companies to settle in Virginia, which was then the name for all the territory from what is now Maine to Florida.

1. Each company was to own a block of land 100 miles square; that is, 100 miles along the coast, — 50 miles each way from its first settlement, — and 100 miles into the interior.

1 Doyle's English Colonies in America, Virginia, pp. 56-74 ; Bancroft's History of the United States, Vol. I., pp. 60-79; Hildreth's History of the United States, Vol. I. , pp. 80-87.

2 By thus shortening the journey 3000 miles, he practically brought America 3000 miles nearer to Europe.

3 Because the waters thereabout abounded in codfish. For a comparison of Gosnold's route with those of the other early explorers see the map on p. 15.

4 Bancroft's United States, Vol. I., pp. 70-83. Hildreth's United States, Vol. I., p. 90.

2. The First Compan}^, a band of London merchants, might

establish its first settlement anywhere between 34° and 41° north latitude.

3. The Second Company, a band of Plymouth merchants,

might establish its first settlement anywhere between 38° and 45°.

4. These settlements were to be on the seacoast.

5. In order to prevent the blocks from overlapping, it was

provided that the company which was last to settle should locate at least 100 miles from the other company's settlement.^

20. The Jamestown Colony. — Thus empowered, the two companies made all haste to gather funds, collect stores and settlers, and fit out ships. The London Company was the first to get ready, and on the 19th of December, 1606, 143 colonists set sail in three ships for America with their charter, and a list of the council sealed up in a strong box. The Plymouth Company soon followed, and before the year 1607 was far advanced, two settlements were planted in our country : the one at Jamestown, in Virginia, the other near the mouth of the Kennebec, in Maine. The latter, however, was abandoned the following year (see p. 40).

The three ships which carried the Virginia colony reached the coast in the spring of 1607, and entering Chesapeake Bay sailed up a river which the colonists called the James, in honor of the King. When about thirty miles from its mouth, a landing was made on a little peninsula, where a settlement was

1 Over the affairs of each company presided a council appointed by the King, with power to clioose its own president, fill vacancies among its own members, and elect a council of thirteen to reside on the company's lands in America. Each company might coin money, raise a revenue by taxing foreign vessels trading at its ports, punish crime, and make laws which, if bad, could be set aside by the King. All property was to be owned in common, and all the products of the soil deposited in a public magazine from which the needs of the settlers were to be supplied. The surplus was to be sold for the good of the company. The charter is given in full in Poore's Charters and Constitutions^ pp. 1888-1893.

THE ENGLISH ON THE SEABOARD begun and named Jamestown.^ It was the month of May, and as the weather was warm, the colonists did not build houses, but, inside of some rude fortifications, put up shelters of sails and branches to serve till huts could be built. But their food gave out, the Indians were hostile, and before September half of the party had died of fever. Had it not been for the energy and courage of John Smith, every one of them would have perished. He practically assumed command, set the men to building huts, persuaded the Indians to give them food, explored the bays and rivers of Virginia, and for two dreary years held the colony together. When we consider the worthless men he had to deal with, and the hardships and difficulties that beset him, his work is wonderful. The history which he wrote, however, is not to be trusted.^

Bad as matters were, they became worse when a little fleet arrived with many new settlers, making the whole number about 500. The newcomers were a worthless set picked up in the streets of London or taken from the jails,

1 Nothing now remains of Jamestown but the ruined tower of the church shown in the picture. Much of the land on which the town stood has been washed away by the river, so that its site is now an island.

2 Read the Life and Writings of Captain John Smith, by Charles Dudley Warner; also John Fiske in Atlantic Monthly, December, 1895; Eggleston's Beginners of a Nation, pp. 31-38. Smith's True Belation is printed in American History Leaflets, No. 27, and Library of American Literature, Vol. I.

- "^ 'uliimlti

All that is left of Jamestown and utterly unfit to become the founders of a state in the wilderness of the Kew World. Out of such material Smith in time might have made something, but he was forced by a wound to return to England, and the colony went rapidly to ruin. Sickness and famine did their work so quickly that after six months there were but sixty of the 500 men alive.

Then two small ships, under Sir Thomas Gates and Sir George Somers, arrived at Jamestown with more settlers ; but all decided to flee, and had actually sailed a few miles down the James, when, June 8, 1610, they met Lord Delaware with three ships full of men and supplies coming up the river. Delaware came out as governor under a new charter granted in 1609.-^

21. The Virginia Charter of 1609 made a great change in the boundary of the company's property. By the 1606 charter the colony was limited to 100 miles along the seaboard and 100 miles west from the coast. In 1609 the company was given an immense domain reaching 400 miles along the coast,

1 Read "The Jamestown Experiments," in Eggleston's Beginners of a Nation, pp. 25-72.

t Chavhs V ^'Old Pt Comfort

\i Henry

Vicinity of Jamestown

THE ENGLISH ON THE SEABOARD

V I Iv (J I N I A ' ^^OlU Pt.Comfort V

— 200 miles each way from Old Point Comfort, — and extending "up into the land throughout from sea to sea, west and northwest." This description is very important, for it was afterwards claimed by Virginia to mean a grant of land of the shape shown on the map.^

22. The First Representative Assembly in America. — Under the new charter and new governors Virginia began to thrive. More work and less grumbling were done, and a few wise reforms were introduced. One governor, however, Argall, ruled the colony so badly that the people turned against him and sent such reports to England that immigration almost ceased. The company, in consequence, removed Argall, and gave Virginia a better form of government. In future, the governor's ]30wer was to be limited, and the people were to have a share in the making of laws and the management of affairs. As the colonists, now numbering 4000 men, were living in eleven settlements, or " boroughs," it was ordered that each borough should elect two men to sit in a legislature to be called the House of Burgesses. This house, the first representative assembly ever held by white men in America, met on July 30, 1619, in the church at Jamestown, and there began " government of the people, by the people, for the people."

23. The Establishment of Slavery in America. — It is interesting to note that at the very time the men of Virginia thus planted free representative government in America, another

1 Read Hinsdale's Old Northwest^ pp. 74, 75. McM. Hist. —3 institution was planted beside it, which, in the course of two hundred and fifty years, almost destroyed free government. The Burgesses met in July, and a few weeks later, on an August day, a Dutch ship entered the James and before it sailed away sold twenty negroes into slavery. The slaves increased in numbers (there were 2000 in Virginia in 1671), and slavery spread to the other colonies as they were started, till, in time, it existed in every one of them.

24. Virginia loses her Charter, 1624. — The establishment of popular government in Virginia was looked on by King James as a direct affront, and was one of many weighty reasons why he decided to destroy the company. To do this, he accused it of mismanagement, brought a suit against it, and in 1624 his judges declared the charter annulled, and Virginia became a royal colony.^

25. Maryland begun. — A year later James died, and Charles I. came to the throne. As Virginia was now a royal colony, the land belonged to the King; and as he Avas at liberty to do what he pleased with it, he cut off a piece and gave it to Lord Baltimore. George Calvert, Lord Baltimore, was a Roman Catholic nobleman who for years past had been interested in the colonization of America, and had tried to plant a colony in Newfoundland. The severity of the climate caused failure, and in 1629 he turned his attention to Virginia and visited Jamestown. But religious feeling ran as high there as it did anywhere. The colonists were intolerantly Protestant, and Baltimore was ordered back to England.

Undeterred by such treatment, Baltimore was more determined than ever to plant a colony, and in 1632 obtained his grant of a piece of Virginia. The tract lay between the Potomac River and the fortieth degree of north latitude, and extended from the Atlantic Ocean to a north and south line

1 On the Virginia colony in general read Doyle's volume on Virginia^ pp. 104-184 ; Lodge's English Colonies in America, pp. 1-12 ; of course, Bancroft and Hildreth. For particular epochs or events consult Channing and Hart's Guide to American History, pp. 248-253.

THE ENGLISH ON THE SEABOARD through the source of the Potomac.^ It was called Maryland in honor of the Queen, Henrietta Maria.

The area of the colony was not large ; but the authority of Lord Baltimore over it was almost boundless. He was to bring to the King each year, in token of homage, two Indian arrowheads, and pay as rent one tifth of all the gold and silver mined. This done, the " lord proprietary," as he was called, was to all intents and purposes a king. He might coin money, make war

ORIGINAL BOUNDARY

OF