Brief history of the United States

Front matter

Class

Book

CopyriglitlN?-

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I. Discovery of the New World 1

II. Exploration and First Settlement 13

CHAPTER I DiSCOVEKY OF THE NeW WoRLD

Although tliere were people living on tlie Western Hemisphere long before its discovery by Europeans, we tliink of American history as having its source in Europe, because the Old World nations developed the New and made it what it is to-day.

At the time of the discovery of the New World, the people of Europe were making great progress in learning and industry and art ; but ideas of the the wisest men among them were ignorant of some of the things all of us now know. What they knew, for instance, of the extent of the world is shown in the white portion of the map on page 2. Nearly every one believed that the earth was flat and that the sky rested on its edges like an overturned bowl.

There were a few men, however, at this time who felt sure tliat the earth could not be flat. Some, like Paul Toscanelli, an Italian geographer, views of drew charts or maps to show that the earth cofumbW^' is round. These charts were carefully ^^^°* studied by thoughtful sailors and navigators, like Christopher Columbus and John Cabot, who became convinced that they were living on a globe and that gililiHiiiiiliU Bi

•

.5

J

1 i

S5 lit m

:^ii' :i:lilNii!iiHIII;iihi!l « g

MEMORIAL TO COLUMBUS if they were given the chance they conkl prove it by sailing around the workl.^

In medieval times, the dangers and difficulties of

Copyright by G. Y. Buck Memorial to Christopher Cokimbus, Washington, D. C. Erected in 1912 by The Knights of Columbus. Designed by an American sculptor, Lorado Taft.

navigation in unknown seas were so great that men needed strong motives to lead them to risk their lives

^It is well to recall that Cristoforo Colombo and Giovanni Cahoto are the names by which Columbus and Cabot were known in Genoa (see map), where they were born about the time of the capture of Constantinople (1453). We are not sure of the exact date of the birth of Columbus. Cabot was at one time a citizen of Venice, but it seems clear that he was born at or near Grenoa.

and fortunes in sucli enterprises. These motives lay chiefly in the desire to secure new routes to carry on a profitable trade with India and other countries of the East; for the old trade routes to the East (see map) had been cut oft' or rendered unsafe by the in- Necessity for roads of the Turks, who had over-run Asia ^oiltes'^to^he Minor and, in 1453, had even captured Con- ^^^* stantinople. These old routes by land and

sea had been controlled by Venice and Genoa; but, under new conditions, both cities, as well as the rest of Europe, faced the necessity of giving up the Eastern trade or finding other ways of reaching India. While the little group of thinkers which included Toscanelli, Columbus, and Cabot were working out their theory that the earth is a sphere and that India could, therefore, be reached hy sailing in the opposite direction^ Dias, a Portuguese sailor serving Prince Henry the Navigator, braved the terrors of

Portuguese

sail around tlic African coast and rounded the southern

Africa

end, now called the Cape of Good Hope. Although Dias made this voyage in 1-1:86 and showed a new way to India, the route was very long and dangerous. Moreover, the entire distance to India was not covered even by the Portuguese until the voyage of Vasco da Gama in 11^98.

Upon learning of the voyage of Dias, Columbus set to work with even greater energy to convince others that India could be reached by sailing westward. About 1473, he had moved to Lisbon and married the daughter of a Portuguese sailor. He diligently studied the log-book of his father-in-law

TRIALS OF COLUMBUS 6

and listened eagerly to the accounts of navigators who had sailed farthest to the west and had xnais of found floating bits of wood and other things c°i""^^"^- which seemed to show that land lay beyond.- The more he studied the more he believed in his theory. When, however, he tried to convince others, he was laughed at by men who asked him how people on the other side of the

1^ ^^ 111^ -w,^*-*-!^ This picture, taken from an old print, was

WOrla COUiCl live Wltn designed to represent an incident in the "Sea

,-,.-,-. ■, of Darkness" at the western edge of the

tneir neaClS always worW. it was believed that great sea serpents

' were able to reaeh up and catch sailors high

downward. Moreover, in the rigging of the ship! it is no wonder,

therefore, that Columbus had trouble in get-

he risked imprison- ^^^^ ^^" ^^ ^^ ^^ ^^^ ^^^^ voyage. ment and death in expressing his beliefs ; for, at this time, a great many people thought the founders of the Christian (Uiurch and the Bible itself taught that the earth is flat and hence that it was wrong to teach or believe otherwise.

After many years, during which he suffered innumerable trials and rebuffs, and after he had endeavored, as we are told, to procure help from Genoa, Portugal, France and England, Columbus was at last

^ Cclnmbi-is was himself a eai-togi^aplier, or map-drawer. We are told that at school he was especially good at arithmetic and map-drawing'. We may imagine how many maps he later drew of what he knew in the Old World and what he thought might be in the unknown West. His ideas, however, as well as those of Toscanelli, led him to imagine that the earth was about one-third smaller than it is ; so that he did not make any reckoning for the stretch of new continents and for the Pacific Ocean.

successful in gettius: a hearing before King Ferdi- First voyage uaud and Queeu Isabella of Spain. Espeof Columbus ^.^ij^, ^^.^g Isabella impressed with his story, and in 1492 she gave authority and aid to Columbus

to procure the vessels and crews necessar}^ for the voyage. Sailors, however, fled from him in terror for fear of being impressed, and even the jails were called upon to complete his crew.

The expedition was at last equipped, and Columbus set sail from the harbor of Palos, August 3, 1492, with three small vessels and about one THE SHIPS OF COLUMBUS huudred men. After

The Santa Maria, the Pinta, and the Nina. The o f r» r\ r* i ■»! O' nf flic* largest of these was Columbus' flagship, of leas » ^ U |J |J i ai ^ clL LliC than 200 tons burden.

Islands

Canary Islands to make some necessary repairs to one of the vessels, he set out upon the unexplored expanse of western waters in search of India. Weeks passed without signs of land. The hitherto unchangeable needle of the mariner's compass became '^sluggish" and variable, the ships were becalmed, and for days all seemed about to be engulfed in the floating weeds of the great ^ * Sargasso Sea. " It is small wonder that the frightened and ignorant sailors were inclined to mutiny,

DISCOVERY OF LAND 7

but the faith and determination of Columbus seemed never to waver, although in mid-ocean he was persuaded to alter his course from due west and northwest more to the southward to follow the flight of some passing birds. (See map, p. 10.)

Early in the morning of October 12, 1492, the little fleet came in sight of land now believed to be Watling Island, called by Columbus San Salvador. Here Columbus landed and, in the name of the King and Queen of Spain, claimed possession with ceremony and thanksgiving befitting the triumphant outcome of one of the greatest achievements of history. Although the simple, wondering natives of j^iscovery of the island were unlike any people of whom i^nd he had ever heard, Columbus called them Indians, because he thought they were inhabitants of the (East) Indies, and this is the name by which we have ever since known the natives of the Western Hemisphere. Lured by stories of wealth and neighboring lands, Columbus sailed from San Salvador for the coasts of Cuba and Hayti. On the latter island he built a fort and left some fifty men, the first colony of a European nation in the New World. He took on board a number of the Indians, and having got together a great display of birds, plants, and native gold ornaments, returned to Spain in the following spring, where the once despised adventurer was accorded the highest honors of the kingdom.

It was now easy to get ships and men for further exploration, so that before the end of the year Columbus again set out for the Indies with a far greater force under his command. At Hayti, he learned tliat the Spanisli colonists had repaid the kindness of the Indians there with cruel

other

voyages; treatment, so that the natives had killed

beginning or '

Spanish them and had laid their forts in ruins.

Now followed a long and weary search for mines of precious metal, — a search that met with little success ; and the Spaniards, both those w^itli the expedition and those at home, began to complain bitterly that the discoveries were not worth the price they had paid for them. Consequently, Columbus returned to Spain some years later in disfavor. In all, from 1492 to 1504, the great discoverer made four voyages, the last two resulting in the exploration of parts of the coast of C'entral and South America. He did not, however, touch the shores of the northern continent, and died without the New knowing he had found a new world, but believing that he had reached the Indies and the coast of Asia. Nor was the new-found country named in honor of its discoverer; but it was called America, after Amerigo A^espucci, an Italian navigator who had written letters describing the coastline and character of the western lands.^

During this time John Cabot had been living in England, and the news of the first voyage of Columbus reached him there. He now proposed to Henry VII that he should, in the name of

* The original letters have been lost, and only more or less accurate copies have been preserved. These had wide circulation in Europe and were read at St, Die, in noi-theastern France, by a teacher of g'eoo-raphy named Martin Waldseemiiller, who first published the name which came to be applied to the whole of the two continents.

CABOT DISCOVERS NORTH AMERICA 9

England, make explorations in search of a route to India and other Oriental countries. Appar- ^^^^^ ^.^_ ently, he was not successful in this effort covers con-

•^ \ . tinent of

until it became plain that the treaties which North

were being arranged between Spain and

Portugal with the sanction of the Pope were intended

to exclude every other nation from a share in the

trade and colonization of the newly

discovered lands.^ The line of

boundary set between Spain and

Portugal ran from north to south,

not far from the middle of the

Atlantic Ocean; all lands to the

east of this line were to belong

to Portugal, while those to the west

were to become the possession of

Spain. Henry VII now saw the

necessity of acting in the interest eovetd" t£^contTn'e°n?'of

of England and gave authority Kfiatcr^c;?Ve%fafJs

j_ r^ -I 1 1 1 • i-i X of Spain and Portugal, he

to Cabot and his three sons to laid the foundation for the

., . ,, . -, settlement of the English

sail to all countries and seas CoioniesintheNewWorid. of the East and of the West and of the North under our banners and ensigns." In May, 1497, Cabot, in command of a single small vessel, set out from Bristol. After a comparatively brief voyage, he came in sight of land on the coast of what is now Labrador. Here he went on shore, and by this act became the first representative of European nations to set foot upon the coast of North America; and his discovery of this continent is of special importance

* The teacher may here explain the temporal power of the Popes in medieval times.

Avery's History

JOHN CABOT because it gave England a definite claim to territory in the New World, and set the minds of Englishmen upon making homes there. This led eventually to the establishment of those thirteen colonies which became, in less than three hundred years, the United States of Amekica.

Map showing the first voyage of Christopher Columbus and the first and second voyages of John Cabot. The " ? " at the southernmost point of Cabot's second voyage shows that we do not know the exact extent of that voyage.

Some of the boys and girls who have read this first chapter

have also read stories of Leif Ericson and the Norsemen and

'It is not intended that these notes should be in the least exhaustive. They are chiefly intended to arouse thought and interest, — to indicate that outside of the text there is so much in history which is profitable to know and attractive to look up.

THE SECOND SANTA MARIA 11

their discovery of America. It is interesting to know about this earlier exploration of our continent, but it is not connected with the real stoiy of settlement. The Norsemen came over to this continent from Iceland in the year 1000 a.d. Ji)o(f f ^1*^^°°' The stories of their exploration and temporary settlement were told by word of mouth from father to son until written down in " sagas/' or stories, hundreds of years later. Every boy and girl should read Longfellow's " The Skeleton in Armor," which brings to mind the romantic stories of Norse adventure. Reference may be made to extended histories of the United States, such as Avery's; and special material may be found in American History Leaflets, Old South Leaflets, No. 31, etc.

In the reading of history, frequent reference to maps is a matter of veiy great importance. On the map of the world as first known to Columbus and Cabot (page 2), we find the name of Marco Polo. A wide-awake American boy or girl is likely to wonder at once who Polo was, where he lived, and when. Marco Polo wasi bom in Venice about 200 years before Columbus. Before he was 21 his father took him on a trading expedition to China (Cathay). He entered the service of Marco Poki' the Great Khan, or Emperor, and did not return for many years. On the way back, he traveled through Eastem countries and he has left us a very interesting narrative which hs dictated while he was a prisoner of war in the city of Genoa. His book has in it almost a^ much fable as history; but it doubtless served to stir the imagination of many explorers to the time of Columbus and Cabot and for some years later.

Look at the map on page 10 and find out where Columbus would have landed, if he had sailed due west from Palos instead of going first to the Canary Islands and directing his course from there.

Four hundred years after Columbus set sail from Palos, a vessel modeled after his flagship, the Santa Maria, sailed from the same port to the Columbian Exposition, or World's Fair, at Chicago, which commemorated the four hundredth anniversary of the discovery of the New World. Six ganta^Maria years later the United States was the means, through and the last freeing Cuba, of taking from Spain the last colony gpa^n^in^the left to her of all her once vast possessions in the New World Western Hemisphere. The teacher will find additional material on the life and times of Columbus in Prescott, Irving, Bancroft, Winsor, and other volumes less easily available, such as those by Harisse, Thacher, Vignaud.

When Columbus was being derided for not at onee bringing back great riches from the new countiy, some called him " Admiral of Mosquito Land/' showing that the Spaniards had become acquainted with the mosquito and the immediate discomfort caused by its bite. The Spaniards did not know, however, that the bite of some of these " little flies " of tropical America often brought on fever and death. This was found «^^jj,jj.jji ^f out by United States Army surgeons after the war with Mosquito Spain in 1S98. These brave physicians, believing that Land"; the mosquito cari-ied the dread disease, yielded themselves to the bite of insects known to have been with yellow fever victims. Their discoveries, which cost them their health and at last life itself, led to organized effort to destroy the mosquito in Cuba and other tropical countries. Where the mosquito has been exterminated, yellow fever has been stamped out, and thousands of lives have been saved that must have otherwise been lost. It may not be too much to state that the Panama Canal could not have been completed but for this discovery by American heroes.

To the pui)il : Why not ask your English teacher to let you choose for some of your compositions descriptions and stories connected with American histoiy? These may be based on what you think might have happened on any of the voyages of exploration; or what happened to " lost " colonies; or on Indian life, etc. The writing of American history has wonderfully improved in recent years. Perhaps if you start early and write carefully you may write books as much better than the ones you now read as the latter are better than those wi'itten a hundred years ago !

To the teacher: The chapter on the American Indian is put in the appendix to be studied when it is thought advisable.

Dates, for Ready Reference A.D. 1000 : Leif Ericson and the discovery of " Vinland." A.D. 1450 : Approximate date of fii'st printing giving easy access

to stories of travel.

A.D. 1453 : Capture of Constantinople by the Turks forcing search

for new trade routes to the East.

A.D. 1486-^87 : Dias rounds Cape of Good Hope. A.D. 1492: Columbus discovers the New World. A.D. 1497: Cabot discovers the continent of North America.

1492-1503 : Pope Alexander VI. 1479-1516: Ferdinand and Isabella (Spain). 1485-1509: Henry VII (England).