A history of the United States for schools

Front matter

'7'

4 O

M^ o.

Preface

The aim of the authors in writing this book has been to present what seemed to them the main historical developments in American history, the knowledge of which will enable the pupil to understand +he social, political, and economic institutions which he finds about him in this land wherein he lives. In doing this we have tried to use simple language, to show clearly the relation of one fact to another, and to keep the story constantly moving forward. We have sought to interest not by the selection of the merely entertaining facts which are often the things of least value, but by choice of the facts that have meant something in our growth as a nation.

This is first of all a text-book and not a story-book. We make no apology for the omission of many of the '^yarns'' of American history. If history is worth teaching at all, it is worth teaching as causal, vital, meaning history. We heartily approve of reading history for mere pleasure. History is, we believe, in many of its high* est literary forms, most delightful and valuable "mere reading," but for serious study there are certain essentials which should not be disguised or palliated by facts which are only entertaining, and not essentially significant.

We have tried to include only such historical facts and problems as may be easily understood by the child of school age, and we have intentionally omitted some traditional school-book lore which, in our opinion, might well be left to obhvion. Many pupils will never study their country's history again, and there is so much which they, as American citizens, ought surely to know, that in a text like this all unmeaning events must be sacrificed. By means of this elimination

V vi PREFACE

we have secured space for fuller explanation and interpretation of really important events. The hterature suggested for reading outside of the text will assist in encouraging the pupil to search for and to report upon any events or problems which are here omitted, but which appear to the teacher to be of interest and importance. We are far from sure that we have always chosen our facts wisely and are humble enough to be more than tolerant of the differing emphasis which any weU trained teacher may lay upon the various phases of American history. Suggestions, criticisms and corrections will be thrice welcome, for only through such friendly cooperation can we hope to bring this little book toward the goal of perfection.

Special acknowledgments of service are due to: Mr. L. A. Chase, Instructor in History, Houghton, Michigan, High School, who prepared the chapter "How Europe Influenced America"; Mr. A. C. Shong. Principal of the West Division High School, Milwaukee; Mr. A. J- Gerson, Principal of the Robert Morris Pubhc School, Philadelphia: Mr. Gilbert P. Randle, Superintendent of Schools, Danville, 111.; and Miss Edith S. Patten, State Normal School, DeKalb, 111.

Acknowledgment is also due to Messrs. Ginn and Company for permission to reproduce the rehef map on page 23; to Mr. R. T. Haines Halsey for permission to reproduce two Revolutionary cartoons from his collection; to Professor W. H. Siebert for the photograph on page 334, reproduced from his "Underground Railroad from Slavery to Freedom" (copj- right, 1898, by the Macmillan Company); to the Lenox Library, New York City, for permission to reproduce from many prints; to the Alabama State Department of Arcliives for the cartoon on page 396; and to the Museum of the Peabody Academy of Science for a photograph of the model of the Constitution that is in their possession.

This new edition of 1919 contains two altered chapters and a new one on the events of the World War.

Andrew C. McLaughlin.

Contents

PERIOD OF DISCOVERY AND DIVISION OF COLONIZING FIELDS

CHAPTER PAGE

I. — ^How THE Old World got Ready to Discover the

Appendix

Important Dates in United States History

Questions

The Presidents and Vice-Presidents ....

Population and Area of States

Territories and Other Political Bodies .

Population of Continental United States by Decades The "Mayflower" Compact . . . . = .

The Declaration of Independence ....

Constitution of the United States ....

page

i

vii

xxviii

xxix

xxix

XXX

xxxi xxxii xxxvi

INDEX (with Pronunciation of Difficult Proper

MAPS

PAGE

The World as Known to Europeans at the Middle of the

Old Trade Routes to the East . , » . , . . 6

The Four Voyages of Columbus . . o . . „ . 12

The Route of Magellan ........ 16

Early Explorations in the New World ..... 17

Rehef Map of the United States ....... 23

Early French Discoveries and Settlements .... 30

French Settlements and Water Routes in the Interior . . 34

Territory Granted by the Charter of 1 GOG .... 42

Land Granted by Charter to the Virginia Company in 1609 . 46

Rhode Island Settlements 68

Extent of Settlements in New England in 1660 ... 71

European Possessions in 1650 (colored) 79

The Hudson River, Delaware, and Pennsylvania Settlements . 83

Maryland 92

The Carohnas and Georgia 100

The Dominion of New England under Andros . . . .107

Relief Map of the Northeastern Colonies Ill

Relief Map of the Southern Colonies 112

European Claims before 1755 (colored) . . . facing 116 The French and Indian War, Western Campaigns . . . 118 The French and Indian War, Northern and Eastern Campaigns ..... 119

Colonial Governments Distinguished (colored) . . . 131

Central North America 1763-1783 (colored) . . facing 144

Boston and its Vicinity in 1776 155

The Early Campaigns of the Revolution . . . o . 172

xi xii MAPS

PAGE

Clark's Campaign in the West 182

The Campaigns in the South, War of the Revolution . . 191 The United States at the End of the Revolutionary War

(colored) 192

The Northwest Territory ...„,... 216

Distribution of the Population in 1790 ..... 223 Routes from Philadelphia and Virginia to Pittsburg and the

Ohio 229

Map Showing Spanish Control of the Mouth of the Mississippi 242 Central North America after the Louisiana Purchase

(colored) facing 250

Routes of Lewis and Clark and Pike 252

Field of Campaigns in the West, War of 1812 . . . .263

Field of Campaigns in the North and East, War of 1812 . 267

The Region about Washington and Baltimore .... 268

The Cumberland Road , , 276

The Erie Canal 277

Free and Slave Areas after 1820 280

Distribution of the Population in 1830 291

Field of the War with Mexico ....... 324

The Oregon Country 326

Acquisition of Territory in the West 327

Chart Showing Increase of Immigration by Decades . . 338

Charleston Harbor 351

The United States in 1861 (colored) .... facing 352

Railroads in the United States in 1860 355

The Relation of Nassau to the Blockaded Ports of the South 360

The United States East of the Mississippi . . . . 362

Field of the Eastern Campaigns of the Civil War . . . 366

Field of the Western Campaigns of the Civil War . . . 369

Historical Sketch of the Civil War 379

Field of the Last Campaigns of the Civil War and the Line of

Sherman's March ......... 382

•MAPS xiii

PAGE

Field of the Campaigns in Cuba . . . . . . . 419

Territorial Growth of the United States (colored) . facing 422

Trails to the West and Routes of Pacific Railroads . . 425 The World, Showing the United States and its Dependencies and the Changes that Will be Effected in the World's

Trade Routes by the Panama Canal 443

Distribution of the Population in 1910 . . . . 447

A

HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES

FOR SCHOOLS

I

PERIOD OF DISCOVERY AND DIVISION OF COLONIZING FIELDS

Chapter I How The Old World Got Ready To Discover The New

1. Ignorance of Geography Five Hundred Years Ago.—

Five hundred years ago the wisest men of Europe knew less about the geography of the earth than is now known by the schoolboy. They knew little more than was known by the geographer who lived in the days of the Apostle Paul. The Mediterranean^ Sea was still the center of the world's business and interest as it had been fifteen hundred years before. The outline of Europe was fairly well known, but of Africa, stretching away to the southward into the tropics and beyond, little was known save the northern coast. Men still relied on the map of Ptolemy, a geographer of the second century, who had merely guessed at the shape and size of the great southern continent. Australia and America had never been heard of, and Asia was a land of great empires, still largely a land of myth and fancy, with an outline on the maps that we could hardly recognize to-day.

2. Fear of the Great Sea,— These three parts of the world — Europe, Asia, and Africa — vaguely known even to the

* Mediterranean means "the middle of the earth." 1

Terrors of the Sea of Darkness As pictured by a sixteenth century illustrator.

learned, were thought to be encircled by a vast mysterious sea—'' the Sea of Darkness/' as men called it five hundred years ago. Ships dared not venture far out upon its waters, for it was supposed to be haunted by dangerous monsters of the deep ; and out far away, the fearsome sailors thought, lay the edge of the world, where the sea grew gumhke and sluggish; and the water became heavy against the oar, where no waves were raised by the wind, and where even to breathe the air was impossible.

3. A Flat Earth. — Some of the wiser men of early days had believed that the earth is round, but in the fifteenth century, the time of which we are speaking, this belief in a rovmd world was confined to a very few men of learning; the sailors and men of everyday business were largely ruled by these fanciful notions, by these mysteries of an unknown earth and the terrors of an unknown sea. To make voyages far out to the westward on this terrible Sea of Darkness seemed beyond human powers. Though men at the beginning of the fifteenth century knew little of the big world, and though their notions of geography were not much truer than those held a thousand years before, new ideas were soon to come.

4. The Crusaders. — To understand these changes and this new impulse we must know something about things which had been happening during several hundred j^ears before the fifteenth century. These things had been altering the

CHANGES IN THE OLD WORLD 3

way men lived and even the way they thought. In the ninth century hordes of barbarous Turks took possession of large parts of Asia Minor and seized upon the places in Palestine that were sacred to the Christians of Europe. Army after army was sent from Europe to fight the Turks in the Holy Land and to regain the sacred places from their hands. These crusades, ^ as the wars were called, these two hundred years (1096 to 1300) of effort to conquer the Turks, awakened new interest in the East and increased the desire for Eastern goods. Men were more eager than ever for the pearls and ivory, the perfumes and the spices, silks and beau-

The World as Known to Europeans at the Middle of the 15th

Century tiful cashmere shawls which traders brought out of the '' Golden East."

5. Tales of the Far East. — In the two centuries after the Crusades (1096-1300), trade with Asia was brisk and vigorous. Europe was coming to be more and more dependent on the spices and other commodities of the East. There came, too, at this time, new tales of the wealth and wonders of Asia. Marco Polo, an Italian who had spent nearly thirty years in the Far East, returning to Europe, wrote a book telling marvelous stories of Cathay, or China, and Cipangu, or Japan. The King of Japan, he said, lived in

^Crusade, "a war for the cross," from Latin crux, a cross. 2 a palace roofed with gold; ^ the floor was of slabs of gold two fingers thick. Another book, '' The Travels of Sir John Mandeville," much more widely read, was filled with fanciful and weird stories. It told of golden birds that clapped their wings by magic, of golden vines laden with costly jewels, of a fountain of youth where one might drink and be forever young.

6. New Interests. — With such tales as these, the longing for the wealth and wonders of the East grew stronger. The minds of men were preparing for great tasks that were to change the world. The Crusades had stirred the thoughts of men as never before. In the Dark Ages ^ the common man had tilled the soil in ignorance; the nobleman or the knight amused himself in his castle or led his followers to battle; book learning was largely confined to a few men, and they often spent their days in considering what seem to us strange questions, such as: "How many angels can stand on the point of a needle?" and ''Is it a greater crime to kill a thousand men than to mend a beggar's shoe on Sunday?" But now learned men began to talk and think of things more full of meaning for practical ends.

7. Discovery and Inventions. — One man, the great Copernicus, had begun the studies which led him to discover that the earth on which he stood was a vast planet whirling in space with other planets about the sun. Another invented the art of printing by movable blocks, and henceforward it was not necessary to write laboriously by hand each copy of a book, for many might be printed at lit+le cost. A few skilled hands also left off making curious ornaments for church furniture or for the armor of knights, and turned their attention to perfecting instruments that told the ;sailor his whereabouts at sea, or to the improvement of

1 " The Travels of Marco Polo " appears on the whole to be a truthful account of what he had himself seen. Of Japan he knew only from the lales of others.

2 As the centuries before the Crusades were called.

CHANGES IN THE OLD WORLD paper, on which books could be printed and letters written. Gunpowder was coming into use, and this meant a new kind of warfare ; bows and arrows and spears gave w^ay to guns and cannon.^

8. TheTiirksBlock the Way to the East. ■ — At the end of the fourteenth century there came a new need for exploration and discovery. The result of the Crusades had been not only to awaken new interest in the East, but to hold back, for a time, the spread of the Turks. The Italian cities, especially Genoa and

Venice, carried on a thriving trade with Asia. But in the fourteenth century the Ottoman Turks, the same race that now holds Constantinople, came into the region of the trade routes ^ and began slowly to spread over wide areas in

^ Against the cannon the armor of the knight did not give him safety, nor were even his castle walls secure, as they had been against the epears and arrows. A simple farmer with a gun could now kill the greatest lord clad in armor. The king of the land, aided by workmen and tradesmen, could beat down the castles of the knights and extend the royal power. The kings of Portugal, Spain, France, and England, for this reason as well as for others, became rich and powerful. Thus they were able to give aid to brave and earnest men who wished to explore the earth and who had neither money nor ships for the purpose.

2 These routes led from India and China through the Black Sea, the Persian Gulf, and the Red Sea to Venice and Genoa. See map on page 6.

An Early Printing Shop

Europe and Asia.^ The routes from Europe to India and Cliina were blocked, and though traffic was not altogether broken up, there was danger that in time Europe would be completely cut off from the Far East.

9. Henry the Navigator. — In the face of these dangers, the enterprising men of Europe were not idle. The new

Northern or Genoese Route ■

Middle Route

Southern or Venetian Route

Old Trade Routes to the East

Over these routes with boat and caravan the Europeans had traveled for centuries in search of the silks, spices, and other treasures of the East.

conditions, of which we have spoken, the zeal for a wider and better knowledge of the world, were making themselves felt, and men were turning to new tasks. Among the famous men of the day was the son of the King of Portugal, now known as Prince Henry, the Navigator. He gathered about him bold sailors and trained them well; he helped them to learn the arts they needed. He taught them to trust the devices which made it safe to sail the seas v/here there is no other guide than the sun and stars. He helped them to rely on the astrolabe and on the compass, the

^ They gradually spread westward and took Constantinople in 1453.

CHANGES IN THE OLD WORLD

An Early Compass wonderful needle which always tries to point toward the

north. Under his guidance, and moved by his courageous

spirit, mariners made long voyages

down the coast of Africa, pressing ever

farther southward. Not in his lifetime did his captains pass the southern

point of the continent; but soon after

his death, Diaz, more steadfast than

the rest, rounded the Cape of Good

Hope (1486), and a decade later Vasco

da Gama, starting in 1497, passing the

Cape, pushed northv^a^d and sailed

into a harbor on the coas-: of India.

The Portuguese could justly boast that

''new lands, new seas, new worlds,

even new constellations have been dragged from darkness

into the light of day."

10. The Great Work of the Portuguesa. — The most important result of Henry's work was to banish imaginary terrors of the deep and to train up a body of seamen who dared to sail the ocean even bej^ond the sight of land.

Henry's sailors proved that there was no flaming zone at the equator, as men had imagined, barring the way to the south. Even the Sea of Darkness did not seem so pitiless and terrible as men had fancied for ages.

11. To Find the East by Sailing West. — As we have seen, the mariners of Portugal sought the way to

the East by sailing southward, and before 1500 they found

the way to India by sea around the south of Africa. But

before this southern way to India was found, yex mor?

An Astrolabe This is the instrument that was used by navigators, at the time of CoLumbus, to obtain altitudes of the sun and stars above the horizon.

wonderful voyages had been made. We have seen hoT7 Europe had long stood with her back to the Atlantic looking with greedy eyes toward Asia, until the Turks seized the trade routes thither. Now, under the leadership of a daring man, attempts were to be made to reach the coveted riches of the East by sailing westward out into the wide Atlantic, and around the earth to Asia. The Turks might bar the routes eastward to India and China, but the way westward still lay open if only men were brave and wise enough to turn that way.

Histories: (Crusades and Marco Polo) Fiske, Discovery of America, 1, 270-276, 280-284. Brooks, Story of Marco Polo. (Da Gama^ Hale, Stories of Discovery, 34-58. Higginson, American Explorem.

Sources: (Marco Polo) Old South Leaflets, No. 32.

Chapter II Columbus Seeks The East And Finds A New Worlj)

12. Christopher Columbus. — The man who was to try tl.ie great feat of discovering the East by saihng westward was Christopher Columbus, an Itahan. Born in Genoa, the son of a poor wool weaver, he had gone to sea at an early age and had learned the art of navigation. In some way, too, he had studied Latin, for he could read the learned books of the day. Travels and geography pleased him most, and we know that he pored over volumes that told of the strange lands of the world. It was in Portugal, his son tells us, that Columbus first began to think that, if men could sail so far southward, they might sail westward and find China and India in the western ocean.^ From " The Travels of Marco

^ Vignaud, an eminent investigator, does not believe this. Not until after Columbus' second voyage, says Vignaud, did he think he had reached the Indies, and at first he set out merely to find new islands and new lands. For the present we choose to keep the old story.

COLUMBUS FINDS A NEW WORLD

Polo '^ he learned that there was a sea east of China, and in another book, called ^' The Picture of the World," he read that '^ between the end of Spain and the beginning of India the sea is small and can be sailed over in a few days.'^ Wise men had believed for ages that the world is round, and Columbus accepted this belief. He had himself sailed into the north and as far ^ ^^ .j i m puni

south as Guinea, and i^^)^^*^«% had seen proofs Hhat the ^^^^^ ^^ earth is round.

13. Tales of the Western Ocean. — Stories of lands in the western ocean had long been told, and these may have strongly influenced Colum])us as he bent over his books on geography or heard the accounts of Portuguese discoveries on the coast of Africa.

It is at least not unlikely that, in times past, storm-driven vessels had actually touched lands on the western side of the Atlantic; but in those early days, when there was no printing, the tales of poor and obscure sailors, even if believed when first reported, were soon forgotten. In fact, we now know that nearly five hundred years before the time of Columbus, a Norse sailor, Leif, son of Eric the Red, sailed southward from Greenland and found the coast of a new land, which he called " Yinland the good," for he found grapes there. This land where grapes grew was doubtless North America; but the discovery of the new continent made little or no impression on the world of the

* Some of the proofs which you find mentioned in your geographie3.

Christopher Columbus From the earliest engraved likeness.

year 1000, and, though the storj- was told and retold from father to son in far-away Iceland, Columbus probably never heard of Vinland or the adventurous voyages of the Northmen. 14. A Voyage to the West.— When Columbus put together the ideas of a round earth, a narrow sea between China and Europe, and the rumors of lands seen by storm-driven

sailors, he was sure he

could sail west from Spain and reach the marvelous Indies. He failed, however, even with sayings of great geographers and travelers, to convince the King of Portugal, of whom he first asked aid; but after long years of perseverance in his search for help, he won the interest of Queen Isabella of Spain. In hope that Columbus would bring back the gold and other treasures of the East, a ro3^al order was issued to the people of Palos, a seaport of Spain, to provide two ships and wages for the crews to undertake the new and perilous voyage. Three vessels ^ were at last secured and manned with such seamen as could be hired or forced to enter on what seemed a foolhardy venture. In August, 1492, the little fleet set sail for the Canary Islands, and thence went out upon the trackless waters of the Sea of Darkness.

1 Pinta, Santa Maria, and Nina were the names.

Columbus' Flag Ship, the Santa Maria This picture is of the model sent over by

Spain to the Columbian Exposition in

Chicago, in 1893.

COLUMBUS FINDS A NEW WORLD 11

15. On the Sea of Darkness.— The ships were small and not very trustworthy for ocean travel; the dangers to be met seemed great and fearful because they were unknown. The sailors were frightened from the first; and, as the days went by and no land appeared, they grumbled and threatened until only with difficulty could Columbus persuade them to go on. He told them '' it was useless to complain, as he had come to go to the Indies, and he would keep on till he found them, with the aid of our Lord." It was this faith and courage that won the day. After more than a month of westward sailing, signs of land began to appear — a tuft of grass, a piece of wood that some man had carved, land birds flying over the ship.

16. Land Discovered.— On the morning of October 12, 1492, land itself was seen. It proved to be a small coral island of the Bahamas, and Columbus claimed it for tfie King and Queen of Spain, naming it San Salvador. He naturally supposed it was an outlying island near the coast of Asia. The naked, copper-colored natives, their bodies painted black and white and red, hardly tallied with Marcr Polo's pictures of the silken-garbed Chinese and Japanese; but Columbus, believing himself near India, a name then loosely applied to the whole East, called the people Indians.

When he heard of Cuba, he beUeved that it was Japan, and that not far away were the great cities of China, one with its twelve thousand stone bridges and one with its hundred pepper ships a year, as Marco Polo had described them. When he sailed to the coast of Cuba, he believed he had found the mainland, but when he sought the Great Khan, the mighty Eastern emperor, he found only a village of naked barbarians. The only thing the natives could do for the white strangers was to teach them " to draw smoke from the leaves of a plant rolled into a tube and lighted at one end." These tubes were called " tobaccos."

17. Columbus Believed He Had Found Asia. — Columbus expected to find gold, precious stones, perfumes, valuable woods, and rich fabrics; and though he did not find them, he did not yield to discouragement or think he had not found the Golden East. He sailed to another island, Haiti, which he called La Isla Espaiiola, '^ the Spanish Island," and there he saw again, not riches or the palaces of China but only swarms of naked savages. He had the misfortune to lose

The Four Voyages of Columbus This map shows how much of the New World was visited by its discoverer.

one of his ships, and as another was unseaworthy, he left part of his men on the island and sailed back to Spain.

18. His Success Proclaimed in Europe.— Upon the return of Columbus after a stormy voyage, he was received with great joy and pomp by the Spanish king and queen. The tale of his discovery was heralded far and wide. One of his letters, telling the story, was printed in different countries and circulated throughout Europe within a year — for now, with the aid of printing, a great achievement could easily be made known. Tales of new and strange sights greatly interested men, but they were chiefly pleased be-

COLUMBUS FINDS A NEW WORLD cause they believed that Columbus had found a new way to the treasures of the East.

19. Disappointment. — Columbus went on three more voyages, but search as he might, he could not find the wealth of Asia or the marvelous cities of China. Little by little his reputation as a great discoverer departed, and after his return from his fourth voyage he lived in obscurity

The Da Vinci Map (1515 or 1516) One of the earliest maps on which the word "America" appeared.

and died almost unnoticed. We know that he had found a new world and had won undying fame; he himself believed to the end that he had reached the Orient, and he died in disappointment because he had not found the riches and the splendors he had expected.

20. Amerigo Vespucci. — Why the new world was not named after Columbus is a curious story. Among the many explorers who hastened thither was Amerigo Vespucci. He wrote about his voyage along the South American coast, and said the land was a " New World " — not meaning that it was a part detached from Asia, but that it was not the part formerly known. Columbus never claimed to have found anything but the Indies — a part of Asia. Therefore, when the account of Amerigo or Americus came to a certain teacher of geography who was printing a book with a map showing this new part of the world, it seemed right to him to call the new land America. Later many map makers placed this name on South America, though they were still uncertain as to whether it was part of Asia. Everybody came in time to call it America. Hence, with no ill intention, Columbus was robbed of the glory of having the new world named after him.

Histories: Wright, Stories of American History, (Columbus) 38- 60, (Norsemen) 27-37. (Columbus) J. Lang, Children's Heroes Series; F. A. Ober, Columhus, the Discoverer; McMurry, Pioneers on Land and Sea; T. B. Lawler, The Story of Columhus and Magellan; Brooks, The True Story of Christopher Columhus.

Sources: Hart, American History Told hy Contemporaries, I, Xo. 16, Old South Leaflets, No, 31. American History Leaflets, Xo. 3.

Fiction: Longfellow, Skeleton in Armor.

Chapter III

HOW THE PEOPLE OF EUROPE CAME TO KNOW WHAT THE NEW WORLD WAS LIKE