6. Key moments in american history

1. Key Moments in American History

Profile: American Warfare (From the War of Independence to 2WW)

State: From the Discoveries to the civil war

Prehistory:

• first step on the Vikings (1 000) Leif Ericson

• First inhabitants – mostly hunters that lay foundations for Native American population came at around 12 000 B.C. through a land bridge (Beringia) between Asia and North America. They did so almost certainly without knowing they had crossed into a new continent.

• The first Europeans to arrive in North America were Norse, at around 1000 A.D. – namely Erik the Red and later his son Lief, travelling west from Greenland. They explored the north-east coast of what is now Canada (namely Newfoundland).

• In 1492 Christopher Columbus landed in the Caribbean in search of the western route to Asia (12th October the Columbus Day)

• America was named by Amerigo Vespucci

The Colonial period (1607-1776):

• the French, Dutch, British, Spanish, Portuguese (Europeans which made settlements / colonies in America)

• the Amerindians the Apache, the Mohawks, the Cherokees, the Dakotas

• it wasn’t easy to live next to each other fights between Europeans and Amerindians

• during this time, 13 colonies formed along the eastern coast of North America – most of them began as English colonies

• the colonist learned about their new lands from the American Indians – many of colonist tried to live peacefully side by side with Indians → with more colonists coming, fighting between those two groups increased.

• 1584: Sir Walter Raleigh established the first English colony in what we now call the USA; its name was Virginia.

• 1607: The first successful settlement in Virginia – Jamestown.

• 1620: A group of Puritan refugees from England, known as the Pilgrim Fathers, reached in their ship Mayflower the coast of North America (Massachusetts) and founded a settlement called Plymouth.

  • the first colonies established in the North were called New England

  • Pilgrim Fathers were Puritans who escaped religious persecution; They were hard-working, courageous, steadfast and enterprising

  • Indians who helped the Pilgrims were invited to Thanksgiving feast in 1621

• 1620 – 1640: some 30 000 Puritans settled in New England, but when the English Revolution began their exodus weakened and the Royalists started to come in. The Royalists emigrated to Virginia where they bought large estates (lands)

• 1681: W. Penn, Quaker, founded the colony of Pensylvania – place, where Quakers and people of other faiths could enjoy religious freedom → he helped to establish religous tolerance as a basic value in the US colonies

Situation in the 2 nd part of the 17th century:

• South – English colonies (Virginia, North Carolina)

• North – English colonies (New England)

• Between these – a Dutch colony (New Netherlands, with the capital New Amsterdam – later in 1664 New York)

• West of Appalachians – French colonies:

  • New France (today´s Canada)

  • Lousiana - Mississippi valley

• English–French wars: Seven Years´ War (1756 – 1763); the English won