Colonial Kids: An Activity Guide to Life in the New World
spread through Europe other kings and queens sent ships and people to claim and settle the land for their own country Spanish colonists settled in southern Florida and the Caribbean Islands Dutch colonists settled in what is now New York Swedish colonists settled in what is now Pennsylvania French ships carried set tlers to the southeastern coast and into Canada Eng lish ships brought most of the colonists who settled in New England and Virginia At first most colonists were men and boys In October 1608 the first two women arrived at James Fort They quickly married two male settlers Other women came and ten years later there were almost a hundred single women coming each year They were auctioned off to men for marriage James Fort was later called Jamestown as it grew from a fort into a settlement WHEN CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS was young he read a book written by a man named Marco Polo who wrote about travel adventures in Asia He dreamed of going to Asia someday too but Columbus wanted to go by ship Read about Marco Polo's trip for yourself After reading it can you figure out why Columbus wanted to go by sea Maybe you'll decide to be an explorer
New World Explorations A Russian D Norse D Esenchi Aish Er sh spani If A WHAT DID COLUMBUS's crew eat during their voyages Kidney beans salted fish hardtack dried fruit vinegar oil and honey Also they ate garlic cloves to stay healthy In the Virginia colonies an English child could pay for ship's passage by working as an indentured ser vant until he or she was twenty one years old An indentured servant was owned by his master and could be sold traded or gambled away Orphaned children worked their way to the New World in order to have a free life outside of an
Earliest colonies Three Saints Bay 5sian Quebec Frore mouth English Pennsylvania New Amsterdam paten Waiah Penn s For Christine Swedish Colony Jamestown English Savannah Georgia English St Augustine Spanish Fort Ross Russian San Dieаo Spanish Santa Fe Spanish Most newcomers expected to find some sort of riches in the New World They thought there would be a lot of gold and some ships were sent back to England full of fool's gold actually rocks of pyrite that sparkled like gold but they were worthless Every citizen in England had to belong to the Church of England which was headed by the King A group of people who called themselves separatists wanted to form their own church because they didn't want to belong to the Church of England They went to the Netherlands but weren't happy living there because their children were learning Dutch ways and forgetting their English culture The separatists decided to journey to the New World on a ship named the Mayflower In exchange for passage and some supplies the future colonists agreed to send back valuable goods for the merchants to sell in Eng Page 17
land Their ship landed a hundred miles north of the Virginia colony They built their own colony called Plymouth in what is now Massachusetts THE OCEAN CROSSING was rough but many people died while waiting on the ship to go ashore On the Mayflower eighteen women boarded the ship only three were alive to get off of twenty eight children on the Mayflower twen ty three survived of the twenty nine men and servants aboard only ten were alive and only fif teen of the thirty Strangers were alive to go ashore It was a hard journey and people had to fight off fever scurvy and pneumonia as well as cold weather to survive By the following April when the Mayflower left to return to Europe the village had only fifty colonists and half of them were children The Mayflower was overloaded with 102 passen gers but only 44 were really pilgrims or separatists who intended to stay in the New World The rest were called Strangers by the pilgrims because they were recruited by merchants to join the venture Before the Pilgrims left the Mayflower they wrote up a set of rules to govern their new settlement They didn't want the wealthy to rule instead they wanted every citizen to be equal with a government that rep resented everyone It was a very new idea Page 18 4 pages left in this chapter
