The French and Indian War in Brief

Backtracking slightly, here's a bit more coverage of the French and Indian War. Its conclusion was where our late colonial period coverage began, but it's helpful to know what happened. It ended in 1763.

Below, the portrait of Washington, who fought in this war, was painted by Charles Wilson Peale about 12 years after his service but does show him in the uniform he wore then. The other visuals provide basic information and a map (no maps in Zinn).

More on the Boston Massacre

Here's a bit more background on the Boston Massacre from The American Experience website. That program on PBS explores American history and biography.

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The Boston Massacre

Since the Stamp Act of 1765, street violence in Boston had become commonplace. Riots and protests had been instrumental in securing the repeal of the Stamp Act in 1766. Street protests continued on through the late 1760s. Customs officials in the colonies pleaded with the British crown to send soldiers to maintain order. By October 1768 Boston was home to 4,000 British troops, about a quarter of the city's population.

A Hostile Situation
Hostility toward the soldiers escalated. Not only did the colonists object to their presence, but now "the Redcoats" or "lobsterbacks," as the soldiers were commonly known, were taking jobs from Boston's workers. Low wages had led many soldiers to secure part-time jobs in their off-duty hours. They further antagonized many Bostonians by dating local women.

A Boy Killed
On February 22, 1770, an 11-year-old boy, Christopher Seider, was killed when a customs office informant fired into an angry mob. The bullet struck the adolescent, and Seider became a martyr to the cause.

Five More Killed
More martyrs soon followed. Not even two weeks later, on March 5, agitated crowds again roamed the streets of Boston. An argument broke out between a local merchant and Private Hugh White, the British officer on duty at the Customs House. In response to the man's taunting, the soldier struck him with the butt of his rifle. The man screamed. A crowd gathered and began to lob coal, ice, and oyster shells at White. Church bells began to toll -- the signal that all able men were needed to fight a fire -- and colonists poured into the street. When reinforcements arrived under the command of Captain Thomas Preston, the mob turned its fury on the eight new soldiers, jeering and taunting them. Private Hugh Montgomery was hit with a wooden club. A shot was fired. Captain Preston, who had not issued an order to fire, tried to restore peace. But it was too late. There were five new martyrs to the colonists' cause: Crispus Attucks, Samuel Gray, Samuel Maverick, James Caldwell, and Patrick Carr.

A Call to Action
Sensing the potential for propaganda, Samuel Adams, John Adam's cousin and a leader of the revolutionary movement, immediately christened the event the "Boston Massacre." The bloody event galvanized the colonists, helping to swing sentiment away from reform and reconciliation and toward revolution. Paul Revere immortalized the incident in an engraving that depicted the mighty struggle of freedom-loving people.

The Right to a Fair Trial
The problem of holding a trial -- or, more accurately, securing a defense -- for the British soldiers loomed. After short but careful consideration -- he feared that he might put his and his family's personal safety at risk and jeopardize his legal practice -- John Adams accepted the case on the grounds that in a free country, no man, no matter what his alleged crime, should be denied the right to counsel or a fair trial. There were two trials: In the first, Captain Preston was tried and acquitted. It had been impossible to prove that he had issued an order to fire into the crowd. In the second, six of the eight soldiers were acquitted, and the two who were found guilty (it was proved they had fired their weapons) had their thumbs branded as punishment. No riots followed the not-guilty verdicts, as had been feared, and Adams' law practice did not suffer his part in the trial.

Virginia's Colonial Capitol

We will move to the late colonial period of American history next week. Here's what the capitol building of the Virginia colony looked like after the capital had moved from Jamestown to Williamsburg.

The House of Burgesses of the Virginia colony met here (a "burgess" was a representative of a borough or district) from 1699 through 1776--though for seven years they were forced to meet at nearby William and Mary College while the capitol was rebuilt after burning down. Capital operations moved to Richmond, far inland, in 1779.

The second capitol's west wing was demolished and its bricks were sold off in 1793, and the east wing burned in 1832.

The picture below shows a reconstruction of those colonial buildings. 

By the way, "capitol" means the government's central building; "capital" means the city where government is based. One letter can make quite a difference.

Colonial Crafts: Video Links

Before industrialization, how did people work and make needed products? These videos show recreations of several kinds of American colonial crafts. All are just a few minutes long.

A blacksmith:  https://youtu.be/Y2gPg26PkrI

A cook:  https://youtu.be/jOWpzR0b6Ko

A spinner/weaver:  https://youtu.be/ex1Atx1tQPk (yes, she has a Scottish accent; so would many immigrants of the colonial period)

A printer:  https://youtu.be/perc_FZmtxU

A quiz question (not for extra credit) might appear about these items.

King Philip's War

What follows is a brief account of King Philip's war, a devastating conflict between New England colonists and several native groups. King Philip was the name used by colonists for Metacomet, the leader of the Wampanoag Indians. The source is history.net which provides good background reading on many topics.

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In 1675, some 55 years after English separatists later known as the Pilgrims had founded Plymouth Colony (in present-day Massachusetts), newsletters began appearing in London describing horrible atrocities committed by Indians against the New England settlers. The reports told of lightning raids on towns by hundreds of warriors, barns and houses burned to the ground, farmers tomahawked in their fields, colonial militia columns wiped out in ambushes, women and children taken captive, and worse.

While some questioned the veracity of the initial reports, the unrest quickly flared into a broad and bloody armed conflict. Known today as King Philip’s War (after the primary Indian war leader), the conflict stretched from 1675 to 1678 and was the subject of several important Puritan works, among them the Rev. William Hubbard’s The History of the Indian Wars in New England From the First Settlement to the Termination of the War With King Philip in 1677; Benjamin Thompson’s “New England’s Crisis,” the first epic poem written in North America; and the Rev. Increase Mather’s A Brief History of the War With the Indians in New England. The war has intrigued historians ever since.

King Philip’s War was not a localized clash like the Pequot War of the 1630s but full-scale warfare involving most of the New England region and many of the indigenous tribes, a total war that made no distinctions between warriors and civilians. And it was not certain the colonists would win. The war ended the largely stable and, in many ways, mutually beneficial relationship between colonists and Indians that had endured some five decades.

It was also an especially bloody war—the bloodiest, in terms of the percentage of the population killed, in American history. The figures are inexact, but out of a total New England population of 80,000, counting both Indians and English colonists, some 9,000 were killed—more than 10 percent. Two-thirds of the dead were Indians, many of whom died of starvation. Indians attacked 52 of New England’s 90 towns, pillaging 25 of those and burning 17 to the ground. The English sold thousands of captured Indians into slavery in the West Indies. New England’s tribes would never fully recover.

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For the complete article:  http://www.historynet.com/blood-and-betrayal-king-philips-war.htm

More Answers, "Foods of the Americas"

In class the first section (Foods Familiar or Semi-Familiar to the First Europeans) was covered, as was the last (Three Items Not Used, indicating a few of the foods Europeans introduced into the Americas).

The point, by the way, is that foods--and animals not used for food, and ideas, and technology, and diseases--traveled in both directions across the Atlantic after Europeans started showing up and coming back. This is often called the Columbian Exchange, after Columbus but most of it happened well after his life time. He died in 1506, just fourteen years after his first voyage.

Here are the other two categories, all filled in.

Foods Unfamiliar to the First Europeans

amaranth, avocado, cocoa (chocolate), corn, manioc (cassava), papaya, peanut, peppers, pineapple, potato, quinoa, sunflower, sweet potato, tomato, vanilla

Foods Imported from Africa in the Early Colonial Period

black-eyed peas, eggplant, okra, rice, sesame seeds, sorghum, watermelon, yam

A few notes of explanation:

• amaranth is cooked like a grain and can be found at Whole Foods and other alt-grocery stores; it was developed in the highlands of Mexico and Central America
• most Americans see manioc (cassava) in the form of tapioca
• quinoa is cooked like a grain and can now be found at nearly all grocery stores; it was developed in the Lake Titicaca region of South America and is related to amaranth
• sweet potatoes originated in the Caribbean region; they are not the same thing as yams, a distinct species from Africa
• imagine Italian food without tomato sauce; that's all of it before the early 1500s
• sorghum is found on grocery shelves in America as molasses, but this grain is used in many parts of the world for both human and livestock consumption
• okra shows up in Southern cooking (which is true of the other African imports as well); you'll find okra sliced into rounds in gumbo, but it is also served on its own--sliced, dipped in egg and cornmeal, and fried; you might also find it pickled in jars on the shelves next to the more familiar cucumber pickles

Where Did Columbus Go?

The map below shows his four voyages. At no point did he set foot on what would later be U.S. soil, but he did see much of the Caribbean and parts of the coast of Central and South America.

Despite that, the capitals of Ohio and South Carolina are named for him, as are the District of Columbia and the Columbia River in the Pacific Northwest. “Columbia” is also an old nickname for the United States in addition to the name of a republic in South America.

Given his mixed legacy, the celebration of Columbus Day (Oct. 12) has diminished in the United States. Some want to change that day, still a holiday for some schools, state governments, and banks, to Indigenous Peoples Day to commemorate the Arawak (Taino) and others who suffered from European exploration and colonization

A Powhatan Home

The picture below is from a state historical park in Virginia, and shows what historians and archaeologists think a typical Powhatan home looked like inside. Can you guess or surmise what the objects shown were for? Imagine the real John Smith and Powhatan inside one of these structures. Then, mentally scoff at the Disney film. Go ahead. It's fun!

Sneak Preview of Next Week

Among other things, we'll meet this man whose last name is still used for a major city in North Carolina and a brand of pipe tobacco. Why was he interested in founding a British colony? Money.