CHAPTER III THE OLD THIRTEEN: THEIR STRENGTH AND WEAKNESS As we proceed to outline the completion of the founding of the full thirteen English colonies which finally became our Republic, we note at once two important factors. The later colonies were established more easily than were Virginia and New England, for the older colonies could be, and were, called upon at times for supplies and other necessaries of pioneering; again, the Middle Colonies were not of the pure English strain. America became a "melting-pot" very early in its history. Yet with all the mixture of racial stocks these later colonies, whether royal or proprietary, passed through about the same political experiences as the older ones of purer strain. Everywhere democracy combated royalty with sturdy persistence. In Dutch wooden shoes, under Quaker hats or Amish bonnets, the spirit of the New World forests seemed to be brewing a new race of men in the pot which suddenly received so many unexpected ingredients. Section 8. The Gateway of Old New York THE curious policy which allowed the London Company to occupy "Virginia" only up to the Potomac River and the Plymouth Company to occupy "New England" only down to Long Island, left temporarily unoccupied the rich inland regions tributary to what are now the great ports of the states of Maryland, Pennsylvania, and New York. The unoccupied zone On two counts this dense ignorance of the coastline promised to be costly to England. Here lay three of the most excellent And behind the present sites of harbors of the New World. Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York lay the best soils for general agriculture within reach of Old World immigrants. Neither New England's sterile hills nor her little meadows could furnish the grain needed in young of early America; Virginia was ill-fitted, until she found America her rich valley behind the Blue Ridge, to meet The granary this need. But behind the ports named lay the valleys of the Mohawk and Hudson, of the Susquehanna, Delaware, Schuylkill, and Lehigh. Of all this, of course, Henry Hudson, who nosed into New York Harbor ahead of the English, in 1609, was ignorant; but his finding the Hudson and laying the foundation of New Amsterdam (now New York) in 1626 was a bold and spectacular feat and one which promised large profit, commercial and mili Hudson's gift to Holland tary, for Holland's proud banner which this Englishman in her employ flew at the masthead of his famous ship, the Half Moon. Splendid were Holland's opportunities as she founded her "New Netherlands" along the magnificent waterway between New Amsterdam and "Fort Orange" which she planted, at they also built a fort (1623). At the same time enterprising Sweden (1638) attempted to seize a slice of this rich unoccupied country and planted a colony on the present site of Wilmington, Delaware, which region she called "New Sweden." In 1655 the Dutch in New Amsterdam objected and captured this settlement; but sea-might determined land-right in these rollicking days, as the Dutch found out, in turn, when an English fleet took from them both New Amsterdam and also the Delaware settlements in 1664-5. Short as was the existence of New Netherlands, however, our whole New York region received an impress that proved distinct and lasting. For one thing, the Dutch gave unique names to hundreds of creeks, rivers, hills, and valleys in the Hudson-Mohawk country. They introduced types of architec ture and arts of farming that have not wholly disappeared. They gave to a charming country the grace of a quiet, home-spun quaintness of life-type and manners which was fortunate in its origin and doubly fortunate in its historian, Washington Irving. More important, however, the Dutch régime laid substantial beams in the building of a princely Empire State. The StatesGeneral in 1629 granted to the Dutch West India Company what were called patroons' manorial rights-land' grants which were held by individuals at a rental paid to the company and sublet to tenants; thus New World feudal baronies arose beside the Hudson as well as the James. In granting a few great families, such as the Van The Dutch land system Rensselaers, Schuylers, etc., immense plantations, a political bent was given to the future colony and State of New York which is only in our day losing its grip. NEW AMSTERDAM, ABOUT 1630. (From an old print.) Of equal moment, the Dutch occupation of the HudsonMohawk key to the important Iroquois homeland (soon inherited by the conquering English) kept it from amicable rela being occupied by more troublesome foes. Little Importance was it realized at the time that the Hudson-Lake- of Holland's Champlain-Richelieu passageway to the St. Law- tions with the rence was to become preeminently important in Iroquois the struggle for the mastery of the continent. And as little was it comprehended that, in welding to English interest the formidable Iroquois confederacy, a deathblow was being prepared for French hopes of continental mastery. The Province of New York The English took New Amsterdam in 1664 and "New Netherlands" became the Province of New York because the King gave it to his brother James, Duke of York. It was, already, a miniature of our present-day metropolis in population; its laws had to be printed in three languages in order to be understood by a majority of the one thousand inhabitants! The feudal system which existed along the Hudson's tidal arm which reached to Albany was untouched, and the portly patroons smoked their long pipes in peace within their bouweries, the native name for plantation, not a whit more dissatisfied at paying their rentals to English authorities than to Dutch. Backbone of New York democracy But when it came to paying what they considered unjust taxes, these stolid patroons formed a backbone of democracy which had much to do with the fact that New York became a stout champion for what we now know as American liberty. The people demanded and received both a Charter of Liberties and a Provincial Assembly in 1683; in Leisler's Rebellion, six years later, they showed that neither New Englanders nor Virginians should be an iota ahead of them in championing the rights of the common people. King James II was now succeeded at home by the bloodless revolution which placed William and Mary on the English throne. The new rulers confirmed the right of the people in Parliament, a tenet the Stuarts had doggedly denied. Instantly the New Englanders ousted former King James's hated representative, Andros, from the governorship. In New York, Andros's deputy, Nicholson, was equally despised and under Jacob Leisler, a successful German merchant, Nicholson was forced to flee the colony, leaving its government in the hands of three deputies. Leisler called a convention of delegates from the counties of the colony; this convention chose Leisler commander-in-chief and during two years this popularly chosen official ruled the colony. Leisler's movement for popular rule was typical; in fact, the whole history of the colony, except when its people were united to ward off the French enemies in the North, is a story of Leisler's |