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Roanoke Island VIRGINIA. Colony
1588 - In Europe, the
defeat of the Spanish Armada by the English results in Great Britain
replacing Spain as the dominant world power and leads to a gradual
decline of Spanish influence in the New World and the widening of
English imperial interests
1590 - Roanoke found abandoned
1598 - deOnate leads Spanish into New Mexico
English found Jamestown, Virginia
French found Quebec -
1609 - Spanish found Santa Fe
1613 - A Dutch trading post is set up on lower
1619 - DUTCH DELIVER FIRST SLAVES TO VIRGINIA
November 9, the Mayflower ship lands at Cape Cod,
Massachusetts, with 101 colonists. On November 11, the
is signed by the 41 men, establishing a form of local government
in which the colonists agree to abide by majority rule and to
cooperate for the general good of the colony. The Compact sets
the precedent for other colonies as they set up governments.
1620’s - Puritans settle in Massachusetts
- In March, John Winthrop leads a Puritan migration of 900
colonists to Massachusetts Bay, where he will serve as the first
governor. In September, Boston is officially established and serves as
the site of Winthrop's government.
1634 - ANNE HUTCHINSON ARRIVES IN BOSTON
1636 - HARVARD
FOUNDED - In June, Roger Williams founds Providence and Rhode
Island. Williams had been banished from Massachusetts for "new and
dangerous opinions" calling for religious and political freedoms,
including separation of church and state, not granted under the Puritan
rules. Providence then becomes a haven for many other colonists fleeing
- Anne Hutchinson is banished from Massachusetts for
nonconformist religious views that advocate personal revelation over the
role of the clergy. She then travels with her family to Rhode Island.
- The first colonial printing press is set up in
1640 - 1659
- English Civil War erupts between the Royalists of King
Charles I and the Parliamentary army, eventually resulting in defeat for
the Royalists and the downfall of the monarchy. On January 30, 1649,
Kings Charles I is beheaded. England then becomes a Commonwealth and
Protectorate ruled by Oliver Cromwell.
- In Massachusetts, the general court approves a law that makes
religious heresy punishable by death.
- Rhode Island enacts the first law in the colonies declaring slavery
- The English monarchy is restored under King Charles II.
- The English Crown approves a Navigation Act requiring the exclusive
use of English ships for trade in the English Colonies and limits
exports of tobacco and sugar and other commodities to England or its
1661 - The French Royal government takes over direct control of
New France from the charter corporation and sends 1,000 soldiers to
- King Charles II establishes the colony of Carolina and grants the
territory to eight loyal supporters.
- Navigation Act of 1663 requires that most imports to the colonies must
be transported via England on English ships.
- The Dutch New Netherlands colony becomes English New York after Gov.
Peter Stuyvesant surrenders to the British following a naval blockade.
- Maryland passes a law making lifelong servitude for black slaves
mandatory to prevent them from taking advantage of legal precedents
established in England which grant freedom under certain conditions,
such as conversion to Christianity. Similar laws are later passed in New
York, New Jersey, the Carolinas and Virginia.
- The Royal Africa Company is given a monopoly in the English slave
- Dutch military forces retake New York from the British.
- The British Navigation Act of 1673 sets up the office of customs
commissioner in the colonies to collect duties on goods that pass
- The Treaty of Westminster ends hostilities between the English and
Dutch and returns Dutch colonies in America to the English.
1675 - 1676 - King Philip's War
erupts in New England between colonists and Native Americans as a result
of tensions over colonist's expansionist activities. The bloody war
rages up and down the Connecticut River valley in Massachusetts and in
the Plymouth and Rhode Island colonies, eventually resulting in 600
English colonials being killed and 3,000 Native Americans, including
women and children on both sides. King Philip (the colonist's nickname
for Metacomet, chief of the Wampanoags) is hunted down and killed on
August 12, 1676, in a swamp in Rhode Island, ending the war in southern
New England and ending the independent power of Native Americans there.
In New Hampshire and Maine, the Saco Indians continue to raid
settlements for another year and a half.
- Pennsylvania is founded as William Penn, a Quaker, receives a Royal
charter with a large land grant from King Charles II.
- French explorer La Salle explores the lower Mississippi Valley region
and claims it for France, naming the area Louisiana for King Louis XIV.
- A large wave of immigrants, including many Quakers, arrives in
Pennsylvania from Germany and the British Isles.
- The Duke of York ascends the British throne as King James II.
- Protestants in France lose their guarantee of religious freedom as
King Louis XIV revokes the Edict of Nantes, spurring many to leave for
- King James II begins consolidating the colonies of New England into
a single Dominion depriving colonists of their local political rights
and independence. Legislatures are dissolved and the King's
representatives assume all of the judicial and legislative power.
- In March, New England Royal Governor, Sir Edmund Andros, orders
Boston's Old South Meeting House to be converted into an Anglican
Church. In August, the Massachusetts towns of Ipswich and Topsfield
resist assessments imposed by Gov. Andros in protest of taxation without
- In March, Gov. Andros imposes a limit of one annual town meeting for
New England towns. The Governor then orders all militias to be placed
under his control.
- Quakers in Pennsylvania issue a formal protest against slavery in
- In December, King James II of England flees to France after
being deposed by influential English leaders.
- In February, William and Mary of Orange become King and Queen of
England. In April, New England Governor Andros is jailed by
rebellious colonists in Boston. In July, the English government orders
Andros to be returned to England to stand trial.
- The beginning of King William's War as hostilities in Europe
between the French and English spill over to the colonies. In
February, Schenectady, New York is burned by the French with the aid of
their Native American allies.
THE GLORIOUS REVOLUTION
- In New York, the newly appointed Governor of New England, Henry
Sloughter, arrives from England and institutes royally sanctioned
representative government. In October, Massachusetts gets a new royal
charter which includes government by a royal governor and a governor's
- In May, hysteria grips the village of Salem, Massachusetts, as
witchcraft suspects are arrested and imprisoned. A special court is
then set up by the governor of Massachusetts. Between June and
September, 150 persons are accused, with 20 persons, including 14 women,
being executed. By October, the hysteria subsides, remaining prisoners
are released and the special court is dissolved.
- The College of William and Mary is founded in Williamsburg,
- The Royal African Trade Company loses its slave trade monopoly,
spurring colonists in New England to engage in slave trading for profit.
In April, the Navigation Act of 1696 is passed by the English Parliament
requiring colonial trade to be done exclusively via English built ships.
The Act also expands the powers of colonial custom commissioners,
including rights of forcible entry, and requires the posting of bonds on
- The English Parliament passes the Wool Act, protecting its own wool
industry by limiting wool production in Ireland and forbidding the
export of wool from the American colonies.
- The Anglo population in the English colonies in America reaches
275,000, with Boston (pop. 7000) as the largest city, followed by New
York (pop. 5000).
- In June, Massachusetts passes a law ordering all Roman Catholic
priests to leave the colony within three months, upon penalty of life
imprisonment or execution. New York then passes a similar law.
- In July, The French establish a settlement at Detroit. In October,
Yale College is founded in Connecticut.
- In March, Queen Anne ascends the English throne. In May, England
declares war on France after the death of the King of Spain, Charles II,
to stop the union of France and Spain. This War of the Spanish
Succession is called Queen Anne's War in the colonies, where the English
and American colonists will battle the French, their Native American
allies, and the Spanish for the next eleven years.
- January 17, Benjamin Franklin is born in Boston. In November, South
Carolina establishes the Anglican Church as its official church.
- Hostilities break out between Native Americans and settlers in North
Carolina after the massacre of settlers there. The conflict, known as
the Tuscarora Indian War will last two years.
- In May, the Carolina colony is officially divided into North Carolina
and South Carolina. In June, the Pennsylvania assembly bans the
import of slaves into that colony. In Massachusetts, the first sperm
whale is captured at sea by an American from Nantucket.
- Queen Anne's War ends with the Treaty of Utrecht.