Massachusetts Bay Colony Dbq

The New England society of the Massachusetts bay colony and the Chesapeake colony of Virginia were different in development by the distinctive groups of colonist that built up their towns, religiously persecuted families that were looking to establish a perfect church society in the New England region, where as young single men came to look for gold and wealth in the Chesapeake region. Because of this difference in types of colonists, there was a major difference in the type of economy that came about. The New England colony mostly focused on community farming and shipbuilding because of the recourses surrounding the colony and Virginia had a cash crop driven economy and plantations. Despite these major differences, the regions were still similar …show more content…
The New England colony used their surrounding resources and focused on shipbuilding and mills for grain because the soil was not favorable for growing crops. The New England colonies were settled by families, they created community based economies with shared farms, called a “commons” and used the materials around them to build their economy. Such as the lumber from the large amounts of forests surrounding the colony to be used for shipbuilding. The Articles of Agreement was written for the colonist to put forth the basic rules of their colony. In this, they say that everyone will have a part of the community planting ground. This shows that they had a community farm that everyone had their part of. (Doc. 2) In Virginia, there were only the single men seeking wealth, so the economy was very hard to sustain. Virginia had a joint stock company chartered by James I to establish settlements along the coast of North America. This meant that stock was sold to investors who provided capital. This proved unsuccessful because instead of buying stocks, everyone focused on building their own farms and finding gold. Captain John Smith hated the gold seekers because, as the leader of the Virginia colony, he was upset that they were not participating in the company. He wrote the History of Virginia to express his anger and show the differences between the wealthy class, …show more content…
The Puritan’s religion affected their attitudes toward Native Americans. They thought of the Native Americans inferior because of their lifestyle, but many believed they could be converted to Christianity. The natives found Puritan conversion practices culturally insensitive, because they involved giving up their language, severing kinship ties with other Natives who had not been saved, and abandoning their traditional homes. There were also many large disputes over land with the Native Americans. Much of the disputes led to much warfare, one being King Philip’s war. King Philip’s War was a last major effort by the Native Americans of southern New England to drive out the English settlers. Led by Metacom, the Pokunoket chief called ‘King Philip’ by the English, Wampanoag Indians joined with the Nipmucks, Pocumtucks, and Narragansetts in a bloody uprising. It lasted fourteen months and destroyed twelve frontier towns. This was also apparent in the Virginian colonies as well. Due to many disputes with the Natives, Governor Berkeley, the royal governor of Virginia, had worked to establish peace with the tribes and successfully negotiated a settlement in which lands east of the Blue Ridge Mountains were reserved for the white settlers. However, the colonist began to spill over into Indian lands. This angered many