Once upon a time, in a land far away, lived a intrepid and wise man named Christopher Columbus. Columbus lived in a world of ignorant fools, who refused to believe that the earth was round. One day, Columbus convinced the King and Queen of Spain to give him some boats, so that he could prove his theory right. Columbus then sailed on the ocean blue, in the year 1492. He arrived in a Recent World, populated with dark-skinned savages, whom he educated and converted to the true gospel of Christ. Soon, scores of people flocked to the new world, bringing the imbecile Negroes of Africa with them. Years later, a group of brave Christians known as the Puritans set out upon the Mayflower, in hopes of creating a better world. When they arrived in Massachusetts, these pilgrims became best friends with their savage Indian neighbors, who were so happy to have them there. Together, the Puritans and Indians created Thanksgiving, by eating turkey, singing songs, and praying to God. Then they all lived happily ever after.

Any person with even an elementary understanding of history is more than gracious of seeing through the sarcasm of this fairytale. To suggest that such a fable provides a just and correct account would invoke laughter and scorn from most. Despite this knowledge, there are aloof many who have succumbed to a fairytale of their own. They own that the New World was a land of freedom, opportunity, and wealth for European immigrants, who were blessed by the watchful hand of Providence. While their assertion is partially true, its bias is determined. Such a perspective fails to recognize what the Original World meant to the thousands of Africans, who instead of freedom, found themselves in chains in the New World. It also negates the opinions of millions of Natives, who had called this “Fresh World” home for centuries. Such a simple perspective also denies us the opportunity of understanding the numerous nations, cultures, religions, social classes and motivations of Europe, which all contributed to American colonization. In essence, the colonization of America was not a simple affair, but a complex series of events that changed the world forever. By studying the various European motivations for colonization, and how these motivations impacted both the Native Americans and the Africans, we can better understand the true nature of American colonization, and the impact it left on the world.

For years, the history of American colonization has been wrapped up in a counterfeit blanket of ignorance. This blanket has provided a warped sense of warmth and comfort, which has given many a cheerful but misled understanding of the past. Though the established myths of popular culture provide an uplifting account of American colonization, they neglect essential truths that help allotment the puzzle together. For example, to suggest that American colonization was a loving endeavor, brought to pass by God himself, is hard to prove conclusively when we take into account the actual motivations for colonization. From the English perspective, the elder Richard Hakluyt made it clear that the main motivations for colonization were, “To plant Christian religion, To trafficke, To conquer” (Mancall, 39). These three clear motivations inspired a wide range of settlers, all of whom were driven by different motivations.

There is no doubt that the establishment of Christianity was a strong motivation for American colonization. From the very beginning, many explorers were driven by religious convictions, which propelled them into the unknown. Alan Taylor, author of the book American Colonies: The Settlement of North America, claims that Columbus desired to convert those he encountered to Christianity and, “to recruit their bodies and their wealth to assist Europeans in a final crusade to crush Islam and reclaim Jerusalem. Such a victory would then invite Christ’s return to earth” (33). The Franciscan Friars of Spain were also motivated to migrate to America, in an effort to convert the Pueblo Indians. Upon their arrival, the Friars committed themselves to eradicating faded Indian traditions. They raided homes, confiscated ceremonial emblems, destroyed idols, and defiled native gods (Benjamin, 89). The Friars also sought to undermine the family traditions of the Pueblo Indians, by indoctrinating their youth, restricting their sexual activities, and emasculating the men (Benjamin, 92-93).

The Spanish were not the only European nation that sought for Indian conversion. The French Jesuits were also ambitiously active in converting Indians to their tag of Catholicism. With a full realization that the Protestant movement had arrived in the Fresh World, the Jesuits became ambitious missionaries. They hoped that by converting the Indians to Catholicism, the French would be able to make them more reliable allies (Taylor, 107). In many cases, the Jesuits were able to assert themselves as equally powerful with the tribal shamans. By using Catholic rituals, the Jesuits endeavored to call down the powers of heaven. As Alan Taylor puts it, “the Jesuit priests believed that their rituals…could induce God to provide immediate relief: needed rain, abundant game, or the destruction of a crop pest” (110). By establishing their “magical” abilities among the tribes, many French Jesuits gained substantial influence over the Native Americans.

With the Spanish and French pressing their Catholic agendas on the natives of the New World, England quickly realized that they too needed to get involved. For the English, the establishment of Christianity in the New World seems somewhat contradictory. In his list of goods and services needed to successfully keep a colony, the elder Richard Hakluyt makes no mention of missionaries, bibles, or any other service that would have been significant in establishing Christianity in the New World (Mancall, 41-44). The Younger Richard Hakluyt only mentions transporting missionaries and bibles at the end of his list, as almost a side notice (Mancall, 59). The majority of emphasis, when it came to provisions for colonization, was clearly placed on food commodities and defense.

This evidence however, is not indicative of a lack of interest in the expansion of Christianity in the New World. Through the efforts of King Henry VIII and his daughter Elizabeth I, England had broken its allegiance to the Roman Catholic church and embraced the new movement of Protestantism. This current Christian movement dramatically changed many relationships in Europe. Spain and France, who were already heavily involved in colonization, clearly supported Catholicism, and had already begun its preaching in the Current World. For England, this posed a serious threat that had to be put in check. As Karen Kupperman states in her book Roanoke, The Abandoned Colony:

“We should not underestimate the emotional force of this confrontation between Christians, which has been compared to the Cold War of the twentieth century. Each side believed the other was absolved by its religion of all normal moral and ethical behavior in dealing with the enemy, and capable of the most obnoxious plots” (4).

To the English, there was nothing worse than confronting the possibility of a New World ruled under the banner of the Pope.

Arguably the most famous immigration to the New World for religious purposes is the Puritans. During the early years of the 17^th century, the Puritans suffered from religious persecution in their home country. Under the reign of King Charles I, who tried to reconcile England with the Catholic Church (Taylor, 164), Puritans found themselves searching for a safe haven. America, being a complete ocean away, must have seemed like a reasonable option. In an effort to convince other Puritan faithful that America could be their sanctuary, John Winthrop wrote, “who knows but that god hath provided this place to be a refuge for many whom he meanes to establish out of the generall callamitie, and seeinge the Church hath no dwelling lefte to flie into but the wildernesse…” (Mancall, 135). After much deliberation, 102 brave Puritans boarded the now infamous Mayflower, and set skim to seek their asylum. As Nathaniel Philbrick, author of the book Mayflower states, “It was a stunningly audacious proposition. With the exception of Jamestown, all other attempts to establish a permanent English settlement in North America had so far failed. And Jamestown, founded in 1607, could hardly be counted a success” (5). It would be foolish for anyone to question the religious convictions of these Puritans. They left their homes, braved the seas, endured harsh winters, suffered sicknesses, and labored endlessly to create their Utopia. Despite their hardships and shortcomings, this group of immigrants established a successful colony, and their legacy is revered even to this day.

There is no doubt that religion played a vital role in American colonization. As important as religious fervor was, it was not the exclusive motivation for settling the New World. The drive to save trade with the Indians, and to conquer new lands, was impartial as significant as the drive to spread Christianity. Contrary to popular opinion, European colonization was not an explosive and daring operation. Instead of seeking to further humanity’s knowledge of the unknown world, many explorers hoped to find lands and cultures that could be exploited for profit. As Alan Taylor states, “the adventurers did not pursue exploration for pure love of geographic knowledge…They proceeded incrementally…seeking the sources of known commodities” (29). Instead of being a benevolent voyage to chart the unknown, most European exploration was empowered “to exploit opportunity for immediate profits” (Benjamin, 24).

The conquest of the Aztecs by Hernando Cortes is a prime example of the profit-hungry intentions, which many explorers exhibited. Like many other conquistadores, Cortes came from the Spanish gentry. To turn a profit, men like Cortes depended on their ability to plunder, conquer, and enforce their will on others. Alan Taylor sums up the life of a conquistador perfectly when he writes, “Greed was the prerequisite for pursuing the hard life of a conquistador” (58). Upon discovering the riches of the Aztecs, Cortes held to the Spanish law of conquest, which demanded that all Indians were required to submit to Spanish rule, or receive the punishments of a “just war” (Taylor, 58). By gaining the allegiance of neighboring tribes, who detested the Aztecs, Cotes was able to conquer a literal treasure of wealth for himself and his nation.

The conquests of the Spanish in the New World provided an incredible amount of wealth for the home world. Between 1500 and 1650, Spanish settlers shipped home 181 tons of gold, and 16,000 tons of silver (Taylor, 63). With such a bountiful supply of riches, the Spanish government moved to monopolize on the market. They made it illegal for all foreigners to trade directly with the colonies, which forced them do deal directly with Spain (Benjamin 135). Such a policy protected Spain from losing this very lucrative market.

Spain was not the only European nation to seek economic gain in the New World. England quickly caught the fever of colonization, believing that the New World was an undiscovered Utopia, overflowing with untapped potential. In their planning, Europeans perceived the New World to be a bountiful paradise, which “bringeth forth all things in abundance, as in the first creation, without toil or labor” (Kupperman, 17). This Eden-like New World must have appealed to the hopes and imaginations of many English, especially considering all the poverty, disease and warfare that had plagued Europe over the years. There is small doubt that such hopes and dreams grew into unrealistic fantasies for many who longed for a better world. Speaking from his perspective, nevertheless lacking a elephantine understanding of global weather patterns, the elder Richard Hakluyt made the following assumption of what settlers could examine in the new world:

This land that we purpose to direct our course to, lying in part in the 40 degree of latitude, being in like heat as Lisbone in Portugall doth, and in the more Southerly part as the most Southerly coast of Spaine doth, may by our diligence yeeld unto us besides Wines and Oiles and Sugars, Orenges, Limons, Figs, Resings, Almonds, Rice…” (Mancall, 38)

Returning from his original explorations to the New World, Sir Richard Grenville stated that “we have discovered the main to be the goodliest soil under the cope of heaven” (Kupperman, 34-35). With such a Utopia awaiting them, Englishmen began gathering and making preparations for a stride that would ultimately make England even mightier than it already was. All of these men, “had an image of England’s future greatness and the exhilarating feeling that they were the people who would do it near true” (Kupperman, 30). From the English perspective, there was a clear expectation of a bountiful, fertile, and relatively easy to maintain oasis that awaited them, and that England would become even greater because of it.

All of these diverse motivations for colonizing the Modern World inevitably created a tremendous amount of tension between the rival European powers. Not only were these countries competing to control a distant continent, they were also sweltering in the heat of previous hostilities in their homelands. Many of these European nations had been at war for centuries, and their competition to control the New World became a new chapter in the hatred they shared for one another. For the countless number of French and English colonists who took the slither to the Current World, colonial life would design many of the same struggles they had left behind in the homeland. Old hostilities between rival nations came to the surface in America, as European wars raged back home. With the outbreak of King William’s War in 1689, the American colonies “began a cycle of imperial wars…that would be waged on American soil up through the American Revolution” (Haefeli, 28). Hostilities between England and France would continue for nearly a century, as both nations took to arms in both Europe and America.

Hostilities would rage in the colonies until 1761, when the Seven Years War finally settled the English/French feud in America. Like other wars, the Seven Years War irrupted over land rights. The English, determined to oust the French from the Ohio territories, sent a regiment of troops to evict the French trespassers (Taylor, 428). The English sent their prominent but unprepared General Braddock to America, to crush the French and take the land by force. Braddock’s plan was sound by European standards, but ineffective on the American frontier. As stated in Fred Anderson’s book Crucible of War, Braddock’s knowledge of the terrain was severely limited, due to the poor intelligence he had on the area (87-89). After seven years of bloody conflict, both the French and English agreed to peace. In the Treaty of Paris, France was required to give up its lands in North America. Even though the French lost their lands in North America, they were able to keep many of their most coveted colonies in the Indies. Despite this consolation, it is clear that “the Peace of Paris was a phenomenal diplomatic coup for Britain” (Anderson, 506).

Despite the multitude of afflictions suffered by the various European colonists, there is another group that suffered far more than England, Spain, and France combined: the Native Americans. It is often easy to forget the role that Native Americans played in American colonization. After all, history in modern America is often taught from an Anglo perspective. For the various tribes of the “New World,” the history of American colonization is a sunless tale of disease, deceit, and dependency. These tribes had developed unique cultures, religions, and beliefs, which took centuries to establish. In just a few years time, much of the Native American way of life would be lost forever.

The arrival of European explorers, onboard their massive wooden ships with large white sails, must have been a dramatic event for Native Americans. Some cultures may have even considered these European visitors as divine. When Cortes arrived at Tenochtilan, many accounts claim that Moctezuma considered him to be the returning god Quetzaquatl (Taylor, 53). Unfortunately for many natives, these alleged beliefs that Europeans were divine were quickly destroyed. Men like Cortes and others took advantage of their newfound fame, and quickly exploited it to their advantage. Columbus alluded to the true intentions of Europeans when he stated, “when they [the natives] have got rid of the cruel habits to which they have become accustomed, [they] will be better than any other kind of slave” (Benjamin, 43). In these native populations, most Europeans saw nothing more than an abundant work force. Rarely did they believe the religious or cultural beliefs of the “savages.”

To compound the problem even more for the natives was an invisible invasion that caused more horror than any conquistador was capable of. Foreign diseases and pathogens, which Europeans had adapted to and were able to overcome, killed about half the natives within the first decade of contact (Taylor, 39). It was the silent colonizers of the human body that nearly crippled the Native American world. The devastation of disease was so catastrophic that “nearly everyone in a village became ill at the same time,” and, “few could care for the sick” (Taylor, 42). Without an ocean’s distance to protect the natives from smallpox, measles, diphtheria, malaria, influenza, and others diseases, the mighty Indian nations quickly fell to their slight predators. Whatever the disease was, the only thing that matters is that “there was undeniably an avalanche of disease that decimated all Native American peoples” (Benjamin, 171).

The arrival of European settlers was a landmark event for Native Americans, whose lives would never again be the same. As the boats continued to arrive, Indians were quickly driven further away from their native lands. This migration caused feuding not only with the colonists, but with rival tribes, who were faced with the same difficulties as well. These Native American tribes, once powerful and thriving nations, were slowly reduced to a state of dependency. The afflictions of disease, deceit, and dependency ravaged the Indian way of life, and ushered in a new era known as colonial America.

Paralleling the conquest of the Native American tribes was the African migration to the New World as slave labor. Having lost a much number of native slaves to disease, European settlers turned elsewhere to fill the void, and Africa was a logical choice. Africans had already been exposed to the idea of slavery long before colonization of the New World. As Taylor points out, “West African societies had long enslaved war captives and convicted criminals for sale to Arab traders…” (31). For the most part, Africans had a stronger immunity to European diseases than did Native Americans. After losing so many Indians to disease, there is little doubt that colonizers viewed blacks as valuable “commodities” for that very reason.

Securing the human “property” was an entirely different matter, which caused Europeans a great deal of trouble. Most colonists were content to follow a system of raiding and plunder that had worked in the past (Benjamin, 24). Once in control of the plundered land, many colonizers converted the natives into slaves. Having achieved success in the past with this system, European colonizers saw no reason why they would have a different result in Africa. Africa however, would prove to be much different. Having established their presence, African peoples along the west coast of their continent proved to be a formidable opponent to the Europeans. John Thornton points out that “West Africans had well-developed specialized maritime culture that was fully gracious of protecting its own waters” (Benjamin, 26). Unable to conquer the Africans in the west, and in desperate need of slave labor, “the Europeans had to abandon the time-honored tradition of trading and raiding and substitute a relationship based more or less on still regulated trade” (Benjamin, 27). As a result, the African elites were more than willing to trade slaves with European colonizers, just as they had been doing with Arab nations. Hugh Thomas states that, “The large labor force would not have been available to the Europeans in the Americas without the cooperation of African kings, merchants, and noblemen” (Benjamin, 146). With a new slave force, both European colonizers and African slave traders stood to make a fortune in the revenue created by the hands of Negroes.

The story of colonial America is a complicated collection of various nations, events and motivations, which created a dynamic world full of conflict. Contrary to the beliefs of many Americans today, the settlement of the Fresh World was not as cut and dry as we wish it to be. For those who maintain that American colonization was an honorable, benevolent, and glorious event that promotes a sense of patriotism, the facts suggest that they are lying to themselves. Pointing out such truths is neither blasphemous nor un-American. It is simply the way things were. The different motivations that Europeans had for colonizing the New World directly impacted the lives of millions of Native Americans, who had considered this land their home for centuries. These motivations also impacted the lives of thousands of Africans, who were subjugated to the evils of slavery. It is unfortunate that many people are unwilling to embrace these truths, since they have some valuable lessons to teach. One wonders if history would have been different had the American settlers learned this valuable lesson as well.

Bibliography

Anderson, Fred. Crucible of War: The Seven Years War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754-1766. New York: Random House Inc., 2000.

Benjamin, Thomas, Hall, Timothy, and Rutherford, David, eds. The Atlantic World in the Age of Empire. Original York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2001.

Haefeli, Evan and Sweeney, Kevin. Captors and Captives: The 1704 French and Indian Raid on Deerfield. University of Massachusetts Press, 2003.

Kupperman, Karen. Roanoke: The Abandoned Colony. Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 1984.

Mancall, Peter, ed. Envisioning America: English Plans for the Colonization of North America. Boston: Bedford Books, 1995.

Philbrick, Nathaniel. Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community and War. New York: Penguin Books, 2006.

Taylor, Alan. American Colonies: The Settling of North America. New York: Penguin Books, 2001.