who had
been sent out from England.
Though the Plymouth Company had obtained exclusive grants and
privileges, they never achieved any actual colony. A band of
independents, numbering one hundred and two, whose extreme principles
led to their exile, first from England and then from Holland, landed at
a place called New Plymouth, in 1620. Half died within a year.
Nevertheless, the Pilgrims, as they were called, extended their
settlement. The distinction of the Pilgrims at Plymouth is that they
relied upon themselves, and developed their own resources. Salem was
begun in 1625, and for three years was called Naumkeag. In 1628, John
Endicott came from England with one hundred settlers, as Governor for
the Massachusetts Colony, extending from the Charles to the Merrimac
river. A royal charter was procured for the Governor and Company of
Massachusetts Bay in New England, and one thousand colonists, led by
John Winthrop, settled Boston, 1630. These colonists were Puritans, who
wished to escape political and religious persecution. They brought over
their own charter and developed a form of popular government. The
freemen of the town elected the governor and board of assistants, but
suffrage was restricted to members of the church. Representative
government was granted in other colonies, but in the royal colonies of
Virginia and New York, the executive officers and members of the upper
branch of the legislature were appointed by the Crown. In Maryland,
appointments were made in the same way by the Proprietor. Maryland was
founded 1632, by royal grant to Cecilius Calvert, Lord Baltimore.
The English colonies were divided in the middle by the Dutch at New
Amsterdam and the Swedes on the Delaware. The claim of the prior
discovery of Manhattan was raised by the English, who took New
Amsterdam, in 1664. Charles II. presented a charter to his brother,
James, Duke of York. East and west Jersey were formed out of part of the
grant.
The patent for the great territory included in the present state of
Pennsylvania was granted to William Penn in 1681. Penn laid the
foundations for a liberal constitution. Patents for the territory of
Carolina were given in 1663. Carolina reached the Spanish possessions in
the South.
The New England settlers spread westward and northward. Connecticut
adopted a written constitution in 1639. The charter of Rhode Island,
1663, confirmed the aim of its founder, Roger Williams, in the
separation of civil
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