The New England colonies were founded by religious dissenters seeking freedom to practice their faith. The Pilgrims established Plymouth colony in 1620 and signed the Mayflower Compact to govern themselves. Puritans later founded the Massachusetts Bay colony, attracting over 15,000 immigrants during the Great Migration of the 1630s. Religious intolerance led to the founding of additional colonies, including Rhode Island, Connecticut, and New Hampshire, which developed early forms of democratic government and separation of church and state. Conflicts with Native Americans erupted into King Philip's War in 1675, resulting in the decline of indigenous populations in New England.

1. NEW ENGLAND COLONIES

2. 1. dissent – disagreement with an opinion
2. persecute – to treat someone harshly because of their beliefs
3. Puritans – Protestants who wanted to reform the Anglican Church
4. Separatists – Protestants who wanted to leave the Anglican Church and found
their own churches
5. Pilgrims – Separatists who journeyed to the colonies to escape religious
persecution

3. 6. Mayflower Compact – a formal document that provided law and order to the
Plymouth colony in 1620
7. toleration – the acceptance of different beliefs
8. immigrants – people who leave the country where they are born to live in
another country
9. treaty – a formal agreement between countries
10. constitution – the basic principles of a government
11. midwife – a woman trained to assist in childbirth

5. • England had been a Protestant country since 1534, when King Henry VIII
formed the Anglican Church (Church of England)
• Many people in England dissented, however; English Catholics were
persecuted for their beliefs

6. • Puritans wanted to reform the Anglican Church, remaining part of the Church
but changing some aspects
• Others, called Separatists, wanted to leave the Anglican Church and set up their
own churches
• Separatists who had fled to the Netherlands
arranged to go to Virginia to practice
their religion freely
• In 1620 these Separatists, now calling
themselves Pilgrims, set sail on a ship
called the Mayflower.

8. • Though they had planned to settle in Virginia, they stopped at the first land
they saw, today called Cape Cod
• They went ashore on Plymouth Rock, led by William Bradford

9. • The Pilgrims drew up a
document called the
Mayflower Compact.
• In this document, they pledged
their loyalty to England and
promised to pass laws for
the “general good of the colony”
• The Mayflower Compact was
one of the first attempts at
self-government in the English colonies,
an important step in the development
of representative government in America

10. • In the winter of 1620, almost half of the Pilgrims died of disease, cold, and
malnutrition
• That spring, two Native Americans,
Tisquantum (Squanto) and Samoset,
befriended the colonists and
showed them how to plant food,
and how to hunt and fish
• In March of 1621, the Pilgrims signed
a treaty with the Wampanoag leader named
Massasoit. This treaty ensured that the
groups would live in harmony

11. FYI: The event that Americans commonly call
the "First Thanksgiving" was celebrated by the
Pilgrims after their first harvest in the New
World in October 1621. This feast lasted three
days, and—as accounted by attendee Edward
Winslow—it was attended by 90 Native
Americans and 53 Pilgrims.

12. • In 1629, a group of Puritans who had left England formed the Massachusetts
Bay Company and established a colony north of Plymouth
• John Winthrop was the colony’s governor
• In 1634, a woman named Anne Hutchinson came
to the Massachusetts Bay Colony from England
- She was a nurse and midwife in Boston
- An outspoken woman, she had different views
about religion than the local ministers
- She was put on trial for her “radical” ideas, and was
forced out of the colony

13. • During the 1630s, the Great Migration took place.
• More than 15,000 Puritans escaped religious persecution in England and
went to Massachusetts
• The colony’s laws were made by a General Court until 1634, when the
settlers demanded a role in their government
• The General Court became an elected assembly
• New colonies were formed due to the Puritans lack of toleration for other
religious views

14. FYI:

16. • Colonists began settling in Connecticut in 1634; the town of Hartford was
founded by Thomas Hooker in 1636
• The colony of Connecticut was formed in 1639
• Their plan of government was called the Fundamental Orders of
Connecticut, which became the first written constitution in America

17. • In 1635, minister Roger Williams was forced out
of Massachusetts because he had views that
opposed the government’s role in religion, and
was against the settlers taking Native American
land
• The Narraganset people sold Williams land that
became the town of Providence
• Williams received a charter for Rhode Island in
1644
• This colony became a safe place for dissenters,
and was the first place in America to practice
the ideals of religious freedom for people of all
faiths

18. • In 1638, John Wheelwright went north
to found the colony of New Hampshire,
which became independent from
Massachusetts in 1679

19. • Throughout the colonial period,
English settlers and Native Americans
competed for control of the land
• War between the groups broke
out in 1636, and again in 1675
• In 1675, King Philip’s War destroyed
the power of the Native Americans
in New England
• This left the colonists free
to expand their settlements