Chapter 4: The Mosaic of EighteenthCentury America

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Chapter 4 The Mosaic of Eighteenth-Century
America

• Preview British colonials were such a diverse,
  contentious lot that any hope of political union
  seemed utterly impractical.Yet despite such
  disagreements, a majority of white colonials took
  pride in their English traditions and in
  membership in a powerful empire.
• The Highlights
• Forces of Division
• Slave Societies in the Eighteenth-Century South
• Enlightenment Awakening in America
• Anglo-American Worlds of the Eighteenth Century
• Toward the Seven Years War

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Learning Outcomes 18th c

• Be knowledgeable concerning the rivalry between
  France and England in North America
• Comprehend to conflict between the tidewater and
  the backcountry in colonial America
• Ability to explain the rising tide of black
  resistance to slavery in the south
• Awareness of the spread of Enlightenment ideas in
  America
• Awareness of the influence of the first Great
  Awakening in all the colonies
• Understand how the presence of the French on the
  frontier changed British Imperial design

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Forces of Division

• Immigration Natural Increase
• Ethnic diversity
• 250,000 enslaved African immigrants
• 250,000 Scots-Irish
• 135,000 Germans
• Some Swiss, Swedes, Highland Scots, Spanish
  Jews
• Birthrate three times higher than today

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The Mosaic of 18th Century America (4)

• Expanding Horizons
• Cultures of the Backcountry
• Scotch-Irish Germans
• Native Americans
• Middle Ground

America in 1750
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• The Settlement of the Backcountry
• Settlers from older communities stream into rural
  western sections of Pennsylvania, Virginia, and
  the Carolinas
• Isolated Backcountry society
• Few legal religious institutions
• Presence of frontier women vital
• Social Conflict on the Frontier
• 1763 Paxton boys protest inadequate protection
  from Indians
• Absence of courts, regulators, or vigilantes
  mete out justice in backcountry
• Ethnic differences spark tensions

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The settlement of the frontier also triggered
disputes between colonies over their boundaries.
At the root of the confusion were the old
colonial charters and their vague definitions of
western borders that allowed groups of settlers
and speculators from different colonies to claim
the same tract of land(117).

• Boundary Disputes Tenant Wars
• Settlement of frontier prompts bitter disputes
  between colonies over boundaries
• 1760s Ethan Allen the Green Mountain Boys
  resist New York governance of Vermont
• Tenant insurrection throughout the Northeast

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• The Seaports Entrepot
• Eighteenth-Century Seaports
• All major colonial cities were seaports
• Merchants artisans dominant
• Blacks, both free slave, numerousheld Negro
  election days which honored black leaders
• Different experiences for women in urban settings
• Social Conflict in Seaports
• Ethnic religious diversity created tensions
• Class resentment also palpable

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Slave Societies in the 18th Century South

• The Slave Family Community
• 1700-1740 peak years for importation of African
  slaves into the colonies
• By mid-century, natural reproduction created
  American-born slave majority
• Elaborate kinship networks evolved, but
  relationships always vulnerable to sale
• African influences perpetuated in religion,
  music, skills, and folktales

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• Slavery Colonial Society in French Louisiana
• Louisiana Experience of Africans was different
  than that of Africans in rest of North America
• 1729 Africans joined forces with Indians in the
  Natchez Revolt
• Greater freedom for blacks in Louisiana

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Throughout the eighteenth century, slave
rebellions occurred far less frequently on the
mainland of North America than in the Caribbean
or Brazil (126).

• Slave Resistance in 18th Century British North
  America
• Slaves use both overt subtle methods to resist
  enslavement
• 1739 Stono Rebellion in South Carolina the
  largest of the colonial period
• Slave rebellions in America less frequent than in
  the Caribbean

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Enlightenment Awakening in America

• The Enlightenment in America
• Ben Franklin many colonial leaders devotees of
  the Enlightenment ideals
• Movement of rational Christianity Christian
  beliefs must be reasonable
• Many ministers grow concerned over the growth of
  rationalism
• The First Great Awakening
• Evangelical reaction to rationalism
• 1739-41 George Whitfield tours the colonies,
  attracting many to his enlivened worship
• Message appeals to all classes ethnicities

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The Aftermath of the Great Awakening

• Movement deepens divide between religious
  factions
• Growth of Baptist Presbyterian churches
• Colonial diversity accentuated
• by the Great Awakening

Jonathan Edwards, 1703-1758
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18th Century Patterns of Settlement

• French
• expansion
• fur trade
• English
• Appalachians
• backcountry
• Non-English
• Scots-Irish
• Germans
• Dutch

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Anglo-American Worlds of the 18th Century

• English Economic Social Development
• Large financial institutions textile factories
  dominate Englands economy
• colonies are predominantly rural
• Londons population in 1750 675,000
• 90 of all colonists live in towns of fewer than
  2,000

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• The Consumer Revolution
• English producers sold appealing array of
  consumer goods to colonists
• Consumption of imported manufactures rose 120
  percent, 1750-1773
• Inequality in England and America
• Clear class distinctions in England
• Colonists ambivalent toward English grandeur
• Concerned over the idle classes in England, both
  rich and poor

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Overseas Trade Networks
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The Mosaic of 18th Century America (4)

• Politics British Theory American Practice
• The English Constitution
• The Reality
• Commonwealthmen
• Governing the Colonies
• American Experience
• Colonial Assemblies

Virginia House of Burgesses
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The Mosaic of 18th Century America

• The Imperial System before 1760
• English policy of benign neglect
• Imperial Wars
• King William's Queen Annes Wars
• Albany Congress (1754)
• Toward the
• Seven Years War

Benjamin Franklin, Pennsylvania Gazette 1754
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• Toward the Seven Years War
• William Pitts designs to make England the most
  powerful imperial nation in Europe
• Events alter Americans conception of themselves
  as English

The Albany Congress had demonstrated that a few
Americans like Franklin had seen beyond the
diversity of a divided colonial world to the
possibility of union.But it would take another
war, one that restructured an empire, before some
Americans saw in themselves a likeness that was
not English (136).
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Key Words and Terms (4)

• Middle Ground
• Pueblo Revolt, 1680
• deference
• Benjamin Franklin
• Enlightenment
• dame schools
• evangelical Christianity
• Richard Allen
• millennium

• Board of Trade and Plantations
• Imperial Wars
• John Trenchard/Thomas Gordon
• Albany Plan of Union
• Fort Necessity
• Ethan Allen the Green Mountain Boys
• William Pitt

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Summary Learning Outcomes 18th c

• Be knowledgeable concerning the rivalry between
  France and England in North America
• Comprehend to conflict between the tidewater and
  the backcountry in colonial America
• Ability to explain the rising tide of black
  resistance to slavery in the south
• Awareness of the spread of Enlightenment ideas in
  America
• Awareness of the influence of the first Great
  Awakening in all the colonies
• Understand how the presence of the French on the
  frontier changed British Imperial design