Thirteen States
The first European people who came to the east coast
of North America, in the 1600's and
1700's, came for many different reasons, so their settlements were very
different from each other. The earliest successful settlement was in Florida,
in 1565 AD, when Spanish explorers founded the city of St. Augustine.
The second successful settlement was in 1607, when English adventurers settled at Jamestown,
Virginia. The Paspahegh people who lived in the area tried to push them
out, but could not and were defeated. Dutch traders settled in New York
in 1614 to trade with the Iroquois
for furs. Another settlement was in Massachusetts in 1620, when the Puritans
came in the Mayflower from England to live according to their religion.
In 1631, Dutch traders settled in Delaware and made arrangements with the
local Delaware people to trade with them for furs. In 1681, a group of Quakers
came from England, led by a man called William Penn, and they called the
place where they settled down Pennsylvania (Penn's woods).
By the time of the American
Revolutionary War and the Declaration of Independence,
there were thirteen English colonies that decided to become the United States.
They were (from north to south):
- New Hampshire
- Massachusetts (Maine split off from Massachusetts later)
- Rhode Island
- Connecticut
- New York
- New Jersey
- Pennsylvania
- Delaware
- Maryland
- Virginia (Kentucky and West Virginia split off later)
- North Carolina (Tennessee split off later)
- South Carolina
- Georgia
Florida was English by this time but chose not to participate in the
Revolution.
