A brief history of the USA
Early American history (before 1775).)
The first Americans
The first people appeared in America 10-15 thousand years ago, hitting Alaska through the frozen or shallowed Bering Strait. The tribes of the mainland of North America were divided and periodically at odds with each other. Famous Icelandic Viking Leif Erickson discovered America, calling it Vinland. The first visits to America by Europeans had no impact on the lives of indigenous people.
The discovery of America by Europeans
After the Vikings, the first Europeans in the New World were the Spaniards. In October 1492, a Spanish expedition led by Admiral Christopher Columbus arrived on the island of San Salvador. At the end of XV — beginning of XVI century there were several expeditions to the regions of the Western hemisphere. Standing in the service of the English king Henry VII, the Italian Giovanni Cabot reached the coast of Canada (1497-1498.), the Portuguese Pedro Alvares Cabral discovered Brazil (1500-1501.), the Spaniard Vasco núñez de Balboa founded the first city on the American mainland and went out to the Pacific ocean (1500-1513.), consisting in the service of the Spanish king Ferdinand Magellan in 1519-1521 he rounded the America from the South.
In 1507 Lorraine geographer Martin waldseemüller proposed to call the New world America in honor of Florentine Explorer Amerigo Vespucci. At the same time began the development of the continent. In 1513, the Spanish Conquistador Juan Ponce de Leon discovered the Florida Peninsula, where in 1565 the first permanent European colony was established and the city of St. Augustine was founded. In the late 1530s, Hernando de Soto discovered Mississippi and reached the Arkansas river valley.
By the time the colonization of America by the British and French began, the Spaniards had already settled firmly in Florida and the American southwest. The power and influence of the Spaniards in the New World began to decline after the defeat in 1588 of the Spanish Invincible Armada. During the XVI century information about new lands was collected, documentary sources were translated into many European languages.
Colonization of America by Europeans
The first English settlement in America originated in 1607 in Virginia and was named Jamestown. The trading post, founded by members of the crews of three English ships under the command of captain Newport, served at the same time as a watchtower on the way of the Spanish advance inland. In just a few years, Jamestown became a thriving village thanks to tobacco plantations planted there in 1609. By 1620 the population of the village was about 1000 people. European immigrants were attracted to America by the rich natural resources of a distant continent, and its remoteness from European religious dogmas and political preferences. Exodus to the New World was financed primarily by private companies and individuals who received income from the transportation of goods and people. In 1606 in England were formed London and Plymouth company, which engaged in the development of the North-East coast of America. Many immigrants moved to the New World with their families and communities at their own expense. Despite the attractiveness of the new lands, there was a constant shortage of human resources in the colonies.
At the end of August 1619, a Dutch ship arrived in Virginia, bringing black Africans to America, twenty of whom were immediately bought by the colonists as servants. In December 1620 on the Atlantic coast of Massachusetts came the ship "Mayflower" with 102 puritans-Calvinists. This event is considered the beginning of purposeful colonization of the continent by the British. They signed an agreement between them, called the Mayflower. It reflects in the most General form the first American colonists ' perceptions of democracy, self-government and civil liberties. Similar agreements were later concluded between the colonists of Connecticut, new Hampshire and Rhode island. After 1630 in Plymouth colony, the first colony of New England, later to become the colony of Massachusetts Bay, there arose no less than a dozen small towns in which they settled newly arrived English puritans. The immigration wave 1630-1643 he was taken to New England about 20 thousand people, 45 thousand settled in the colonies of the American South or on the Islands of Central America.