Compare and contrast the different colonial regions established in British North America. In what ways were they similar or different?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

ANSWER:
Students should group the colonies into three basic geographic categories: New England, the Middle Atlantic, and the South. The motives for colonization differed. Some were private ventures whose purpose was escape from religious persecution, and others were private ventures designed to gather wealth. Some colonies were established by the monarchy, while others were given only a royal blessing. Their modes of settlement and the types of societies they established varied as widely as their means of supporting themselves. The English added a new system of compulsory labor to the Americas: indentured servants eventually accounted for approximately 80 percent of all English immigrants to Virginia and Maryland. However, as life expectancy in the colonies improved, planters purchased more slaves. As a result, the slave population of Virginia grew rapidly. In the northern part of the Carolinas, an economy based on tobacco and forest products encouraged a slow expansion of slavery. In Charleston and the interior of South Carolina, settlers began to imitate the slave plantation systems of Brazil and the Caribbean. The introduction of rice and indigo crops attracted an increasing flow of African slaves. The New England colonies differed dramatically from the southern economies. New England climate and resources did not favor cash crop agriculture. Instead, New Englanders traded fish, timber, fur, and other forest products. New England also provided commercial and shipping services to the American colonies. Slaves and indentured servants were present in New England, but in very small numbers because of the lack of cash crop agriculture. Therefore, environmental factors and geography played a role in the experience of slaves and the demand for slave labor.