The Great Puritan Migration and the Settling of New England

American colonial development was influenced by three main elements of the Protestant Reformation.

Henry VIII split England away from the Catholic Church Henry VIII split England away from the Catholic Church. His Anglican Church helped England compete with Spain on the global stage.

Martin Luther sparked the Reformation by splitting from the Catholic Church. His movement further strengthened existing cracks in the Church.

Partly inspired by Luther, John Calvin established Calvinism in 1536 with his work Institutes of the Christian Religion. Calvinism became the dominant root faith of the English settlers who colonized Massachusetts and the rest of New England.

Calvinism God is all powerful and all good. Because of original sin, humans are weak and wicked. God, who is all knowing, has a divine plan already laid out for everyone who will ever be born.

Calvinism Under this divine plan most humans, upon their deaths, are destined for. . .

However, a few have been chosen by God to go . . . Calvinism However, a few have been chosen by God to go . . .

Those who have been predestined for eternal salvation are known as… Calvinism Those who have been predestined for eternal salvation are known as… The Elect The Elect are the only people who will be saved. No matter what anyone else does, if they haven’t been chosen by God, they’re screwed.

The question for Calvin was, how could you tell if you were a member of the Elect of not? The secret was. . . Conversion

During conversion God revealed his saving grace to the Elect During conversion God revealed his saving grace to the Elect. He told them that they would be saved when they died. This communication with God was deeply personal and could take many forms.

The important thing was that a person was able to share their story of conversion with the leaders of the Church. Once a person had been converted and had shared their story, they were considered a “visible saint” and were admitted to full Church membership.

After conversion Calvinists were expected to lead proper lives demonstrating their holy behavior to the community.

Calvinists in England found themselves caught between the teachings of Calvin and the policies of Henry.

These Calvinists wanted the Anglican Church to be totally purged of Catholicism. They wanted it to be purified. These Puritans believed only those who had gone through conversion should be allowed in church. Henry believed otherwise. The more who attended, the more who gave money, and as head of the Anglican Church, the more money went into his pocket.

Outraged at the state of the Anglican Church, a group of Puritan separatists vowed to leave the Church and start their own. We know this group as. . .

The Pilgrims

In 1620 the Pilgrims set off in their ship the Mayflower bound for the Virginia Colony where they had secured the right to settle from the joint stock Virginia Company.

However, instead of landing here They actually land here. ?

Before leaving the ship, the men on board agreed to establish a form of democratic government for their settlement. This document is known as… The Mayflower Compact

Assisted by Native Americans and led by William Bradford, the Pilgrims set out to form a new society based strictly upon their Calvinist beliefs.

Meanwhile...

Puritans in England were increasingly persecuted by King James I, then King Charles I. Fearing for their safety, a group of Puritans secured a charter to establish the Massachusetts Bay Company which would in turn establish the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

Most Puritans saw the move as necessary, but it soon became something much more.

As more and more Puritans moved to the Bay Colony they came to view their settlement as a quasi “Heaven on Earth.”

Puritans became convinced that God was smiling on them by providing them the opportunity to build their own perfect society.

Preachers like John Winthrop firmly believed that the Puritans were God’s chosen people. He had made a covenant with them. He would look out for them and, in return, they would proclaim his glory by building a new society.

Winthrop taught that the Puritans would be an example for the world: “For we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill, the eyes of all people are upon us; so that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken, and so cause Him to withdraw His present help from us, we shall shame the faces of many of God’s worthy servants, and cause their prayers to be turned into curses . . ."

As a result, the Puritan faith and Puritan law, came to dominate the Massachusetts Bay Colony. While religious leaders could not actually hold government office, they held huge sway over events in the “Bible Commonwealth.”

Not only did the Puritans have a covenant with God, they had one with each other. This social covenant required strict belief by all community members in the Puritan faith, in the success of the colony, and in a mutual watchfulness to prevent anyone from deviating from the proper path.

The first threat to this way of life came from Anne Hutchinson Hutchinson suggested that living a holy life was no sure sign of eternal salvation. The truly saved, therefore, did not need to obey either God’s laws or the laws of the colony. This philosophy is known as. . . antinomianism

The second threat came from Roger Williams Williams argued that the Puritans needed to make a clean break with England. Because the charter of the Bay Colony was a document of the English then, he viewed it as illegitimate and the laws established under it to be void.

To deal with these threats the Massachusetts Bay government sent Hutchinson and Williams to what would become. . . Rhode Island

Williams helped found the Rhode Island Colony based upon religious tolerance and the right to vote for all males. This contrasted with Massachusetts were only males who were full members of the Puritan Church could vote.

Because they were moving for primarily religious reasons, Puritans moved their entire families to the New World, unlike settlers moving to Virginia, who largely came for economic reasons, leaving their families behind.

Each household was given it’s own plot of farm land Each household was given it’s own plot of farm land. The environment of New England did not lend itself to commercial agriculture, so this land was largely used for subsistence farming.

Owning land, and supporting the family, was the expectation of every Puritan man. God expected his chosen people to work hard, and they would not let him down.

Each family needed its own land and by 1650 colonists had spread out to large areas of New England. The colonies of Rhode Island and Connecticut were settled in 1636. New Hampshire joined in 1638.

As New Englanders continued to expand, they increasingly ran into conflict with local Native American tribes.

Pequot War 1636-1637: The first large scale clash between Natives and New Englanders.

His efforts proved futile and King Phillips war broke out in 1675. The Wampanoag chief Metacom forged alliances with other tribes in an effort to resist further New England expansion. His efforts proved futile and King Phillips war broke out in 1675.

The real cause of King Phillip's War was in fact. . .

The settlements that had been founded for religious reasons eventually found themselves tied to global commerce and trade. But the founding generations, never strayed far from the idea that their settlements were indeed “a city upon a hill.”

Fin.