Part Two

• The age of the Tudor and Stuart monarchs was one of momentous change. Under the Tudors, England and Wales were finally united and large parts of Ireland came under direct English control. The Tudors and the Scottish royal family, the Stuarts, came together through marriage too, and later the two countries united under one king. For many, Britain became a more prosperous place as farming and industry expanded. There was also a surge in overseas trade too, as British explorers and even pirates found new sea routes across the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. These adventurers laid strong foundations for an overseas empire.
• In the late 1400s, improvements in technology for ships and navigation meant longer journeys were possible, and more ships returned from these journeys.
• In 1492, Christopher Columbus (who was working for the Spanish) set sail across the Atlantic Ocean, hoping to find new routes to India and China by sea. Instead, by sailing west, he 'discovered a group of islands, later known as the West Indies, which Europeans didn't know existed. In fact, he had found the continents we now know as the American
• Soon more explorers from Spain, and then Portugal, set sail for the Americas to claim land for their monarchs
• Spain was the first major nation to colonise the Americas
• The Spanish discovered gold in South America, which made them rich
• In 1496, the Tudor King Henry VII joined this age of exploration when he gave the adventurer, John Cabot, the mission of finding new lands
• From the port of Bristol, Cabot sailed westwards across the Atlantic, and landed on the coast of North America in what is now Canada. But there were no great riches or obvious financial gains to be found in this newly discovered place-no silks and no gold-so Cabot returned home. However, Cabot's brief visit marked the start of the British Empire. Over time, British settlers would move out to live in what was named Newfoundland, and eventually settle all along the east coast of North America. Establishing a base now meant that other British adventurers, such as Sir John Hawkins and Sir Walter Raleigh, could explore and claim further territory. They could also plunder riches from Spanish ships and colonies
• Privateer


  Sailor with permission from the king or queen to attack foreign ships and steal from them
• Piracy


  Attacking and stealing from foreign ships without permission from the monarch
• It is important to note that there was a religious dimension to the competition between Spain and England at this time-Spain was Catholic and England was Protestant. This religious rivalry gave an added edge to the desire of each country's monarch to gain more land and increase their power base
• As Britain failed to find any of its own gold, it used other methods: one of the ways to which countries obtained wealth and riches at this time was simply taking it from another country's ships or territory
• Any sailor with permission from the king or queen-known as a privateer- could attack foreign ships and steal from them. This permission was granted as long as the privateers shared anything they stole with the monarch. Any sailors who didn't have permission and kept any treasure for themselves, were considered pirates. An estimated 10 to 15 per cent of all Spanish treasure ships were successfully captured by rival countries
• Some successful British privateers also took part in piracy-keeping the plunder for themselves rather than sharing it with the monarch
• Hawkins was the second son of a man named William Hawkins, who sailed in trading expeditions to West Africa in the 1530s. In his youth, John Hawkins first voyages were to the Spanish Canary Islands in the Atlantic. He became a respected English naval commander, merchant, privateer and pirate, and was responsible for building up the Elizabethan Royal Navy
• He was the cousin of another famous explorer, Sir Francis Drake. Hawkins narrowly escaped with his life in a battle with the Spanish at San Juan de Ulua in 1568. He and Drake were caught in an attack from the Spanish after they thought they had negotiated a truce. Drake and the others took vengeance for the treachery and the losses they suffered
• Explorers like Drake, Hawkins and Morgan made lots of money for Britain as privateers, by stealing fortunes from Spanish and Portuguese ships. However, by the late 1500s, it became clear that there were other ways to make money out of the New World of the Americas. Britain set up colonies there, and by the 1600s, developed huge farms called plantations, where crops like sugar and cotton were grown
• There were a number of reasons (or factors) why people could go to the Americas, including religious factors where some religious groups such as Puritans and Catholics felt they were not permitted to worship as they wished in Britain, so they left to settle in a place where they would have greater religious freedom
• Following the establishment of the first successful British colony in Virginia in 1607 (during the Stuart King James I's reign), more people were willing to move to the New World so as to find land and to make money. Homes were built and there was plenty of land to grow crops such as corn, tobacco, and potatoes. These were grown on large farms called plantations, which could grow huge quantities. The crops were then exported back to Britain for great profit. This was a key factor that made the hardship of settling (including harsh weather, hunger and conflicts with Native Americans or indigenous people) worthwhile
• It wasn't just North America where British businessmen (or colonists) were setting up plantations. They also set up plantations in the West Indies, such as Barbados (1625) and the Cayman Islands (1670)
• From the 1580s onwards, British merchants became involved in the slave trade, and in 1619, the first African slaves arrived in Virginia in America. Between 1700 and 1807, over 11,000 British ships took slaves to the Americas. The slave trade in the 1700s, as estimated 3.1 million Africans were taken across the Atlantic Ocean into slavery. Meanwhile, British slave traders pocketed tens of millions of pounds, making Britain one of the richest nations in the world
• In the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, people began to leave different European countries and settle in America. Early British settlers occupied the east coast of North America. These British settlements, or colonies, made up what could be described as Britain's first successful overseas empire. By the mid-1700s there were thirteen successful British colonies
• Some of the causes that made people leave Britain included religious factors, where certain religious groups such as Puritans and Catholics felt they were not permitted to worship as they wished in Britain, so they left to settle in a place where they would have greater religious freedom
• One of the first groups of English people to settle in America arrived in 1620 on a ship called the Mayflower. They and their settlement became known as the Pilgrim Fathers. They set up their own colony known as the New Plymouth colony, which eventually became the state of Massachusetts
• The New Plymouth colony worked very hard, and offshore fishing became the main source of income. Cod was in high demand as one of the few highly nutritious foods in Britain at the time. The settlers wanted peace and order in the colony so they quickly established democratic principles and a constitution, to ensure that their Puritan religious beliefs would remain central to the colony
• The success of the Pilgrim Fathers led to more religious groups moving to this area - more than 20,000 settlers arrived in Massachusetts between 1629 and 1640. The Pilgrim Fathers are seen by some historians as the first real Americans - they established the foundations of American democracy and religious freedom
• The arrival and settlement of the British in North America had a devastating impact on the indigenous Native American populations. Diseases brought by the settlers, as well as conflicts over land and resources, led to the deaths of millions of Native Americans
• By the 1770s, the British had grown as a presence in North America. They controlled a huge area of land on the east coast, stretching back from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River. Divided into 13 colonies, each had strong ties to Britain
• In 1778, these 13 colonies broke away from Britain and declared themselves to be united as one independent country - the United States of America
• The British sent soldiers to force the American colonists to obey new laws and taxes, but the colonists resisted. This led to the War of Independence, with the American colonists eventually defeating the British army under the leadership of George Washington
• The loss of the American colonies at the Treaty of Paris (1783) was certainly a setback for Britain. But it was not a complete failure - Britain went on to build a much larger empire in other parts of the world, including Canada, Australia, and parts of Africa and Asia
• Though the 13 American colonies declared independence in 1776, it took over five years of fighting before the British finally conceded that they had lost. It was the Battle of Yorktown in 1781 that was seen as the decisive end of the war, when the British surrendered to the American forces
• Reasons why exploration started in the late 15th century

  • Religious conflicts
  • Economic gain
  • Imperialist youth of an Empire
• Why did people settle in the Americas in the 16th and 17th centuries?
• Religious factors


  Some religious groups of dissenters had been persecuted in Britain since the Break with Rome under Henry VIII in the 1530s. The swings from Protestant to Catholic and back to Protestantism again had made this worse. Once things stabilised under Elizabeth it became illegal not to attend Church of England services, punishments ranged from a fine to execution.
• Religious groups facing persecution

  • Puritans and Catholics in Britain
  • Strict Protestants (Puritans) under Oliver Cromwell
  • Protestants from France, the Netherlands and the Holy Roman Empire (Germany)
• Economic factors


  Businessmen had set up large plantations in North America and the West Indies. Trade in the Americas helped to expand the British Empire elsewhere. Crops and raw materials were sold to factories in Britain and the new manufactured goods could be sold back or exported elsewhere in the world.
• First successful British colony

  • Jamestown, Virginia established in 1607
• As Britain's empire grew across the Atlantic and India, there was no longer a need for privateers and so the government stopped giving permissions to raid ships from other countries. The British navy started to act against pirates who could harm their profits and so by the 1790s piracy in the Caribbean and New World had become rare.
• British interests in the Caribbean islands

  • Barbados (1625)
  • Cayman Islands (1670)
  • Jamaica
  • Bahamas
  • Trinidad & Tobago
  • Virgin Islands