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New England Colonies

Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and Rhode Island

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  • Geography and climate

    • ​Flat along the rocky coastline, which made good harbors

    • Hilly and mountainous further inland

    • Densely forested

    • Rocky soil made farming difficult

    • Harsh winters and mild summers

  • Economy

    • Because the soil was rocky and the climate was often harsh, colonists in New England only farmed enough to feed their families

    • Forests provided wood that colonists were able to use to build homes, buildings, and ships; lumber was used for shipbuilding

    • Coastal locations allowed the fishing industry to flourish

  • Religion

    • Mainly founded by Puritans (Protestants who believed that the Church of England was too similar to the Roman Catholic Church, and believed in eliminating religious practices not rooted in the Bible)​​​

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Massachusetts  |  New Hampshire  |  Connecticut  |  Rhode Island

Province of Massachusetts Bay

Plymouth Colony (est. 1620): the second successful English colony in America following Jamestown, Virginia

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Chartered 1691 as a royal colony

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​18th century Massachusetts

  • Economy​​

    • Key commodities: Shipbuilding, fishing, fur, and lumber production​

    • Also heavily reliant on the carrying trade (transporting goods from one place to another)

    • Lacking rich soils or other valuable resources except for lumber, Massachusetts—to a degree unmatched by any other colony—depended upon maritime activities for its economic well-being

      • ​In other words, its key commodities were highly profitable and also highly vulnerable not only to war, acts of God, and trade restrictions imposed by other countries

    • As a result, Massachusetts was especially vulnerable to the import taxes imposed by the British

  • Slavery

    • Massachusetts residents actively participated in the slave trade — not only as a source of labor, but also as trade commodities (trading slaves for staple products like molasses and rum)

    • Between 1755 and 1764, the Massachusetts slave population was approximately 2.2% of the total population

      • The slave population was generally concentrated in the industrial and coastal towns

      • While Massachusetts did not have a huge slave population compared to other colonies, it did still enact many laws to try and control the behavior of its enslaved people, which tells us a lot about how the colony viewed the enslaved

    • As Massachusetts colonists began actively arguing for independence from Britain, critics began noting the glaring inconsistency of arguing for the rights of Englishmen while owning slaves

  • Religion

    • ​Favored the Puritan church

    • The Massachusetts Puritans were pretty intolerant

      • When religious dissenters, including Puritan minister Roger Williams and midwife Anne Hutchinson, challenged Governor Winthrop in Massachusetts Bay in the 1630s, they both were banished from the colony.

      • Williams went on to found Rhode Island as a colony that sheltered dissenting Puritans from their brethren in Massachusetts​

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Massachusett's road to voting Yes for independence

  • The city of Boston was considered the "birthplace of the American Revolution"

    • Controlling the city was a very important symbol for both the Americans and British

    • Boston Harbor was the main port in the region and a vital maritime transportation center for troops and supplies

  • In protest of the Stamp Act of 1765:

  • During the Revolutionary War, Massachusetts saw the pivotal Siege of Boston, which included the battle of Bunker Hill and Dorchester Heights

  • Moreover, Massachusetts was always a radical force at Congress

    • Its delegation included President of the Continental Congress John Hancock, as well as "the Atlas of independence" John Adams

  • John Hancock was first to sign the document, as President of Congress, and he signed his name infamously large on the document — it's not really clear why. Possibly he was just a showy guy, or possibly he was trying to set an example for the rest of Congress, or possibly he just didn't realize how big it was going to be relative to everyone else's (since he went first)

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Votes for independence

  • July 1, 1776: Yes

  • July 2, 1776: Yes

 

Delegates who signed the Declaration of Independence:

  • John Hancock

  • Samuel Adams

  • John Adams

  • Robert Treat Paine

  • Elbridge Gerry

Charlestown, Boston, Massachusetts.

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Province of New Hampshire

Established 1629

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1641-1679: Administered by the colonial government of Massachusetts

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Chartered 1679 as a royal colony, following territorial and religious disputes

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Concord, New Hampshire.

​​18th century New Hampshire

  • Economy

    • Divided by class

      • ​The economic and social life of the seacoast revolved around sawmills, shipyards, merchant's warehouses, and established village and town centers

      • On one hand, wealthy merchants built substantial homes, furnished them with the finest luxuries, and invested their capital in trade and land speculation

      • On the other hand, permanent underclass of day laborers, mariners, indentured servants, and slaves developed

    • Key commodities: Fishing, timber

  • Slavery

    • Even though the number of Black folk in New Hampshire in the 18th century was relatively small, New Hampshire still relied on slave labor to profit, directly and indirectly

    • As one of the few colonies that did not impose a tariff on slaves, New Hampshire became a base for slaves to be imported into America and then smuggled into other colonies

    • Read more

    • Video resources about slavery in New Hampshire

  • Religion

    • Unlike some of the other New England Colonies, the Puritan Congregational church was not the established church​

    • A good degree of diversity in Protestant practices

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New Hampshire's road to voting Yes for independence

  • December 14-15, 1774: The Raid on Fort William and Mary takes place. Ignited by Paul Revere, hundreds of Seacoast New Hampshire men raided the armory of the British King in an rare act of open treason – four months before the Battle of Lexington and Concord, which sparked the American Revolutionary War.

  • January 5, 1776: The provincial congress of New Hampshire became the first legislative body in the American colonies to vote in favor of a state constitution establishing a government apart from Great Britain

  • June 15, 1776: New Hampshire authorized its delegates to vote for independence

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Votes for independence:

  • July 1, 1776: Yes

  • July 2, 1776: Yes

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Delegates who signed the Declaration of Independence:

  • Josiah Bartlett

  • William Whipple

  • Matthew Thornton

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Connecticut Colony

Established in 1636

Chartered 1662 as a royal colony

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18th century Connecticut

  • Economy

    • Farm-based; specialized in furs and produce

    • Pockets of manufacturing existed in the market towns, mostly to supply goods to the local population

    • Prospered from coastal trading with other colonies and in the West Indies

      • In particular, relied heavily on the triangular slave trade for its economic success

    • Nicknamed "the Provision State" for its aid to the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War

  • Slavery​

    • Slave ownership was not limited to the wealthiest people, and in fact was concentrated among the middle class: colonial Connecticut most commonly practiced a kind of "personal" slavery, where many people owned just a single black man or woman, or a married couple, or a small family

      • Enslaved Black men did work, in large numbers, on farms; but they also built barrels, shoed horses, rolled casks across wharves, dyed cloth and raised barns

      • Enslaved Black women made medicines, tended children, cooked, cleaned, milked cows and made clothes

    • ​Peaked in 1774 at 5,101 persons (3% of the population); dwindled after the 1784 state law setting up gradual manumission

    • View some primary sources

  • Religion

    • Established church: Congregational Church (Puritanism)

    • Adopted a toleration act in the early 1700s, but in practice dissenters had to register with the town clerk and their taxes still supported the established Puritan church anyway

    • During the Revolution, Connecticut Congregationalists were almost invariably Patriots; Connecticut Anglicans often became Loyalists. This trend was not reflected in other parts of the country​

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Connecticut's road to voting Yes for independence

  • Read more about Connecticut's role in the American Revolutionary War and its desire for independence from Britain

  • June 14, 1776: The Connecticut Assembly instructed its delegates to support independence

  • Only two of the four delegates (Roger Sherman and Samuel Huntington) were present and voted for the adoption of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776; but all four eventually signed the document

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Votes for independence:

  • July 1, 1776: Yes

  • July 2, 1776: Yes

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Delegates who signed the Declaration of Independence:​

  • Roger Sherman

  • Samuel Huntington

  • William Williams

  • Oliver Wolcott

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Waterbury, Connecticut.

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Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations

Chartered 1663 as a royal colony, when four settlements were merged into one

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An 18th century kitchen.

18th century Rhode Island

  • Economy

    • Enjoyed independent wealth and trade coming through the two sea ports of Providence and Newport

    • Key commodity: Farming and trading, including the triangle slave trade (see the next bullet point on Slavery)

      • Rhode Island was able to add value to imported raw materials and turn the new products into exports

      • For example, cacao, sugarcane, and molasses from the Caribbean region were made into chocolate, sugar, and rum

  • Slavery

    • By 1774, the slave population of Rhode Island was 6.3%, nearly twice as high as any other New England colony

    • Served as a mercantile center of the transatlantic slave trade

      • ​West Indian molasses became rum in Rhode Island distilleries, which was then traded on the West African coast for enslaved workers

      • After taking their human cargo across the middle passage, Rhode Island merchants would sell the survivors to West Indian plantation owners for use as enslaved workers in exchange for a fresh shipment of molasses

    • The desire to protect this lucrative triangle trade led Rhode Islanders to bristle at British attempts to tighten their control over their colonies’ commerce, beginning with the Sugar Act of 1764

    • Antislavery laws were passed in 1774, 1784, and 1787, but the international slave trade continued regardless

  • Religion

    • Rhode Island was founded by Roger Williams after he was banished from the Massachusetts Bay colony for disagreeing with their Puritan religious practices

    • Governed by the principles of religious liberty and separation of church and state

    • Became a haven for Baptists, Quakers, Jews and other religious minorities

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Rhode Island's road to voting Yes for independence

  • June 10, 1768: British customs officials confiscated John Hancock’s sloop Liberty because it had previously been used to smuggle Madeira wine, inciting a riot in the streets of Boston.

  • 1772: The British customs boat Gaspee ran aground near Providence. Rhode Islanders, angered by continued British attempts to tax them in ways they perceived as unfair, boarded and burned it, wounding the ship’s captain.

  • May 4, 1776: Rhode Island became the first territory to renounce its allegiance to Great Britain and King George III, when the general assembly passed an act declaring Rhode Island and Providence Plantations an independent state

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Votes for independence:

  • July 1, 1776: Yes

  • July 2, 1776: Yes

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Delegates who signed the Declaration of Independence:

  • Stephen Hopkins

  • William Ellery

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