What Were the Goals of the Separatists Who Settled in Plymouth in 1620?
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1. What were the goals of the Separatists who settled in Plymouth in 1620?
Plymouth Colony (or Plantation), the second permanent English settlement in North America, was founded in 1620 by settlers including a group of religious dissenters commonly referred to as the Pilgrims. Though theologically very similar to the Puritans who later founded the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the Pilgrims believed that the Church of England could not be reformed. Rather than attempting to purify the church, the Pilgrims desired a total separation.
2. How did these settlers change the physical and social landscape in and around Plymouth?
the settlement of Wessagussett provided the spark for an event that would dramatically change the political landscape between the local Native American tribes and the English settlers. Responding to reports of a military threat to Wessagussett, Myles Standish organized a militia to defend Wessagussett.
3. What was the Pilgrims' relationship with Native Americans? How did their experiences differ from those of the Virginia settlers?
The Pilgrims who settled New England were originally very fearful of the Native Americans, but eventually, both got used to the presence of each other and had a warm relationship for the most part. The Native Americans that the Pilgrims came across, the Patuxets, were a peaceful group of people and were not a threat to the Pilgrims. It can be said that the Pilgrims would not have survived were it not for the help of Squanto, a Native American who knew English and taught the Pilgrims which plants were poisonous, which had medicinal powers, and how to successfully fertilize plants using fish. The Pilgrims were so successful with growing and gathering food that Governor William Bradford proclaimed a day of thanksgiving to be shared by all the colonists and the neighboring Native Americans.
On the other hand, the Virginia settlers and the Native Americans in Virginia often came into violent conflict with each other. Despite that fact, trade with the Europeans proved a strong attraction to the Native Americans, which enabled the Natives to acquire valuable new products, such as guns, steel hatchets, cloth, and kettles.
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