Poor economic conditions, social stresses, and political turmoil plagued England in the seventeenth century. These problems motivated almost 400,000 people to leave England for British colonies in America. Among them was a group of reform-minded Protestants known as Puritans. The English government had proven unwilling to "purify" what the Puritans believed to be a corrupt Church of England. When King Charles I dissolved Parliament and economic conditions worsened, many Puritan leaders decided to establish a godly colony in the "New World." This colony would also provide the economic and social security the Puritans craved but could not attain in England. Show Between 1630 and 1643, over 20,000 English men, women and children sailed to the new Massachusetts Bay Colony in what became known as the "Great Migration." In contrast to the Pilgrims, or Separatists, who had established a colony at Plymouth some ten years earlier, many of the Puritans of Massachusetts Bay were men of authority and not -inconsiderable wealth. Nor did they intend to sever their connection with the existing Church of England, as had the Separatists. The Puritan goal was to reform the existing church by modeling godly communities in New England. Like other colonists from England, Puritan settlers carried with them distinctly English economic and cultural assumptions. English society in this period was essentially hierarchical. Everyone was supposed to know his or her place in the social order. Ministers and other public figures enjoyed great respect and prestige. This portrait of the Reverend Stephen Williams of Longmeadow, Massachusetts, conveyed his social and intellectual authority. His clerical dress identified him as one of the most educated and important men in early New England society. His wig, and the fact that he had his portrait painted at a time when very few people could afford to do so, also marked Williams as a person of importance. Williams achieved notoriety when he was taken captive at the age of ten in a French and Indian raid on the town of Deerfield, Massachusetts in 1704. The Puritan migration to New England was marked in its effects from 1620 to 1640, declining sharply afterwards. The term Great Migration usually refers to the migration in the period of English Puritans to Massachusetts and the Caribbean, especially Barbados. They came in family groups rather than as isolated individuals and were mainly motivated for freedom to practice their beliefs.[1] Context[edit]King James VI and Charles I made some efforts to reconcile the Puritan clergy who had been alienated by the lack of change in the Church of England. Puritans embraced Calvinism (Reformed theology) with its opposition to ritual and an emphasis on preaching, a growing sabbatarianism, and preference for a presbyterian system of church polity, as opposed to the episcopal polity of the Church of England, which had also preserved medieval canon law almost intact. They opposed church practices that resembled Roman Catholic ritual. This religious conflict worsened after Charles I became king in 1625, and Parliament increasingly opposed his authority. In 1629, Charles dissolved Parliament with no intention of summoning a new one in an ill-fated attempt to neutralize his enemies there, which included numerous Puritans. With the religious and political climate so unpromising, many Puritans decided to leave the country. Some of the migrants were also English expatriate communities of Nonconformists and Separatists from the Dutch Republic who had fled to the European mainland since the 1590s. The Winthrop Fleet of 1630 included 11 ships led by the flagship Arbella, and it delivered some 700[2] passengers to the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Migration continued until Parliament was reconvened in 1640, when the scale dropped off sharply. The English Civil War began in 1641, and some colonists returned from New England to England to fight on the Puritan side. Many then remained in England since Oliver Cromwell backed Parliament as an Independent.[3] The Great Migration saw 80,000 people leave England, roughly 20,000 migrating to each of four destinations: Ireland, New England,[4] the West Indies, and the Netherlands. The immigrants to New England came from every English county except Westmorland; nearly half were from East Anglia.[5] The colonists to New England were mostly families with some education who were leading relatively prosperous lives in England.[1] One modern writer, however, estimates that 7 to 10 percent of the colonists returned to England after 1640, including about a third of the clergymen.[6] Religious societies in New England[edit]A group of separatist Puritans had fled from England to the Netherlands because they were unhappy with the insufficient reforms of the English church, and to escape persecution. After a few years, however, they began to fear that their children would lose their English identities, so they traveled to the New World in 1620 and established Plymouth Plantation.[7] They and the later wave of Puritan immigrants created a deeply religious, socially tight-knit, and politically innovative culture that is still present within the United States. They hoped that this new land would serve as a "redeemer nation." They fled England and attempted to create a "nation of saints" in America, an intensely religious, thoroughly righteous community designed to be an example for all of Europe and the rest of the world.[8] Roger Williams preached religious toleration, separation of church and state, and a complete break with the Church of England. He was banished in 1635 from the Massachusetts Bay Colony and founded Providence Plantations, which became the Rhode Island Colony. The Rhode Island Colony provided a haven for Anne Hutchinson, who had been tried and banished from Massachusetts Bay in 1638 for her Antinomian beliefs.[9] Quakers were also expelled from Massachusetts, but they were welcomed in Rhode Island.[10] In 1658, a group of Jews were welcomed to settle in Newport; they were fleeing the Inquisition in Spain and Portugal but had not been permitted to settle elsewhere. The Newport congregation is now referred to as Jeshuat Israel and is the second-oldest Jewish congregation in the United States. Why did people leave England in the 1700s?Many colonists came to America from England to escape religious persecution during the reign of King James I (r.
What are the causes that made the English people leave their land?The most common reason for migration was to obtain access to better work opportunities, moving to places where economic gains were anticipated; indeed, migration was an important part of the pattern of economic growth in Britain during this period, as migrants provided much-needed labour in certain areas and industries ...
Why did people leave Europe in the 1700s?People migrated for a number of reasons. Some, like the Pilgrim Fathers, for religious reasons. Others saw the opportunity for riches in a new world. Explorers and prospectors sought a passage to the far east which also fuelled colonisation.
Why did people leave England in the 16th century?In the autumn of 1620, a group of Christians fleeing persecution for their faith by the English Crown took ship on the Mayflower, intent on establishing in the New World a perfect society where all people would be free to worship as they wished.
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