/1679, A major fire in Boston, Massachusetts, burnt all the warehouses, all the ships in the dockyards, and 80 houses.
10/11/1674. All Dutch-held areas of New York were returned to Britain under the Treaty of Westminster. During the third Anglo-Dutch war, the Dutch had captured New York on 9/8/1672.
13/6/1674. Philip Carteret, the governor of New Jersey, launched a campaign to enforce the payment of quitrents; rents charged on land initially granted free to settlers from Europe. The colony had rebelled against this taxation. In 1673 London had enacted the Plantation Duty Act, imposing duties on any ship carrying certain products, such as sugar, cotton, or tobacco, between colonial ports.
17/5/1673, Jacques Marquette, a French missionary, discovered the Mississippi River.
1/1/1673. A regular postal service was set up between New York and Boston. The mounted service used a special ‘post road’ along which men and horses are posted at intervals.
18/10/1667, Brooklyn received its Town Charter under Mathias Nichols, Governor of the New Netherlands, as ‘Brueckelen’.
23/9/1667. A law passed in Williamsburg, America, prevented slaves from gaining their freedom by converting to Christianity.
2/2/1665. The British captured Manhattan Island from the Dutch, almost 40 years after the Dutch bought it from the Indians for beads in 1626. The Dutch colony was ruled by Peter Stuyvesant under strict Puritanical principles. The British renamed it ‘New York’ after King Charles II’s brother the Duke of York. See 31/7/1667. British rule was more relaxed.
12/3/1664, New Jersey became a colony of England.
24/3/1663, King Charles II of England granted Carolina (from Virginia down to Florida) to eight of his courtiers, who had helped him regain the throne.
1/10/1660. The English reinforced the Navigation Act by insisting that certain colonial goods were only to be shipped to Britain. This was directed against the Dutch but caused resentment in the British colonies.
3/10/1658, Myles Sundish, leader of the Pilgrim Fathers, died.
9/5/1657, Pilgrim Father William Bradford, Governor of Plymouth County in Massachusetts, died.
3/5/1654. The first toll bridge in America was licensed to Richard Thurley at Newbury River. There was a charge for animals but not for people.
14/10/1651. Massachusetts passed laws forbidding the poor to wear excessively luxurious dress.
1649, Puritans fleeing religious persecution in Virginia established the town of Annapolis. It was originally known as Anne Arundel Town, after the wife of the second Lord Baltimore, Governor of Maryland. It was renamed after Princess Anne of England in 1695.
5/4/1649, Death of John Winthrop, first Governor of the Massachusetts Bay Company.
26/5/1647. A new law in Massachusetts banned Catholic priests from the colony. The penalty was banishment, or death for a second offence.
14/10/1644. The Quaker Leader William Penn, founder of the State of Pennsylvania, was born in London, the son of an admiral.
1/11/1642, Death of Jean Nicolet (born ca. 1598), French explorer of the Lake Michigan area (now Wisconsin).
24/1/1639, American settlers meeting in Hartford voted to adopt a new constitution called the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut. It allowed colonists to administer their own laws and to raise taxes, and made no mention of allegiance to the British Crown.
26/5/1637, Fort Pequod, Connecticut, was destroyed
See also Education; 1636, Harvard University.
4/7/1636, The city of Providence, Rhode island, was founded.
4/3/1634. Samuel Cole opened the first tavern in Boston, Massachusetts.
30/9/1630, The first death sentence in America. John Billington was executed for murder in New Plymouth.
17/9/1630. The city of Boston, USA, officially received its name. It was named after Boston, Lincolnshire, from where the Puritan leaders of the town had come.
12/6/1630, The fleet of the Massachusetts Bay Company docked at Salem, with 700 Puritan colonists on board.
4/3/1629, Massachusetts Bay Colony was granted a Royal Charter
6/5/1626, Manhattan Island, now part of New York, was bought by Peter Minuit, Director-Gene