To Their New Homes : 183 



call it a New World, they called it Hispaniola, or New Spain or New 

 Grenada or New Leon. 



The French and the Dutch settlers were not oppressed minorities 

 so it is easy to see why they should have called their colonies New 

 France and New Amsterdam, They were content, even eager, to recre- 

 ate in the new country what they had left at home. The case of the 

 Pilgrims was different. They were a minority that felt cramped and 

 abused yet the first colony they established was Plymouth and their 

 efforts and that of later settlers resulted in the development of New 

 England. 



As time went on people came to this country from many parts of 

 the world and in increasing numbers. As time went on they were 

 no longer called "pilgrims" or "pioneers" but "immigrants." Often they 

 came from the same countries and for the same reasons that brought 

 our original settlers. Comments on how and when they came will be 

 found in the various chapters dealing with the types of ships that 

 brought them: packets, clippers, steamships. In time the pattern of 

 their movements becomes very complicated — but wherever they came 

 from, however they traveled, wherever they finally settled they brought 

 with them interests and attachments to their old homes. 



One of the results of these interests and attachments was to build 

 up a web of transatlantic travel and trade. The ships that brought the 

 Puritan settlers to the coast of New England returned with letters 

 and messages to families and friends at home. The success of one 

 small settlement encouraged the development of another one and, in 

 time, built up a stream of new colonists and of pioneers. Even when 

 the Puritans developed austerities and restrictions of their own, even 

 when they rejected members of the colony that they regarded as unde- 

 sirable, the result was simply to enlarge the area of colonization. 

 Roger Williams established Providence Plantation and Anne Hutch- 

 inson, Rhode Island and these in turn developed their own contacts 

 with the mother country. 



In later chapters we shall see how the development of different 

 types of ships affected the volume and direction of American coloni- 

 zation and settlement. 



All of these special groups mentioned, and many more that we 

 have not had the time or space to enumerate, each carried out across 

 the Atlantic their own type of sailing pilgrimage. The ocean was a 

 part of their declaration of independence from all that they found irk- 

 some and oppressive in the life of Europe. It was the ocean that gave 



