Why English people went to the New World

Why English people went to the New World

One of the most important event was the war against the Spain. At first the Spanish were attaqcked out of pure gred. Then, having become Protestant under Henry VII, England fought Spain for religious motives. Second, England needed gold, and Spain was loaded with American gold.

In 1604 James I made peace with Spain. Money that was once spent on war could now be spent on other things, and there was a lot of money to be spent.

There were a lot of people willing to leave to settle in America. Some of this people were farmers who had lost their land when large areas of lands were appropriated for ship farming. Other were the poor created by the wars, the price inflation, and by the growth of towns and cities.

This large population of poor worried the rich, and a solution was to send them away to be colonists.

A slogan of the period was "In Virginia land free and labor scarced, in England land scarce and labor plently".

So England had a lot of poor people willing to leave, and a lot of money to send them away and support them once they were in America.

Besides the vast number of people uprooted for economic reason there were many people, the Puritans in particular, who left for religious reasons. 

The Puritans came mostly  from the middle class and brought over to America many useful skills.

In the 1600 England's only claim to North Americawas that made by John Cabot, who had made one vojage to Labrador in 1497.

The French had trading posts in canada down to the Great Lakes, and along the Mississipi River. The Spanish were well estabilished in the south, and only later England Colonized the costes of North America.