Tag: continuity

We spent last Thursday’s class discussing the imperial wars in North America and how—in many ways—the French, British, and Spanish colonies functioned as a microcosm of the imperial conflicts in Europe. I think we see some continuities of this theme in our latest reading.

In Chapter 19, Taylor directs our focus westward to the Pacific, detailing the Russsian and Spanish colonization efforts along the west coast of North America. Eager to reap the commercial rewards of colonization, Russian explorers ventured east through Siberia into present-day Alaska; meanwhile, their Spanish counterparts crept northwest from Mexico into Alta California. Though separated by thousands of miles, the Pacific colonies shared some interesting similarities with those of the British and Spanish in the East. Taylor notes that in their treatment of the Siberians—and later the Aleut—Russian promyshlenniki resembled the Spanish conquistadors, intimidating Native peoples into hunting furs later to be traded with Chinese and Russian merchants (447). I, however, found even more striking similarities in Taylor’s description of the Spanish missions in Alta California that I’d like to share:

1. Intimidation Tactics – To suppress Native insurrection, the Spanish employed a number of intimidation tactics against the Native peoples. Exercising their technological supremacy, Spanish colonists stifled periodic Native uprisings with their impressive array of horses and guns. Much less organized and more poorly equipped, the Natives stood little chance against the Spanish invaders. In the greatest demonstration of power and intimidation, the commander at Mission San Gabriel decapitated a local chief and displayed his head on a stake just outside the mission. Though the chief had retaliated—and justly so—against the Spanish for having recently raped his wife, the Spanish commander felt that his excessive retribution was necessary, “lest the Indians ‘come to know their power'” (458). This tragic story immediately reminded me of Taylor’s account of King Phillip’s War, in which the the New English and their “praying town” allies executed Metacom and displayed his head atop a watchtower (201-2). Both accounts serve as fine examples of Native suppression at the hands of European colonists. Depending on how they perceived the Native peoples—as a tool to be used or animals to be broken—Europeans altered their treatment of the Native peoples.
2. Forced Assimilation – In an effort to Christianize the Native peoples, Spanish missions adopted a methods of forced assimilation to Spanish culture and Catholic religion. Taylor notes that by keeping their recents converts under close scrutiny within the confines of the mission, Spanish franciscans, led by Fray Serra, required Native peoples to forsake their animism and adopt Spanish customs. They required them wear Spanish clothing, recite the Catechism, and learn the Castilian language. Most disturbingly, Spanish monks confined young, unwed girls to barracks at night, where, as one California governor noted, ‘[it] was not possible for [him] to endure them, even for a minute” (463). Such horrifying treatment of the Natives, reminded me of the Puritan “praying towns,” in which Puritans confined converted Native peoples for the sake of evangelism. Anglicizing the Natives, the Puritans missionaries forced those living within the praying towns to adopt English names, cut their hair, change their clothes, and abandon hunting and fishing (200). Such horrifying accounts of Native suppress reveal that while each colony differe

Though there were certainly many continuities in the colonies from the Atlantic to the Pacific, I found the most interesting example in the European motivation to colonize. In his blog last week,  A.J. described how North America served as the stage for European power struggles (http://sites.davidson.edu/his141/old-world-competition-comes-to-the-new-world/). As he aptly noted, “now battles would take place on New World land which would greatly affect the people living there.” I think the same occurred on the Pacific coast. This war, however, was much unlike the war to the East, where geopolitical struggles culminated in numerous violent conflicts. Rather than engaging in a violent conflict, the Russia and Spain entered a cold war. Though Russian colonial efforts in Alaska remained small and insignificant—only 400 settlers by 1800—in the scheme of geopolitics, the Spanish saw them as a threat to Spanish supremacy in America (454). Paranoid that Russia settlers or British fur-traders might assume control of the resource-rich North American West, Spanish ordered the colonization of Alta California, a project rife with economic, domestic, and environmental trouble. Though they never engaged in full-scale war, the colony of Alta California was born out of imperial paranoia and geopolitical conflict. Indeed, the Spain and Russia did engage in a political struggle for power in North America, characterized by unwarranted fear. So, one could say that Spain and Russia engaged in a cold war in the Pacific.