Puritans – American History to 1877

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In Chapter 8: “Puritans and Indians, 1600-1700” of American Colonies, Alan Taylor addresses a series of violent conflicts that occurred between the New England Indians and the Puritans shortly after Puritans founded the Plymouth settlement. While Taylor focuses on an overview of the wars until the Indians’ defeat following King Phillip’s War in 1676, he also outlines Puritans’ justification for aggressive action against the Indians, which often included massacres of Indian women and children. Puritans, who perceived themselves as “God’s Chosen People,” considered Indians to be “savage people, who are cruel, barbarous, and treacherous.” Throughout Taylor’s text, as well as in many other academic histories I have read, white western Europeans frequently describe Indians and other non-Aryan races as “barbarous” in comparison to their own “civilized” society.

Coincidentally, just before reading Chapter 8 of Taylor, I read Walter D. Mignolo’s The Idea of Latin America for my Spanish seminar, “Latin American Culture and Literature Before 1900.” The central argument of Chapter 1: “The Americas, Christian Expansion, and Racism,” affirms that European colonizers justified their dominance over South and North American Indians by categorizing them into varying degrees of “barbarous”, thus affirming Europeans’ superiority over them. Bartolome de Las Casas, a Spanish friar who participated in the colonization of the Americas, outlined the racial inferiority spectrum, dividing “barbarians” into four distinct categories. The first form of barbarians exhibited irrationality and “a degenerate sense of justice reason, manners, and/or human generosity.” The second categorization deemed barbarians to be a group of people who lacked a written alphabet and language system mirroring Spanish’s appropriation of the Latin language. Third, barbarians did not have a formal system of law and justice as defined by the nation-state. Finally, groups of people who rejected the Christian faith were Pagans, and consequently, barbarians.

While the Puritans did not specifically utilize Las Casa’s system for barbarianism as justification for their violent oppression of the Indians, it is a useful template to understand the complex system of racialization that cemented Puritans’ sense of superiority. In her blog post, “Violent Puritans and the Not-So English Middle Colonies,” Rebecca articulates Puritans’ religious rationalization for the massacre of Indians, who “claim they are permitted to exploit others because they are in God’s favor.” Rebecca does an excellent job of explaining this vicious cycle; Puritans’ successful massacre of Indians served as Divine validation for their superiority, thus perpetuating Puritans’ belief that they were “God’s Chosen People” and Indians were Pagan barbarians. Following Las Casas classification of barbarians, Puritans primarily grouped the New England Indians under the fourth category—Pagan barbarians who rejected Christianity. Puritans, whose entire society centered around conservative Protestantism, judged Indians with respect to their religious beliefs. It is significant to recognize that other colonizers, like Spanish conquistadores, may have placed a larger emphasis on different types of barbarism in affirming their superiority over Indians. For instance, South and Central American Indians’ lack of a conventional language and alphabet system highlighted their alleged barbarity in terms civility and intellectual capabilities.

Most importantly, I believe one must recognize that Europeans did not cognitively articulate the grounds for Natives’ inferiority that justified the oppression and annihilation of Indian population. Rather, during the period of colonization, the complex system of racialization that still polarizes modern society was already cemented in the collective mindset of Europeans. Indians’ barbarity need not be articulated, it just was. In the study of American history, we must consciously acknowledge the racialization that shaped society and not ignore it as relic of antiquity, or risk being complicit in the institutionalization of racism.

Knowlton, Rebecca. “Violent Puritans and the Not-So English Middle Colonies.”

Mignolo, Walter D. The Idea of Latin America. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, 2008.

Taylor, Alan. American Colonies. New York: Penguin Books, 2001.

As Rebecca points out in her post on chapter 6 and 8, Taylor mainly focuses on the different failures and successes of English colonization, and focuses on dynamics and relationship (or lack there of) between the different settler groups and the Indians.

Chapter 6 focuses on the ethnocentric and uncompromising approach of the English, both in Ireland and in the New World. It was interesting to read about the double squeeze happening in England, which is what America was promoted off it, in order to rid the streets of London of the poor, the beggars, etc. However, I found it interesting to read Taylor’s description of a narrowing middle class with higher rates of unemployment and inflation, and an increasing lower class. Although I am no economics students, it seemed somewhat reminiscent to the current economical state of the US since the recession in 2008. Thus, I found it interesting to see how it parallels the motives to come to America, and the promises America may or may not have fulfilled in lieu of current events.

Additionally, this drive to send the poor to America to serve as workers in the tobacco industry supports Grey’s point that the main driver for colonizers seems to be economical, rather than religious. While religion might justify their actions, the main catalyst remains economics. The growth of the tobacco industry gave the English a new foothold in a New World industry that had yet to be tapped by the Spanish or French.

After our class discussion on whether it was important to distinguish between European countries in their colonization of America, I found it interesting that Taylor compares countries against each other, thus creating a scale of which country is more humane. Taylor notes that the way the English acted towards the Irish during war was similar to the Spaniards in their treatment of Indians. In our discussions and blog posts, everyone seems very careful to differentiate countries from each other in their behavior (Dana contrasts the French with the Spaniards in her post). However, here Taylor is showing similarities between countries, and creating almost a scale of which country did it “better”.

In light of the war in Ireland, I also found it interesting that Taylor seems to dispel myths of the “proper” English by describing them as truthfully and as brutal as they were. Taylor mentions that they were no better than the conquistadors themselves. I found correlations between the picture of the Aztec’s human sacrificing and the British colonel lining a path with human heads of Irish victims — which is an interesting juxtaposition when many other historical narrative I’m familiar with describe the English as proper, humane, and religious peoples.

This very much contrasts the Puritans settlers in New England, and their approach to the land, their neighboring Indians, and their motives for settling in the New World. This was always the narrative of English settlers I have been familiar with — the reason we still celebrate Thanksgiving. It seemed very democratic and egalitarian modest way of living, which is the story of a hard-working American people that history and media today love to glorify. However, I also found it interesting that Taylor points out the religious oppression the Puritans placed on everyone who lived within New England, another aspect to the story often disregarded.

Tag: Puritans

“Barbarians”: a Justification for Oppression

Dispelling Myths of the Proper English