Беликова Е.К., Саратовская Л.Б. - The United Kingdom and United States of America in Past and Present (1268141), страница 17
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It was the Indians who kept the Virginia colony originally aliveby trading corn and other foodstuffs to the settlers. But in return for theirfriendship the Europeans took their lands, destroyed their way of life, andturned them into refugees and beggars in their own country. The story ofthe American Indians is one of the most brutal stories of violence andcruelty in human history.The settlers needed land, Indians occupied it. Only when the white menbegan pushing the Indians off their land did they started viewing them asenemies and tried to strike back. The year of 1622 marked the beginningof 200 long conflicts between the Native Americans and the whitesettlers.
The Indians were doomed to be defeated. The colonists had guns,the Indians fought with bows and arrows.Overall, the treatment of North American Indians by Europeans standsas the bloodiest acts of genocide. In books and later in Westerns theIndians were always portrayed as “the hair-raising baddies” (villains).The phrase “the only good Indian is a dead Indian” was generally used.The means of violence were varied and included not only outright massextermination, but also bounty-hunting (scalping for profit), massacre ofwomen and children, the assassination of Indian kings and leaders, theforced relocation of peoples. By the end of the 18-th century some Indiantribes had been exterminated.
The others had been forced to accept “thepeace terms” according to which they ceded a substantial part of theirterritory to the whites and moved to reservations, not suitable for farmingand that’s why not needed by white settlers.Afro-Americans. To work the new lands, to produce large-scaleproducts of tobacco, rice, cotton and indigo black slaves were captured inAfrica and brought to America. In August 1619 the first cargo of twentyblacks was brought by a Dutch ship to Virginia. In 1661 the Virginialegislature enacted the law that assumed African Negroes as “inferior”and “servants for life”. After that slaves were brought into other colonies.Although, while crossing the Atlantic many African slaves died fromterrible conditions on the ships, their number had grown to 6 thousand bythe 17th century..
The difference in skin and culture of Africans wasviewed by most white settlers as their inferiority, creating the basis for asystem of racial slavery Black slaves were considered to be the property67of their masters and were bought and sold like farm animals. In 1800,there were almost 900,000 black slaves, most of them in the southernstates of the New World. America proved for many of them a terribleprison, and death provided the only escape from life-long sufferings anddegradation. They often came from different tribes and did not evenspeak the same languages. Enslaved into a hostile and strange culture,they had to fully obey their masters or else they were beaten, tortured, orkilled.
Most of them worked in the fields on tobacco or cottonplantations, others worked as domestic servants, cooking, cleaning, andcaring for the master’s family. It was illegal to teach a slave reading andwriting. If slaves wanted to marry, they had to ask their master’spermission. The children of the slaves automatically became the propertyof the master. Sometimes family members were sold to different ownersand never saw each other again.Scattered references to attempted suicides and occasional slavemutinies indicate that Africans did not accept their fate passively, and thesadness of their songs - their most powerful legacy of expression provides insight into their personal tragedies.
Outright resistance wasimpossible, but some slaves tried to escape .Although a few northernstates, including New York, New Jersey, and Vermont, abolished slaveryin the 19th century, escaped slaves from the South could be legallyrecaptured there and returned to their masters. Many slaves tried toescape to Canada, the only place that slaves could become free legally.The escape route, called the Underground Railroad, was a network ofhiding places and people called “conductors” who led slaves north tofreedom. The journey was long and extremely difficult. During the day,slaves hid in caves or in barns belonging to anti-slavery white farmers. Atnight, they were taken to the next hiding place.
The “conductors” riskedtheir lives, because people could be executed for helping slaves to escape.Only a few fugitive slaves ever reached the promised land of Canada.1. Answer the questions: 1. Why did the English settlers of the VirginiaCompany call their first permanent location as New England? 2. Who were thevery first colonists in North America? 3.
What were the major events of the firstperiod of the English colonization of North America? 4. Why were someimmigrants indentured for a term of service? 5. How did New Amsterdam turninto New York? 6. What was the colonists’ policy towards the Indians? 7.How did Africans get into America? 8. Why did the colonists need Blackslaves? 9. What happened to the Black slaves, if they escaped but later wererecaptured? 10. Who were so-called “conductors”?682.
Render the texts in English: А) Виржиния. В мае 1607 г. поселенцыЛондонской компании основали на восточном побережье Америки фортДжеймстаун.Освоение девственной страны шло медленно. Многиепоселенцы не выдерживали и умирали. Шло время. В колонии постепенноскладывалась определенная общественная структура. Высший слойобщества составляли администрация и губернатор. Cредний слой –поселенцы, которые сами оплатили свой проезд в Америку.
Низший слойвключал людей, посланных в Америку за счет Лондонской компании. Поконтракту они обязывались выполнять любую порученную им работу.После окончания контракта каждый из них мог получить свою землю.Постепенно многие “сервенты” Виргинии становились батраками уземлевладельцев и резервом работников будущих капиталистическихмануфактур. Таким образом, постепенно в Виргинии создавалоськапиталистическое производство. Однако количество сервентов,прибывавших из Европы, не удовлетворяло потребности колониальногохозяйства. Попытки превратить индейцев в рабов были безуспешны.Нужны были новые рабочие руки, которыми стали черные рабы изАфрики.Б) Первые поселения. За группой пуританских пилигримов в 1620 годупотянулись представители других протестантскихверований,намеревающихся на новом континенте устроить жизнь в соответствии сосвоими религиозными убеждениями.
Численность населения рослабыстрыми темпами. За первой английской волной эмиграции последовалидругие; в Северную Америку стали приезжать немцы, голландцы,швейцарцы и французы, превращая колонии в огромный «Этническийкотел».Английские короли пытались насадить за океаном феодальныеотношения: раздавали своим приближенным земли, жаловали хартии,согласно которым землевладелец мог отдавать землю зависимымдержателям. Однако развитие колоний пошло по иному, гораздо болеепрогрессивному пути. Идеология «здорового эгоизма», стимулирующаяконкурентную борьбу, культ супермена-одиночки, преодолевающего всепрепятствия на пути к успеху, и девиз «время-деньги», подхлестывающийделовую активность, привели к быстрому развитию производства.
Уже впервой половине 17 в. начали появляться города – будущие центрыпромышленности и торговли. В 1640-х гг. возникли первые мануфактуры;развивалось судостроение и производство железа. На северераспространилось фермерство, т.е. утверждался новый путь развитиясельского хозяйства. Этому способствовали огромные неосвоенныепространства земли. Уход на Запад был способом решения споров междуарендаторами и землевладельцами: беднейшие колонисты захватывалисами свободные земли и становились ее собственниками..69Part 3. War for Independence. American RevolutionRead the following words and word combinations:Legislative assembly–законодательная ассамблея offensive- наступлениеTo put levy/ a duty on – наложить пошлинуdisguised as - переодетые какTo dump the cargo - выбрасывать груз to furnish shelter - предоставить кровPunitive measures - карательные мерыgrievances - жалобыTo be aligned - построены в рядto bring into line - призвать к порядкуTo pledge support - обещать поддержкуsubdue - покорять, подчинятьRag-tag irregulars - солдаты нерегулярной армии; to lay down arms –сложитьоружиеUproar - возмущениеrepeal the duties- отменить пошлиныBy the middle of the 18th century North America was no longer aserious of isolated imperial outposts inhabited by Englishmen.
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