By Matt

     New Jersey had a lot of wars!!! There were almost one hundred wars in New Jersey during the Revolutionary War.  In New Jersey around the 1600’s Native Americans owned the place.  In the early 1600’s the Europeans started to come to New Jersey.  In 1609, Henry Hudson came to New Jersey looking for a river that connected the Atlantic and the Pacific Ocean.  But later on the Dutch people got all the land that they explored and named it the New Netherlands.

     In 1624 the Dutch people built a fort called Fort Nassau.  The Swedes came and built Fort Elsborg.  Both the Dutch and the Swedes wanted the colonies around the area so they could buy furs from the Native Americans.  The Swedes gave up without a fight.

     In the 1660’s England had a lot of colonies in America.  But King Charles II wanted another one.  He gave the New Netherlands to his brother James, the Duke of York.  But there was one problem, the Dutch owned the New Netherlands.  In May of 1664, he sent warships to the New Netherlands.  The Dutch people surrendered without a fight.                                                                     

     In 1664 James gave part of New York to two friends, Sir George Carteret and John Berkeley.  So James named the new colony New Jersey.  They were the proprietors.  They charged the settlers who moved onto their land.  To get colonists to move to New Jersey the proprietors offered cheap land and freedom of religion.  Many settlers came to New Jersey.  In 1672 the Dutch reclaimed New Jersey and the English couldn’t get it back till 1674.

     In 1674 John Berkeley sold his part of New Jersey to two Quakers.  The Quakers were a religious group that was a part of England, and many Quakers wanted to move to America.  New Jersey was divided into East Jersey and West Jersey.  The Quakers moved into West Jersey.  Then Sir Carteret’s widow sold West Jersey to twenty-four English, Irish, and Scottish men.  Most of them were Quakers.  Neither East nor West Jersey was very successful.  In 1702 they joined together and made a royal colony ruled by the king of England. 

         New Jersey was growing fast.  By 1760, New Jersey had 60 towns and 94,000 colonists.  Pretty much everyone farmed.  They grew a lot of stuff.  They also raised cows, chickens, pigs, and sheep.  A town was usually a bit bigger than a church, a courthouse, an inn, a general store, and a blacksmith shop.  The colony also had a college.  It was the College of New Jersey.  It began in 1747 with one college professor and six students.

         When England won the last French and Indian War in 1763, it cost a lot of money for soldiers, weapons, and forts.  To make money England decided to tax the colonies.  Many colonists became angry and did not want to pay the taxes, but people in New Jersey were not that upset at first.  They liked their English King.

          I learned that New Jersey had the first college and that New Jersey had 94,000 colonists in 1760.  I was surprised they had 94,000 colonists!!!  I was also surprised that New Jersey had over one hundred wars around the 1700 and 1800's.

To Mrs. Gurwicz's Home Page
To the People and Projects
Comments? Email Mrs. Gurwicz