|
The
story of the Delaware colony began hundreds of years ago, when this
land was much different and
Native Americans were living on the land.
The land was mostly wilderness
then.
In 1609 Henry Hudson found some land that was later named
Delaware. When he found
it he had really been looking for a faster way to get from Europe to
Asia so he could get spices. He
was thinking that he would possibly find a river that went through
America. As he was looking for that river he sailed right into a bay.
This bay was one that no other explorer had known of until one year later
when a sea captain whose name was
Samuel Argyll, got caught in a storm and happened to end up in that
same bay. Samuel Argyll named it “De La
War”. The
spelling was changed later to Delaware.
Henry Hudson sailed back to the Netherlands to tell the
Dutch that they should settle there because the land had
good forests with wildlife and many rivers.
In
1631 thirty Dutch men began the first settlement in Delaware. They named
it Zwaanendael, that means Valley of the swans. They put up a symbol of Holland
that was made out of tin.
In
1603 there was a man named Peter Minuit who brought settlers to Delaware
from Sweden. Minuit paid for land which was not much longer after that,
named New Sweden. The first Governor of New Sweden was Peter Minuit.
Two
countries both wanted Delaware because of its furs, fish and timber.
Those two countries were Netherlands and Sweden. Swedes were in charge
of the colony in 1651. Then when the Dutch came back and built Fort
Casimir, it was seven miles away from the Swedish fort, called Fort
Christian. The Swedes took over fort Casimir in 1654. They named the
fort Trinity and put a Swedish flag up. In 1655 the Dutch took back Fort
Trinity and changed the name back to Fort Casimir. The Dutch and Swedish
continued to fight over Delaware from 1655 to 1664. Then the English
joined in.
King
Charles of England decided he wanted the colony of Delaware for England.
He decided this in 1664. James, the King's brother, sailed to England to
claim Delaware. He and 300 other soldiers defeated the Dutch and won
Delaware for England.
A
lot of the
colonists lived on small farms and had cows, pigs and chickens.
This was in
the 1700's. Some of the settlers lived in towns and their houses were
built with bricks. They had special Dutch doors that would open on
top.
In 1776 each of
the colonies sent some men to Philadelphia so they could decide if colonies
should fight for freedom from England.
The colonies
decided to fight England and they won. So in 1778 the first colony to
sign the Constitution was Delaware. That made it the first
official
state.
To Mrs.
Gurwicz's Home Page
To the People and
Projects
Comments? Email Mrs. Gurwicz
|
