HISTORICAL EVENTS
LEADING TO THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
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However instructive to the student of history to trace the leading events from the creation, the deluge, the calling of Abraham, the exodus of Israel, and the giving of the Law, the foundation of Sparta, the death of Saul, the foundation of Rome, the destruction of Nineveh, the death of Cyrus, the battle of Marathon, the death of Darius, birth of Plato, the death of Socrates, the destruction of Thebes, Alexander invades Asia, completion of the Collossus of Rhodes, Hannibal crosses the Alps, death of Hannibal, birth of Julius Ceasar, death of Marius, Ceasar crosses the Rubicon, and is made Dictator, death of Cicero, of Anthony and Cleopetra, and the great central event of the world's history, the birth of Christ, it is not the province of this work to detail. From the birth of Christ to the discovery of America, a period of nearly fifteen centuries, events thicken, as time rolls on, with apparently an accelerated velocity. Prominent among them, we note the death of Augustus, and the accession of Tiberius, and the crucifixion of Christ, Nero Emperor of Rome, and Titus of Jerusalem, Christianity preached in Britain, siege of Alexandria, Constantine the Great, Emperor or Rome, Anglo-Saxons in Britain, Persia conquered by the Saracens, descent of the Danes on England, Otho, the first King of Germany, America discovered, in 1801, by Biorn and Lief, two Icelanders, accession of William the Conqueror, death of Abelard, the Tartar in Hungary, Palestine lost to the Christians, Turks in Europe, burning of Heretics in England, siege of Orleans, fall of the Byzantine Empire, Gibralter taken by the Moors, birth of Luther and Raphael, the inquisition in Spain, battle of Bosworth, Cape of Good Hope discovered, surrender of Grenada, end of the Moorish Dominion in Spain, expulsion of the Jews from Spain; and the discovery of America. The province and scope of this work suggest extreme brevity, and the avoidance of detail in the part of the work before us. We will merely state in brief, in their chronological order, the events bearing on the discovery of America. Christopher Columbus discovered land belonging to the Western Hemisphere, October 12, 1492, first landing on one of the Bahama Islands. John and Sebastian Cabot landed on Newfoundland the following June. Columbus on his third voyage discovered the Continent, near the mouth of the Orinoco river, in South America, in 1498. In the following year, Americus Vespucius conducted a vessel to the coast of South America, and told the story of his voyage so well that the Continent received his name; an error which the injustice of mankind has allowed to continue. Ponce De Leon, in 1512, discovers Florida while searching for the "Fountain of Youth." James Cartier, a French sailor, discovers the river St. Lawrence, in 1535. DeSoto, a Spaniard, discovers the Mississippi, discovers Indians, near where the city of Mobile now stands, residing in a walled city, of several thousand inhabitants. He explored the Mississippi and Red rivers, and died, near the mouth of the latter, May 21, 1542. The first English settlement was contemplated in 1578, or about three centuries ago. Queen Elizabeth, of England, granted a patent to Sir Humphry Gilbert "to such remote heathen and barbarous lands as he should find in North America." Two unsuccessful attempts are made by him to establish colonies. He finally perishes, with his vessels, Sept. 23, 1583. Sir Walter Raleigh is then sent with two vessels, and lands at Pamlico Sound; also makes an unsuccessful attempt on Roanoke Island. A third attempt, in 1587, was unsuccessful, by the interference of the Spanish Armada, and surrenders his charter to a company of merchants or Indian traders. The Plymouth company landed a colony at the mouth of Kenebec river, in 1607, are unsuccessful, and return to England; at the same year a London company establish a settlement at James river, which was the first permanent English settlement in America. English convicts are sent to Virginia, and slaves introduced in 1620. Various colonies and settlements were now established, with variable success, encountering opposition from the Indians. The first germ of American Union, we find in a confederation of the Plymouth, Massachusetts, Connecticut and New Haven colonies, a confederation that lasted nearly forty years. Common school laws, an institution purely American, were passed in Connecticut, in 1650. The growth of the colonies, by emigration and natural increase, continued to progress favorably, till they suffer the misfortune of the resignation of their distinguished friend, Mr. Pitt, in October 1761. In 1763, a treaty of peace between England and France closed the war in America which was so disastrous to the colonies, by reason of the atrocities committed by the Indians at the instigation of the French. The colonies paid $16,000,000 war expenses, and lost 30,000 men, and the French lost their Canadian possessions and all of their immense territory east of the Mississippi river. These were preparatory steps; in the hands of an overseeing Providence other results that were to follow, namely: preparing the people for war, and the organization of the new confederation whose centennial anniversary we celebrate the present year. The Colonial Commanders learned the art of war as they fought side by side with the veterans of Great Britain, and the soldiers of the western frontier compared favorably with the flower of the British army. This was illustrated in the notable defeat of Gen. Braddock. The skill and bravery of Washington saved the British army from annihilation in Pennsylvania. Various acts were passed by the British Parliament in 1763, and 1764, acts obnoxious and adverse to the interest of the colonies, which our intended brevity compels us to omit, and refer to the obnoxious stamp act of 1765. Also, an act authorizing the British Ministry to send any number of troops to America, for whom the colonists were to find "quarters, firewood, bedding, drink, soap and candles." Various colonies passed resolutions, in their House of Burgesses, claiming the rights of British subjects, and remonstrating with the mother country to the burdens thus imposed. On October 7, 1765, an assembly of committees or delegates from nine colonies met, in New York. This was the first Continental Congress. The experience of one year convinced England that the Stamp Act could not be enforced in America. While the colonies rejoiced over the repeal of the Stamp Act, the home government was framing laws for their more serious oppression, and in 1767 taxes were levied on tea, paint, paper, glass and lead, and so exorbitant were these demands, that the colonies determined to pay no more taxes or duties at all, illustrating a principle in that early day that has since became patent to the even casual observer, that the best way to get rid of an obnoxious law is to rigidly enforce it. In 1768, the Massachusetts General Court issued a circular to the other colonial assemblies, inviting co-operation for the defense of their common and mutual rights, and generally received most cordial replies. In 1770 the indignation of the people of Boston at the British soldiers breaks out into an affray of so serious a nature that the troops fire on the citizens, killing three and wounding several others. Importations are nearly discontinued, and home manufactured goods superceded the foreign article, and so popular did this become that the graduating class at Harvard College took their degrees in homespun this year. Through 1770 the feeling becomes more intense, and the year following, a British Revenue Schooner was burned by a party of colonists, at Providence, Rhode Island. Parliament offered $3,000 and a pardon to any one of that party who would betray his accomplices, that they might be arrested. Though they were known by all the colonies, no legal evidence was ever brought against them. In 1773, the celebrated Boston tea party comes off, and the cargoes of three ships are emptied into the sea. The year following the Tea Party, the feeling acquires intensity, and a Continental Congress was ordered by all the colonies but Georgia. They assemble in Philadelphia, and Peyton Randolph, of Virginia, is chose President, and a "Declaration of Colonial Rights" is the result of their labors, and agree on fourteen articles as a basis of an "American Association." This body was henceforth the real government, and their requirements were the laws of the country, to which the people gave strict allegiance. We have been more minute in the details of these transactions because they prove the loyalty of the people to their former government, and the gradually tightening system of tyranny and oppression that drove them from that loyalty to a state of revolt. The inauguration of the war of the Revolution, the variable successes of the contending armies, the progress of public opinion gradually growing stronger on the side of patriotism, ripened into the DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE, JULY 4, 1776. The Declaration of Independence was followed by the Articles of Confederation, and they being, after a few years experience, found insufficient and unsatisfactory, were superceded by the Constitution of the United States, in the year 1787.

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