The similarities and differences between the Chesapeake.
colonies and the New England colonies.
In the 1600s England experienced a population boom. All the additional people needed clothing, food, and other goods. Many English people were looking for a way to improve their circumstances. Numerous people hoped that by leaving England they could accomplish this. The English migrants who were trying to pursue a better way of life established the Chesapeake colonies and the New England colonies in North America, but the colonies however differed in the aspects of developing economics, religious beliefs, and family life. .
The Chesapeake's economy was based on farming. By the 1630s, tobacco was established as the main crop and chief source of revenue in the Chesapeake. Thus, it had few towns, for the residents did not need commercial centers in order to buy and sell goods. The farms required planting, cultivation, and harvesting. These tasks were considered intensive labor because they were all done by hand. The Chesapeake farmers therefore needed workers to help with the labor. They developed the headright system, which stated that in return for their passage, the men and women contracted to work for farmers for periods ranging from four to seven years. Indentured servants then accounted for 75 to 85 percent of the English immigrants in the Chesapeake. By the 1700s the Chesapeake was no longer the land of opportunity. Farmers worked in the fields alongside servants, clearing land then planting and harvesting tobacco and corn.
The economic motives that prompted English people to move to the Chesapeake also drew men and women to New England. However, the Puritans organized the New England colonies and also because of the environmental differences between the two regions, the northern colonies turned out different from those in the South. The northern climate was too cold and the soil to infertile to raise tobacco on a large scale.