gious tolerance unique in that intolerant century. (This tolerance made
Holland a logical refuge for the English Puritan group that became the
American Pilgrims.) Religious diversity also made Holland a target for
Catholic Spain and France, and its lack of major natural barriers made it
vulnerable to attack by their armies.
England was at least theoretically a potential counterweight. Realizing
this, and looking for allies, the lord protector of England during the
Puritan-dominated Commonwealth, Oliver Cromwell, sent a mission to
Holland in 1650 with a truly revolutionary proposal: instead of competing
against one another for trade, the two countries should form a union.
Fearing English domination, the Dutch imprudently declined his offer.
Rebuffed, Cromwell enacted the first of the so-called Navigation Acts in
- This act quickly led to the first of three Anglo-Dutch Wars and
would cost Holland its first colonial venture in North America, the area that
became New York. The seizure of Dutch ships also gave the British
colonists their means to get to the New World.
Even more than Holland, the scores of petty German states were tar-
gets of aggression. French troops devastated their farmlands in 1688, and
other British and French armies trampled their fields and burned their
houses during the first decade of the eighteenth century. In fear for the
present and despair for the future, 13,000 people fled during the single
year 1708–1709. Some of these eventually made their way to America and
especially to Pennsylvania, where they became known as the Pennsylvania
Dutch (German,Deutsch). Even distant North Carolina received some 650
Rhinelanders in 1710. They were the advance parties of many tens of thou-
sands who followed during the eighteenth century.
They certainly were driven by fear, but most of these people had at
least the theoretical ability to refuse to go. Those who had no choice were
the millions of Africans who went as slaves. To them, I now turn.
78 THE BIRTH OF AMERICA