William Penn's Peaceable Kingdom

England’s first six colonies were founded before 1640; the next six were founded or became English possessions during the Restoration era (1660-1688) when the Stuart monarchy was restored after the English Revolution. Georgia, the last of the thirteen colonies, was settled in the 1730s. All of the Restoration colonies were proprietary colonies where Crown favorites or “proprietors” were rewarded with large tracts of land to develop. Most of the proprietors had large visions but limited resources. William Penn was the exception. He had grown up in privilege and knew King James II well.

Penn had converted to the Society of Friends or Quakers, a religious group who rejected worldly and spiritual hierarchies, believing that all men and women share an “inner light... He turned an old debt (from the king due to his father) into a charter for the proprietary colony called “Pennsylvania” (all the land between New Jersey and Maryland) his “holy experiment” in brotherly love, a contrast to the Puritan concept of a “City on a Hill”. Penn took great pains in setting up his colony; twenty drafts survive of his First Frame of Government, the colony’s 1682 constitution. Penn was determined to deal fairly and maintain friendly relations with the Lenni Lenape or Delaware Indians. He carefully planned the city of Philadelphia as well as organized other settlements and established the Free Society of Traders to control commerce with England. He sent back glowing accounts of the colony to his English friends and patrons. This Letter to the Free Society of Traders (found on EDSITEment reviewed History Matters) , published in 1683, has been recognized as the most effective of his promotional tracts. And it proved successful.

Penn organized the speediest and most efficient of the seventeenth-century efforts at English colonization. In 1682 twenty three ships from England reached the Delaware River with about two thousand colonists and their possessions. By 1700 Pennsylvania’s population reached 21,000. Pennsylvania’s fertile soils, temperate climate, and policy of religious freedom attracted many migrants beyond England. Germans from the Rhine Valley increasingly left their homelands because of its limited rural economy and religious intolerance; also, good news from Pennsylvania drew many discontented Germans across the Atlantic. Francis Daniel Pastorius arrived in Pennsylvania in 1683, commissioned by the Frankfort Land Company and a group of German merchants to obtain 15,000 acres of land for a settlement in the new colony of Pennsylvania. Pastorius, well educated in European universities, reported back to his friends in Germany. After he negotiated with Penn, Pastorius became a Quaker. His report was later published as Positive Information From America, concerning the Country of Pennsylvania by a German who Traveled There (1684), a promotional tract to encourage other Germans to immigrate. Pastorius found the journey to be difficult but the prospects attractive. He remarked notably upon the ethnic and religious complexity of the colony. Pastorius went on to lead settlement at Germantown of Mennonites and Quakers from the Rhineland.

Both primary sources used in the second part of this lesson were written as promotional tracts. While Penn wrote his with an audience of prospective settlers in mind, Pastorius wrote his to friends back in Germany, hoping to convince them to emigrate. While Penn’s letter overall has more detail, Pastorius' report includes a frank account of the journey and the struggle to survive. Both accounts, however, resound with a glowing endorsement of the life that awaits those who dare to venture to the new colony, despite the risks.

Some of the following websites offer the teacher information on William Penn, his vision for the colony, his ideas of religious tolerance, and his relationship with the Native Americans. The first is recommended for all teachers who use the lesson, and the other sites will give a deeper understanding for teachers interested in each particular area:

• The Vision of William Penn, a discussion of Penn’s vision of his colony and its settlement. The site contains pages on Penn’s arrival, Indian relations, and legacy of tolerance along with original documents and lessons (one lesson of interest is about the government of the people).
• EDSITEment-reviewed website, Teacherserve’s essay by Patricia Bonomi on The Middle Colonies as the Birthplace of Religious Pluralism, a substantial discussion of all four middle colonies (New York New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware.)
• Penn and the Indians from the EDSITEment reviewed web site American Studies at University of Virginia.

Download or bookmark William Penn’s “Letter to the Free Society of Traders” and Daniel Pastorius’ “Positive Information from America” both available through a link from the EDSITEment-reviewed History Matters.

Throughout this unit, students will read and analyze a variety of primary documents. The following materials from EDSITEment resources may be useful to teachers seeking expert advice on the use of primary documents:

• How Can I Use Primary Sources in my Classroom linked from American Memory, an EDSITEment-reviewed website
• The Historian’s Sources from American Memory
• Document Analysis Worksheets and History in the Raw on National Archives Educator Resources
• Making Sense of Evidence on History Matters

Activity 1. Peopling Pennsylvania

Have students read the selections below (see PDF) from the document The Frame of the Government of the Province of Pennsylvania in America, 1682 on the EDSITEment-reviewed Avalon website. The Frame that Penn wrote in 1682 should introduce students to the ideas and ideals behind the founding of Pennsylvania and moreover, his efforts to create a successful colony. Students will then read subsequent promotional tracts that offer contrasting views on how the settlement proceeded. Students should consider the following questions and highlight the sentences that provide evidence for their answer.

For excerpt 1: What elements does William Penn see as necessary for good government?

"Governments, like clocks, go from the motion men give them; and as governments are made and moved by men, so by them are ruined too. Wherefore governments rather depend upon men, than men upon governments. Let men be good, and the government cannot be bad; if it be ill, they will cure it. But, if men be bad, let the government be never so good, they will endeavor to warp and spoil it to their turn.

I know some say, let us have good laws, and no matter for the men that execute them: but let them consider, that though good laws do well, good men do better: for good laws may want good men, and be abolished or evaded by ill men; but good men will never want good laws nor suffer ill ones …"

—From William Penn’s Preface to The Frame of the Government of the Province of Pennsylvania in America, 1682

For excerpt 2: Who does William Penn want in his colony? How does he entice new settlers?

XXXV. That all persons living in this province, who confess and acknowledge the one Almighty and eternal God, to be the Creator, Upholder and Ruler of the world; and that hold themselves obliged in conscience to live peaceably and justly in civil society, shall, in no ways, be molested or prejudiced for their religious persuasion, or practice, in matters of faith and worship, nor shall they be compelled, at any time, to frequent or maintain any religious worship, place or ministry whatever.

—Law Thirty-five from Laws Agreed Upon in England in William Penn’s The Frame of the Government of the Province of Pennsylvania in America, 1682

Alternative

• Students should read an excerpt from Penn’s The Frame of the Government of the Province of Pennsylvania in America, 1682, and answer the following questions: What does William Penn see as necessary for good government? Who does William Penn want in his colony? How does he entice new settlers?

• Place students in pairs, and have one student read the William Penn Letter while the other reads Daniel Pastorius’ “Positive Information from America” both linked from EDSITEment-reviewed website History Matters.
• Students should go through the documents highlighting sections and making annotations in response to the following questions. They can use the comparison charts (in the PDF document) as a way of taking notes before they make their annotations on their document.
  • How is the land described?
  • What are some of the author's general attitudes towards the land and its natural resources?
  • What is viewed as positive? What is viewed as negative?
  • What descriptions of Native Americans and European settlers are included in the document?
  • Does the document encourage settlement in the new colony? What characteristics do you think Penn or Pastorius desire in settlers? Please include any social, religious, and ethnic characteristics that are expressed or implied (referred to indirectly, but not expressly stated) in the document.
  • Can you explain the reason(s) for the differences between these two documents?
  • What do these documents, taken together, teach us about the importance of determining an author’s perspective when using primary sources?
• Students will share information from their notes and annotations on both letters. Then the students should use that evidence for a debate on whether a prospective settler should immigrate to Pennsylvania. Students can consider evidence that either supports immigration or discourages immigration. Students should cite the sources (either Penn or Pastorius) as their evidence in the debate. One suggested format would be to divide the class into three groups: Pro-immigration, anti-immigration, and judges.

Students should use the evidence they have gathered in the interactive activity to write an essay based on the following topic:

• Compare and contrast the two letters written in 1683 and 1684 about the colony of Pennsylvania. Also, keep in mind the ideals that Penn expressed in his 1682 Frame of Government. Keep in mind that both letters were written and published and used to encourage further colonization. Consider the following questions as you write your essay:
  • Which document does a better job of promoting settlement?
  • Which document is more honest about both positive and negative aspects of the colony?
  • What is the role of Native Americans in each letter?
  • Who would these letters appeal to?

This essay should be 1-2 pages and include at least seven pieces of evidence from the documents.

• The Pastorius letter could be linked to more research on the German colonists in Pennsylvania, a significant non-English population group. Students could compare Pastorius’ voyage with that of another well-known account by Gottlieb Mittelberger in his Journey to Pennsylvania in the Year 1750. Two excerpts are on History Matters.
  • “Packed Densely, Like Herrings”: Gottlieb Mittelberger Warns His Countryman of the Perils of Emigration, 1750
  • “Work and labor in this new and wild land are very hard”: A German Migrant in Philadelphia, 1750
• Pennsylvania became the home of numerous pietistic and other communal communities. Students could investigate one such community as Bethlehem, Pennyslvania: A Moravian Settlement in Colonial America from the National Park Service website.
• William Penn envisioned a more positive and respectful relationship with the Indians. Was this vision achieved? Students could research this topic through materials such as Penn and the Indians or the Walking Purchase of 1737 transcript.
• Students could explore the idea of religious tolerance in Pennsylvania and how such ideas were established even before the founding. See Penn’s 1675 statement about the Quaker Ideal of Religious Tolerance on the EDSITEment-reviewed Digital History.

Selected EDSITEment Websites

• American Memory
  • Analysis of Primary Documents
  • The Historian’s Sources
  • How can I use primary documents in my classroom
  • Image of Quaker Meeting House
• American Studies
  • Penn and the Indians
• The Avalon Project at Yale Law School
  • Frame of Government of Pennsylvania
• Digital History
  • Document Analysis Worksheets
  • Excerpt, Letter From William Penn to the Committee of the Free Society of Traders, 1683
  • History in the Raw
  • Quaker Idea of Religious Tolerance
  • William Penn, The Diversity of Native America: The Middle Colonies
• Explore PAhistory.com
  • The Vision of William Penn
  • The Walking Purchase: August 25, 1737
• History Matters
  • Daniel Pastorius’ “Positive Information from America”
  • Making Sense of Evidence
  • “Packed Densely, Like Herrings”: Gottlieb Mittelberger Warns His Countryman of the Perils of Emigration, 1750
  • William Penn’s “Letter to the Free Society of Traders”
  • Work and labor in this new and wild land are very hard”: A German Migrant in Philadelphia, 1750
• Teacherserve from the National Humanities Center
  • The Middle Colonies as the Birthplace of American Pluralism
  • Pennsylvania: The Quaker Province