The New England colonies of the Thirteen Colonies included Connecticut Colony, the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Massachusetts Bay Colony, Plymouth Colony, and the Province of New Hampshire, as well as a few smaller short-lived colonies. The colonies were founded to escape religious persecution in England.
The New England colonies attracted Puritan settlers with families and not single indentured servants, unlike the Chesapeake colonies.
Government
While on the Mayflower, the Pilgrims drafted a simple constitution called the Mayflower Compact, which established an early form of self-government. It allowed all male members of the Puritan church the right to participate in elections for the governor, his assistants, and a representative assembly. Taking into account that the English colonies were still under the British crown, creating the Mayflower Compact was unusually democratic for the time.
Interactions with Native Americans
Unlike the Spanish, French, and Dutch colonizers, the English colonizers rarely married Native Americans. Unwilling to integrate Native Americans into their society, English colonizers had several armed conflicts with Native Americans who were angry about English encroachment on native land, such as King Philip’s War (Metacom’s War) in 1675.