RPC Week 26: The Pilgrims and the Mayflower

This is the essay for the 26th week of the 7th Grade Ron Paul Curriculum. It’s about The Pilgrims and the Mayflower.

The Pilgrims and the Mayflower

When Queen Elizabeth I of England died she didn’t have any heir, because she never married. King James I who was the king of Scotland, also became king of England. James I was a Catholic. He wanted to persecute Protestants. One of these protestant groups known as the Pilgrims fled to Leiden, Holland.

But in Leiden in didn’t go very well. This was because most of the Pilgrims were farmers and Leiden was an urban area. The pilgrims wanted to go to a place more rural like the America’s. They tried to get the London Company to let them start a colony in the America’s. The London company was a government run company that gave permission for people to start new colonies in the America’s. A man named Thomas Weston helped the Pilgrims get permission from the London company.

A ship named the Speedwell brought the pilgrims back to England where they would sail from to the America’s with another boat, the Mayflower. The Speedwell and the Mayflower left in July 1620. But after the two ships left the Speedwell sprung a leak and they had to go back. Once again the ships were underway. But the Speedwell sprung another leak. The Pilgrims thought that the London Company was purposely sabotaging the ship to get out of their agreement. Instead of going back to England the Pilgrims abandoned the Speedwell and went further with the Mayflower.

The Pilgrims arrived at the America’s in the November of 1620. Before any of the pilgrims could get of the Mayflower they signed a treaty, the Mayflower Compact, which said that all the pilgrims will work together and help the colony survive

RPC Week 25: Elizabeth I of England

This is the essay for the 25th week of the 7th Grade Ron Paul Curriculum. It’s about Elizabeth I of England.

Elizabeth I of England

 

Elizabeth was born in 1533. Elizabeth was the daughter of Henry VII second wife Anne Boleyn, but since her mother was executed at a young age she was raised by governesses.  She had a good education, which caused her to have a gentle, calm spirit.

But before we can tell the story of Elizabeth we need to quickly tell you about Mary.

Mary was the daughter of Henry’s first wife,  Catherine of Aragon. Mary became queen after Lady Jane who she executed after only 9 days. Because Elizabeth was a Protestant and Mary was a staunch Catholic, she put Elizabeth on house arrest for 4 years until Mary died in 1558. After Mary’s death, Elizabeth became queen. Elizabeth became queen in 1559 and was crowned at Westminster Abbey. Since Elizabeth was Protestant she reversed all of Mary’s work to make England Catholic.

In 1585 King Philip of Spain went to war with Queen Elizabeth of England, although the war was never formally declared. Spain declared a war against the English because King Philip used to be the wife of Mary and he thought he should get some consideration to the crown. Which he was not given. King Philip at least to be the wife of Elizabeth wich Elizabeth refused. But there was also another reason. English ships were attacking and pillaging Spanish ships and colonies. The war lasted several years, with victories from the Spanish and English. The war didn’t accomplish much during the time it lasted, but it did give the English naval superiority over the Spanish and they held this for a long time.

Queen Elizabeth was sometimes called the “Virgin Queen”. She was called this, because she never married anyone, although Elizabeth had a lot of tutors. Elizabeth’s reign was mostly peaceful and great stability while other countries around England were in chaos. This started to fade away during the end of her reign. During the end of her ,reign several of her best friends died this made her depressed. She died of blood poisoning in March of 1603 and was buried in Westminster Abbey.

RPC Week 24: Edward VI of England and Lady Jane Grey

This is the essay for the 24th week of the 7th Grade Ron Paul Curriculum. It’s about Edward VI of England and Lady Jane Grey.

Edward VI of England

 

Edward VI of England was born on 12th of October, 1537. He was the son of Henry VIII of England. Edward’s mother was Henry’s third wife, Jane Seymour. Edward had two older half-sisters, Mary and Elizabeth. Henry’s education began when he was 9 years old. He was educated by private tutors because he was the king’s only son. During his education, Edward became quite interested in theology, but especially in Protestantism.

Edward’s life took a turn for the worst when his father died when Edward was only 9 years old. He became king in 20th of February, 1547. Because of Henry’s young age, he wasn’t the complete ruler. As by his father’s will, he appointed a council to govern England before Edward turned 18. Due to Edward’s young age when he became king, he was nicknamed the “Second Josiah” or the “British Josiah”.

Even though Edward had the council with him he still had some influence in several places. But he still needed somebody to help him enact the reforms he wanted to the church. Thomas Cranmer Archbishop of Canterbury helped Edward carry out these reforms to the church. So Edward started changing churches from Catholicism to Protestantism. Due to all the changes in the church, people started revolting and rebelling against Edward. This came to a peak in 1549 when to revolts had to be stopped by the English military. There was another effect of his reforms, he had started the English Reformation.

In 1553 Henry became sick and the council of England thought he would die so they started looking for a new heir. Because Henry didn’t have any children his oldest half-sister would become queen, but Edward knew that Mary was a Catholic and that she would ruin his changes to the church. So Edward chose his cousin Lady Jane Grey. And on 6th of July, 1553 Edward VI died of Tuberculosis and only 4 days later Lady Jane Grey became Queen of England.

 

Lady Jane Grey

Lady Jane Grey was born in October 1537. Because her father was the Duke of Suffolk she received a very nice humanist education, although she didn’t receive the education for a queen, because she wasn’t in the line of succession. So when Edward wanted her to become queen this came as a big surprise, but after 4 days she finally agreed. Edward’s half-sister Mary didn’t like that she didn’t become queen so she gathered an army of supporters and marched to London. The council apologized for crowning Lady Jane Grey and now they supported Mary. Lady Jane Grey was captured on 19th of July, 1553 and executed in 1554. Because of her extremely short reign, she is sometimes known as the “Nine Days Queen”.

RPC Week 23: The Protestant Reformation

 

The Protestant Reformation

The Protestant Reformation was a new movement, essentially created by Martin Luther. There were several reformers before Martin Luther, but Martin Luther made the Reformation a force to be reckoned with. He did this by nailing his 95 theses on the door of the church of Wittenberg.

The Protestant Reformation has been called other things, like the Reformation or the Reformation Movement. I shall say a brief summary of each Reformer and what they contributed to the Reformation. I’ll start with the Reformers before Martin Luther.

 

John Wycliffe

John Wycliffe was the first person who was helping the Reformation movement although back then he didn’t know it, because the Protestant Reformation didn’t exist yet. Wycliffe translated the Bible into English, which is now known as the Wycliffe Bible. As with most of the Reformers, he was declared a heretic by the Catholic Church, because they said he was opposing God and after that the Church burns the Reformers at the stake. This is what happened to Wycliffe.

John Huss

John Huss is a Bohemian reformer, which means he was born in the Czech Republic. He was influenced heavily by Wycliffe and Huss fought against the heresies of the Bohemian Church. Huss was captured during his travels and put on trial, but Huss refused to recant his teachings. So he was burned at the stake on July 6th, 1415.

Gerhard Groote

Gerhard Groote is the last important reformer before Martin Luther. Gerhard Groote was born in 1340 in the Netherlands. He set up schools for orphans to learn theology. Many reformers after him came from these schools. Gerhard Groote didn’t die like most reformers, because he didn’t directly oppose the church. He created the opposition. Instead, he died when the Black Plague entered his town for the third time. His schools lasted about 150 years after his death. I go more in-depth with my blog post solely on him. So if you want to learn more go to this link: https://worldsubjects.wordpress.com/2018/04/26/rpc-week-22-gerhard-groote/

Martin Luther

As I touched earlier in the blog post. Luther was the one who kickstarted the Reformation. The reason that Luther wrote the 95 theses is that he was against the church selling indulgences and other things done by the church during this time. Luther was called by the Diet of Worms, where he was excommunicated and declared a heretic. He went into hiding for a few years and when the outrage had subsided, he married and had 6 children. Martin Luther even organized a Protestant church. He also translated the Bible into German. Luther died in 1546.

 

There have been many more reformers like Desiderius Erasmus, Ulrich Zwingli, John Calvin and William Tyndale. But there are too many to state all of them so I will do only do William Tyndale.

 

William Tyndale

William Tyndale is an English reformer just like John Wycliffe. He translated the bible again into English, only he first asked for permission from the Bishop of London in 1523. The bishop refused and he had to translate the Bible in secret. When the New Testament emerged the English church wasn’t happy and they started searching for him. Tyndale was betrayed by one of his colleagues and captured, while he was working on translating the Old Testament. Tyndale was burned at the stake on October 6th, 1536.

The Counter-Reformation

The Catholic Church opposed the Protestant Reformation the whole way through. This is why they created the Counter-Reformation. Which was, as indicated in the name a reformation supposed to stop the Protestant Reformation. The Counter-reformation tried hard, but after the Protestant Reformation had gained enough steam it was unstoppable. Europe even fought wars over this called the European Wars of Religion, which were ended in 1648 when the treaty of Westphalia.