There were numerous cities founded by the English Pilgrims in the mid to late 1600’s, including Plymouth, Jamestown, Williamsburg and Yorktown. Although each of these cities was important in the growth and development of the colonies, the first permanent settlement founded by the English Pilgrims was Plymouth, named an official settlement in 1621. Plymouth was located near present day Cape Cod, and many of the people who settled in this colony were lower class farmers, or those who did hard labor. As more and more people came over to the New World, colonies were developed in order to divide the land into sections.

The first thirteen colonies were as follows: Massachusetts, Rhode Island,  Connecticut,  New Hampshire, New York,  Delaware,  New Jersey,  Pennsylvania,  Virginia,  Maryland,  North Carolina,  South Carolina, and Georgia. Each of these colonies were founded sometime in the 1600’s, with the exception of Georgia, which was founded in the early 1700’s. When word of the new and successful colonies reached England, nearly 21,000 immigrants sailed from Western Europe to the New World.

This caused a large fluctuation of population between 1629 and 1640, due to the many ships carrying settlers back and forth between England and the New World. As a result, several small towns sprang up quickly, and cities that were already very big became even larger. Although there were many English settlements founded throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, Plymouth was a significant city whose success encouraged and guided the immigration of hundreds of thousands of people.