American bourgeois historians, when studying the colonial period of US history, usually emphasize the "exclusivity" and "democracy" of the development of the English colonies in North America. The situation in the English colony of New York, which until 1664 was Dutch and was called New Netherlands, is also idealized. Dutch settlers of the 17th century represent the democratic tradition in the history of the United States1 . In some works, the New Netherlands even appears as a kind of colonial idyll . However, the real facts of history refute this picture. The first European to visit the bay of what is now New York in 1524 was the Florentine navigator J. da Verrazano, who was in the service of King Francis I of France .3 But the colonization of what is now New York State was begun at the turn of the seventeenth century by Dutch merchants, who quickly realized the profitability of the fur trade they were conducting with the Indians .4 In September 1609, the captain of the ship "Crescent", an Englishman G. Hudson, who was in the service of the Dutch East India Company, visited North America on the banks of the river, which was later named after him. He was looking for a strait connecting the Atlantic Ocean with the seas bordering India and China. The captain did not find the strait, but this failure was compensated by a successful trade with the Indians, from whom " knives and various trinkets could be bought... animal skins " 5, valued in Europe for their weight in gold. Through deception or direct violence against the Indians, the Hudson sailors filled the hold of the Crescent Moon with furs in a month. Shortly thereafter, the Amsterdam merchant I. La Mer sends his ships to 1 Raesly E. Portrait of New Netherland. N. Y. 1945, pp. 2, 331 - 333; Kenney A. Stubborn for Liberty. The Dutch in New York. Syracuse (N. Y.). 1975, pp. 13 - 150. 2 Janvier Th. The Dutch Founding of New York. N. Y. 1903; Earle A. Colonial Days in Old New York. Port Washington. 1962; Hults D. New ... Read more