| 1606 | Virginia Company receives royal charter. |
| 1607 | English colonists found Jamestown; Pocahontas "rescues" John Smith. |
| 1607–1610 | Starvation plagues Jamestown. |
| 1612 | John Rolfe begins to plant tobacco in Virginia. |
| 1617 | First commercial tobacco shipment to England. Pocahontas dies in England. |
| 1618 | Powhatan dies; Opechancanough becomes Algonquian chief. |
| 1619 | First Africans arrive in Virginia. House of Burgesses begins to meet. |
| 1622 | Opechancanough leads first uprising in Virginia. |
| 1624 | Virginia becomes royal colony. |
| 1630s | Barbados colonized by English. |
| 1632 | Colony of Maryland founded. |
| 1634 | Colonists begin to arrive in Maryland. |
| 1640s | Barbados colonists grow sugarcane with slave labor. |
| 1644 | Opechancanough leads second uprising. |
| 1660 | Navigation Act requires colonial products be shipped only to English ports. Virginia law defines slavery as inherited, lifelong servitude. |
| 1663 | Carolina colony founded. |
| 1670 | Charles Towne, South Carolina, founded. |
| 1670–1700 | Slave labor system emerges in Carolina and Chesapeake colonies. |
| 1676 | Bacon's Rebellion. |
| 1680 | Pueblo Revolt. |