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A Cold Welcome: The Little Ice Age and Europe’s Encounter with North America
When Europeans first arrived in North America, they faced a cold new world. The average global temperature had dropped to lows unseen in millennia, and its effects were stark and blizzards and deep freezes, droughts and famines, and winters when even the Rio Grande froze. This period of climate change has come to be known as the Little Ice Age, and it played a decisive role in Europe’s encounter with the lands and peoples of North America. In A Cold Welcome , Sam White tells the story of this crucial period in world history, from Europe’s earliest expeditions in an unfamiliar landscape to the perilous first winters at Santa Fe, Quebec, and Jamestown.
Weaving together evidence from climatology, archaeology, and the written historical record, White describes how the severity and volatility of the Little Ice Age climate threatened to freeze and starve out the Europeans’ precarious new settlements. Lacking basic provisions and wholly unprepared to fend for themselves under such harsh conditions, Europeans suffered life-threatening privation, and their desperation precipitated violent conflict with Native Americans.
In the twenty-first century, as we confront an uncertain future from global warming, A Cold Welcome reminds us of the risks of a changing and unfamiliar climate.
Weaving together evidence from climatology, archaeology, and the written historical record, White describes how the severity and volatility of the Little Ice Age climate threatened to freeze and starve out the Europeans’ precarious new settlements. Lacking basic provisions and wholly unprepared to fend for themselves under such harsh conditions, Europeans suffered life-threatening privation, and their desperation precipitated violent conflict with Native Americans.
In the twenty-first century, as we confront an uncertain future from global warming, A Cold Welcome reminds us of the risks of a changing and unfamiliar climate.
376 pages, Hardcover
Published October 16, 2017
25 people are currently reading
344 people want to read
About the author
Sam White
3 books6 followersSam White is a professor of history at the Ohio State University, where he teaches courses on climate and society, environmental change, and Big History. He has written numerous articles and chapters for academic journals and textbooks, and pieces for newspapers, magazines, and popular blogs. His first book, The Climate of Rebellion in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire (Cambridge University Press: 2011) tells the story of how ecological pressures, climatic change, and human mistakes drove the once powerful Ottoman Empire into economic and political crisis, with profound consequences for the history of the Middle East. It won book prizes from the Middle East Studies Association, Turkish Studies Associations, and British-Kuwaiti Friendship Society. His second book, A Cold Welcome: The Little Ice Age and Europe's Encounter with North America (Harvard University Press: 2017) explores the forgotten first century of Spanish, French, and English expeditions across the Atlantic, drawing on a vast array of historical sources in seven languages and new insights from archaeology and climatology. It received book awards from Ohio Academy of History and the Sixteenth Century Society, and was a finalist for the Cundill Prize.
The author lives with his wife, daughter, and cat in Columbus, Ohio.
The author lives with his wife, daughter, and cat in Columbus, Ohio.
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Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
December 31, 2019
Author White discusses 16th and early 17th century European attempts at colonization of North America. Almost all of these failed. He argues that gross misunderstanding of North American climate, coupled with the cold, unstable and rapidly-changing weather during the Little Ice Age, largely doomed these attempts. The book is worth reading, more for the well-researched history than for White's discussions of climate science. Both his history and science are up to date. And his game of "what might have been" in the conclusion is fun. I'm still digesting the book, but overall: good but not great. 3.7-ish stars.
Here's the best review I saw online:
https://marginalia.lareviewofbooks.or...
It's pretty exhaustive, but you will be able to figure out whether or not to tackle the book from her review, I think. Excerpt:
"The frame of A Cold Welcome is revolutionary. No one reading this book will soon forget the profound impact of climate change on North American colonization. The story within this frame, however, is in some ways not new at all.
“It is worthwhile to remember,” White declares in the conclusion, “how differently history would have turned out but for these accidents.” The differences he cites are in the patterns and timing of European colonization; most importantly, that Spain rather than England and France might have pursued claims to North America, and that the continent might have been colonized sooner than it was. Such differences would doubtless have altered the world we know today, but White does not elaborate on how."
Brief review by Kelly Robson, that led me to read the book: https://kellyrobson.com/my-favorite-n...
"Early North American colonization attempts by Europeans were doomed by the colonizers’ poor knowledge of climate science. They assumed that growing seasons in North America were analogous to those at the same latitude on the opposite side of the Atlantic, which it simply isn’t. This led to a lot of failed attempts and fascinatingly stupid disasters."
Here's the best review I saw online:
https://marginalia.lareviewofbooks.or...
It's pretty exhaustive, but you will be able to figure out whether or not to tackle the book from her review, I think. Excerpt:
"The frame of A Cold Welcome is revolutionary. No one reading this book will soon forget the profound impact of climate change on North American colonization. The story within this frame, however, is in some ways not new at all.
“It is worthwhile to remember,” White declares in the conclusion, “how differently history would have turned out but for these accidents.” The differences he cites are in the patterns and timing of European colonization; most importantly, that Spain rather than England and France might have pursued claims to North America, and that the continent might have been colonized sooner than it was. Such differences would doubtless have altered the world we know today, but White does not elaborate on how."
Brief review by Kelly Robson, that led me to read the book: https://kellyrobson.com/my-favorite-n...
"Early North American colonization attempts by Europeans were doomed by the colonizers’ poor knowledge of climate science. They assumed that growing seasons in North America were analogous to those at the same latitude on the opposite side of the Atlantic, which it simply isn’t. This led to a lot of failed attempts and fascinatingly stupid disasters."
January 25, 2019
The co-founder of the web site “The Climate History Network” has written a interesting and well-researched book reconstructing how climate change led up to the founding of Jamestown as well as the colonies of Santa Fe and Quebec. Professor Sam White is a scholar of global environmental history. My interest is how the past weather reconstruction and human behavior is tied with understanding future climate changes.
The early colonists were extremely ill-prepared and their leaders were ignorant when they arrived in frozen North America. They felt pressured to report how wonderful the new colonies and weather were to their British sponsors. The winters were something to be dreaded,and many died during the “little ice age” that lasted from 1300 to 1870.
The Native Americans suffered but they had their woodcraft and the wisdom of living in frozen land for centuries. They knew how to hunt and fish in the snow, how to dress and build homes but despite all of their skills, they were not prepared for the smallpox the Europeans brought with them. The Europeans could have learned so much from the local tribes (how to dress for the weather for example) but considered them “savages.” Highly informative and just the beginning of my research but very glad to have read this book. Recommend.
The early colonists were extremely ill-prepared and their leaders were ignorant when they arrived in frozen North America. They felt pressured to report how wonderful the new colonies and weather were to their British sponsors. The winters were something to be dreaded,and many died during the “little ice age” that lasted from 1300 to 1870.
The Native Americans suffered but they had their woodcraft and the wisdom of living in frozen land for centuries. They knew how to hunt and fish in the snow, how to dress and build homes but despite all of their skills, they were not prepared for the smallpox the Europeans brought with them. The Europeans could have learned so much from the local tribes (how to dress for the weather for example) but considered them “savages.” Highly informative and just the beginning of my research but very glad to have read this book. Recommend.
December 25, 2018
This much-acclaimed 2017 book brings fresh light and new questions to the narratives of early European exploration and colonization of North America that every school child learns about. "Climate change" is merely a symptom here of the much more profoundly complex task that Sam White sets for himself. How does one reconstruct the "climate history context" of past events, and what can doing so teach us? Over the course of its 10 chapters, the book provides plenty of evidentiary surprises and provocative interpretations. A spirit of fascination for the counterfactual ("what if history had played out differently?") enlivens White's narrative without totally spoiling its historical analytical integrity.
February 6, 2018
Welcome this one: it’s a new take on the colonial history of America.
White’s focus is on the repeated attempts and repeated failures (mostly) of the Spanish, French, and English governments and rich entrepreneurs to establish survivable colonies on the North American continent up to and through the 16th century.
There’s a new bad guy in the story: cold weather, AKA the Little Ice Age.
Conventionally, the Little Ice Age is a well-researched period of global cooling that ended about 1850, and began as early as the 14th century, and no later than the 16th century.
European explorers and colonists believed, and were encouraged to believe, that they could expect European, even Mediterranean temperatures and weather in the so-called New World.
They were disastrously wrong time after time. Sam White proposes that Indian resistance, bad luck, poor planning, and freak bad weather were not the only reasons that so many colonial enterprises failed before 1600.
There is ample modern scientific evidence, and persistent references in the primary source texts, to verify that the inhospitable cold weather killed crops, animals, and the colonists themselves. In 1541 a Spanish adventurer in what is now Arkansas recorded: “There were such great snows and cold weather that we thought we were dead men.”
The killing cold devastated the indigenous Americans, as well.
There was no place to come in out of the cold.
Read more of my book reviews here:
http://richardsubber.com/
White’s focus is on the repeated attempts and repeated failures (mostly) of the Spanish, French, and English governments and rich entrepreneurs to establish survivable colonies on the North American continent up to and through the 16th century.
There’s a new bad guy in the story: cold weather, AKA the Little Ice Age.
Conventionally, the Little Ice Age is a well-researched period of global cooling that ended about 1850, and began as early as the 14th century, and no later than the 16th century.
European explorers and colonists believed, and were encouraged to believe, that they could expect European, even Mediterranean temperatures and weather in the so-called New World.
They were disastrously wrong time after time. Sam White proposes that Indian resistance, bad luck, poor planning, and freak bad weather were not the only reasons that so many colonial enterprises failed before 1600.
There is ample modern scientific evidence, and persistent references in the primary source texts, to verify that the inhospitable cold weather killed crops, animals, and the colonists themselves. In 1541 a Spanish adventurer in what is now Arkansas recorded: “There were such great snows and cold weather that we thought we were dead men.”
The killing cold devastated the indigenous Americans, as well.
There was no place to come in out of the cold.
Read more of my book reviews here:
http://richardsubber.com/
April 11, 2024
All in all this is a very fine examination of the impact of climate, and of climate knowledge (or the lack thereof), on the Early Modern efforts of the European nations to gain a foothold in what is now Canada and the United States. If the impact of the Little Ice Age (and of assorted major volcanic eruptions) wasn't enough of a barrier to European efforts to create overseas footholds, White spends much time dealing with the European misconceptions regarding the climactic conditions they were going to be subjected to. For too long they thought they would encounter relatively mild conditions, instead of the "continental" climate with its relative extremes of winter and summer. To a large degree it was only sheer stubbornness and a bit of dumb luck that allowed early settlements at Jamestown, Quebec, St. Augustine and Santa Fe to survive until adaptation to the new reality could take place (the French being the possible exception). Highly recommended.
Originally written: April 2, 2020.
Originally written: April 2, 2020.
September 2, 2018
I had no idea that the sixteenth-century explorers of North America faced disaster time and again not only because of poor planning and cultural ignorance but also because the continent was experiencing a "little ice age," a period of extraordinarily harsh winters, drought, and extreme weather in general. The colonizers not only had false expectations, they were slow to adapt to the unexpected and failed to made use of local indigenous knowledge about the environment. White concludes with this paradox: "Human psychology may be both too quick to grasp at false patterns and yet too slow to let go of familiar expectations in order to make the constant calculations necessary to understand and adjust to a changed or changing climate.
Very well written.
Very well written.
May 25, 2025
Sam is a real homie. He spits climate facts then regales you with colonial tales of stupidity, arrogance, and extreme self-deception.
One English expedition to the arctic in the 1500s, brought back a ship full of beach rocks because they thought “there may be gold in here dog”. There wasn’t and it bankrupted the expeditions investors. Is this what space exploration will be like?
One English expedition to the arctic in the 1500s, brought back a ship full of beach rocks because they thought “there may be gold in here dog”. There wasn’t and it bankrupted the expeditions investors. Is this what space exploration will be like?
January 15, 2018
What’s extraordinary about the impact of the Little Ice Age on the early exploration of North America is not simply the cold, but the complexity of weather, geography, landscape, mythology, and the mutual incomprehension between Europeans and Native Americans.
But still, it was often abnormally cold — not simply for the 16th-century explorers of what is now New England and Canada, but for the Spanish in “La Florida,” the American Southwest, and the English in the Jamestown colony in Virginia. The extreme weather patterns often caused immense suffering among Native American populations as well, decades before European-borne diseases such as smallpox became rampant.
Sam White, a professor at Ohio State University, uses historical and archeological records, along with tree-ring analysis and ice core sampling, to document the complicated impact of the Little Ice Age, which also caused major disruptions in Europe itself. White is an academic, and the level of detail and analysis may occasionally overwhelm the general reader, but the story he tells is a compelling one.
For example, European explorers seized, quite reasonably, on the fact that since the latitude of the mid-Atlantic states corresponded with that of Spain, it should possess a climate and topography like Andalusia, where they could easily grow grain, olives, grapes, and other Old World crops. Canada roughly corresponded to France, and it took the bitter experience of many voyages, shipwrecks, and failed settlements for first the English, then the French to accept the reality of Canada’s fearsome winter seasons.
The Little Ice Age not only brought unprecedented cold and snow to the Americas, but often lengthy drought as well, as attested to by contemporary accounts and tree-ring evidence. Often, the local Indians themselves struggled to grow enough corn for themselves, much less trade it to settlers in Florida and Virginia. Cold and hunger inevitably bred conflict.
Ideas were often as potent as realities. Dreams of cities of gold and silver drove Spanish expeditions from Mexico into the Southwest. At the same time, fantasies of a Northwest Passage motivated repeated conveys of ill-equipped English and French ships into the ice-infested waters of the North Atlantic and Arctic Oceans, often with disastrous consequences.
Spain narrowly decided against giving up its unprofitable St. Augustine colony. In the case of Jamestown, the colonists decided to abandon the place after the “starving winter” of 1610 and were only saved by the providential arrival of a large supply fleet.
After detailing the many failed voyages and abandoned early settlements — from New Mexico to Newfoundland — it is remarkable that, by the early 1600s, four permanent settlements actually survived in North America: two Spanish (Santa Fe and St. Augustine), one English (Jamestown), and one French (Quebec).
As White concludes, European explorers “did not fail only because it was the Little Ice Age — although Little Ice Age climates did pose very real challenges. The failed mainly because they did not know what to expect and how to adapt.”
But still, it was often abnormally cold — not simply for the 16th-century explorers of what is now New England and Canada, but for the Spanish in “La Florida,” the American Southwest, and the English in the Jamestown colony in Virginia. The extreme weather patterns often caused immense suffering among Native American populations as well, decades before European-borne diseases such as smallpox became rampant.
Sam White, a professor at Ohio State University, uses historical and archeological records, along with tree-ring analysis and ice core sampling, to document the complicated impact of the Little Ice Age, which also caused major disruptions in Europe itself. White is an academic, and the level of detail and analysis may occasionally overwhelm the general reader, but the story he tells is a compelling one.
For example, European explorers seized, quite reasonably, on the fact that since the latitude of the mid-Atlantic states corresponded with that of Spain, it should possess a climate and topography like Andalusia, where they could easily grow grain, olives, grapes, and other Old World crops. Canada roughly corresponded to France, and it took the bitter experience of many voyages, shipwrecks, and failed settlements for first the English, then the French to accept the reality of Canada’s fearsome winter seasons.
The Little Ice Age not only brought unprecedented cold and snow to the Americas, but often lengthy drought as well, as attested to by contemporary accounts and tree-ring evidence. Often, the local Indians themselves struggled to grow enough corn for themselves, much less trade it to settlers in Florida and Virginia. Cold and hunger inevitably bred conflict.
Ideas were often as potent as realities. Dreams of cities of gold and silver drove Spanish expeditions from Mexico into the Southwest. At the same time, fantasies of a Northwest Passage motivated repeated conveys of ill-equipped English and French ships into the ice-infested waters of the North Atlantic and Arctic Oceans, often with disastrous consequences.
Spain narrowly decided against giving up its unprofitable St. Augustine colony. In the case of Jamestown, the colonists decided to abandon the place after the “starving winter” of 1610 and were only saved by the providential arrival of a large supply fleet.
After detailing the many failed voyages and abandoned early settlements — from New Mexico to Newfoundland — it is remarkable that, by the early 1600s, four permanent settlements actually survived in North America: two Spanish (Santa Fe and St. Augustine), one English (Jamestown), and one French (Quebec).
As White concludes, European explorers “did not fail only because it was the Little Ice Age — although Little Ice Age climates did pose very real challenges. The failed mainly because they did not know what to expect and how to adapt.”
January 26, 2018
Had to read this book for a History course. White makes the point (over and over again) that the Little Ice Age is a main reason for the failure or expeditions to the Americas in the 1500’s and 1600’s. It’s really repetitive and drives that point home about once a page. However, in the conclusion, he states that the Little Ice Age was not the reason for the colonists’ failures and that it was really their lack of information on climate, weather, and the New World. He then goes on to talk about how the Little Ice Age made the adaptation and learning curve much more difficult for North America because it was hard to set seasonal expectations and exacerbated conflict between natives and colonists. And then he ends the book by talking about current global warming patterns. So all in all I do not understand the point this man is trying to make. Did the Little Ice Age impact colonists so greatly that their expeditions failed (which is his point for pages 1-252) or did the settlers’ gross incompetence cause them to fail (page 253) or was the Little Ice Age just one of many reasons they failed (page 254)?
Sam White, if you’re out there, please tell me what your point is.
Sam White, if you’re out there, please tell me what your point is.
January 4, 2018
A good look at the various attempts by France, Spain, and England (don't forget Portugal) to colonize North America and the effect of weather during the late 1500s to early 1600s. I do have some issues with how the author interprets proxy data and states his conclusions as incontrovertible facts (such as tree ring data that only show summer* but interprets as telling exact information for winter) but still a good read. Especially if your knowledge of North American history jumps from the conquistadors in 1521 to the Pilgrims in 1620.
*I don't personally know how tree rings are read and calculated beyond the physical counting of rings to tell years but am going off what the author states. The author states that tree ring data are proxy data (a proxy is not direct but something that stands in place of something else) that are imperfect for data analysis but then states his analysis and interpretation are true, accurate, and unquestionable facts about winter weather. He mentions only once that proxy data are imperfect but then goes on to take that data as if it were direct data.
*I don't personally know how tree rings are read and calculated beyond the physical counting of rings to tell years but am going off what the author states. The author states that tree ring data are proxy data (a proxy is not direct but something that stands in place of something else) that are imperfect for data analysis but then states his analysis and interpretation are true, accurate, and unquestionable facts about winter weather. He mentions only once that proxy data are imperfect but then goes on to take that data as if it were direct data.
January 4, 2020
I was afraid this book might get into discussions on the current climate issues which I was not interested in reading about, but it didn't, so that's a mark for it. I came across 3 typos while reading, which was a mark against. I also felt the organization was unclear. The books gives a lot of great info but it's hard to connect it all. I think it would have helped to have chapters titled with a location and date, rather than a vague quote. That way, if I wanted to look back and compare what was happening in Jamestown to New Mexico it would have been easier to find. Overall: interesting topic and good read.
December 10, 2017
A very readable and timely look at how the Little Ice Age affected early colonization in the Americas. White looks at every aspect of the extreme weather: how it precipitated the need to leave Europe, how it left Europeans totally unprepared to survive in the New World, and how it affected Native/European relations. Considering that the Little Ice Age represented only a 1–2 °C shift in global temperatures, this book raises some interesting questions about the myriad of unpredictable and potentially deadly ways global warming could affect our lives.
June 18, 2021
3.5
Rather dry (pun ontended)
On the one hand, this book helps understand European exploration & colonization of North America. It gave me an added layer of context.
However, I wonder if the author is giving too much (or maybe not enough?) credit to climate change/the Little Ice Age.
Rather dry (pun ontended)
On the one hand, this book helps understand European exploration & colonization of North America. It gave me an added layer of context.
However, I wonder if the author is giving too much (or maybe not enough?) credit to climate change/the Little Ice Age.
July 22, 2018
Well-written and entertaining. Lots of good information on the impact of the climate on the exploration and settling of North America.
January 29, 2019
So interesting!
December 22, 2020
I am always interested in learning more about the settlement of America. This book does this wonderfully.
July 29, 2021
well-researched study of the effects of climate on emigration.
July 4, 2025
Sam White’s A Cold Welcome is one of the most eye-opening history books I’ve read in a while. It completely reshaped how I understand early European colonization in North America not as a triumph of exploration, but as a fragile, often desperate struggle for survival in the face of an unforgiving climate.
White’s core argument is powerful: the Little Ice Age wasn’t just background noise it was a central player in the drama of European expansion. I had no idea how extreme the conditions really were during that time. The descriptions of blizzards paralyzing the earliest settlements, rivers like the Rio Grande freezing over, and famines gutting entire colonies were sobering. What struck me most was how ill-equipped the colonists were not just materially, but mentally for what they encountered. They didn’t just underestimate the climate; they misunderstood it entirely.
The book weaves together science and narrative history in a way that feels both rigorous and readable. White draws on climatology, archaeology, and detailed historical records, and somehow manages to keep the storytelling compelling throughout. I especially appreciated the chapters on Jamestown and Quebec, which really bring home how climate volatility and environmental misjudgment could turn already difficult situations into total catastrophes.
Another strength of the book is how it doesn’t shy away from the consequences of this desperation namely, increased tension and violence with Indigenous peoples. White doesn't romanticize the past; he shows how climate stress pushed these already fraught relationships into violent, often tragic territory.
If I had one minor critique, it's that a few sections get quite dense with data and technical language, especially the climatology parts but even then, White usually circles back to the human story at the heart of it all.
Overall, A Cold Welcome is a deeply researched, beautifully written, and refreshingly original take on early American history. It’s not just a story of cold winters it’s a story about human vulnerability, miscalculation, and resilience in the face of a climate that refused to cooperate. Highly recommend for anyone interested in environmental history, early colonization, or just a well-told story that challenges what you thought you knew.
White’s core argument is powerful: the Little Ice Age wasn’t just background noise it was a central player in the drama of European expansion. I had no idea how extreme the conditions really were during that time. The descriptions of blizzards paralyzing the earliest settlements, rivers like the Rio Grande freezing over, and famines gutting entire colonies were sobering. What struck me most was how ill-equipped the colonists were not just materially, but mentally for what they encountered. They didn’t just underestimate the climate; they misunderstood it entirely.
The book weaves together science and narrative history in a way that feels both rigorous and readable. White draws on climatology, archaeology, and detailed historical records, and somehow manages to keep the storytelling compelling throughout. I especially appreciated the chapters on Jamestown and Quebec, which really bring home how climate volatility and environmental misjudgment could turn already difficult situations into total catastrophes.
Another strength of the book is how it doesn’t shy away from the consequences of this desperation namely, increased tension and violence with Indigenous peoples. White doesn't romanticize the past; he shows how climate stress pushed these already fraught relationships into violent, often tragic territory.
If I had one minor critique, it's that a few sections get quite dense with data and technical language, especially the climatology parts but even then, White usually circles back to the human story at the heart of it all.
Overall, A Cold Welcome is a deeply researched, beautifully written, and refreshingly original take on early American history. It’s not just a story of cold winters it’s a story about human vulnerability, miscalculation, and resilience in the face of a climate that refused to cooperate. Highly recommend for anyone interested in environmental history, early colonization, or just a well-told story that challenges what you thought you knew.
October 5, 2025
This book is extremely well researched but in actuality is more of a history of the early exploration and colonization attempts in North America than it is about the Little Ice Age. Yes, exploration attempts were dangerous and risky; yes it was very cold. People starved and had to figure out how to survive as they knew nothing of varying climates across a primarily unexplored globe. If you find yourself ready to give up on this read, at least read the conclusion. There you will probably find what you were looking for with this book.
September 5, 2019
How climate affected colonization for Spanish, French, and British.
November 30, 2022
Fascinating well researched account of early North American colonies and the effects of climate and weather on their success.
March 1, 2024
I wil write a review later.
January 22, 2026
Read this book for grad school in a week… Still not sure what the main argument of the book was… Kind of confusing and definitely not my cup of tea.
August 22, 2021
It was too cold, too wet, too stormy, too hot, too dry…and everyone was too busy playing pirates anyway
Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews