The Foreign Protestants were a group of non-British Protestant immigrants to Nova Scotia , primarily originating from France and Germany. They largely settled in Halifax at Gottingen Street (named after the German town of Göttingen ) and Dutch Village Road as well as Lunenburg .
141-594: In 1749, the British colony of Nova Scotia was almost completely populated by native Mi'kmaq and 10,000 French-speaking and Roman Catholic Acadians . The British, specifically the Board of Trade , wanted to settle Protestants in the region. Attracting British immigrants was difficult since most preferred to go to the warmer southern colonies . Thus, a plan was developed to aggressively recruit foreign Protestants , who came mostly from German duchies and principalities on
282-567: A charter for the colonization of an area of North America which was to be called, in her honour, Virginia . This charter specified that Raleigh had seven years in which to establish a settlement, or else lose his right to do so. Raleigh and Elizabeth intended that the venture should provide riches from the New World and a base from which to send privateers on raids against the treasure fleets of Spain . Raleigh himself never visited North America, although he led expeditions in 1595 and 1617 to
423-827: A European power during the remainder of the nineteenth century, and that war did not lead to territorial changes in the Americas. However, the British Empire continued to engage in wars such as the First Opium War against China; it also put down rebellions such as the Indian Rebellion of 1857 , the Canadian Rebellions of 1837–1838 , and the Jamaican Morant Bay rebellion of 1865. A strong abolition movement had emerged in
564-692: A Puritan leader who was expelled from the Massachusetts Bay Colony after he advocated for a formal split with the Church of England . As New England was a relatively cold and infertile region, the New England Colonies relied on fishing and long-distance trade to sustain the economy. In 1632, Cecil Calvert, 2nd Baron Baltimore founded the Province of Maryland to the north of Virginia. Maryland and Virginia became known as
705-492: A base for the privateers. After Gilbert's death, Walter Raleigh took up the cause of North American colonization, sponsoring an expedition of 500 men to Roanoke Island . In 1584, the colonists established the first permanent English colony in North America, but the colonists were poorly prepared for life in the New World, and by 1590, the colonists had disappeared. There are a variety of theories as to what happened to
846-764: A colony in Guiana in 1604 lasted only two years and failed in its main objective to find gold deposits. Colonies in St Lucia (1605) and Grenada (1609) also rapidly folded. Encouraged by the success of Virginia, in 1627 King Charles I granted a charter to the Barbados Company for the settlement of the uninhabited Caribbean island of Barbados . Early settlers failed in their attempts to cultivate tobacco, but found great success in growing sugar . The success of colonization efforts in Barbados encouraged
987-518: A colony in North America. However, the expedition was abandoned before the Atlantic had been crossed. In 1583, Gilbert sailed to Newfoundland , where in a formal ceremony he took possession of the harbour of St John's together with all land within two hundred leagues to the north and south of it, although he left no settlers behind him. He did not survive the return journey to England. On 25 March 1584, Queen Elizabeth I granted Sir Walter Raleigh
1128-905: A crown colony in 1752. In 1754, the Ohio Company started to build a fort at the confluence of the Allegheny River and the Monongahela River . A larger French force initially chased the Virginians away, but was forced to retreat after the Battle of Jumonville Glen . After reports of the battle reached the French and British capitals, the Seven Years' War broke out in 1756; the North American component of this war
1269-585: A downturn in overseas trade which had created financial problems for the Exchequer , King James instructed his Privy Council to establish an ad hoc committee of inquiry to look into the causes of the decline. This was called The Lords of the Committee of the Privy Council appointed for the consideration of all matters relating to Trade and Foreign Plantations . Intended to be a temporary creation,
1410-535: A generation before the Plantation of Ulster and occurring a little bit after the plantation of Munster. Soon there was an explosion of English colonial activity, driven by men seeking new land, by the pursuit of trade, and by the search for religious freedom. In the 17th century, the destination of most English people making a new life overseas was in the West Indies rather than in North America. Financed by
1551-598: A head with the Nootka Crisis in 1789. Both sides mobilised for war, and Spain counted on France for support but when France refused, Spain had to back down and capitulated to British terms leading to the Nootka Convention . The outcome of the crisis was a humiliation for Spain and a triumph for Britain, for the former had practically renounced all sovereignty on the North Pacific coast. This opened
SECTION 10
#17327867732821692-782: A large number of the Protestants removed and resettled in the Summer of 1753 to Merliguish/Merligash, renamed to Lunenburg, Nova Scotia. Conditions in Lunenburg were initially quite poor and rumours that the people were not receiving all of the support authorized by the British Parliament resulted in the Lunenburg Rebellion in December 1753. The Foreign Protestants also faced numerous Mi'kmaw attacks, such as
1833-578: A new sovereign state called Great Britain , provided for the subjects of the new state to "have full freedom and intercourse of trade and navigation to and from any port or place within the said united kingdom and the Dominions and Plantations thereunto belonging". While the Treaty of Union also provided for the winding up of the Scottish African and Indian Company , it made no such provision for
1974-832: A permanent break with Britain, the delegates adopted a Declaration of Independence on 4 July 1776 for the United States of America. The French formed a military alliance with the United States in 1778 following the British defeat at the Battle of Saratoga . Spain joined France in order to regain Gibraltar from Britain. A combined Franco-American operation trapped a British invasion army at Yorktown, Virginia , forcing them to surrender in October 1781. The surrender shocked Britain. The king wanted to keep fighting, but he lost control of Parliament and peace negotiations began. In
2115-831: A royal charter, the Hudson's Bay Company established the territory of Rupert's Land in the Hudson Bay drainage basin . The English also established or conquered several colonies in the Caribbean , including Barbados and Jamaica . England captured the Dutch colony of New Netherland in the Anglo-Dutch Wars of the mid-17th century, leaving North America divided amongst the English, Spanish , and French empires . After decades of warring with France, Britain took control of
2256-715: A second company, the Company of the City of London for the Plantacion of The Somers Isles (better known as The Somers Isles Company ) was spun-off from the London Company in 1615, and continued to administer Bermuda after the London Company's Royal Charter was revoked in 1624 (The Somers Isles Company's Royal Charter was similarly revoked in 1684). Bermuda pioneered tobacco cultivation as the engine for its economic growth, but as Virginia's tobacco agriculture outstripped it in
2397-579: A series of English fortresses on the Indian coast was initiated with Fort St George . In 1661, the marriage of King Charles II to Catherine of Braganza brought him as part of her dowry new possessions which until then had been Portuguese , including Tangier in North Africa and Bombay in India. In North America, Newfoundland and Virginia were the first centres of English colonisation. During
2538-610: A third after the Patience returned again, then departed for England (it had been meant to return to Jamestown after gathering more food in Bermuda), ensuring that Bermuda remained settled, and in the possession of England and the London Company from 1609 to 1612, when more settlers and the first Lieutenant-Governor arrived from England following the extension of the Royal Charter of the London Company to officially add Bermuda to
2679-492: A third voyage, in 1578, he reached the shores of Greenland and also made an unsuccessful attempt at founding a settlement in Frobisher Bay. While on the coast of Greenland, he also claimed that for England. At the same time, between 1577 and 1580, Sir Francis Drake was circumnavigating the globe . He claimed Elizabeth Island off Cape Horn for his queen, and on 24 August 1578 claimed another Elizabeth Island, in
2820-700: A voyage to find a route from the Atlantic to the Spice Islands of Asia , subsequently known as the search for the North West Passage . Cabot sailed in 1497, successfully making landfall on the coast of Newfoundland . There, he believed he had reached Asia and made no attempt to found a permanent colony . He led another voyage to the Americas the following year, but nothing was heard of him or his ships again. The Reformation had made enemies of England and Spain, and in 1562 Elizabeth sanctioned
2961-578: Is known as the French and Indian War . After the Duke of Newcastle returned to power as Prime Minister in 1757, he and his foreign minister, William Pitt , devoted unprecedented financial resources to the transoceanic conflict. The British won a series of victories after 1758, conquering much of New France by the end of 1760. Spain entered the war on France's side in 1762 and promptly lost several American territories to Britain. The 1763 Treaty of Paris ended
SECTION 20
#17327867732823102-577: Is now Newfoundland , called Vinland by the Norse. Later European exploration of North America resumed with Christopher Columbus 's 1492 expedition sponsored by Spain. English settlement began almost a century later. Sir Walter Raleigh established the short-lived Roanoke Colony in 1585. The 1607 settlement of the Jamestown colony grew into the Colony of Virginia . Virgineola —settled unintentionally by
3243-824: The Kingdom of England before 1707. (In 1707 the Acts of Union made England part of the Kingdom of Great Britain . See British Empire .) The first English overseas settlements were established in Ireland , followed by others in North America , Bermuda , and the West Indies , and by trading posts called " factories " in the East Indies , such as Bantam , and in the Indian subcontinent , beginning with Surat . In 1639,
3384-752: The Angevin Empire , England formed part of a collection of lands in the British Isles and France held by the Plantagenet dynasty. The collapse of this dynasty led to the Hundred Years' War between England and France . At the outset of the war the Kings of England ruled almost all of France, but by the end of it in 1453 only the Pale of Calais remained to them. Calais was eventually lost to
3525-698: The Anglo-Spanish War . Spain acknowledged English possession of Jamaica and the Caiman Islands in the 1670 Treaty of Madrid . England captured Tortola from the Dutch in 1670, and subsequently took possession of the nearby islands of Anegada and Virgin Gorda ; these islands would later form the British Virgin Islands . During the 17th century, the sugar colonies adopted the system of sugar plantations successfully used by
3666-597: The Chesapeake Colonies , and experienced similar immigration and economic activities. Though Baltimore and his descendants intended for the colony to be a refuge for Catholics, it attracted mostly Protestant immigrants, many of whom scorned the Calvert family's policy of religious toleration. In the mid-17th century, the Chesapeake Colonies, inspired by the success of slavery in Barbados, began
3807-731: The Council for New England sponsored several colonization projects, including a colony established by a group of English Puritans , known today as the Pilgrims . The Puritans embraced an intensely emotional form of Calvinist Protestantism and sought independence from the Church of England . In 1620, the Mayflower transported the Pilgrims across the Atlantic, and the Pilgrims established Plymouth Colony on Cape Cod . The Pilgrims endured an extremely hard first winter, with roughly fifty of
3948-464: The East Indies , at Bantam on the island of Java , and others, beginning with Surat , on the coasts of what are now India and Bangladesh . Most of the new English colonies established in North America and the West Indies , whether successfully or otherwise, were proprietary colonies with Proprietors , appointed to found and govern settlements under Royal charters granted to individuals or to joint stock companies . Early examples of these are
4089-678: The French Revolution , a Royal Naval Dockyard was established at Bermuda in 1795, which was to alternate with Royal Naval Dockyard, Halifax (Bermuda during the summers and Halifax during the winters) as the Royal Navy headquarters and main base for the River St. Lawrence and Coast of America Station (which was to become the North America Station in 1813, the North America and Lakes of Canada Station in 1816,
4230-444: The French Revolutionary Wars and then in the Napoleonic Wars . During the wars, Britain took control of many French, Spanish, and Dutch Caribbean colonies. Tensions between Britain and the United States escalated during the Napoleonic Wars, as the United States took advantage of its neutrality to undercut the British embargo on French-controlled ports, and Britain tried to cut off that American trade with France. The Royal Navy, which
4371-434: The French colony of Canada and France's territory east of the Mississippi River , as well as several Caribbean territories, in 1763. Many of the North American colonies gained independence from Britain through victory in the American Revolutionary War , which ended in 1783. Historians refer to the British Empire after 1783 as the "Second British Empire"; this period saw Britain increasingly focus on Asia and Africa instead of
Foreign Protestants - Misplaced Pages Continue
4512-405: The Massachusetts Bay Colony , and by 1635 roughly ten thousand English settlers lived in the region between the Connecticut River and the Kennebec River . After defeating the Pequot in the Pequot War , Puritan settlers established the Connecticut Colony in the region the Pequots had formerly controlled. The Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations was founded by Roger Williams ,
4653-401: The Muscovy Company , Martin Frobisher set sail on 7 June 1576, from Blackwall, London , seeking the North West Passage . In August 1576, he landed at Frobisher Bay on Baffin Island and this was marked by the first Church of England service recorded on North American soil. Frobisher returned to Frobisher Bay in 1577, taking possession of the south side of it in Queen Elizabeth's name. In
4794-412: The New World , beginning the European colonization of the Americas . France and England , the two other major powers of 15th-century Western Europe , employed explorers soon after the return of Columbus's first voyage. In 1497, King Henry VII of England dispatched an expedition led by John Cabot to explore the coast of North America, but the lack of precious metals or other riches discouraged both
4935-401: The Nine Years' War , while the powerful Iroquois declared their neutrality. War between France and England continued in Queen Anne's War , the North American component of the larger War of the Spanish Succession . In the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht , which ended the War of Spanish Succession, the British won possession of the French territories of Newfoundland and Acadia , the latter of which
5076-432: The North America and Newfoundland Station in 1821, the North America and West Indies Station about 1820, and finally the America and West Indies Station from 1915 to 1956) before becoming the year-round headquarters and main base from about 1818. English overseas possessions The English overseas possessions comprised a variety of overseas territories that were colonised, conquered, or otherwise acquired by
5217-457: The North American fur trade . During mid-1585 Bernard Drake launched an expedition to Newfoundland which crippled the Spanish and Portuguese fishing fleets there from which they never recovered. This would have consequences in terms of English colonial expansion and settlement. In the Caribbean Sea , English sailors defied Spanish trade restrictions and preyed on Spanish treasure ships . The English colonization of America had been based on
5358-411: The Northwest Territories ), British Columbia, and Prince Edward Island joined Canada by the end of 1873, but Newfoundland would not join Canada until 1949. Like other British dominions such as Australia , New Zealand , and South Africa , Canada enjoyed autonomy over its domestic affairs but recognized the British monarch as head of state and cooperated closely with Britain on defense issues. After
5499-409: The Orinoco River basin in South America in search of the golden city of El Dorado . Instead, he sent others to found the Roanoke Colony , later known as the "Lost Colony". On 31 December 1600, Elizabeth gave a charter to the East India Company , under the name "The Governor and Company of Merchants of London Trading into the East Indies". The Company soon established its first trading post in
5640-456: The Plymouth Company and the London Company for the purpose of establishing permanent settlements in North America. In 1607, the London Company established a permanent colony at Jamestown on the Chesapeake Bay , but the Plymouth Company's Popham Colony proved short-lived. Approximately 30,000 Algonquian peoples lived in the region at the time. The colonists at Jamestown faced extreme adversity, and by 1617 there were only 351 survivors out of
5781-407: The Portuguese princess Catherine of Braganza brought him the ports of Tangier in Africa and Bombay in India as part of her dowry. Tangier proved very expensive to hold and was abandoned in 1684. After the Dutch surrender of Fort Amsterdam to English control in 1664, England took over the Dutch colony of New Netherland , including New Amsterdam . Formalized in 1667, this contributed to
Foreign Protestants - Misplaced Pages Continue
5922-406: The Province of Canada . Responsible government was first granted to Nova Scotia in 1848, and was soon extended to the other British North American colonies. With the passage of the British North America Act, 1867 by the British Parliament , Upper and Lower Canada, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia were formed into the confederation of Canada . Rupert's Land (which was divided into Manitoba and
6063-903: The Raid on Lunenburg (1756) . Most of the foreign Protestants settled along the South Shore between Liverpool and Halifax. The area is still inhabited by their descendants, and last names like, Rothenhauser (modern day spelling: Rhodenizer), Berghaus (anglicized to Barkhouse), Corkum, Creaser, Crouse, Ernst, Harnisch (anglicized to Harnish), Himmelman, Hebb, Hirtle, Lohnes, Joudrey, Kaiser, Knickle, Mariette (anglicized to Marriott), Mettetel (anglicized to Matatall), Morash, Naas, Petterquin (anglicized to Patriquin), Rehfus (anglicized to Rafuse), Reichert (anglicized to Richards), Schmidt (anglicized to Smith), Seeberger (anglicized to Seaboyer), Teubert (anglicized to Tibert), Vogler, Wenzel (anglicized to Wentzell), Whynacht (anglicized to Whynot), Weil (anglicized to Wile), Zinck, Zwicker. Many towns such as Lunenburg , bear distinctly German names. While places adapted to
6204-509: The Royal African Company in West Africa , though others came from Madagascar . These slaves soon came to form the majority of the population in Caribbean colonies like Barbados and Jamaica, where strict slave codes were established partly to deter slave rebellions . Following the success of the Jamestown and Plymouth Colonies, several more English groups established colonies in the region that became known as New England . In 1629, another group of Puritans led by John Winthrop established
6345-526: The Sea Venture , flagship of the English London Company , a division of the Virginia Company , bearing Admiral Sir George Somers and the new Lieutenant-Governor for Jamestown, Sir Thomas Gates , was deliberately driven onto the reef off the archipelago of Bermuda to prevent its foundering during a hurricane on the 25th of July. The 150 passengers and crew built two new ships, the Deliverance and Patience and most departed Bermuda again for Jamestown on 11 May 1610. Two men remained behind, and were joined by
6486-428: The Second Anglo–Dutch War . In 1664, New Netherland was renamed the Province of New York . At the same time, the English also came to control the former New Sweden , in the present-day U.S. state of Delaware , which had also been a Dutch possession and later became part of Pennsylvania . In 1673, the Dutch regained New Netherland, but they gave it up again under the Treaty of Westminster of 1674. In 1621, following
6627-422: The Stadtholder of the Dutch Republic , ensured that England and its colonies would come into conflict with the French empire of Louis XIV after 1689. Under the leadership of Samuel de Champlain , the French had established Quebec City on the St Lawrence River in 1608, and it became the center of French colony of Canada . France and England engaged in a proxy war via Native American allies during and after
6768-435: The Straits of Magellan . In 1579, he landed on the north coast of California , claiming the area for Elizabeth as " New Albion ". However, these claims were not followed up by settlements. In 1578, while Drake was away on his circumnavigation, Queen Elizabeth granted a patent for overseas exploration to his half-brother Humphrey Gilbert , and that year Gilbert sailed for the West Indies to engage in piracy and to establish
6909-437: The Third Anglo-Dutch War , but surrendered its claim to the territory in the 1674 Treaty of Westminster , ending the Dutch colonial presence in North America. In 1664, the Duke of York , later known as James II of England , was granted control of the English colonies north of the Delaware River. He created the Province of New York out of the former Dutch territory and renamed New Amsterdam as New York City . He also created
7050-461: The Upper Rhine . The Duchy of Württemberg was the major source, which included the French region of Montbéliard , and there were also "Foreign Protestants" from what is now the tripoint of France , Germany and Switzerland . The recruiting drive was led by John Dick, a recruiting agent for settlers in the New World. The British government agreed to provide free passage to the colony, free land, and one year of rations upon arrival. Over 2,000 of
7191-464: The Virginia Company , which created the first successful English overseas settlements at Jamestown in 1607 and Bermuda , unofficially in 1609 and officially in 1612, its spin-off , the Somers Isles Company , to which Bermuda (also known as the Somers Isles) was transferred in 1615, and the Newfoundland Company which settled Cuper's Cove near St John's, Newfoundland in 1610. Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Massachusetts Bay, each incorporated during
SECTION 50
#17327867732827332-498: The West Indies were the destination of more than two-thirds of English emigrants to the New World. By 1650, there were 44,000 English people in the Caribbean, compared to 12,000 on the Chesapeake and 23,000 in New England . The most substantial English settlement in that period was at Barbados . In 1660, King Charles II established the Royal African Company , essentially a trading company dealing in slaves , led by his brother James, Duke of York . In 1661, Charles's marriage to
7473-418: The plantations of Ireland . These plantations included King's County, now County Offaly , and Queen's County, now County Laois , in 1556. A joint-stock plantation was established in the late 1560s at Kerrycurrihy near Cork city , on land leased from the Earl of Desmond . In the early 17th century the Plantation of Ulster began, and thousands of Scottish and Northern English colonists were settled in
7614-446: The privateers Hawkins and Drake to attack Spanish ships off the coast of West Africa . Later, as the Anglo-Spanish Wars intensified, Elizabeth approved further raids against Spanish ports in the Americas and against shipping returning to Europe with treasure from the New World . Meanwhile, the influential writers Richard Hakluyt and John Dee were beginning to press for the establishment of England's own overseas empire. Spain
7755-578: The "Foreign Protestants" arrived between 1750 and 1752, in 12 ships: The immigrants disembarked at Halifax , where they were put in temporary quarters. The Foreign Protestants stayed at Halifax to assist the British in building the new outpost. They built their own chapel in Halifax, Little Dutch (Deutsch) Church . Issues arose as a number struggled with high rents in the "shanty town" they had to live in, as well as trouble accessing building materials and having to pay exorbitant prices, while they awaited their promised lands. Governor Hopson and his council had
7896-417: The "first" and "second" empires, in which Britain shifted its attention away from the Americas to Asia, the Pacific, and later Africa. Influenced by the ideas of Adam Smith , Britain also shifted away from mercantile ideals and began to prioritize the expansion of trade rather than territorial possessions. During the nineteenth century, some observers described Britain as having an "unofficial" empire based on
8037-506: The 1620s, and new colonies in the West Indies also emulated its tobacco industry, the price of Bermudian tobacco fell and the colony became unprofitable for many of the company's shareholders, who mostly had remained in England while managers or tenants farmed their land in Bermuda with the labour of indentured servants. Bermuda's House of Assembly held its first session in 1620 (Virginia's House of Burgesses having held its first session in 1619), but with no landowners resident in Bermuda there
8178-400: The 1690s. Between immigration, the importation of slaves, and natural population growth, the colonial population in British North America grew immensely in the 18th century. According to historian Alan Taylor, the population of the Thirteen Colonies (the British North American colonies which would eventually form the United States) stood at 1.5 million in 1750. More than ninety percent of
8319-461: The 1700 colonists who had been transported to Jamestown. After the Virginians discovered the profitability of growing tobacco , the settlement's population boomed from 400 settlers in 1617 to 1240 settlers in 1622. The London Company was bankrupted in part due to frequent warring with nearby American Indians, leading the English crown to take direct control of the Colony of Virginia , as Jamestown and its surrounding environs became known. In 1609,
8460-422: The 1783 Treaty of Paris , Britain ceded all of its North American territory south of the Great Lakes , except for the two Florida colonies, which were ceded to Spain. With their close ties of blood and trade with the continental colonies, especially Virginia and South Carolina, Bermudians leaned towards the rebels during the American War of Independence , supplying them with privateering ships and gunpowder, but
8601-430: The 17th century, Maine , Plymouth , New Hampshire , Salem , Massachusetts Bay , Nova Scotia , Connecticut , New Haven , Maryland , and Rhode Island and Providence were settled. In 1664, New Netherland and New Sweden were taken from the Dutch, becoming New York , New Jersey , and parts of Delaware and Pennsylvania . The Kingdom of England is generally dated from the rule of Æthelstan from 927. During
SECTION 60
#17327867732828742-471: The 1815 defeat of France in the Napoleonic Wars . In the mid- 19th century , Britain began the process of granting self-government to its remaining colonies in North America. Most of these colonies joined the Confederation of Canada in the 1860s or 1870s, though Newfoundland would not join Canada until 1949 . Canada gained full autonomy following the passage of the Statute of Westminster 1931 , though it retained various ties to Britain and still recognizes
8883-426: The 1846 Oregon Treaty , the United States and Britain agreed to split Oregon Country along the 49th parallel north with the exception of Vancouver Island , which was assigned in its entirety to Britain. After warring throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in both Europe and the Americas, the British and French reached a lasting peace after 1815. Britain would fight only one war (the Crimean War ) against
9024-405: The Americas The British colonization of the Americas is the history of establishment of control, settlement, and colonization of the continents of the Americas by England , Scotland , and, after 1707, Great Britain . Colonization efforts began in the late 16th century with failed attempts by England to establish permanent colonies in the North. The first of the permanent English colonies in
9165-453: The Americas was established in Jamestown, Virginia , in 1607. Colonies were established in North America, Central America, South America, and the Caribbean. Though most British colonies in the Americas eventually gained independence, some colonies have remained under Britain's jurisdiction as British Overseas Territories . The first documented settlement of Europeans in the Americas was established by Norse people around 1000 AD in what
9306-404: The Americas, and increasingly focus on the expansion of trade rather than territorial possessions. Nonetheless, Britain continued to colonize parts of the Americas in the 19th century, taking control of British Columbia and establishing the colonies of the Falkland Islands and British Honduras . Britain also gained control of several colonies, including Trinidad and British Guiana , following
9447-620: The Atlantic coast supplied the Atlantic market with beaver fur and deerskins, and sought to preserve their independence by maintaining a balance of power between the French and English. By 1770, the economic output of the Thirteen Colonies made up forty percent of the gross domestic product of the British Empire. Prior to 1660, almost all immigrants to the English colonies of North America had migrated freely, though most paid for their passage by becoming indentured servants . Improved economic conditions and an easing of religious persecution in Europe made it increasingly difficult to recruit labor to
9588-414: The Atlantic coast. Pennsylvania, Virginia, Connecticut, and Maryland all lay claim to the land in the Ohio River valley, and the colonies engaged in a scramble to expand west. Following the 1684 revocation of the Somers Isles Company's Royal Charter, seafaring Bermudians established an inter-colonial trade network, with Charleston, South Carolina (settled from Bermuda in 1670 under William Sayle, and on
9729-461: The British Empire. Meanwhile, seeking to avoid another expensive war with Native Americans, Britain issued the Royal Proclamation of 1763 , which restricted settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains . However, it was effectively replaced five years later thanks to the Treaty of Fort Stanwix . The Thirteen Colonies became increasingly divided between Patriots , opposed to parliamentary taxation without representation, and Loyalists , who supported
9870-451: The British monarch as head of state . Following the onset of the Cold War , most of the remaining British colonies in the Americas gained independence between 1962 and 1983. Many of the former British colonies are part of the Commonwealth of Nations , a political association chiefly consisting of former colonies of the British Empire. Following the first voyage of Christopher Columbus in 1492, Spain and Portugal established colonies in
10011-437: The British were saddled with huge debts following the French and Indian War. As much of the British debt had been generated by the defense of the colonies, British leaders felt that the colonies should contribute more funds, and they began imposing taxes such as the Sugar Act of 1764. Increased British control of the Thirteen Colonies upset the colonists and upended the notion many colonists held: that they were equal partners in
10152-588: The Caribbean, Britain retained Grenada , St. Vincent , Dominica , and Tobago , but returned control of Martinique , Havana , and other colonial possessions to France or Spain. The British subjects of North America believed the unwritten British constitution protected their rights and that the governmental system—with the House of Commons , the House of Lords , and the monarch sharing power—found an ideal balance among democracy, oligarchy, and tyranny. However,
10293-718: The Commander-in-Chief in Halifax, and naval and ecclesiastic links between Bermuda the Maritimes also remained; The military links were severed by Canadian confederation at the end of the 1860s, which resulted in the removal of the British Army from Canada and its Commander-in-Chief from Halifax when the Canadian Government took responsibility for the defence of Canada; The naval links remained until
10434-634: The Crown and were subjected to the measures laid out in An Act for prohibiting Trade with the Barbadoes, Virginia, Bermuda and Antego until Parliament was able to force them to acknowledge its sovereignty. Bermudian anger at the policies of the Somers Isles Company ultimately saw them take their complaints to the Crown after The Restoration , leading to the Crown revoking the Royal Charter of
10575-566: The Dutch colony of New Netherland , with a capital at New Amsterdam . In 1657, New Netherland expanded through conquest of New Sweden , a Swedish colony centered in the Delaware Valley . Despite commercial success, New Netherland failed to attract the same level of settlement as the English colonies. In 1664, during a series of wars between the English and Dutch, English soldier Richard Nicolls captured New Netherland. The Dutch briefly regained control of parts of New Netherland in
10716-750: The English colonization of Ireland, specifically the Munster Plantation, England's first colony, using the same tactics as the Plantations of Ireland . Many of the early colonists of North America had their start in colonizing Ireland, including a group known as the West Country Men . When Sir Walter Raleigh landed in Virginia, he compared the Native Americans to the wild Irish. Both Roanoke and Jamestown had been based on
10857-545: The French and British communities, and implemented governmental systems similar to those employed in Britain, with the intention of asserting imperial authority and not allowing the sort of popular control of government that was perceived to have led to the American Revolution. The British also expanded their mercantile interests in the North Pacific. Spain and Britain had become rivals in the area which came to
10998-621: The French in 1558. The Channel Islands , as the remnants of the Duchy of Normandy , retain their link to the Crown to the present day. The first English overseas expansion occurred as early as 1169, when the Norman invasion of Ireland began to establish English possessions in Ireland , with thousands of English and Welsh settlers arriving in Ireland. As a result of this the Lordship of Ireland
11139-511: The French. In 1695, the Parliament of Scotland granted a charter to the Company of Scotland , which established a settlement in 1698 on the Isthmus of Panama . Besieged by neighbouring Spanish colonists of New Granada , and afflicted by malaria , the colony was abandoned two years later. The Darien scheme was a financial disaster for Scotland—a quarter of Scottish capital was lost in
11280-553: The Irish plantation model. In the late sixteenth century, Protestant England became embroiled in a religious war with Catholic Spain. Seeking to weaken Spain's economic and military power, English privateers such as Francis Drake and Humphrey Gilbert harassed Spanish shipping. Gilbert proposed the colonization of North America on the Spanish model, with the goal of creating a profitable English empire that could also serve as
11421-515: The Islands of Bermuda, where the spin-off Somers Isles Company still administered, the company and its shareholders in England only earned profits from the export of tobacco, placing them increasingly at odds with Bermudians for whom tobacco had become unprofitable to cultivate. As only those landowners who could attend the company's annual meetings in England were permitted to vote on company policy,
11562-732: The Islands of Newfoundland, Cape Breton, Prince Edward and Bermuda were under the Command of Lieutenant-General Sir John Coape Sherbrooke . Below Sherbrooke, the Bermuda Garrison was under the immediate control of the Lieutenant- Governor of Bermuda , Major-General George Horsford (although the Lieutenant-Governor of Bermuda was eventually restored to a full civil Governorship, in his military role as Commander-in-Chief of Bermuda he remained subordinate to
11703-581: The Jerseys. Penn named this land the Province of Pennsylvania . Penn was also granted a lease to the Delaware Colony , which gained its own legislature in 1701. A devout Quaker , Penn sought to create a haven of religious toleration in the New World. Pennsylvania attracted Quakers and other settlers from across Europe, and the city of Philadelphia quickly emerged as a thriving port city. With its fertile and cheap land, Pennsylvania became one of
11844-479: The Massachusetts Bay Colony were reorganized as royal colonies, with a governor appointed by the king. Maryland, which had experienced a revolution against the Calvert family, also became a royal colony, though the Calverts retained much of their land and revenue in the colony. Even those colonies that retained their charters or proprietors were forced to assent to much greater royal control than had existed before
11985-510: The Portuguese in Brazil , which depended on slave labour. The English government valued the economic importance of these islands over that of New England. Until the abolition of its slave trade in 1807, Britain was responsible for the transportation of 3.5 million African slaves to the Americas, a third of all slaves transported across the Atlantic . Many of the slaves were captured by
12126-720: The Royal Navy withdrew from Halifax in 1905, handing its dockyard there over to the Royal Canadian Navy ; The established Church of England in Bermuda , within which the Governor held office as Ordinary , remained linked to the colony of Newfoundland under the same Bishop until 1919). In response to the Rebellions of 1837–1838, Britain passed the Act of Union in 1840, which united Upper Canada and Lower Canada into
12267-472: The Sea Venture were thriving, before moving to St. George's Island where they established the town of New London , which was soon renamed to St. George's Town (the first actual town successfully established by the English in the New World as Jamestown was really James Fort , a rudimentary defensive structure, in 1612). Bermuda was soon more populous, self-sufficient and prosperous than Jamestown and
12408-471: The Somers Isles Company and taking over direct administration of Bermuda in 1684. From that date, Bermudians abandoned agriculture, diversifying their maritime industry to occupy many niches of inter-colonial trade between North America and the West Indies. Bermudians limited landmass and high birth rate meant that a steady outflow from the colony contributed about 10,000 settlers to other colonies, notably
12549-614: The Spanish and English from permanently settling in North America during the early 17th century. Later explorers such as Martin Frobisher and Henry Hudson sailed to the New World in search of a Northwest Passage between the Atlantic Ocean and Asia, but were unable to find a viable route. Europeans established fisheries in the Grand Banks of Newfoundland , and traded metal, glass, and cloth for food and fur, beginning
12690-614: The United Kingdom in the late-eighteenth century, and Britain abolished the slave trade in 1807. In the mid-nineteenth century, the economies of the British Caribbean colonies would suffer as a result of the Slavery Abolition Act 1833 , which abolished slavery throughout the British Empire, and the 1846 Sugar Duties Act , which ended preferential tariffs for sugar imports from the Caribbean. To replace
12831-620: The United States began the American War of 1812 with the invasion of the Canadas, but the British Army mounted a successful defence with minimal regular forces, supported by militia and native allies, while the Royal Navy blockaded the United States of America's Atlantic coastline from Bermuda, strangling its merchant trade, and carried out amphibious raids including the Chesapeake Campaign with its Burning of Washington . As
12972-407: The United States failed to make any gains before British victory against France in 1814 freed British forces from Europe to be wielded against it, and as Britain had no aim in its war with its former colonies other than to defend its remaining continental territory, the war ended with the pre-war boundaries reaffirmed by the 1814 Treaty of Ghent , ensuring Canada's future would be separate from that of
13113-501: The United States to Canada. The 14,000 Loyalists who went to the Saint John and Saint Croix river valleys, then part of Nova Scotia , felt too far removed from the provincial government in Halifax, so London split off New Brunswick as a separate colony in 1784. The Constitutional Act of 1791 created the provinces of Upper Canada (mainly English-speaking) and Lower Canada (mainly French-speaking ) to defuse tensions between
13254-567: The United States. Following the final defeat of French Emperor Napoleon in 1815, Britain gained ownership of Trinidad , Tobago, British Guiana , and Saint Lucia, as well as other territories outside of the Western Hemisphere. The Treaty of 1818 with the United States set a large portion of the Canada–United States border at the 49th parallel and also established a joint U.S.–British occupation of Oregon Country . In
13395-529: The West Indies where colonies like Barbados grew tobacco to the exclusion of subsistence crops. As the company's magazine ship would not carry their food exports to the West Indies, Bermudians began to build their own ships from Bermuda cedar , developing the speedy and nimble Bermuda sloop and the Bermuda rig . Between the late 1610s and the American Revolution, the British shipped an estimated 50,000 to 120,000 convicts to their American colonies. Meanwhile,
13536-573: The advent of metal hulls and steam engines, were to slowly strangle Bermuda's maritime economy, while its newfound importance as a Royal Navy and British Army base from which the North America and West Indies Station could be controlled meant increasing interest from the British Government in its governance. Bermuda was grouped with British North America, especially Nova Scotia and Newfoundland (its closest British neighbours), following United States Independence. When war with France followed
13677-540: The apparent weakness of Spanish rule in Florida , Barbadian planter John Colleton and seven other supporters of Charles II of England established the Province of Carolina in 1663. Settlers in the Carolina Colony established two main population centers, with many Virginians settling in the north of the province and many English Barbadians settling in the southern port city of Charles Town . In 1712, Carolina
13818-606: The colonies in the 17th and 18th centuries. Partly due to this shortage of free labor, the population of slaves in British North America grew dramatically between 1680 and 1750; the growth was driven by a mixture of forced immigration and the reproduction of slaves. In the Southern Colonies, which relied most heavily on slave labor, the slaves supported vast plantation economies lorded over by increasingly wealthy elites. By 1775, slaves made up one-fifth of
13959-506: The colonists lived as farmers, though cities like Philadelphia, New York, and Boston flourished. With the defeat of the Dutch and the imposition of the Navigation Acts, the British colonies in North America became part of the global British trading network. The colonists traded foodstuffs, wood, tobacco, and various other resources for Asian tea, West Indian coffee, and West Indian sugar, among other items. Native Americans far from
14100-587: The colonists there. The most popular theory is that the colonists left in search of a new area to settle in the Chesapeake, leaving stragglers to integrate with local Native American tribes. A separate colonization attempt in Newfoundland also failed. Despite the failure of these early colonies, the English remained interested in the colonization of North America for economic and military reasons. In 1606, King James I of England granted charters to both
14241-400: The committee, later called a 'Council', became the origin of the Board of Trade which has had an almost continuous existence since 1621. The Committee quickly took a hand in promoting the more profitable enterprises of the English possessions, and in particular the production of tobacco and sugar . The Treaty of Union of 1706, which with effect from 1707 combined England and Scotland into
14382-531: The company worked to suppress the developing maritime economy of the colonists and to force the production of tobacco, which required unsustainable farming practices as more was required to be produced to make up for the diminished value. As many of the class of moneyed businessmen who were adventurers in the company were aligned to the Parliamentary cause during the English Civil War , Bermuda
14523-417: The continental colonies were confederated into Canada ) than to the West Indies, and the nearest landfall is North Carolina. Following the independence of the United States, this would make Bermuda of supreme importance to Britain's strategic control of the region, including its ability to protect its shipping in the area and its ability to project its power against the Atlantic seaboard of the United States, as
14664-568: The crown's authority over colonial affairs. James was deposed by the new joint monarchy of William and Mary in the Glorious Revolution , but William and Mary quickly reinstated many of the James's colonial policies, including the mercantilist Navigation Acts and the Board of Trade . The Massachusetts Bay Colony, Plymouth Colony and the Province of Maine were incorporated into the Province of Massachusetts Bay , and New York and
14805-556: The cultural and business requirements including Bridgewater and Riverport . Many of the names of islands, beaches, and points like Kingsburg are also German. In the mid-18th century, the Foreign Protestants were the ethnonymic basis behind the name " New Brunswick ", as well as support behind naming " Prince Edward Island " for a representative of the Braunschweiger dynasty. British colonization of
14946-461: The early 1600s, were charter colonies , as was Virginia for a time. They were established through land patents issued by the Crown for specified tracts of land. In a few instances the charter specified that the colony's territory extended westward to the Pacific Ocean . The charter of Connecticut, Massachusetts Bay and Virginia each contained this "sea to sea" provision. Bermuda , today
15087-680: The early 1800s and pushed into the wilderness territories of the Rocky Mountains and Interior Plateau and all the way to the Strait of Georgia on the Pacific Coast expanding British North America Westward. In 1815, Lieutenant-General Sir George Prevost was Captain-General and Governor-in-Chief in and over the Provinces of Upper-Canada, Lower-Canada, Nova-Scotia, and New~Brunswick, and their several Dependencies, Vice-Admiral of
15228-507: The enterprise—and ended Scottish hopes of establishing its own overseas empire. The episode also had major political consequences, persuading the governments of both England and Scotland of the merits of a union of countries, rather than just crowns. This occurred in 1707 with the Treaty of Union , establishing the Kingdom of Great Britain . After succeeding his brother in 1685, King James II and his lieutenant, Edmund Andros , sought to assert
15369-604: The establishment of more Caribbean colonies, and by 1660 England had established Caribbean sugar colonies in St. Kitts , Antigua , Nevis , and Montserrat , English colonization of the Bahamas began in 1648 after a Puritan group known as the Eleutheran Adventurers established a colony on the island of Eleuthera . England established another sugar colony in 1655 following the successful invasion of Jamaica during
15510-468: The export of goods and financial investments around the world, including the newly independent republics of Latin America. Though this unofficial empire did not require direct British political control, it often involved the use of gunboat diplomacy and military intervention to protect British investments and ensure the free flow of trade. From 1793 to 1815, Britain was almost constantly at war, first in
15651-783: The first starting out in 1792, and a year a later he became the first European to reach the Pacific overland north of the Rio Grande reaching the ocean near present-day Bella Coola . This preceded the Lewis and Clark Expedition by twelve years. Shortly thereafter, Mackenzie's companion, John Finlay , founded the first permanent European settlement in British Columbia , Fort St. John . The North West Company sought further explorations firstly by David Thompson , starting in 1797, and later by Simon Fraser . More expedition took place in
15792-898: The king. In the British colonies nearest to the Thirteen Colonies, however, protests were muted, as most colonists accepted the new taxes. These provinces had smaller populations, were largely dependent on the British military, and had less of a tradition of self-rule. At the Battles of Lexington and Concord in April 1775, the Patriots repulsed a British force charged with seizing militia arsenals. The Second Continental Congress assembled in May 1775 and sought to coordinate armed resistance to Britain. It established an impromptu government that recruited soldiers and printed its own money. Announcing
15933-548: The labor of former slaves, British plantations on Trinidad and other parts of the Caribbean began to hire indentured servants from India and China. Despite its defeat in the American Revolutionary War and shift towards a new form of imperialism during the nineteenth century, the British Empire retained numerous colonies in the Americas after 1783. During and after the American Revolutionary War, between 40,000 and 100,000 defeated Loyalists migrated from
16074-527: The mass importation of African slaves . Though many early slaves eventually gained their freedom, after 1662 Virginia adopted policies that passed enslaved status from mother to child and granted slave owners near-total domination of their human property. 640 miles (1,030 km) East-South-East of Cape Hatteras , in the Virginia Company's other former settlement, the Somers Isles, alias
16215-535: The most attractive destinations for immigrants in the late 17th century. New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware became known as the Middle Colonies . In 1670, Charles II incorporated by royal charter the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), granting it a monopoly on the fur trade in the area known as Rupert's Land . Forts and trading posts established by the HBC were frequently the subject of attacks by
16356-439: The oldest-remaining British Overseas Territory , was settled and claimed by England as a result of the shipwreck there in 1609 of the Virginia Company's flagship Sea Venture . The town of St George's , founded in Bermuda in 1612, remains the oldest continuously-inhabited English settlement in the New World. Some historians state that with its formation predating the conversion of "James Fort" into "Jamestown" in 1619, St George's
16497-605: The one hundred colonists dying. In 1621, Plymouth Colony was able to establish an alliance with the nearby Wampanoag tribe, which helped the Plymouth Colony adopt effective agricultural practices and engaged in the trade of fur and other materials. Farther north, the English also established Newfoundland Colony in 1610, which primarily focused on cod fishing. The Caribbean would provide some of England's most important and lucrative colonies, but not before several attempts at colonization failed. An attempt to establish
16638-529: The passage of the 1931 Statute of Westminster , Canada and other dominions were fully independent of British legislative control; they could nullify British laws and Britain could no longer pass laws for them without their consent. United States independence, and the closure of its ports to British trade, combined with growing peace in the region which reduced the risk to shipping (resulting in smaller evasive merchantmen, such as those that Bermudian shipbuilders turned out, losing favour to larger clippers ), and
16779-504: The population of the Thirteen Colonies but less than ten percent of the population of the Middle Colonies and New England Colonies. Though a smaller proportion of the English population migrated to British North America after 1700, the colonies attracted new immigrants from other European countries, including Catholic settlers from Ireland and Protestant Germans. As the 18th century progressed, colonists began to settle far from
16920-625: The power of the Royal Navy on the surrounding Atlantic left no possibility of their joining the rebellion, and they eventually availed themselves of the opportunities of privateering against their former kinsmen. Although often mistaken for being in the West Indies, Bermuda is nearer to Canada (and was initially grouped within British North America , retaining close links especially with the Nova Scotia and Newfoundland until
17061-456: The province of Ulster . English control of Ireland fluctuated for centuries until Ireland was incorporated into the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland in 1801. The voyages of Christopher Columbus began in 1492, and he sighted land in the West Indies on 12 October that year. In 1496, excited by the successes in overseas exploration of the Portuguese and the Spanish , King Henry VII of England commissioned John Cabot to lead
17202-402: The provinces of West Jersey and East Jersey out of former Dutch land situated to the west of New York City, giving the territories to John Berkeley and George Carteret . East Jersey and West Jersey would later be unified as the Province of New Jersey in 1702. Charles II rewarded William Penn , the son of distinguished Admiral William Penn , with the land situated between Maryland and
17343-422: The role, including religious Independent and Parliamentarian William Sayle ) by force of arms and elected John Trimingham to replace him. Many of Bermuda's religious Independents, who had sided with Parliament, were forced into exile. Although some of the newer continental colonies settled largely by anti-Episcopalian Protestants sided with Parliament during the war, Virginia and other colonies like Bermuda supported
17484-430: The rule of the House of Knýtlinga , from 1013 to 1014 and 1016 to 1042, England was part of a personal union that included domains in Scandinavia . In 1066, William the Conqueror , Duke of Normandy , conquered England , making the Duchy a Crown land of the English throne. Through the remainder of the Middle Ages the kings of England held extensive territories in France , based on their history in this Duchy. Under
17625-442: The same latitude as Bermuda, although Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, is the nearest landfall to Bermuda) forming a continental hub for their trade (Bermuda itself produced only ships and seamen). The widespread activities and settlement of Bermudians has resulted in many localities named after Bermuda dotting the map of North America. The Glorious Revolution and the succession of William III, who had long resisted French hegemony as
17766-425: The same, Lieutenant-General and Commander of all His Majesty's Forces in the said Provinces of Lower Canada and Upper-Canada, Nova-Scotia and New-Brunswick, and their several Dependencies, and in the islands of Newfoundland, Prince Edward, Cape Breton and the Bermudas, &c. &c. &c. Beneath Prevost, the staff of the British Army in the Provinces of Nova-Scotia, New-Brunswick, and their Dependencies, including
17907-418: The shipwreck of the Virginia Company's Sea Venture in 1609, and renamed The Somers Isles —is still known by its older Spanish name, Bermuda . In 1620, a group of mostly Pilgrim religious separatists established a second permanent colony on the mainland, on the coast of Massachusetts. Several other English colonies were established in North America during the 17th and 18th centuries. With the authorization of
18048-406: The southern continental colonies (including Carolina Province , which was settled from Bermuda in 1670), as well as West Indian settlements, including the Providence Island colony in 1631, the Bahamas (settled by Eleutheran Adventurers , Parliament-allied Civil War exiles from Bermuda, under William Sayle in the 1640s), and the seasonal occupation of the Turks Islands from 1681. Encouraged by
18189-406: The territory of Virginia. The archipelago was officially named Virgineola , though this was soon changed to The Somers Isles , which remains an official name though the archipelago had already long been infamous as Bermuda , and the older Spanish name has resisted replacement. The Lieutenant-Governor and settlers who arrived in 1612 briefly settled on Smith's Island, where the three left behind by
18330-414: The war, and France surrendered almost all of the portion of New France to the east of the Mississippi River to the British. France separately ceded its lands west of the Mississippi River to Spain, and Spain ceded Florida to Britain. With the newly acquired territories, the British created the provinces of East Florida , West Florida , and Quebec , all of which were placed under military governments. In
18471-443: The way to British expansion in that area, and a number of expeditions took place; firstly a naval expedition led by George Vancouver which explored the inlets around the Pacific NorthWest, particularly around Vancouver Island . On land, expeditions took place hoping for a discovery of a practicable river route to the Pacific for the extension of the North American fur trade (the North West Company ). Sir Alexander Mackenzie led
18612-419: Was actually the first successful town the English established in the New World . Bermuda and Bermudians have played important, sometimes pivotal, roles in the shaping of the English and British trans-Atlantic empires. These include roles in maritime commerce, settlement of the continent and of the West Indies, and the projection of naval power via the colony's privateers , among others. Between 1640 and 1660,
18753-406: Was claimed for centuries by the English monarch; however, English control mostly was resigned to an area of Ireland known as The Pale , most of Ireland, large swaths of Munster , Ulster and Connaught remained independent of English rule until the Tudor and Stuart period. It was not until the 16th century that the Tudor monarchs of England began to "plant" Protestant settlers in Ireland as part of
18894-411: Was consequently no property qualification , unlike the case with the House of Commons . As the bottom fell out of tobacco, many absentee shareholders (or Adventurers ) sold their shares to the occupying managers or tenants, with the agricultural industry quickly shifting towards family farms that grew subsistence crops instead of tobacco. Bermudians soon found they could sell their excess foodstuffs in
19035-626: Was desperately short of trained seamen and constantly losing deserters who sought better-paid work under less draconian discipline aboard American merchant vessels, boarded American ships to search for deserters, sometimes resulting in the Impressment of American sailors into the Royal Navy. The United States, at the same time, coveted the acquisition of Canada, which Britain could ill afford to lose as its naval and merchant fleets had been constructed largely from American timber before United States independence, and from Canadian timber thereafter. Taking advantage of Britain's absorption in its war with France,
19176-417: Was divided into the crown colonies of North Carolina and South Carolina . The colonies of Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina (as well as the Province of Georgia , which was established in 1732) became known as the Southern Colonies . Beginning in 1609, Dutch traders had established fur trading posts on the Hudson River , Delaware River , and Connecticut River , ultimately creating
19317-468: Was established in the late 1560s, at Kerrycurrihy near Cork city Several people who helped establish colonies in Ireland also later played a part in the early colonisation of North America, particularly a group known as the West Country men . The first English colonies overseas in America was made in the last quarter of the 16th century, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth . The 1580s saw the first attempt at permanent English settlements in North America ,
19458-420: Was one of the colonies that sided with the Crown during the war , being the first to recognise Charles II after the execution of his father. With control of their Assembly and the militia and volunteer coastal artillery , the Royalist majority deposed the company-appointed Governor (by the 1630s, the company had ceased sending Governors to Bermuda and had instead appointed a succession of prominent Bermudians to
19599-437: Was renamed Nova Scotia . In the 1730s, James Oglethorpe proposed that the area south of the Carolinas be colonized to provide a buffer against Spanish Florida, and he was part of a group of trustees that were granted temporary proprietorship over the Province of Georgia . Oglethorpe and his compatriots hoped to establish a utopian colony that banned slavery, but by 1750 the colony remained sparsely populated, and Georgia became
19740-406: Was to be shown during the American War of 1812 . Having defeated a combined Franco-Spanish naval force at the decisive 1782 Battle of the Saintes , Britain retained control of Gibraltar and all its pre-war Caribbean possessions except for Tobago. Economically, the new nation became a major trading partner of Britain. The loss of a large portion of British America defined the transition between
19881-428: Was well established in the Americas, while Portugal had built up a network of trading posts and fortresses on the coasts of Africa, Brazil , and China , and the French had already begun to settle the Saint Lawrence River , which later became New France . The first English overseas colonies started in 1556 with the plantations of Ireland after the Tudor conquest of Ireland . One such overseas joint stock colony
#281718