56-549: The Province of Maine refers to any of the various English colonies established in the 17th century along the northeast coast of North America , within portions of the present-day U.S. states of Maine , New Hampshire , and Vermont , and the Canadian provinces of Quebec and New Brunswick . It existed through a series of land patents made by the kings of England during this era, and included New Somersetshire , Lygonia , and Falmouth (now Portland, Maine ). The province
112-567: 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
168-581: 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
224-585: 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,
280-535: 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
336-578: 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
392-596: A portion of his lobsters in the Penobscot Bay region, where this fishery had just been started. The quantity of lobsters carried by him that year was 40,000.... Lobsters were so abundant at the Muscle Ridges, at this period, that four men could fully supply Captain Oakes with lobsters every trip. In the course of ten days each man would obtain between 1,200 and 1,500 marketable lobsters. In Captain Oakes' opinion,
448-579: 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
504-498: A survey made in the early 1650s, Massachusetts extended its land claims as far north as Casco Bay. By 1658, Massachusetts had completed the assimilation of all of Gorges' original territory into its jurisdiction. In 1664, Charles II of England made a grant to James, Duke of York for territories north and east of the Kennebec River. Under the terms of this patent the territory was incorporated into Cornwall County , part of
560-492: 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
616-482: A trip in 7 to 9 days. This traffic continued for six or seven years. In 1879, Captain Davis bought from 15 men In the same locality, and at times was obliged to buy also of others in order to make up a load. The fishery at North Haven began in 1848, but did not increase so rapidly at first as in sections farther west, as the smacks would only take the medium-sized lobsters, fearing that the largest would not be able to stand
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#1732782696415672-756: 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
728-526: Is between Muscongus Bay and Blue Hill Bay , just west of Acadia National Park . At the beginning of the Holocene epoch 11,000 years ago, the Gulf of Maine's sea level fell as low as 180 feet (55 m) below its present height. Penobscot Bay was then a continuation of Penobscot River that meandered through a broad lowland extending past present day Matinicus Island . Penobscot Bay and its chief tributary ,
784-831: Is subject to abatement under procedures described in Section 10 of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act , as amended" The WPCA report recommended specific water quality requirements for these pollution dischargers, and concluded if the identified pollution sources improved their waste treatment practices, the waters of the upper Penobscot Bay communities of Northport , Searsport , Stockton Springs , Penobscot, Castine , Islesboro and Belfast would again be available for commercial and recreational fishing, swimming, pleasure boating, industrial processing and cooling water, wildlife and navigation. Early Commercial Lobstering: 1840s to 1870s . Penobscot Bay
840-824: 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,
896-752: 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
952-464: 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
1008-488: The Federal Water Pollution Control Act of 1948 , where states were requested to evolve and enforce their own standards, federal water pollution regulation evolved in 1970 to require that any project requiring a federal permit must be certified to meet state standards, then expanded in 1972 to require projects to meet a host of federal standards. The law is now known as the Clean Water Act of 1972 . On June 28, 1966,
1064-640: 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
1120-724: 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
1176-617: The Piscataqua River , with Mason retaining the land south of the river as the Province of New Hampshire . Gorges named his more northerly piece of territory New Somersetshire after his home county of Somerset in England. Lack of funding and the absence of a royal charter held back development, and only a few small settlements were established. Gorges sought to create a neo-feudal community similar to western England. The colony
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#17327826964151232-529: The Plymouth Council for New England , which itself had been granted a royal patent by James I to the coast of North America between the 40th to the 48th parallel "from sea to sea". This first patent encompassed the coast between the Merrimack and Kennebec rivers, and an irregular parcel of land between the headwaters of the two rivers. In 1629, Gorges and Mason agreed to split the patent at
1288-672: 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
1344-599: 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
1400-549: 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
1456-733: 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
1512-744: 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
1568-468: 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
1624-570: 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
1680-430: 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
1736-654: The English companies or colonies. In effect, with the Union they became British colonies . Penobscot Bay Penobscot Bay ( French : Baie de Penobscot ) is an inlet of the Gulf of Maine and Atlantic Ocean in south central Maine , a stretch known as Midcoast Maine , in a broader Atlantic region known as Down East . The bay originates from the mouth of Maine's Penobscot River , downriver from Belfast . Penobscot Bay has many working waterfronts including Rockland , Rockport , and Stonington , and Belfast. Penobscot Bay
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1792-726: 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
1848-461: The Muscle Ridges have furnished the most extensive lobster fishery of the Maine coast. He ran to this locality until 1874. Capt. S. S. Davis, of South Saint George, states that about 1864, when he first began buying lobsters at the Muscle Ridges, three men, tending 40 to 50 pots each, caught all the count lobsters he could carry to market in his smack. He could load 5,000 lobsters at a time, and averaged
1904-767: The Penobscot River, are named for the Penobscot Indian Nation , which has continuously inhabited the area for more than ten thousand years, fishing, hunting and shellfish gathering in and around the bay and river. A part of the Wabanaki Confederacy , the Penobscot Indian Nation's present reservation includes Indian Island , north of Orono, Maine , and all the islands of Penobscot River above it. Ancient remains of their campsites dating back millennia have been found on
1960-637: The State of Maine's Commissioner of Sea and Shore Fisheries, Ronald W. Green, ordered closure of the shellfish beds in the waters of Searsport and Stockton Springs, in upper Penobscot Bay, "due to the polluted condition of the water." The US Department of the Interior 's Water Pollution Control Administration and the US Public Health Service then conducted a joint investigation of the lower Penobscot River and upper Penobscot Bay "to determine
2016-677: The bay's shores and islands. The bay was the site of a humiliating American defeat during the Revolutionary War . In 1779 a Continental Navy flotilla consisting of 19 warships and 25 support vessels was dispatched on July 24 to recapture the mid-coast of Maine from the British who had captured part of the territory and constructed fortifications near the bay, naming the newly captured territory New Ireland . The American besiegers became stalled in their assaults due to dissension between Solomon Lovell and Dudley Saltonstall , two of
2072-412: The chief sources of the pollution. According to the report,"substantial economic injury results from the inability to market shellfish or shellfish products in interstate commerce because of pollution caused by sewage and industrial wastes discharged to the Penobscot River and upper Penobscot Bay area and action of state authorities." The WPCA noted that "accordingly the pollution of these navigable waters
2128-451: 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
2184-451: The country's most well-known summer colonies . Historic Water Pollution Management . Penobscot Bay has been the receiving waters for sewage waste and industrial waste discharges from bay and river towns since the 19th century. Discharge treatment was primarily dilution until the mid 20th century when the federal government began requiring communities and businesses of all states to meet water pollution control standards. Beginning with
2240-632: The duke's proprietary Province of New York . The territory stipulated in this charter encompassed the areas between the Kennebec and St. Croix Rivers . This region, which had previously been called the Territory of Sagadahock , forms the eastern portion of the present-day state of Maine. Charles had intended to include the former Gorges territory in this grant, but the Gorges' heirs instead chose to sell their remaining claims to Massachusetts. In 1674-75,
2296-399: 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
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2352-403: The expedition's commanders, and after a British flotilla led by George Collier arrived on August 13, the American fleet fled, beaching and burning their ships in the face of a superior British force. All 44 ships were either destroyed or captured, in what proved to be America's worst naval defeat until Pearl Harbor , 162 years later. There are many islands in this bay and on them are some of
2408-412: The former claims of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and those of the Duke of York. The region became York County, Massachusetts and then the District of Maine , part of Massachusetts until it achieved statehood of its own in 1820. English overseas possessions The English overseas possessions comprised a variety of overseas territories that were colonised, conquered, or otherwise acquired by
2464-439: 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
2520-456: 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
2576-450: The region between the Kennebec River and Penobscot Bay was administered as Devonshire County, District of Maine, Massachusetts Bay Colony , overlapping the New York claim. Starting in 1675, King Philip's War resulted in the abandonment of this area by English settlers until the 18th century. In 1691, William III and Mary II issued a charter for the new Province of Massachusetts Bay that encompassed (in addition to other territories)
2632-430: 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
2688-432: The sources of this pollution, the direction of travel of this pollution and the degree of economic injury involved." In February 1967, the Water Pollution Control Administration (WPCA) published its findings as "Report on Pollution - Navigable Waters of the Penobscot River and Upper Penobscot Bay" . The investigation found that the sewage from eleven towns and effluents of thirteen businesses and one university facility were
2744-405: Was Anglican and Royalist, and so sided with the king in the English Civil War (1642–1651). In 1639, Gorges obtained a renewed patent, the Gorges Patent, for the area between the Piscataqua and Kennebec Rivers, in the form of a royal charter from Charles I of England . The area was roughly the same as that covered in the 1622 patent after the 1629 split with Mason. This renewed colonization effort
2800-419: 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,
2856-418: Was also hampered by lack of money and settlers, but continued to survive even after the death of Gorges in 1647. Beginning in the 1640s, the nearby Massachusetts Bay Colony began claiming territories north of the Merrimack River , because the Merrimack's northernmost point was farther north than its mouth. This resulted in its administration of the early settlements of what later became New Hampshire . After
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#17327826964152912-406: 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
2968-468: 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 ,
3024-453: Was incorporated into the Massachusetts Bay Colony during the 1650s, beginning with the formation of York County, Massachusetts , which extended from the Piscataqua River to just east of the mouth of the Presumpscot River in Casco Bay . Eventually, its territory grew to encompass nearly all of present-day Maine. The first patent establishing the Province of Maine was granted on August 10, 1622 to Sir Ferdinando Gorges and John Mason by
3080-460: Was one of the first Maine lobster grounds exploited on a significant commercial scale. A United States Fish Commission report "The Lobster Fishery of Maine" in the 1899 Bulletin of the United States Fish Commission, Vol. 19, Pages 241-265 details some of these early ventures, as these excerpts reveal: In 1847 Captain Oakes purchased the smack Josephine, with which he began running to Johnson & Young's establishment, at Boston, in 1848, buying
3136-428: 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
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