Territorial evolution of North America prior to 1763
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Non–Native American nations' territorial claims over North America around 1750
Before contact with Europeans, the natives of North America were divided into many different polities, from small bands of a few families to large empires. Modern anthropology assigns some larger divisions into various "culture areas", regions within which a particular set of cultural, political, subsistence and/or linguistic traits predominated. These pre-Columbian American culture areas may also roughly correspond to particular geographic and biological zones of the continent. During the thousands of years of native inhabitation on the continent, cultures changed and shifted. One of the oldest cultures yet found is that of the Clovis peoples.[1] Upon the arrival of the Europeans in the "New World", Native American population declined substantially, primarily due to the introduction of European diseases to which the Native Americans lacked immunity.[2]
There was limited contact between North American people and the outside world before 1492. Several theoretical contacts have been proposed, but the earliest physical evidence comes from the Norse or Vikings. Norse captain Leif Ericson is believed to have reached the Island of Newfoundland circa 1000 AD.[3] In 1492 Columbus reached land in the Bahamas. Almost 500 years after the Norse, John Cabot explored the east coast of what would become Canada in 1497. Giovanni da Verrazzano explored the East Coast of North America from Florida to presumably Newfoundland in 1524. Jacques Cartier made a series of voyages on behalf of the French crown in 1534 and penetrated the St. Lawrence River. These powers slowly replaced the native nations of the North American east coast and then spread into the interior. The main powers in North America frequently fought over territory. One of the biggest wars was the French and Indian War that ended in France leaving the continent and giving up its claims in the Treaty of Paris. After 1763 a new power emerged, the independent United States of America.
The Treaty of Tordesillas was signed on June 7, 1494 and ratified by Spain and Portugal on July 2 and September 5, 1494, respectively. The Treaty divided the "newly discovered" lands outside Europe between Spain and Portugal along a meridian 370 leagues west of the Cape Verde islands off the west coast of Africa. There was great confusion around the implementation of the Treaty.[4]
1513
The Spanish claims on the Pacific coast, based on a 1493 papal bull which had granted Spain the rights to colonize the western coast of North America, allowed Vasco Núñez de Balboa to claim all of the "South Sea" (the Pacific Ocean) and the lands adjoining the Pacific Ocean for the Spanish Crown.[5]
August 13, 1521
The Aztec Triple Alliance fell into Spanish hands after the long Siege of Tenochtitlan when Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco fell on August 13, 1521 after the last Aztec emperor, Cuauhtémoc, surrendered to Cortés.[6]
Menéndez de Avilés attacked Fort Caroline, killing all the French Huguenot soldiers defending it (sparing only a few Catholics), and renamed the fort San Mateo.[10]
Under the supervision of Sir Walter Raleigh in 1585, a colonizing expedition composed solely of men, many of them veteran soldiers who had fought to establish the British rule in Ireland, was sent to establish a colony in Virginia. With about 75 men, Raleigh decided to establish the English colony at the northern end of Roanoke Island. The British ships disembarked on August 17, 1585, leaving the isolated men to form a colony.[12]
1590
The initial colony was abandoned but a second attempt led by John White, an artist and friend of Sir Walter Raleigh who had accompanied the previous expeditions to Roanoke, was sent out. After problems with the colony mounted they sent White back to England for help due to the continuing war with Spain ( Anglo-Spanish War (1585) ), White was not able to mount another resupply attempt for three more years. He finally gained passage on a privateering expedition that agreed to stop off at Roanoke on the way back from the Caribbean. White landed on August 18, 1590, on his granddaughter's third birthday, but found the settlement deserted. His men could not find any trace of the ninety men, seventeen women, and eleven children, nor was there any sign of a struggle or battle. The only clue was the word "Croatoan" carved into a post of the fort and "Cro" carved into a nearby tree.
Arriving in August 1607, these British Plymouth Company colonists established their settlement, known as the Popham Colony, in the present-day town of Phippsburg, Maine near the mouth of the Kennebec River.
1608
Virginia history
The Popham Colony colonists abandoned their colony leaving on the 30-ton ship, a pinnace they named Virginia. It was the first ship built in America by Europeans, and was meant to show that the colony could be used for shipbuilding. The short-lived colony had lasted about a year.
1613
The earliest Dutch settlement was built around 1613, and consisted of a number of small huts built by the crew of the "Tijger" (Tiger), a Dutch ship under the command of Captain Adriaen Block which had caught fire while sailing on the Hudson.[14] Soon after, the first of two Fort Nassaus was built and small factorijen, or trading posts, where commerce could be conducted with Algonquian and Iroquois population, went up (possibly at Schenectady, Schoharie, Esopus, Quinnipiac, Communipaw and elsewhere).
In 1654, war between France and England broke out. Led by Major Robert Sedgwick, a flotilla from Boston, under orders from Oliver Cromwell, arrived in Acadia to chase the French out. The flotilla seized La Tour’s fort, then Port-Royal.[18]
September 15, 1655
In May 1654, the Dutch Fort Casimir was captured by soldiers from the colony of New Sweden, led by GovernorJohan Risingh. The fort was taken without a fight because its garrison did not have any gunpowder, and the fort was renamed Fort Trinity (in Swedish, Trefaldigheten).
As reprisal, the Dutch — led by Governor Peter Stuyvesant — moved an army to the Delaware River in the late summer of 1655, leading to the immediate surrender of Fort Trinity and Fort Christina. Thus the settlement was absorbed into the Dutch New Netherlands on September 15, 1655.
A modern map which approximates the relative size and location of the settled areas of New Netherland and New Sweden, which was never officially recognized by the Dutch Republic
Acadia returned to France via the Treaty of Breda, signed July 31, 1667. However, it took three years before the officials of the French Empire to take control of this land.[18]
1673
In August 1673, the Dutch recaptured New Netherlands with a fleet of 21 warships, the largest fleet that had ever been seen off the North American coast.
1674
In November 1674, the Treaty of Westminster concluded the war and ceded New Netherland to the English.[21]
1683
The first settlement in Baja California, named San Bruno, was founded but it lasted only about two years before being abandoned.[22]
1697
In 1697, the first "permanent" mission in Baja California was established at Loreto, about 20 miles away from San Bruno, also on the east coast of the peninsula.[23]
In 1719, the French captured the Spanish settlement at Pensacola, but the Spanish were able to retake the town. Then the Spanish lost it again later in the same year.[25]
1722
The French turned over the settlement of Pensacola to the Spanish in the Treaty of 1722.[26]
MacKay, Donald (1996). Scotland Farewell: The People of the Hector (1996ed.). Dundurn Press Ltd. ISBN1-896219-12-8.- Total pages: 236
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Thorne, Kathryn Ford; Long, John Hamilton (1993). Atlas of historical county boundaries (1993ed.). Simon & Schuster. ISBN0-13-051962-6.- Total pages: 242
Page, Melvin Eugene; Sonnenburg, Penny M. Colonialism: an international, social, cultural, and political encyclopedia, Volume 1 (2003ed.). ABC-CLIO. ISBN1-57607-335-1.- Total pages: 1208
Reid, John G. (2004). The "conquest" of Acadia, 1710: imperial, colonial, and aboriginal constructions (2004ed.). University of Toronto Press. ISBN0-8020-8538-5.- Total pages: 297
Rowland, Lawrence Sanders; Moore, Alexander ;Rogers, George C. The History of Beaufort County, South Carolina: 1514-1861 (1996ed.). University of South Carolina Press. ISBN1-57003-090-1.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)- Total pages: 521
During the Age of Discovery, a large scale colonization of the Americas, involving a number of European empires, took place between around 1492 and 1800. The Norse had explored and colonized areas of Europe and the North Atlantic, colonizing Greenland and creating a short term settlement near the northern tip of Newfoundland circa 1000 CE. However, the later colonization by the European powers involving the continents of North America and South America is arguably more well-known.
France began colonizing the Americas in the 16th century and continued into the following centuries as it established a colonial empire in the Western Hemisphere. France established colonies in much of eastern North America, on several Caribbean islands, and in South America. Most colonies were developed to export products such as fish, rice, sugar, and furs.
The Netherlands began its colonization of the Americas with the establishment of trading posts and plantations, which preceded the much wider known colonization activities of the Dutch in Asia. While the first Dutch fort in Asia was built in 1600, the first forts and settlements along the Essequibo River in Guyana date from the 1590s. Actual colonization, with the Dutch settling in the new lands, was not as common as by other European nations.
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 the Americas was established in Jamestown, Virginia in 1607. Approximately 30,000 Algonquian peoples lived in the region at the time. 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 opted to remain under Britain's jurisdiction as British Overseas Territories.
Queen Anne's War (1702–1713) was the second in a series of French and Indian Wars fought in North America involving the colonial empires of Great Britain, France, and Spain; it took place during the reign of Anne, Queen of Great Britain. In the United States, it is regarded as a standalone conflict under this name. Elsewhere it is usually viewed as the American theater of the War of the Spanish Succession. It is also known as the Third Indian War. In France it was known as the Second Intercolonial War.
Acadia was a colony of New France in northeastern North America which included parts of what are now the Maritime provinces, the Gaspé Peninsula and Maine to the Kennebec River. During much of the 17th and early 18th centuries, Norridgewock on the Kennebec River and Castine at the end of the Penobscot River were the southernmost settlements of Acadia. The French government specified land bordering the Atlantic coast, roughly between the 40th and 46th parallels. It was eventually divided into British colonies. The population of Acadia included the various indigenous First Nations that comprised the Wabanaki Confederacy, the Acadian people and other French settlers.
New France was the territory colonized by France in North America, beginning with the exploration of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence by Jacques Cartier in 1534 and ending with the cession of New France to Great Britain and Spain in 1763 under the Treaty of Paris.
This section of the timeline of United States history concerns events from before the lead up to the American Revolution.
Santa Rosa Island is a 40-mile (64 km) barrier island located in the U.S. state of Florida, thirty miles (50 km) east of the Alabama state border. The communities of Pensacola Beach, Navarre Beach, and Okaloosa Island are located on the island. On the northern side of the island, are Pensacola Bay on the west and Choctawhatchee Bay on the east, joined through Santa Rosa Sound.
The colony of Canada was a French colony within the larger territory of New France. It was claimed by France in 1535 during the second voyage of Jacques Cartier, in the name of the French king, Francis I. The colony remained a French territory until 1763, when it became a British colony known as the Province of Quebec.
Spanish Florida was the first major European land claim and attempted settlement in North America during the European Age of Discovery. La Florida formed part of the Captaincy General of Cuba, the Viceroyalty of New Spain, and the Spanish Empire during Spanish colonization of the Americas. While its boundaries were never clearly or formally defined, the territory was initially much larger than the present-day state of Florida, extending over much of what is now the southeastern United States, including all of present-day Florida plus portions of Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Louisiana. Spain's claim to this vast area was based on several wide-ranging expeditions mounted during the 16th century. A number of missions, settlements, and small forts existed in the 16th and to a lesser extent in the 17th century; they were eventually abandoned due to pressure from the expanding English and French colonial settlements, the collapse of the native populations, and the general difficulty in becoming agriculturally or economically self-sufficient. By the 18th century, Spain's control over La Florida did not extend much beyond a handful of forts near St. Augustine, St. Marks, and Pensacola, all within the boundaries of present-day Florida.
This is a chronology and timeline of the colonization of North America, with founding dates of selected European settlements. See also European colonization of the Americas.
The history of Pensacola, Florida, begins long before the Spanish claimed founding of the modern city in 1698. The area around present-day Pensacola was inhabited by Native American peoples thousands of years before the historical era.
New Holland was a colony established by Dutch naval captain Jurriaen Aernoutsz upon seizing the capital of Acadia, Fort Pentagouet in Penobscot Bay, and several other Acadian villages during the Franco-Dutch War. The Dutch imprisoned the Governor of Acadia Jacques de Chambly. The French and native allies under the command of St. Castin regained control of the area the following year in 1675, however, a year later the Dutch West India Company appointed Cornelis Steenwijck, a Dutch merchant in New York, governor of the "coasts and countries of Nova Scotia and Acadie." The formal Dutch claim to Acadia (1676) was finally abandoned at the end of the war with the Treaty of Nijmegen in 1678.
Colonial American military history is the military record of the Thirteen Colonies from their founding to the American Revolution in 1775.
A number of states and polities formerly claimed colonies and territories in Canada prior to the evolution of the current provinces and territories under the federal system. North America prior to colonization was occupied by a variety of indigenous groups consisting of band societies typical of the sparsely populated North, to loose confederacies made up of numerous hunting bands from a variety of ethnic groups, to more structured confederacies of sedentary farming villages, to stratified hereditary structures centred on a fishing economy. The colonization of Canada by Europeans began in the 10th century, when Norsemen explored and, ultimately unsuccessfully, attempted to settle areas of the northeastern fringes of North America. Early permanent European settlements in what is now Canada included the late 16th and 17th century French colonies of Acadia and Canada, the English colonies of Newfoundland (island) and Rupert's Land, the Scottish colonies of Nova Scotia and Port Royal.
The English overseas possessions, also known as the English colonial empire, comprised a variety of overseas territories that were colonised, conquered, or otherwise acquired by the former Kingdom of England during the centuries before the Acts of Union of 1707 between the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland created the Kingdom of Great Britain. The many English possessions then became the foundation of the British Empire and its fast-growing naval and mercantile power, which until then had yet to overtake those of the Dutch Republic, the Kingdom of Portugal, and the Crown of Castile.
Spanish West Florida was a province of the Spanish Empire from 1783 until 1821, when both it and East Florida were ceded to the United States.
White Haitians, also known as Euro-Haitians, are Haitians of predominant or full European descent.
This Timeline of European imperialism covers episodes of imperialism outside of Europe by western nations since 1400; for other countries, see Imperialism § Imperialism by country.
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