William Colston

William Colston
William Colston
Born	Bristol, England
Nationality	British
Occupation	Newfoundland settler and deputy governor of colony

Last updated May 05, 2019

William Colston (fl. 1610–1612) was an Englishman and one of the first settlers in the colony at Cuper's Cove, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada.^[1]

Floruit, abbreviated fl., Latin for "he/she flourished", denotes a date or period during which a person was known to have been alive or active. In English, the word may also be used as a noun indicating the time when someone flourished.

He was almost certainly a native of Bristol, England, and travelled to Newfoundland in 1610 as one of the first settlers in a scheme for the plantation of Newfoundland. They settled at Cuper's Cove and the colony was governed by John Guy, another Bristol man. Some authorities claim that Colston was Guy’s brother-in-law, though this is uncertain.^[1]

Bristol is a city and county in South West England with a population of 459,300. The wider district has the 10th-largest population in England. The urban area population of 724,000 is the 8th-largest in the UK. The city borders North Somerset and South Gloucestershire, with the cities of Bath and Gloucester to the south-east and north-east, respectively. South Wales lies across the Severn estuary.

John Guy was an English merchant adventurer, colonist and politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1621 to 1624. He was the first proprietary governor of Newfoundland Colony, the first attempt to establish a colony on Newfoundland.

John Guy appointed Colston as deputy governor during his absence from the colony between August 1611 and June 1612,^[2] and Colston kept the required journal of weather and what the settlers were doing throughout the winter,^[1] though this journal has not survived.^[3] After Guy returned from England, with 16 women settlers,^[4] cattle and a chaplain, he is reported to have sent Colston home to England for a holiday.^[2] Back in Bristol, Colston told John Slany, treasurer of the London and Bristol Company who sponsored the Cuper's Cove colony, of the vast riches to be had in Newfoundland.

John Slany, merchant, ship builder, born in Shropshire, England, was secretary of the Newfoundland Company and a member of the Merchant Taylor's Company. He had also invested in the East India Company.

The London and Bristol Company came about in the early 17th century when English merchants had begun to express an interest in the Newfoundland fishery. Financed by a syndicate of investors John Guy, himself a Bristol merchant, visited Newfoundland in 1608 to locate a favourable site for a colony. Upon his return to England 40 people applied for incorporation as the Tresurer and the Companye of Adventurers and planter of the Cittye of london and Bristoll for the Collonye or plantacon in Newfoundland. The company was known as the London and Bristol Company or simply the Newfoundland Company.

Other authorities claim that he remained longer in Cuper's Cove, and that Colston recorded the first birth of an English child in the settlement on 27 March 1613, when Nicholas Guy and his wife had a baby boy.^[5] Prowse^[6] claims that Guy abandoned Newfoundland in 1613, and left Colston in charge of the colony.

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Captain John Mason (1586–1635) was a sailor and colonizer born at King's Lynn, Norfolk, England, and educated at Peterhouse, Cambridge. He was appointed the second Proprietary Governor of Newfoundland's Cuper's Cove colony in 1615, succeeding John Guy. Mason arrived on the island in 1616 and explored much of the territory. He compiled a map of the island and wrote and published a short tract of his findings.

Cuper's Cove, on the southwest shore of Conception Bay on Newfoundland's Avalon Peninsula was an early English settlement in the New World, and the second one after Jamestown, Virginia to endure for longer than a year. It was established in 1610 by John Guy on behalf of Bristol's Society of Merchant Venturers, who had been given a charter by King James I of England to establish a colony on the island of Newfoundland. Most of the settlers left in the 1620s, but apparently a few stayed on and the site was continuously inhabited.

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Henry Crout settler, explorer was most likely from Devon in the English West Country. He became an investor in the London and Bristol Company and acted as Sir Percival Willoughby agent and guardian to his son Thomas at the Cuper's Cove plantation in Newfoundland.

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Nicholas Guy was one of the first settlers at the London and Bristol Company's Cuper's Cove, colony in Newfoundland, and was the father of the first English child born in Newfoundland and subsequently all of the country of Canada.

Thomas Rowley, explorer and pioneer, born Shropshire, England, was one of the first settlers of John Guy's colony at Cuper's Cove, Conception Bay, Newfoundland, Canada. Rowley had accompanied John Guy on his expedition to Trinity Bay from Cuper's Cove in search of the Beothuk to make friendly relations with them for trade.

Thomas Willoughby colonist, born Wollaton, Nottingham, England was one of the first settlers in John Guy's colony at Cuper's Cove, Newfoundland, Canada. Willoughby is the third-eldest child of Bridget and Percival Willoughby. Willoughby, a noted black sheep of the family, was sent, along with his guardian Henry Crout, to Cuper's Cove to mend his ways and help in establishing his father's land ownership on the Bay de Verde Peninsula. He landed at Renews in 1612 before proceeding to Cuper's Cove. Willoughby had taken part in the exploration of the territory around the peninsula and took part in the fishery and was allowed to return to England in 1613. The winter prior to his departure back to England he tried to make amends for his troublesome ways in a letter to his family, where he stated:

indever [my] selfe in all goodnesse, that I hope in time you may live to se[e] mee become a newe man.

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References

1 2 3 Cell, Gillian T. (1979) [1966]. "Colston, William". In Brown, George Williams. Dictionary of Canadian Biography . I (1000–1700) (online ed.). University of Toronto Press.
1 2 Rogers, J.D. (1911). A Historical Geography Of The British Colonies, Vol. V — Part IV, Newfoundland (pdf). Oxford: The Clarendon Press. p. 57. Retrieved 2010-05-19.
↑ "Colston, William". Baccalieu: Crossroads for Cultures. 2005. Retrieved 2010-05-21.
↑ "Guy, John". Baccalieu: Crossroads for Cultures. 2005. Retrieved 2010-05-21.
↑ William Coveduck (2001-07-22). "Settlements – Conception Bay Newfoundland". Families of Newfoundland. Retrieved 2010-05-19.
↑ D.W.Prowse (1895). A History of Newfoundland from the English, Colonial and Foreign Records. London and New York: MacMillan & Co. ISBN 0-7884-2310-X . Retrieved 2010-05-21.

External links

The Cupids Colony and John Guy

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[dcbo-1] 1 2 3 Cell, Gillian T. (1979) [1966]. "Colston, William". In Brown, George Williams. Dictionary of Canadian Biography . I (1000–1700) (online ed.). University of Toronto Press.

[Rogers-2] 1 2 Rogers, J.D. (1911). A Historical Geography Of The British Colonies, Vol. V — Part IV, Newfoundland (pdf). Oxford: The Clarendon Press. p. 57. Retrieved 2010-05-19.

[bacca-3] "Colston, William". Baccalieu: Crossroads for Cultures. 2005. Retrieved 2010-05-21.

[bac-4] "Guy, John". Baccalieu: Crossroads for Cultures. 2005. Retrieved 2010-05-21.

[coveduck-5] William Coveduck (2001-07-22). "Settlements – Conception Bay Newfoundland". Families of Newfoundland. Retrieved 2010-05-19.

[prowse-6] D.W.Prowse (1895). A History of Newfoundland from the English, Colonial and Foreign Records. London and New York: MacMillan & Co. ISBN 0-7884-2310-X . Retrieved 2010-05-21.