Newfoundland Colony

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Today's coat of arms of the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador, which was first awarded to David Kirke in 1637

The colony Newfoundland ( English Newfoundland Colony ) was an English and later British colony on the territory of modern Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador . It was established in 1610 after there had been sporadic settlement activity on the island of Newfoundland for several decades . In 1854 it became a self-governing crown colony in the British Empire and received Dominion status in 1907 . The Dominion Newfoundland finally joined the Canadian Confederation in 1949 as the tenth state.

history

Before the arrival of the first British settlers in the late 16th century, Newfoundland was inhabited by the Beothuk , an Algonquian-speaking Indian ethnic group that has been considered extinct since the 19th century, partly because of the infectious diseases brought by the former. Later, members of the Mi'kmaq tribe moved from the mainland to Newfoundland, who today make up the majority of Newfoundland's residents who profess to be Indians.

In 1583, the English seafarer Humphrey Gilbert, who had been granted a patent by Queen Elizabeth I , took possession of the island for the crown. Gilbert was killed in a storm that same year on his way back to Europe. Almost 90 years before Gilbert, in 1497, the Italian navigator in English service, Giovanni Caboto (English John Cabot ), had probably entered Newfoundland and symbolically took possession of it. Newfoundland has a certain right to the title of the oldest English colony, since the settlement of Roanoke, founded by Walter Raleigh in 1585 on the island of the same name off the coast of North Carolina, did not exist. After the end of the Anglo-Spanish War in 1604 there was a growing interest in overseas colonization in England.

In 1610, three years after the founding of Jamestown in what is now Virginia , a ship arrived with 40 settlers on board Cuper's Cove (now Cupids ) and founded under the leadership of the merchant John Guy a settlement on behalf of the London and Bristol Company , previously a Royal charter by King James I had received. The company initially had a monopoly on trade with Newfoundland, and most of the early settlers were fishermen. In the next few years until 1620, further settlements followed in Bristol's Hope (near Harbor Grace ), Renews , in New Cambriol , South Falkland and Ferryland on the Avalon Peninsula in the far east . At around the same time, French colonists also settled the island, but more on the south coast and in the northwest. In 1623 the Province of Avalon was founded by Captain Edward Wynne on behalf of George Calvert .

In 1638, David Kirke was the first governor appointed for the entire island. In 1655 the French crown appointed a first governor for the port of Plaisance , located at what is now Placentia Bay , and tried in the following years to establish a colony for this place. The largest English settlement in the first census around 1675 was St. John's in Conception Bay , which is still the largest city on Newfoundland today. During King William's War (1689–1697), part of the Palatine War of Succession , the now grown English colony on the Avalon Peninsula was almost wiped out by French troops under Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville and Jacques Testard de Montigny and their Indian allies. Only the outpost on Carbonear Island and the town of Bonavista in the far north of the peninsula of the same name survived the onslaught relatively unscathed. Over the following years the colony was rebuilt and repopulated by the British.

During Queen Anne's War (1702-1713), the British Navy led by John Leake in 1702 several raids on French coastal settlements, but did not dare to go to the French main base of Plaisance. The French governor Daniel d'Auger de Subercase fought back against the British settlements in the following years, but failed in early 1705 with the siege of St. John's. It was not until the winter of 1708/09 that the French succeeded in conquering the British base without being able to hold it permanently. The fortifications were razed during the retreat and then rebuilt by the British. In the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, France had to cede all of the Acadia to Great Britain (it was renamed Nova Scotia ("Nova Scotia") and also recognize British rule over Newfoundland and the islands of Saint-Pierre and Miquelon off its coast . The French were granted fishing rights in the north of the island, on the so-called French Shore , which lasted until the Entente cordiale of 1904.

Map of New England and Nova Scotia from 1758 with Newfoundland at the top right

Between 1729 and 1824, Newfoundland was administered by governors from the ranks of the Royal Navy , the so-called Commodore Governors , the first of which was Henry Osborn . Previously, the captains of the annual fishing expeditions calling on the island had been the highest authority in the colony. The governors typically only stayed in the colony from June / July to November each year; this did not change until 1817.

During the Seven Years' War in North America , St. John's was briefly conquered in the summer of 1762 by a French expedition under Charles-Henri-Louis d'Arsac de Ternay and Joseph-Louis-Bernard de Cléron d'Haussonville . The Battle of Signal Hill near St. John's on September 15, in which the French were defeated, was the final battle of the war in North America. In the Peace of Paris of 1763, the previous New France was assigned to Great Britain, only Saint-Pierre and Miquelon remained for the French as fishing outposts.

The island, isolated from the Thirteen Colonies , was not drawn into the turmoil of the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783) and remained loyal. From 1783 Newfoundland was considered part of the British North America that remained with Great Britain . Some American loyalists who had fled were relocated to the island, but most of them to Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and what is now Ontario .

In 1825, Thomas John Cochrane became the first civilian governor for what is now the crown colony of Newfoundland. Government House in St. John's was built under him . In 1832 the colony received a constitution and in 1854 it was granted self-government. Philip Francis Little, from Charlottetown , Prince Edward Island , became the first premier . During the time of the Canadian Confederation in the 1860s, Newfoundland refused to join. In 1907 it received its own Dominion status. Newfoundland soldiers and volunteers took part in the First and Second World Wars on the motherland side . In the wake of the Great Depression of the 1930s, Newfoundland was administered by a royal government commission from 1934 to 1949. Last year, the Dominion joined the Confederation with Labrador .

For further history see Newfoundland and Labrador

See also

literature

  • Sean T. Cadigan: Newfoundland and Labrador: A History. University of Toronto Press, 2009, ISBN 978-0-8020-8247-3 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The Beothuk on heritage.nf.ca
  2. ↑ The Mi'kmaq (Micmac) on heritage.nf.ca
  3. ↑ Sponsored Settlement: The Colonization of Newfoundland on heritage.nf.ca .
  4. ↑ Permanent Settlement at Avalon on heritage.nf.ca
  5. ↑ David Kirke and the Pool Plantation on heritage.nf.ca
  6. ↑ The French Settlement of Placentia on heritage.nf.ca
  7. ↑ King William's War in Newfoundland 1696-1697 on crossroadsforcultures.ca
  8. ↑ Queen Anne's War on crossroadsforcultures.ca
  9. ↑ The French Treaty Shore on heritage.nf.ca
  10. ↑ Fishing Admirals and Naval Governors on heritage.nf.ca
  11. ↑ Newfoundland and Canada: 1864-1949 on heritage.nf.ca
  12. ↑ Collapse of Responsible Government, 1929-1934 on heritage.nf.ca