Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The rivalry between England and France in Europe was played out in conflicts in North America, where they struggled for predominance. This was particularly true in Newfoundland, where the English colonial settlements on the eastern coasts were in close proximity to the French claims in Southern Newfoundland, which the French dubbed Plaisance.
Newfoundland postage stamp, featuring Sir Humphrey Gilbert. Newfoundland was the oldest English colony in North America, being claimed by John Cabot for King Henry VII, and again by Sir Humphrey Gilbert in 1583. It gradually acquired European settlement; in 1825, it was formally recognised as a Crown colony by the British government.
Its five large American bases—four Air Force and one Navy—were important to Newfoundland's economy, and many Americans intermarried with native residents. [54] Fears of a permanent American presence in Newfoundland caused the Canadian government to attempt to persuade the island to join the Canadian Confederation. [55]
John Cabot (Italian: Giovanni Caboto [dʒoˈvanni kaˈbɔːto]; c. 1450 – c. 1499) [2] was an Italian [2] [3] navigator and explorer.His 1497 voyage to the coast of North America under the commission of Henry VII, King of England is the earliest known European exploration of coastal North America since the Norse visits to Vinland in the eleventh century.
British North America comprised the colonial territories of the British Empire in North America from 1783 onwards. English colonisation of North America began in the 16th century in Newfoundland, then further south at Roanoke and Jamestown, Virginia, and more substantially with the founding of the Thirteen Colonies along the Atlantic coast of North America.
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. [72]
Although the English had laid claims to it in 1497 when John Cabot made landfall somewhere on the North American coast (likely either modern-day Newfoundland or Nova Scotia) and had claimed the land for England on behalf of King Henry VII, [44] these claims were not exercised and England did not attempt to create a permanent colony.
Led by Gilbert, the English briefly claimed St. John's, Newfoundland, in 1583, as the first English territory in North America at the royal prerogative of Queen Elizabeth I, but Gilbert was lost at sea on his return journey to England.