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English overseas possessions

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.

"English Empire" redirects here. For the colonial empire of Great Britain and the United Kingdom, see British Empire. For the Americas in particular, see British colonization of the Americas. For the "empire" of the Plantagenets, see Angevin 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, 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 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.

Council of Trade and Foreign Plantations[edit]

In 1621, following 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, 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.[33]

chartered in 1583 by Sir Humphrey Gilbert, was seasonally settled ca. 1520[34] and had settlers who remained all year round by 1620.[35][36]

St John's, Newfoundland

in present-day North Carolina, was first founded in 1585 but was abandoned the next year. In 1587 a second attempt was made at establishing a settlement, but the colonists disappeared, leading to the name 'Lost Colony.' One of those lost was Virginia Dare.

Roanoke Colony

At , one of the Elizabeth Islands (named after Queen Elizabeth I) of present-day Massachusetts, a small fort and trading post was established by Bartholomew Gosnold in 1602, but the island was abandoned after only one month.

Cuttyhunk

Jamestown, Virginia

: The English started to sail to the East Indies about the year 1600, which was the date of the foundation in the City of London of the East India Company ("the Governour and Company of Merchants of London trading into the East Indies") and in 1602 a permanent "factory" was established at Bantam on the island of Java.[43] At first, the factory was headed by a Chief Factor, from 1617 by a President, from 1630 by Agents, and from 1634 to 1652 by Presidents again. The factory then declined.

Bantam

: The East India Company's traders settled at Surat in 1608, followed by the Dutch in 1617. Surat was the first headquarters town of the East India Company, but in 1687 it transferred its command centre to Bombay.

Surat

: a trading factory was established here on the Coromandel Coast of India in 1611, at first reporting to Bantam.[44]

Machilipatnam

a spice island in the East Indies. On 25 December 1616, Nathaniel Courthope landed on Run to defend it against the claims of the Dutch East India Company and the inhabitants accepted James I as sovereign of the island. After four years of siege by the Dutch and the death of Courthope in 1620, the English left. According to the Treaty of Westminster of 1654, Run should have been returned to England, but was not. After the Second Anglo-Dutch War, England and the United Provinces agreed to the status quo, under which the English kept Manhattan, which the Duke of York had occupied in 1664, while in return Run was formally abandoned to the Dutch. In 1665 the English traders were expelled.

Run

at Madras (Chennai), was the first English fortress in India, founded in 1639. George Town was the accompanying civilian settlement.

Fort St George

: On 11 May 1661, the marriage treaty of King Charles II and Catherine of Braganza, daughter of King John IV of Portugal, transferred Bombay into the possession of England, as part of Catherine's dowry.[45] However, the Portuguese kept several neighbouring islands. Between 1665 and 1666, the English acquired Mahim, Sion, Dharavi, and Wadala.[46] These islands were leased to the East India Company in 1668. The population quickly rose from 10,000 in 1661, to 60,000 in 1675.[47] In 1687, the East India Company transferred its headquarters from Surat to Bombay, and the city eventually became the headquarters of the Bombay Presidency.[48]

Bombay

was an East India Company pepper-trading centre with a garrison on the coast of the island of Sumatra, established in 1685.

Bencoolen

on the Hooghly River in Bengal was settled by the East India Company in 1690.

Calcutta

The : in 1588, António, Prior of Crato, claimant to the Portuguese throne, sold exclusive trade rights on the Gambia River to English merchants, and Queen Elizabeth I confirmed his grant by letters patent. In 1618, King James I granted a charter to an English company for trade with the Gambia and the Gold Coast. The English captured Fort Gambia from the Dutch in 1661, who ceded it in 1664. The island on which the Fort stood was renamed James Island, and the fort Fort James, after James, Duke of York, later King James II. At first the chartered Company of Royal Adventurers in Africa administered the territory, which traded in gold, ivory, and slaves. In 1684, the Royal African Company took over the administration.

Gambia River

: this was another English possession gained by King Charles II in 1661 as part of the dowry of Catherine of Braganza. While it was strategically important, Tangier proved very expensive to garrison and defend and was abandoned in 1684.[32]

English Tangier

an island in the South Atlantic, was settled by the English East India Company in 1659 under a charter of Oliver Cromwell granted in 1657. (The associated islands of Ascension and Tristan da Cunha were not settled until the 19th century.)

Saint Helena

: Normandy became associated with the English crown in 1066 when the Duke of Normandy William the Conqueror became King of England. The mainland duchy was conquered by Philip II of France in 1204 and English claims finally relinquished in the Treaty of Paris in 1259. The Channel Islands remained English.

Duchy of Normandy

and County of Maine: Anjou and Maine merged with the English crown when the Count of Anjou became Henry II of England in 1154. They were lost to the French in 1204.

County of Anjou

: Aquitaine, a fief of the Kingdom of France, passed to the English through the marriage of Eleanor of Aquitaine to the future Henry II of England in 1152. The duchy was declared forfeit by Philip VI of France in 1337, beginning the Hundred Years' War, but Edward III of England was recognised as sovereign Lord of Aquitaine by the Treaty of Brétigny in 1360. The French reconquest of Aquitaine began in 1451 and was complete with the Battle of Castillon in 1453.

Duchy of Aquitaine

: Edward III of England first claimed the French throne in 1340 but abandoned it under the Treaty of Brétigny in 1360. He resumed his claim in 1369 and Henry V of England was recognised as heir to the French throne by the Treaty of Troyes in 1420; his son Henry VI of England succeeded as de facto King of France in 1422. Between 1429 and 1453 the French drove the English out of France, and the Hundred Years' War was finally ended by the Treaty of Picquigny in 1475, when Edward IV of England agreed not to pursue his claim further. English and later British monarchs continued to use the title of King or Queen of France until 1801.

Kingdom of France

: Calais had been captured by Edward III in 1347 and English possession was confirmed by the Treaty of Brétigny. It was the only remaining English possession on the Continent after the effective end of the Hundred Years' War in 1453. Calais was recaptured by the French in 1558 and French occupation recognised by the Treaty of Cateau-Cambrésis in 1559. English claims were finally abandoned by the Treaty of Troyes in 1564.

Pale of Calais

: Tournai was occupied by Henry VIII of England following the Battle of the Spurs in 1513. It was returned to France in 1519 under the terms of the Treaty of London.

Tournai

: English troops occupied Le Havre under the Treaty of Hampton Court in 1562. The town was reconquered by the French the following year.

Le Havre

: English possession of Flushing and Brill was confirmed by the Treaty of Nonsuch in 1585. The towns were sold to the Dutch Republic in 1616.

Cautionary Towns

: French and English forces captured Dunkirk from the Spanish in 1658, and the town was granted to England by the Treaty of the Pyrenees the next year. Dunkirk was sold back to France in 1662.

Dunkirk

: In 1704, Gibraltar was captured for England by an Anglo-Dutch fleet, becoming the country's first European overseas possession since the sale of Dunkirk to France in 1662. The Naval operation was commanded by George Rooke. Gibraltar later became a strategic naval base for the Royal Navy and was officially ceded to Great Britain in 1713. It remains a British possession.

Gibraltar

Transformation into British Empire[edit]

The Treaty of Union of 1706, which with effect from 1707 combined England and Scotland into 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 the English companies or colonies. In effect, with the Union they became British colonies.[49]

Anguilla

Bermuda

Gibraltar

Cayman Islands

Montserrat

as part of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha

Saint Helena

Turks and Caicos

1607

Jamestown, Virginia

1609

Bermuda

1612 , India

Surat

1620 East coast of and Plymouth, Massachusetts

Newfoundland (island)

1625 and Saint Kitts, Caribbean

Barbados

1628

Nevis

1630 , North America and Mosquito Coast, Central America

Boston

1632 and Montserrat, Caribbean

Antigua

1638 (British Honduras)

Belize

1639 (Madras), India

Chennai

1648

The Bahamas

1650

Anguilla

1660 and Cayman Islands, Caribbean

Jamaica

1661 , India and Dog Island, Gambia

Mumbai

1663

Saint Lucia

1664 , North America

New Netherland

1666

Barbuda

1670 and Rupert's Land

Turks and Caicos Islands

1672

British Virgin Islands

1673

Fort James, Ghana

1682

Philadelphia

1690 (Calcutta), India

Kolkata

1704

Gibraltar

Angevin Empire

Concessions and leases in international relations

First wave of European colonization

Historiography of the British Empire

North Sea Empire

Plantations of Ireland

Scottish colonization of the Americas

Thirteen Colonies