New England Colonies

The New England Colonies of British America included Connecticut Colony, Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Massachusetts Bay Colony, and Province of New Hampshire. They were part of the Thirteen Colonies. These were early settlements of what became the states in New England.Captain John Smith was the author of the 1616 work A Description of New England and first applied the term "New England" to coastal lands of North America from Long Island Sound to Newfoundland.

There were several attempts early in the 17th century to colonize New England by France, England, and other countries who were often in contention for lands in the New World. French nobleman Pierre Dugua de Monts (Sieur de Monts) established a settlement on Saint Croix Island, Maine in June 1604 under the authority of the King of France. The small St. Croix River Island is located on the northern boundary of present-day Maine. Nearly half the settlers perished due to the harsh winter and scurvy, and the survivors moved out of New England north to Port-Royal of Nova Scotia (see symbol "R" on map to the right) in the spring of 1605.

King James I of England recognized the need for a permanent settlement in New England, and he granted competing royal charters to the Plymouth Company and the London Company. The Plymouth Company ships arrived at the mouth of the Kennebec River (then called the Sagadahoc River) in August 1607 where they established a settlement named Sagadahoc Colony, better known as Popham Colony (see symbol "Po" on map to right) to honor financial backer Sir John Popham. The colonists faced a harsh winter, the loss of supplies following a storehouse fire, and mixed relations with the indigenous tribes.

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