New Hampshire Colony

Province of New Hampshire
Colony of England (1629–1641, 1680–1686, 1689–1707) Colony of Great Britain (1707–1776)
1629–1641 1680–1686 1689–1776
Seal of the Province of New Hampshire, 1692
Capital		Portsmouth (de facto 1630-1774; de jure 1679-1775) Exeter (de facto 1774-1776)
Languages		English (sole language of government) Abenaki Various other indigenous languages
Government		Constitutional monarchy
Monarch
•	1629–1641, 1680–1686, 1689–1707	(list)
•	1664–1685	Charles II
•	1707–1776	(list)
•	1769–1776	George III
President
•	1680–1681	John Cutt
•	1681–1767	(list)
•	1767–1775	John Wentworth
Legislature		General Court of New Hampshire
History
•	Established	1629
•	First royal charter issued, governance from 1680	1679
•	Dominion of New England	1686–1689
•	Second royal charter issued, governance from 1692	1691
•	Disestablished	1776
Currency		New Hampshire pound (Often pegged to the Pound sterling); Spanish dollar
Preceded by Succeeded by Province of Maine Massachusetts Bay Colony Dominion of New England Massachusetts Bay Colony Dominion of New England New Hampshire
Today part of		United States  New Hampshire

The Province of New Hampshire was a colony of England and later a British province in North America. The name was first given in 1629 to the territory between the Merrimack and Piscataqua rivers on the eastern coast of North America, and was named after the county of Hampshire in southern England by Captain John Mason, its first named proprietor. In 1776 the province established an independent state and government, the State of New Hampshire, and joined with twelve other colonies to form the United States.

Europeans first settled New Hampshire in the 1620s, and the province consisted for many years of a small number of communities along the seacoast, Piscataqua River, and Great Bay. In 1641 the communities were organized under the government of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, until Charles II issued a colonial charter for the province and appointed John Cutt as President of New Hampshire in 1679. After a brief period as a separate province, the territory was absorbed into the Dominion of New England in 1686. Following the collapse of the unpopular Dominion, on October 7, 1691 New Hampshire was again separated from Massachusetts and organized as an English crown colony. Its charter was enacted on May 14, 1692, during the coregency of William and Mary, the joint monarchs of England, Scotland, and Ireland. Between 1699 and 1741, the province's governor was often concurrently the governor of the Province of Massachusetts Bay. This practice ended completely in 1741, when Benning Wentworth was appointed governor. Wentworth laid claim on behalf of the province to lands west of the Connecticut River, east of the Hudson River, and north of Massachusetts, issuing controversial land grants that were disputed by the Province of New York, which also claimed the territory. These disputes resulted in the eventual formation of the Vermont Republic and the US state of Vermont.