Sir John Popham and the Popham Colony
In 1607 Sir John Popham and other English settlers founded
the Popham Colony on the Kennebec River. John Popham paid a group of colonists
to establish a settlement along the coast of Maine. The settlers built
houses and a ship called the Virginia. This was the first English ship
built in North America. The colony didn’t last very long. They had a lot
of Indian troubles and had to fight bitter Maine winter storms. They went
back to England in 1608.
Portrait of Sir John Popham, chief justice of the King’s Bench during
the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, by an unknown artist,
Original from
www.law.harvard.edu/.../backissues/
summer99/article8.html
Reconstruction of the Virginia
by Ernest Bevilacqua (1998).
Courtesy of Maine's First
Ship.
Samuel de Champlain ( 1567-1635 )
Samuel de Champlain was an explorer from France. He explored and mapped the coast of Maine for France in 1604. Champlain named Mount Desert Island in Bar Harbor. He claimed much of the land in Maine for the country of France. This started a major conflict between the French, Indian, and the English.
James and Arianna