Editing Newfoundland and Labrador (section)

===European settlement and conflict ===
{{Main|Newfoundland Colony|Terre-Neuve (New France)}}

Sometime before 1563, [[Basque people|Basque]] fishermen, who had been fishing [[cod]] shoals off Newfoundland's coasts since the beginning of the sixteenth century, founded Plaisance (today [[Placentia, Newfoundland and Labrador|Placentia]]), a seasonal haven which French fishermen later used. In the Newfoundland [[Will and testament|will]] of the Basque seaman Domingo de Luca, dated 1563 and now in an archive in Spain, he asks "that my body be buried in this port of Plazençia in the place where those who die here are usually buried". This will is the oldest-known civil document written in Canada.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://canadashistory.ca/Community/Community-Features/Articles/Basque-Will |title=The 1563 Basque Will |last=Dawson |first=Joanna |website=canadahistory.ca |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170301144128/http://canadashistory.ca/Community/Community-Features/Articles/Basque-Will |archive-date=March 1, 2017 |url-status=dead |access-date=July 1, 2018}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.placentiahistory.ca/images/pdfs/Basque_will_translation_PDF.pdf |title=The Oldest Original Civil Document Written in Canada: The Last Will of Basque Sailor Domingo de Luca a, Placentia, Newfoundland, 1563 |last=Barkham |first=Michael M. |website=placentia.ca |access-date=July 1, 2018 |archive-date=March 16, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170316062025/http://placentiahistory.ca/images/pdfs/Basque_will_translation_PDF.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref>
[[Image:Gilbert plaque.jpg|thumb|upright|Plaque in [[St. John's, Newfoundland|St. John's]] commemorating the English claim over Newfoundland, and the beginning of the British overseas empire]]
Twenty years later, in 1583, Newfoundland became England's first possession in North America and one of the earliest permanent English colonies in the New World<ref>{{cite book |title= Sir Francis Drake |last= Sugden |first= John |year= 1990 |publisher= Barrie & Jenkins |isbn= 978-0-7126-2038-3 |page= 118 }}</ref> when Sir [[Humphrey Gilbert]], provided with [[letters patent]] from [[Queen Elizabeth I]], landed in St. John's.<ref>Brian Cuthbertson, "John Cabot and His Historians: Five Hundred Years of Controversy." ''Journal of the Royal Nova Scotia Historical Society'' 1998 1: 16–35. {{ISSN|1486-5920}}.</ref><ref>See Samuel Eliot Morison, ''The European Discovery of America: The Northern Voyages'' (1971)</ref>  European fishing boats had visited Newfoundland continuously since Cabot's second voyage in 1498 and seasonal fishing camps had existed for a century prior. Fishing boats originated from Basque country, England, France, and Portugal.

In 1585, during the initial stages of [[Anglo-Spanish War (1585–1604)|Anglo-Spanish War]], [[Bernard Drake]] led a [[Newfoundland expedition (1585)|devastating raid]] on the Spanish and Portuguese fisheries. This provided an opportunity to secure the island and led to the appointment of [[Proprietary Governor]]s to establish colonial settlements on the island from 1610 to 1728. [[John Guy (colonial administrator)|John Guy]] became [[List of Newfoundland and Labrador lieutenant-governors|governor]] of the first settlement at [[Cuper's Cove, Newfoundland and Labrador|Cuper's Cove]]. Other settlements included [[Bristol's Hope]], [[Renews]], [[New Cambriol]], [[South Falkland]] and [[Province of Avalon|Avalon]] (which became a province in 1623). The first governor given jurisdiction over all of Newfoundland was Sir [[David Kirke]] in 1638.

Explorers quickly realized the waters around Newfoundland had the best fishing in the North Atlantic.<ref>Grant C. Head, ''Eighteenth Century Newfoundland: A Geographer's Perspective'' (1976)</ref>{{request quotation|date=November 2016}} By 1620, 300 fishing boats worked the [[Grand Banks of Newfoundland|Grand Banks]], employing some 10,000 sailors; many continuing to come from the [[Basque Country (greater region)|Basque Country]], Normandy, or Brittany. They dried and salted [[cod]] on the coast and sold it to Spain and Portugal. Heavy investment by Sir [[George Calvert, 1st Baron Baltimore]], in the 1620s in wharves, warehouses, and fishing stations failed to pay off. French raids hurt the business, and the weather was terrible, so he redirected his attention to his [[History of Maryland|other colony in Maryland]].<ref>{{cite DCB |first= Allan M. |last= Fraser |title= Calvert, Sir George |volume= 1 |url= http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/calvert_george_1E.html}}</ref> After Calvert left, small-scale entrepreneurs such as Sir David Kirke made good use of the facilities.<ref>Compare: {{cite DCB |first=John S. |last=Moir |title=Kirke, Sir David |volume=1 |url=http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/kirke_david_1E.html | quote = In 1639 Sir David, as the first governor of Newfoundland, took possession of Baltimore's "Mansion House" and the other property at Ferryland.}}</ref> Kirke became the first governor of Newfoundland in 1638.

==== Triangular Trade ====

A [[triangular trade]] with New England, the West Indies, and Europe gave Newfoundland an important economic role.<ref name="Pope, Peter Edward 2004">{{cite book |last=Pope |first=Peter Edward |date=2004 |title=Fish into Wine: the Newfoundland Plantation in the Seventeenth Century |location=Chapel Hill |publisher=University of North Carolina Press}}</ref> By the 1670s, there were 1,700 permanent residents and another 4,500 in the summer months.<ref>Gordon W. Handcock, ''"So Longe as There Comes Noe Women": Origins of English Settlement in Newfoundland'' (1989)</ref>

This trade relied upon the labour of enslaved people of African descent.<ref name="cbc.ca">{{cite web |last=Campbell |first=Xavier |title=The Dark Side of Cod, Rum and Molasses: Dispelling the Myths around N.L. Staple Foods |work=CBC News |date=January 8, 2022 |url=https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/opinion-xaiver-campbell-cod-myths-1.6284952 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230321052059/https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/opinion-xaiver-campbell-cod-myths-1.6284952 |archive-date=March 21, 2023 |access-date=October 3, 2024}}</ref><ref name="Walker, Barrington 2012">{{cite book |last=Walker |first=Barrington |date=2012 |chapter=Jamaicans and the Making of Modern Canada |title=Jamaica in the Canadian Experience: a Multiculturalizing Presence |editor-first1=Carl |editor-last1=James |editor-first2=Andrea |editor-last2=Davis |pages=23–34 |publisher=Fernwood Pub}}</ref><ref name="Pope, Peter Edward 2004"/> Salted cod from Newfoundland was used to feed the enslaved persons of African descent on [[Sugar plantations in the Caribbean|plantations]] in the [[British West Indies|West Indies]].<ref name="cbc.ca"/><ref name="Walker, Barrington 2012"/><ref name="Pope, Peter Edward 2004"/> Products typically associated with Newfoundland such as molasses and rum ([[Newfoundland Screech|Screech]]), were produced by the enslaved persons of African descent on plantations in the West Indies, and shipped to Newfoundland and England on merchant ships.<ref name="Pope, Peter Edward 2004"/> Some merchants in Newfoundland enslaved persons of African descent such as St. John's merchant, Thomas Oxford.<ref name="Pope, Peter Edward 2004"/> [[John Ryan (printer)|John Ryan]], merchant and publisher of the Royal Gazette and Newfoundland Advertiser, who resided in New Brunswick and Newfoundland, freed his enslaved servant Dinah, upon his death in Newfoundland in 1847, notably after the [[Slavery Abolition Act 1833|Slavery Abolition Act in 1833]].<ref>{{cite journal |last=Whitfield |first=Harvey Amani |date=2012 |title=The Struggle over Slavery in the Maritime Colonies |journal=Acadiensis |volume=41 |issue=2 |pp=17–44}}</ref><ref name="thecanadianencyclopedia.ca">{{cite encyclopedia |last=Henry |first=Natasha |title=Black Enslavement in Canada |encyclopedia=The Canadian Encyclopedia |publisher=Historica Canada |orig-date=June 13, 2016 |date=February 9, 2022 |url=https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/black-enslavement |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230321024440/https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/black-enslavement |archive-date=March 21, 2023 }}</ref>

Notably, the Kirke brothers who were merchants in the triangular trade, brought [[Olivier Le Jeune]] to New France, where he was sold in 1629.<ref name="thecanadianencyclopedia.ca"/>

[[File:Les Anglais attaqués par les Français à Terre-Neuve en 1696.jpg|upright|thumb|left|French forces [[Avalon Peninsula campaign|sacking English settlements in Newfoundland]] in 1696]]

In 1655, France appointed a governor in Plaisance (Placentia), the former Basque fishing settlement, thus starting a formal French colonization period in Newfoundland<ref>{{cite web|url= http://collections.mun.ca/cdm4/document.php?CISOROOT=/hist_trust&CISOPTR=242&CISOSHOW=123&REC=5|title= History of Placentia|publisher= Memorial University of Newfoundland|access-date= February 26, 2010|archive-date= October 25, 2011|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20111025190440/http://collections.mun.ca/cdm4/document.php?CISOROOT=%2Fhist_trust&CISOPTR=242&CISOSHOW=123&REC=5|url-status= live}}</ref> as well as a period of periodic war and unrest between England and France in the region. The Miꞌkmaq, as allies of the French, were amenable to limited French settlement in their midst and fought alongside them against the English. English attacks on Placentia provoked retaliation by [[New France]] explorer [[Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville]] who during [[King William's War]] in the 1690s, destroyed nearly every English settlement on the island. The entire population of the English colony was either killed, captured for ransom, or sentenced to expulsion to England, with the exception of those who withstood the attack at [[Carbonear Island]] and those in the then remote [[Bonavista, Newfoundland and Labrador|Bonavista]].

After France lost political control of the area after the [[Siege of Port Royal (1710)|Siege of Port Royal in 1710]], the Miꞌkmaq engaged in warfare with the British throughout [[Dummer's War]] (1722–1725), [[King George's War]] (1744–1748), [[Father Le Loutre's War]] (1749–1755) and the [[French and Indian War]] (1754–1763). The French colonization period lasted until the [[Treaty of Utrecht]] of 1713, which ended the [[War of the Spanish Succession]]: France ceded to the British its claims to Newfoundland (including its claims to the shores of [[Hudson Bay]]) and to the French possessions in [[Acadia]]. Afterward, under the supervision of the last French governor, the French population of Plaisance moved to Île Royale (now [[Cape Breton Island]]), part of Acadia which remained then under French control.

In the [[Treaty of Utrecht]] (1713), France had acknowledged British ownership of the island. However, in the [[Seven Years' War]] (1756–1763), control of Newfoundland once again became a major source of conflict between Britain, France and Spain, who all pressed for a share in the valuable fishery there. [[Great Britain in the Seven Years' War|Britain's victories around the globe]] led [[William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham|William Pitt]] to insist nobody other than Britain should have access to Newfoundland. The [[Battle of Signal Hill]] was fought on September 15, 1762, and was the last battle of the North American theatre of the [[Seven Years' War]]. A British force under Lieutenant Colonel [[William Amherst (British Army officer)|William Amherst]] recaptured [[St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador|St. John's]],<ref>{{London Gazette
| issue = 10251
| date = October 9, 1762
| page = 2
}}</ref> which the French had seized three months earlier in a surprise attack.

[[File:Vue de la descente a Terre Neuve par le chevalier de Ternay en 1762.jpg|thumb|A French invasion of the Newfoundland was repulsed during the [[Battle of Signal Hill]] in 1762.]]

From 1763 to 1767, [[James Cook]] made a detailed survey of the coasts of Newfoundland and southern Labrador while commander of {{HMS|Grenville|1754|6}}. (The following year, 1768, Cook began [[First voyage of James Cook|his first circumnavigation of the world]].) In 1796, a Franco-Spanish expedition again [[Newfoundland expedition|succeeded in raiding]] the coasts of Newfoundland and Labrador, destroying many of the settlements.

By the Treaty of Utrecht (1713), French fishermen gained the right to land and cure fish on the "French Shore" on the western coast. (They had a permanent base on the nearby [[St. Pierre and Miquelon]] islands; the French gave up their French Shore rights in 1904.) In 1783, the British signed the [[Treaty of Paris (1783)|Treaty of Paris]] with the United States that gave American fishermen similar rights along the coast. These rights were reaffirmed by treaties in 1818, 1854 and 1871, and confirmed by arbitration in 1910.