Editing Alabama (section)

=== European settlement ===
{{Main|New France|Louisiana (New France)|French and Indian War|Treaty of Paris (1763)|New Spain|Louisiana (New Spain)|West Florida|Indian Reserve (1763)|American Revolutionary War|Treaty of Paris (1783)|Spanish West Florida|Seminole Wars|Adams–Onís Treaty|Republic of West Florida|Mississippi Territory}}

The Spanish were the first Europeans to reach Alabama during their exploration of North America in the 16th century. The expedition of Hernando de Soto passed through [[Mabila]] and other parts of the state in 1540. More than 160 years later, the French founded the region's first European settlement at [[Old Mobile Site|Old Mobile]] in 1702.<ref name="US50">{{cite web |url=http://www.theus50.com/alabama/ |title=Alabama State History |access-date=September 23, 2006 |publisher=theUS50.com |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060825052401/http://www.theus50.com/alabama/ |archive-date=August 25, 2006 |url-status=live}}</ref> The city was moved to the current site of Mobile in 1711. This area was claimed by the French from 1702 to 1763 as part of [[Louisiana (New France)|La Louisiane]].<ref name=alahisttmln/>

After the French lost to the British in the [[Seven Years' War]], it became part of British [[West Florida]] from 1763 to 1783. After the U.S. victory in the [[American Revolutionary War]], the territory was divided between the United States and Spain. The latter retained control of this western territory from 1783 until the surrender of the Spanish garrison at Mobile to U.S. forces on April 13, 1813.<ref name=alahisttmln>{{cite web |title=Alabama History Timeline |url=http://www.archives.alabama.gov/timeline/al1801.html |publisher=Alabama Department of Archives and History |access-date=July 27, 2013 |archive-date=June 18, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160618035649/http://www.archives.alabama.gov/timeline/al1801.html |url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="annexed1">{{cite book |last=Thomason |first=Michael |title=Mobile: The New History of Alabama's First City|year=2001 |publisher=University of Alabama Press|location=Tuscaloosa|isbn=978-0-8173-1065-3|page=61}}</ref>

Thomas Bassett, a [[Loyalist (American Revolution)|loyalist]] to the [[British Empire|British monarchy]] during the Revolutionary era, was one of the earliest white settlers in the state outside Mobile. He settled in the [[Tombigbee District]] during the early 1770s.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.archives.state.al.us/aha/markers/washington.html |title=Alabama Historical Association Marker Program: Washington County |publisher=Archives.state.al.us |access-date=June 1, 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110822222441/http://www.archives.state.al.us/aha/markers/washington.html |archive-date=August 22, 2011}}</ref> The district's boundaries were roughly limited to the area within a few miles of the [[Tombigbee River]] and included portions of what is today southern [[Clarke County, Alabama|Clarke County]], northernmost [[Mobile County, Alabama|Mobile County]], and most of [[Washington County, Alabama|Washington County]].<ref name="oldsw">{{cite book |title=The Old Southwest 1795–1830: Frontiers in Conflict |last=Clark |first=Thomas D. |author2=John D. W. Guice |year=1989 |publisher=University of New Mexico Press |location=Albuquerque |isbn=978-0-8061-2836-8 |pages=44–65, 210–257}}</ref><ref name="colonial mobile">{{cite book |title=Colonial Mobile: An Historical Study of the Alabama-Tombigbee Basin and the Old South West from the Discovery of the Spiritu Sancto in 1519 until the Demolition of Fort Charlotte in 1821 |last=Hamilton |first=Peter Joseph |year=1910 |publisher=Houghton Mifflin |location=Boston |oclc=49073155 |pages=241–244}}</ref>

What are now [[Baldwin County, Alabama|Baldwin]] and Mobile counties became part of [[Spanish West Florida]] in 1783, part of the independent [[Republic of West Florida]] in 1810, and finally part of the [[Mississippi Territory]] in 1812. Most of what is now the northern two-thirds of Alabama was known as the [[Yazoo lands]] beginning during the British colonial period. It was claimed by the [[Province of Georgia]] from 1767 onwards. Following the American Revolutionary War, it remained a part of Georgia, although heavily disputed.<ref>{{cite book |last=Cadle |first=Farris W |title=Georgia Land Surveying History and Law|year=1991 |publisher=University of Georgia Press|location=Athens, Ga.}}</ref><ref name="pickett">{{cite book |last=Pickett |first=Albert James |title=History of Alabama and incidentally of Georgia and Mississippi, from the earliest period|url=https://archive.org/details/historyalabamaa00pickgoog |year=1851 |publisher=Walker and James|location=Charleston|pages=[https://archive.org/details/historyalabamaa00pickgoog/page/n432 408]–428}}</ref>

With the exception of the area around Mobile and the Yazoo lands, what is now the lower one-third of Alabama was made part of the Mississippi Territory when it was organized in 1798. The Yazoo lands were added to the territory in 1804, following the [[Yazoo land scandal]].<ref name="pickett"/><ref>{{cite web |title=The Pine Barrens Speculation and Yazoo Land Fraud |url=http://www.aboutnorthgeorgia.com/ang/The_Pine_Barrens_Speculation_and_Yazoo_Land_Fraud |publisher=About North Georgia |access-date=July 27, 2013 |archive-date=November 3, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131103193838/http://www.aboutnorthgeorgia.com/ang/The_Pine_Barrens_Speculation_and_Yazoo_Land_Fraud |url-status=dead}}</ref> Spain kept a claim on its former Spanish West Florida territory in what would become the coastal counties until the [[Adams–Onís Treaty]] officially ceded it to the U.S. in 1819.<ref name="annexed1"/>