Welsh colonization of the Americas
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Welsh colonization of the Americas differed from most other European colonizations in that it was not undertaken with government support but as individual initiatives. Welsh settlers also came to the New World as part of the more general British colonization of the Americas.
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[edit] The Madoc legend
A story popularized in the 16th century claimed that the first European to see America was the Welsh prince Madoc in 1170. A son of Owain Gwynedd, prince of Gwynedd, he had supposedly fled his country during a succession crisis with a troup of colonists and sailed east. He eventually landed near the Mississippi River and founded a colony, which later mingled with the Indians. In the late 16th century the legend was used by writers such as John Dee to support English claims to North America. The legend was revived in the 18th century with tales of Welsh speaking Indians, but most modern scholars consider it to have no basis in fact.
[edit] North America
There was extensive Welsh emigration to the United States and Canada, but only a few attempts to set up separate Welsh colonies. Sir William Vaughan sent Welsh colonists to Renews, Newfoundland in 1617 to establish a permanent colony, which eventually failed. Vaughan made further attempts to establish a colony at Trepassey which he called Cambriol, but this also eventually failed.
Many Quakers from Wales emigrated to Pennsylvania in the 17th century with a promise from William Penn that they would be allowed to set up a Welsh colony there. The Welsh Tract was to have been a separate county whose local government would use the Welsh language, since many of the settlers spoke no English. The promise however was not kept and by the 1690s the land had already been partitioned into different counties, and the Tract never gained self-government.
In the late 18th century, a Welsh colony named Cambria was established by Morgan John Rhys in what is now Cambria County, Pennsylvania. Later there was an attempt by Samuel Roberts to establish a Welsh colony at Brynffynnon, Tennessee between 1856 and 1867, and Michael D. Jones had plans to establish colonies in Wisconsin, Oregon, and in British Columbia.
[edit] South America
In 1852 Thomas Benbow Phillips of Tregaron established a settlement of about 100 Welsh people in the state of Rio Grande do Sul in Brazil. Many of these colonists later moved to the more successful colony in Patagonia.
The best known of the Welsh colonies in the Americas, the colony in the Chubut valley of Patagonia known as Y Wladfa Gymreig ("The Welsh Colony"), was established in 1865 when 153 settlers landed at what is now Puerto Madryn. An agreement had been reached with Argentina's Minister of the Interior, Guillermo Rawson that the colony would be recognized as one of the states of Argentina when the population reached 20,000. However this promise was not ratified by the Argentinian Congress, for fear that the British government would use the presence of the settlers as an excuse to seize Patagonia. For the history of this colony see Welsh settlement in Argentina.
[edit] References
- John Davies. A History of Wales. London: Penguin Books. ISBN 0-14-014581-8
[edit] See also
