CAROLYN’S DAILY POSTS: 2011
MOUNT DESERT ISLAND’S
HISTORICAL LAND GRANTS
The year: 1603. November 8, the date.
The event: the first European land grant patent in Maine.
The characters: King Henry IV of France and Pierre du Guast, Sieur e Monts
~~~~~~~~~~~~
The land grant given to du Guast by King Henry IV included trading and seigniorial rights over a vast territory, extending from Newfoundland along the Atlantic coast far to the southward: the territory of La Cadie.
Three years later King James I of England granted the Virginia Company a patent to de Monts which included much of the same territory.
The two rival claims inevitably ended up in a century and a half of intermittent warfare.*
~~~~~~~~~~~~
A French attempt at colonization, beginning in March 1613, took place at Fernald’s Point (near the mouth of Somes Sound). That July an English captain, Argall, attacked the settlers, burned their buildings to the ground, stole their charter, set most of the survivors adrift at sea, and carried the leaders back to Virginia for ransom. The colony of Saint Sauveur was short lived.
The Sagadahoc territory (land between the Kennebec and St. Croix rivers) was next portioned off by allotment to members of the King’s Council for New England.
On November 19, 1622, Sir Robert Mansell purchased, outright, the (more…)
CAROLYN'S COMPOSITIONS 