Newfoundland Colony

The Newfoundland Colony was the English and later British colony on the island of Newfoundland, planted in 1610 after decades of seasonal fishing and the formal claim of Humphrey Gilbert. John Guy's settlers at Cupids held through winters that killed stronger ventures, and the island grew into the codfish capital of the Atlantic, fought over by England and France for a century of raids and treaties. A governor and then an elected assembly at St. John's ruled the merchants and the outports; Signal Hill above the harbour, where Marconi caught the first transatlantic wireless, still guards the Narrows. The Beothuk, caught between disease and the settlers' guns, vanished as a people. Crown colony status came in 1824, responsible government followed, and in 1907 the colony rose to a dominion beside Canada. The Great Depression wrecked the finances, the legislature voted itself out in 1934 for a Commission of Government, and in 1948 the islanders chose Canada by referendum, joining as a province in 1949.