FIRST ENGLISH COLONY IN AMERICA.
The first attempt of the English to effect any settlement in America, was made by Sir Humphrey Gilbert, who, in the month of June, 1578, obtained a patent from Queen Elizabeth, authorizing him to plant a colony in that country. Gilbert's project failed; but it was afterwards resumed by his half-brother, the celebrated Sir Walter Raleigh, who, in 1584, obtained a patent similar to that which had been granted to Gilbert, and next year planted a colony at the mouth of the Roanoke, naming the country Virginia in honour of his royal mistress. But all these settlers, as well as others who crossed the Atlantic during the next twenty years, either perished by famine and disease, or by the hands of the Indians, or returned to England.—Cabinet Cyclopaedia, vol. xiii.; being vol. i. of the History of the Western World—United States of America.