Ferdinando Gorges
Sir Ferdinando Gorges (
1565-
1647) was an early
English colonial entrepreneur in
North America and founder of the
Province of Maine in
1622.
Gorges was born in
Ashton Phillips,
Somerset,
England. In
1601, he became involved in the
Essex Conspiracy and later testified against its leader,
Robert Devereux.
In
1605, he helped sponsor the expedition of
George Weymouth to the mouth of the
Kennebec River along the coast of the present day State of Maine in the United States. In
1607, as a shareholder in the
Plymouth Company, he helped fund the failed
Popham Colony, near present-day
Phippsburg, Maine. Gorges never set foot in the New World himself.
In
1622, Gorges received a land patent, along with
John Mason, from the
Plymouth Council for New England for the Province of Maine, the original boundaries of which were between the
Merrimack and Kennebec rivers. In
1629, he and Mason divided the colony, with Mason's portion south of the
Piscataqua River becoming the
Province of New Hampshire. Gorges and his nephew established Maine's first court system.
He died a destitute man in
1647. Maine later fell under the control of the
Massachusetts Bay Colony.
Fort Gorges
