Did England own America

Answer 1

There are conflicting tales going back Centuries as to who the first white people were to discover the existence of the Americas. Popularly, the discovery of North America is attributed to the Spanish explorer Christopher Columbus in 1492, but there is now considerable evidence that he was NOT the first.

Much points to the fact that both the Vikings and the Welsh Prince Madoc discovered America long before Columbus- indeed, the now-extinct Mandan Indian tribe spoke Welsh up until they were wiped out by an epidemic in mid-Victorian times, a language which they claimed to have learned from Welsh settlers who landed there in the 1100's. The truth is that we will probably never know which European nation or peoples REALLY made the first discovery- probably different parts of the American continent were discovered by different countries and explorers over a long period of Centuries.

The English were by no means the first to do so at all events, and they weren't even the first to settle what is now the USA- this was done previously by the Spanish, Portugese and French. But England WAS the first nation to succesfully establish a PERMANENT, widespread settlement programme in the US. Spanish and French settlements were really glorified trading outposts, for them to trade with the native Indians- the English were the first colonisers to really make the US a new country, expanding their investment and colonisation far into North America right from the time when the Pilgrim Fathers made landfall in the Mayflowerand establishing substantial towns, farms, religious bases and military defences. They also made far more of an effort to relate well to the indigenous Indians than had the Spaniards and French, winning them over with generous trade deals and generally respecting their land rights rather than trying to conquer them by force.

Answer 2

Until the war of independence. 1700's (a rather minute detail in England's History)