The Maritimes
The Maritimes, also called the Maritime provinces, is a region of Eastern Canada consisting of three provinces: New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island. The Maritimes had a population of 1,899,324 in 2021, which makes up 5.1% of Canada's population. Together with Canada's easternmost province, Newfoundland and Labrador, the Maritime provinces make up the region of Atlantic Canada.
Located along the Atlantic coast, various aquatic sub-basins are located in the Maritimes, such as the Gulf of Maine and Gulf of St. Lawrence. The region is located northeast of New England in the United States, south and southeast of Quebec's Gaspé Peninsula, and southwest of the island of Newfoundland. The notion of a Maritime Union has been proposed at various times in Canada's history; the first discussions in 1864 at the Charlottetown Conference contributed to Canadian Confederation. This movement formed the larger Dominion of Canada. The Mi'kmaq, Wolastoqiyik and Passamaquoddy people are indigenous to the Maritimes, while Acadian and British settlements date to the 17th century. The Maritimes are within the Atlantic time zone, putting them one hour ahead of Quebec and the New England region of the United States.
Name
The word maritime is an adjective that means of the sea; from Latin maritimus "of the sea, near the sea", from mare "sea". Thus any land adjacent to the sea can be considered maritime. But the term Maritimes has historically been collectively applied to New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, all of which border the Atlantic Ocean.History
The pre-history of the Canadian Maritimes begins after the northerly retreat of glaciers at the end of the Wisconsin glaciation over 10,000 years ago; human settlement by First Nations began in the Maritimes with Paleo-Indians during the Early Period, ending around 6,000 years ago.The Middle Period, starting 6,000 years ago, and ending 3,000 years ago, was dominated by rising sea levels from the melting glaciers in polar regions. This is when what is called the Laurentian tradition started among Archaic Indians, the term used for First Nations peoples of the time. Evidence of Archaic Indian burial mounds and other ceremonial sites existing in the Saint John River valley has been uncovered.
The Late Period extended from 3,000 years ago until first contact with European settlers. This period was dominated by the organization of First Nations peoples into the Algonquian-speaking Abenaki Nation, which occupied territory largely in present-day interior Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine, and the Mi'kmaq Nation, which inhabited all of Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, eastern New Brunswick and the southern Gaspé. The primarily agrarian Wolastoqiyik Nation settled throughout the Saint John River and Allagash River valleys of present-day New Brunswick and Maine. The Passamaquoddy Nation inhabited the northwestern coastal regions of the present-day Bay of Fundy. The Mi'kmaq Nation is also believed to have crossed the present-day Cabot Strait at around this time to settle on the south coast of Newfoundland, but they were a minority compared to the Beothuk Nation.
European contact
After Newfoundland, the Maritimes were the second area in Canada to be settled by Europeans. There is evidence that Viking explorers discovered and settled in the Vinland region around 1000 AD, which is when the L'Anse aux Meadows settlement in Newfoundland and Labrador has been dated. They may have made further exploration into the present-day Maritimes and northeastern United States.Both Giovanni Caboto and Giovanni da Verrazzano are reported to have sailed in or near Maritime waters during their voyages of discovery for England and France, respectively. Several Portuguese explorers / cartographers have also documented various parts of the Maritimes, namely Diogo Homem. However, it was French explorer Jacques Cartier who made the first detailed reconnaissance of the region for a European power and, in so doing, claimed the region for the King of France. Cartier was followed by nobleman Pierre Dugua, Sieur de Mons, who was accompanied by explorer / cartographer Samuel de Champlain in a 1604 expedition. During this they established the second permanent European settlement in what is now the United States and Canada, following Spain's settlement at St. Augustine in present-day Florida in the American South. Champlain's settlement at Saint Croix Island, later moved to Port Royal, survived. By contrast, the ill-fated English settlement at Roanoke Colony off the southern American coast did not. The French settlement pre-dated the more successful English settlement at Jamestown in present-day Virginia by three years. Champlain was considered the founder of New France's province of Canada, which comprises much of the present-day lower St. Lawrence River valley in the province of Quebec.
Acadia
Champlain's success in the region, which came to be called Acadia, led to the fertile tidal marshes surrounding the southeastern and northeastern reaches of the Bay of Fundy being populated by French immigrants who called themselves Acadians. The Acadians eventually built small settlements throughout what is today mainland Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, as well as Île-Saint-Jean, Île-Royale, and other shorelines of the Gulf of St. Lawrence in present-day Newfoundland and Labrador, and Quebec. Acadian settlements had primarily agrarian economies. Early examples of Acadian fishing settlements developed in southwestern Nova Scotia and in Île-Royale, as well as along the south and west coasts of Newfoundland, the Gaspé Peninsula, and the present-day Côte-Nord region of Quebec. Most Acadian fishing activities were overshadowed by the much larger seasonal European fishing fleets that were based out of Newfoundland and took advantage of proximity to the Grand Banks.The growing English colonies along the American seaboard to the south and various European wars between England and France during the 17th and 18th centuries brought Acadia to the centre of world-scale geopolitical forces. In 1613, Virginian raiders captured Port-Royal, and in 1621 France ceded Acadia to Scotland's Sir William Alexander, who renamed it Nova Scotia.
By 1632, Acadia was returned from Scotland to France under the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye. The Port Royale settlement was moved to the site of nearby present-day Annapolis Royal. More French immigrant settlers, primarily from the Brittany, Normandie, and Vienne regions of France, continued to populate the colony of Acadia during the latter part of the 17th and early part of the 18th centuries. Important settlements also began in the Beaubassin region of the present-day Isthmus of Chignecto, and in the Saint John River valley, as well as smaller communities on Île-Saint-Jean and Île-Royale.
In 1654, raiders from New England attacked Acadian settlements on the Annapolis Basin. Acadians lived with uncertainty throughout the English constitutional crises under Oliver Cromwell, and it was not until the Treaty of Breda in 1667 that France's claim to the region was reaffirmed. Colonial administration by France throughout the history of Acadia was of low priority. France's priorities were in settling and strengthening its claim on the larger territory of New France and the exploration and settlement of interior North America and the Mississippi River valley.
Colonial wars
Over 74 years there were six colonial wars, which involved continuous warfare between New England and Acadia. Throughout these wars, New England was allied with the Iroquois Confederacy based around the southern Great Lakes and west of the Hudson River. Acadian settlers were allied with the Wabanaki Confederacy. In the first war, King William's War, natives from the Maritime region participated in numerous attacks with the French on the Acadia / New England border in southern Maine. New England retaliatory raids on Acadia, such as the Raid on Chignecto, were conducted by Benjamin Church. In the second war, Queen Anne's War, the British conducted the Conquest of Acadia, while the region remained primarily in control of Wolastoqey militia, Acadia militia and Mi'kmaw militia.In 1719, to further protect strategic interests in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and St. Lawrence River, France began the 20-year construction of a large fortress at Louisbourg on Île-Royale. Massachusetts was increasingly concerned over reports of the capabilities of this fortress, and of privateers staging out of its harbour to raid New England fishermen on the Grand Banks. In the fourth war, King George's War, the British engaged successfully in the Siege of Louisbourg. The British returned control of Île-Royale to France with the fortress virtually intact three years later under the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle and the French reestablished their forces there.
In 1749, to counter the rising threat of Louisbourg, Halifax was founded and the Royal Navy established a major naval base and citadel. The founding of Halifax sparked Father Le Loutre's War.
File:A View of the Plundering and Burning of the City of Grymross, by Thomas Davies, 1758.JPG|thumb |right|St. John River Campaign: A View of the Plundering and Burning of the City of Grimross by Thomas Davies in 1758. This is the only contemporaneous image of the Expulsion of the Acadians.
During the sixth and final colonial war, the French and Indian War, the military conflicts in Nova Scotia continued. The British Conquest of Acadia happened in 1710. Over the next forty-five years, the Acadians refused to sign an unconditional oath of allegiance to Britain. During this time period Acadians participated in various militia operations against the British and maintained vital supply lines to the French Fortress of Louisbourg and Fort Beausejour. The British sought to neutralize any military threat Acadians posed and to interrupt the vital supply lines Acadians provided to Louisbourg by deporting Acadians from Acadia.
The British began the Expulsion of the Acadians with the Bay of Fundy campaign in 1755. Over the next nine years over 12,000 Acadians of 15,000 were removed from Nova Scotia.
In 1758, the fortress of Louisbourg was laid siege for a second time within 15 years, this time by more than 27,000 British soldiers and sailors with over 150 warships. After the French surrender, Louisbourg was thoroughly destroyed by British engineers to ensure it would never be reclaimed. With the fall of Louisbourg, French and Mi'kmaw resistance in the region crumbled. British forces seized remaining French control over Acadia in the coming months, with Île-Saint-Jean falling in 1759 to British forces on their way to Quebec City for the first siege of Quebec and the ensuing Battle of the Plains of Abraham.
The war ended and Britain had gained control over the entire Maritime region and the Indigenous people signed the Halifax Treaties.