num_pages: 384
description: In 1695, the Scottish parliament set out to establish a colony in Central America, in an attempt to transform Scotland into a great trading nation. It was the dream of William Paterson, founder of the bank of England and erratic genius, who saw this colony as "the door of the seas...the key of the universe" and a bridge between east and west. Three years later, the whole enterprise 2,000 colonists lay dead and half of Scotland's wealth had been lost. The Darien venture was one of the most harrowing disasters to befall any nation, and the forced parliamentary union with England in 1707 was the bitter consummation of those who had dreamed of creating a Scottish empire.
language: English
title: Darien: The Scottish Dream of Empire
titlecomplete: Darien: The Scottish Dream of Empire
characters: Robert Pennecuik, Francis Borland, Robert Drummond, William Veitch, William Carstares, James Ogilvy, 1st Earl of Seafield, Lord Mungo Murray, John Hamilton, 2nd Lord Belhaven, Juan Diaz Pimienta y Zaldivar, Andrew Fletcher, Andreas, James Graham, Don Pedro Luis Henriquez de Guzmán, Alexander Shields, James Vernon, William III of England and II of Scotland, Ambrosio, Roderick Mackenzie, John Hay, 2nd Marquess of Tweedale, Sir William Paterson, Thomas Drummond, Robert Pincarton, Walter Herries, Benjamin Spence, John Dalrymple, 1st Earl of Stair, Samuel Vetch, John Benbow, John Hay, 1st Marquess of Tweeddale, John Malloch, Charles II of Spain, John Murray, 1st Marquess of Atholl, Lionel Wafer
genres: Nonfiction, History, Scotland
ratings_count: 56
places: Darien
publisher: Birlinn Ltd